Highland Master (18 page)

“I fear that I would have tried to find out, anyway,” Catriona said.

Fin’s smile warmed her. “The bishop made it a matter
of honor, my lady, and all of us yearned to seek knighthood. We knew that if we sacrificed our honor to satisfy mere curiosity, that goal would fly beyond our grasp. Traill also believes in chivalry.
And
he had a strong right arm with a switch or a tawse.”

“So you and Ivor have not seen each other since then, until now?”

The two men looked at each other.

“You have!” she exclaimed. “Did you not learn each other’s names then?”

Understanding from Ivor’s expressionless face that he’d leave it to him to answer that question, Fin said, “We have seen each other once since then. But only once and in circumstances that allowed for only brief conversation.”

She met his gaze and seemed to study him for a long moment before she said, “You are not going to tell me more than that, are you?”

“Not yet,” he said. “Your brother and I must talk more before we do.”

“So, despite all our talks together, you still do not trust me to keep silent.”

He hesitated and, by the look on her face, knew that he had hesitated too long. A glance at Hawk… Ivor… told him that he would get no help there, so Fin caught and held Catriona’s gaze as he said, “I told you that I would reveal what I could, and I have done that. By my troth, although there is more to tell, my
not
telling you has little to do with my trust in you and much to do with the fact that we do not yet know whether the information may endanger you or even ourselves.”

“But—”

“That will do, Cat,” Hawk said. “You have known the man for little more than a sennight, so you cannot expect him to trust you all in all. Such trust does not bloom so quickly but must grow over time. Moreover, if you expect him to trust you, you need to exert yourself first to trust him. Think, lass! This matter is one about which he—and I, too—know much more than you do. If we tell you that it may be dangerous for you to know too much, you should trust us.”

Fin could tell that she was reluctant to accept Hawk’s argument. So, when she shifted her gaze to himself, he met it and held it until she quirked her mouth wryly and sighed. He knew then that she would yield.

Tempted as he was to promise that he would tell her everything as soon as he could, he would not do so without knowing that he could keep that promise. He would talk to her later, more privately, and if she wanted to fratch with him then, she could. He could tell from Ivor’s expression that he would not extend the discussion to soothe her temper and that Ivor still had more to say to him.

The silence lengthened for another beat or two before Ivor said lightly, “I could tell you some fine tales about Fin’s days at St. Andrews, Cat. But I fear that he may have worse ones to tell about me.”

She smiled then. “I’ll coax those tales out of both of you one day.”

“Aye, sure, you will,” he said. “For now, though, you must leave us to our talk. We do thank you for the wine, although I have a strong suspicion that it was your own notion and not Grandame’s to bring it to us.”

Chuckling, she bade them both goodnight and left the chamber.

Ivor said, “Don’t imagine that you are going anywhere, my lad.”

“I don’t,” Fin said, holding out his goblet. “But I want more wine.”

Ivor refilled both goblets, saying, “It occurs to me that I still don’t know exactly who you are. Don’t you think that it’s time you told me?”

“I do, aye,” Fin said, as several ways of saying it flashed through his mind. Opting for bluntness, he said, “My father was Teàrlach MacGillony.”

“The king of archers, who died at Perth. He must be the man by whom you were kneeling when I saw you. I wasn’t sure then that it
was
you, not until you stood up. So you are a full Cameron then and not from one of the minor tribes. Have you revealed that interesting fact to my grandfather?”

“I didn’t have to. He said that I look just like my father and took me severely to task for telling Lady Annis that his name was Teàrlach MacGill. Said my da would have clouted me good for saying such a thing. He would have, too.”

“That was a terrible day, that battle at Perth,” Ivor said soberly. “We’re going to have to make a clean breast of it to them, you know.”

“What do you mean?” Fin asked, hoping that his own deeper thoughts about vengeance and sacred oaths had not revealed themselves. “Did you not—?”

“I fear that I was not entirely truthful afterward with my father and others of Clan Chattan, and James was not there. He wields a sword skillfully, but he has not won his knighthood. And, as you will recall, the royal command was for thirty champions on each side that day.”

“So you are a better swordsman than James. That does not surprise me, Hawk. You are more skilled than most, albeit not as skilled as you are with a bow.”

“Not skilled enough with a sword to defeat you, Lion. Sakes, though, I expect that we’d better start calling each other Fin and Ivor now.”

“What
did
you tell your people?”

“After you dove in, Father asked what you had said to me. That was easy enough, since neither of us had said much of consequence.”

“I said your name,” Fin told him. “I don’t recall what I said after that.” Then he did remember more. “I said that they’d flay you, but you told me you’d be a hero. Not until afterward did I realize that you had meant that they would call me coward. And so I was, I expect. But I could not fight you.”

“Don’t be daft, man. Would you have gone into that river had I not urged you to go? And don’t pretend that I did not. You heard and understood me plainly.”

“Did I? I doubt that I was thinking at all by then.”

“Would you say to my face that I had nowt to do with your departure?”

Fin shook his head. “You know I won’t do that. But neither do I agree that you should tell them that it was your idea. I made the choice, my friend.”

“Are we still friends then? Nowt has changed?”

“As far as I am concerned, you and I are still as close as brothers. Sakes, I feel closer to you than I ever felt to Ewan.” Memory of the vengeance that he had sworn to claim stirred then so harshly that it was all he could do not to wince in response to it. But how could he ever kill his best friend’s father, Catriona’s father? He heard her
voice then in his mind: “
Life is always more important than death
,” she had said. “
An honorable man cannot kill to protect his honor
.”

“What is it?” Ivor asked him.

“Nowt,” Fin said. “If you did not tell them the truth, what
did
you say?”

“I told them the same thing I’d said to you, that I had had enough of killing for one day and thought that someone from your side ought to stay alive to tell his version of the tale. Father was sure that you must have drowned, but we’ll have to tell him and Granddad the truth—aye, and James, too.”

“And Catriona,” Fin said. “I don’t look forward to that.”

“So you haven’t told her yet about Perth. Not even that you were there?”

“I haven’t mentioned Perth to her.” It occurred to him that, at St. Andrews, Hawk would have been the first person to whom he would have confided his dilemma. They would have talked it over until both had agreed on what the best course of action would be. That he could not do that now added to the pain that his indecision had cost him over the years.

“You must tell her,” Ivor said. “But stand back when you do. We don’t call her Wildcat without reason. She has claws, sharp ones, and although she keeps them sheathed most of the time, she does not hesitate to use them when she’s angry.”

“As I said earlier, I have seen that she has a quick temper, but she seems usually to keep it under control,” Fin said.

“Just wait,” Ivor warned him with a grin. “Now, I keep
a dice cup in here. Are you of a mind to throw against me for a while?”

“Aye, sure,” Fin said, drawing up a stool while Ivor moved a table close to the narrow bed and then sat on the bed.

As he did, Fin had a sudden stray notion that Hell might just be a place where every resident faced a dilemma like his, and where the only way out was to find the right answer to an unanswerable question.

Catriona had paused outside Ivor’s door, because as she had closed it, she’d heard Ivor say, “Don’t imagine that you are going anywhere, my lad.”

But once the heavy door had shut, she could hear only the hum of their voices. She could tell Fin’s voice from Ivor’s but could not make out their words.

Moreover, she knew that it might occur to Ivor that she would try to listen. If he caught her, she did not want to think about the consequences.

She did not want to go to her own room, because she was not sleepy and Ailvie would be there. Nor did she want to rejoin the older women. She wanted to think, which required solitude, so she made her way quietly down to the kitchen.

It was dark, except for the glow of embers in the huge fireplace. But the embers cast enough light to show her the way to the scullery and to reveal Boreas curled by the hearth with the kitten that had adopted him sprawled across his neck. Boreas opened his eyes, then shut them when Catriona signaled him to stay.

Lifting the bar from the scullery door, she eased it ajar and stepped outside. Then, leaning against the wall, she
inhaled the crisp night air and relaxed, gazing up at the thick blanket of stars in the moonless sky while she considered what Ivor and Fin had told her and tried to imagine their life at St. Andrews.

As she did, she realized that the two men had much in common. Both had an air of easy confidence, and from what she had seen of Fin’s skill with a sword, he was almost as fine a swordsman as Ivor was. She smiled, realizing that they must both have been thinking of Ivor when they’d argued about great archers.

She had always thought Ivor easy to talk to, and by comparison with James, he was. Fin was even easier to talk with, because Fin expressed more interest in what she said. Ivor was impatient and less likely to listen as carefully or discuss things as thoroughly as Fin did. And Ivor had never stirred her senses the way…

Feeling fire surge into her cheeks at the direction her idle thoughts had taken, and imagining Ivor’s outraged reaction to such a comparison, she realized that Fin outdid him in another way. Although she had always tried to avoid arousing Ivor’s quick temper, the very thought of angering Fin disturbed her more.

Where Ivor raged and might even wreak vengeance, Fin had only to look at her to make her feel his displeasure. Thinking then of what else Fin could make her feel, she let her imagination linger on those thoughts.

Realizing abruptly that the longer she stayed the more she risked discovery, she went back inside and replaced the bar across the door, hoping she would not meet her father on her way upstairs. With so many extra men at the castle, Shaw would not accept the excuse that she had just sought solitude and fresh air. Wincing at the thought of
his most likely response—that he would give her all the solitude she needed by confining her to her bedchamber for a sennight—she went quickly.