Highland Fire (Guardians of the Stone) (6 page)

“Mòran taing.
”
Many thanks.

The elder gave her a nod and an odd smile and Lìli turned her attention to the sisters, greeting them each in turn, avoiding Aidan’s gaze as she addressed his siblings. One was absent, she realized, for the girl had wed a Highlander somewhere near Chreagach Mhor. Lìli had overheard Rogan recounting the story to Aveline with no small amount of disgust.

“Welcome,” offered the one called Lael, but she didn’t make any effort to embrace Lìli. That was well and good, Lìli decided, for she didn’t need blue stains on one of the few gowns she’d brought north.

“
Fáilte
,” said the one called Cailin. The lass’ deep red hair flowed about her face like a radiant flame, and her bright green eyes flashed with something like resentment. She was lovely as a rose, probably just as prickly. Not a one of them seemed very pleased to meet her and the feeling was mutual.

The youngest sister lifted her chin, looking sullen, though her gaze lacked the animosity her sisters shared. The girl bent to crudely scratch her blue-painted thighs and then her arms and then finally she thrust a finger inside her leather boot, scratching there as well, giving her eldest brother a narrow-eyed glare.

“If you should need tae piss,” the brother offered, standing with arms crossed and refusing to come forward another inch. “I can show ye where tae go, lest ye find yourself with an arse full of nettles.”

Lìli blinked at the mention of her private ministrations, but held her aplomb and gave the lad an uncertain smile as the old woman thumped him hard upside the head with the end of her staff. The sound was not unlike the smack of hammer against a stone wall, but the lad merely gave the old woman a sideways glance.

It seemed to Lìli that she and Lael were of an age—which only made her wonder how old Aidan was. She made the mistake of sparing an upward glance at the laird of Dubhtolargg. He was frowning down at her, his dark brows furrowing in disapproval. “I expected you to bring a son,” he said.

But it was the wrong thing to say as far as Lìli was concerned. She felt horrid enough for having abandoned Kellen. “Why, my lord?” she asked pleasantly, but with an edge to her words, “So your brother can teach him where to piss as well?”

He smiled thinly and the old woman cackled, popping the laird’s brother once more upon the pate of his head. Lìli frowned. By the rood, these were strange folk.

“I ken your tongue is cursed as well,” the laird remarked, his green eyes glinting and Lìli hitched her chin a little higher, noting that she came no higher than his mid chest. But what she lacked in height, she had been given in spirit and if he thought for one instant he could intimidate her with his presence alone, he was sorely mistaken.

“That should come as no surprise to you, my lord as ‘twas your folk who cursed me after all.” She said it very sweetly, but with an underlying bitterness that would have escaped only the deaf.

The old woman cackled again, striking the laird's brother yet another time. Lìli might have laughed in horror but she felt a sudden painful tug on her arm.

As Aidan watched, one of his bride's companions jerked her backward by the arm, whispering something into her ear and suddenly, she blanched, her face falling as she lifted her shoulders and turned once more to face him.

An unexpected wave of fury reared up within him and he fought the desire to trounce the man where he stood. His hand had only been upon her for an instant; he had already released her, but from that instant forward Aidan didn’t like the man.

Intensely.

Even more, he didn’t like the way he felt—suddenly protective over the Scots wench. The feeling was wholly unwelcome, considering the circumstances.

The daughter of his enemy was his enemy as well, he reminded himself.

But she could not meet his gaze now. “I-I am sorry, my lord. You have the right of it. I am indeed weary,” she confessed. “It seems the days of travel have soured my mood.”

Her words did not match the fire he had spied in her eyes an instant before—a fire that intrigued him despite that he knew it meant they would not deal well.

Evidently, there was something the lass feared far more than she feared him, and he had a feeling it had to do with her absent son. He tucked the suspicion away to ponder later.

She held his gaze, the violet pools glistening with unshed tears. They seemed to plead with him somehow, but she said not another word.

Confusion warred with anger.

Mo chreach!
He had been prepared to loathe his bartered bride. He had been prepared to dismiss her. But he was not prepared for the unanticipated wave of possessive fury he now felt over the treatment he'd observed. She’d looked both mournful and desperate in the same instant and it was a look that confused him beyond measure.

She is your enemy.

Suddenly he found himself angry, for despite that he knew what they were capable of, these feckless Scots, he clearly had not learned from the past, for here she was—along with her entourage—a danger to his clan simply by their presence.

Damn Una.
This was her doing, he reasoned, for she had advised him to this end. All those years ago, she had been the one to curse Lìleas MacLaren, and now the old woman claimed she was to be the salvation of their clan. It made little sense to Aidan, and yet that was all Una would say. Unfortunately, merely the sight of Lìleas now reopened wounds he had thought long ago healed. Ach, but it had taken him more than thirteen years to banish the memories of that day from his mind. He peered at the old woman at his side.

Una seemed to read his thoughts and gave him a nod.

But Aidan was suddenly blinded by rage. A tiny muscle ticked at his jaw, betraying his emotions, and he realized that if he remained where he stood an instant longer he would betray far more than was prudent.

“See that my
bride
wants for naught,” he demanded of his sisters, and then he spun on his heels and walked away, vowing to steel his heart against the Scots witch.

She was not here for love, he reminded himself—neither did he intend to give it.

T
aking his cue from his elder sibling, Aidan’s brother took one last measure of their troop—and of Lìli—and with a lifted brow that was an identical match to his brother’s, he turned and followed Aidan. Abandoning her to the women of his clan, her betrothed marched down the long pier toward the strange building on the water. Not once did he peer back at her, but it was clear by his stride that he was hardly pleased.

Uncertain what had upset him so thoroughly, Lìli watched the brothers go, and somehow knowing Rogan would blame her wayward tongue for this, she refrained from meeting his gaze. Although were it not for her son, she would die a thousand deaths to speak her mind.

“Dinna mind him,” the old woman said at her side, elbowing Lìli none too gently. “He’s a cantankerous auld sack o’ wind!”

Lìli blinked at the declaration. And despite that the laird’s dismissal stung, the grin on the old lady's withered face brought a reluctant smile to her lips, for it struck her as quite absurd that the elder, who appeared to be no less than one hundred if she were a single day, would call the laird of Dubhtolargg
old
.

In fact, her betrothed was hardly an aged man. He was in fine fettle, even if his manners were boorish and left much to be desired.

For a moment, she watched him walk away...

Thankfully, whatever Stuart’s brother was thinking, he kept it to himself, or perhaps he simply didn’t care to be overheard. Whichever the case, Lìli was grateful he refrained from speaking to her. Merely the sound of his voice grated upon her nerves, and—forsooth—at the moment, her nerves were near to shattering.

Brandishing her cane, the old woman ushered them toward the village center. “Come!” she said and took Lìli by the arm.

Without having to be asked, a handful of villagers rushed forward to tend their mounts.

“’Tis certain ye’ll wish to rest before we sup.”

Lìli glanced back at Aidan’s retreating form on the long dock. He disappeared into the odd building, followed by his brother, and she chewed her lip, trying to determine what it was she was feeling right now—relief?

Disappointment, perhaps?

She was certainly grateful he wasn’t some greasy old man with wiggling jowls, but neither had she envisioned him that way. And yet, that his countenance was fair was no reassurance in itself, for Rogan was a comely man and she had learned that comeliness was no guarantee of kindliness.

But Aidan’s gaze was hardly comforting.

If Lìli felt relief, she told herself, it was only because it seemed she had been granted a reprieve from his company. But that hardly explained the intense feeling of disappointment that lingered after his rude dismissal.

In fact, no man had ever dismissed her quite so. They gave her piteous looks, or they ogled her breasts, or they tried to wheedle her, but none had ever simply cast her aside.

She found herself wondering why the laird of Dubhtolargg had agreed to this union to begin with since he seemed to be wholly unaffected by the one thing other men seemed drawn to: her face. The only answer she could come up with was revenge. Aye, they would wed her to her enemy, in truth. God save her, she must somehow win this battle, lest she become another casualty of war.

“Tonight, we celebrate,” Sorcha announced, intruding on Lìli’s thoughts.

Lìli’s gaze snapped to meet Lael’s in horror. “The wedding?” she asked. Mercy! Nay! Not only was she dreading the moment she would be forced to share the dún Scoti’s bed, they had been traveling now for days and she was desperate for a bath.

Once again, the old crone cackled beside her.

Lael shot her a glance as sharp as the dagger she wore strapped to her leg. “We are no’ quite so barbaric as that,” she replied acidly. “We would hardly drag ye from your sweaty mount and set you willy-nilly before an altar.”

Lìli’s face heated, though she wasn’t given time for chagrin. Lael shoved past her, picking up her pace to lead the way, clearly as disgusted by Lìli as her brother seemed to be.

Sorcha and Cailin flanked her at once and the old woman fell back to walk alongside Rogan. Aveline followed silently and Lìli heard the old woman begin to chatter away, seemingly without regard for any response from Rogan, though she heard Rogan mutter crossly beneath his breath. May God forgive her, but Lìli felt an instant of communion with Aidan’s siblings, for she realized that it grated upon Rogan’s nerves to be treated little differently from women and servants. His ego was boundless. No doubt he had expected to be accorded a king’s honor in David’s stead, but Aidan had not addressed him once—not even an acknowledgment, she realized only belatedly.

His gaze had been fixed solely upon Lìli the entire time.

Alas, but her good humor was quickly tempered by her own disappointment, for clearly, the dún Scoti had judged her and found her lacking.

The man seemed to care not a whit for civilities, nor had she expected him to, judging by the tales she’d heard of him. ’Twas said the messenger who was sent north to barter her marriage had returned with the reek of urine in his breeches. And who could blame the poor lad when faced with a man who, at the tender age of ten, had killed his first foe—two at once if the tales were true?

Not for the first time, she silently questioned her father.
Why?
Why had Padruig provoked these mountain folk? Why had he not simply let them be? They were harming no one living secluded in these corries, but like a sleeping bear, anyone waking him from his slumber may not live to regret it.

Once again intruding on her thoughts, Sorcha reached out to touch the soft velvet of Lìli’s bliaut. “I ha’ never seen a gown so fine!” she said with awe.

Lìli saw no reason not to be completely truthful. “Neither have I,” she confessed, and when the lass peered up at her in surprise, Lìli winked and smiled.

From that moment forward, Sorcha seemed far more amicable, explaining each structure’s use as they passed it. There was little difference in their villages, Lìli noted, save that these huts were all very well tended. They passed a butcher and a baker and a smith. Behind the huts lay an orchard laden with fruit and berry trees. In the near distance, she spied a shepherd tending his flock upon the slope of a hill, a pastoral view if ever she had seen one. The fact that their bodies were painted for war and they were armed to the teeth only confused the image.

Aidan’s sisters walked beside her, while the old woman, Una, prattled on at her back, and one by one their little troupe dispersed. Rogan was given his own quarters while the King’s men were accorded a single dwelling to share. Una remained to see the men settled, leaving Lìli and Aveline to continue along with Aidan’s sisters.

Apparently, until after the ceremony, no one would be permitted within the hall where the laird’s family slept—a fact that Sorcha felt not the least reluctant to share. Lìli had no complaint about that, except that the house they led her to was meant to be shared with Aveline.