Tess and the Highlander (23 page)

“But Mother, I—”

“That is the end of this discussion. You
will
do as you are told. I will receive you in my chambers
once you changed into more suitable attire. Say goodbye to your
Highlander. You shall not be seeing him again.”

With a withering glance at Colin, Lady
Evelyn turned and glided from the hall.

Angry and frustrated, Colin ran a weary hand
over his face and stared after the woman. This was not exactly how
he’d imagined this meeting would go. The setback of not being able
to explain everything properly had his blood boiling.

By the saints, he thought, he hadn’t helped
any by losing his temper with the woman, either. He was clearly the
devil himself, as far as Tess’s mother was concerned, and he was at
a loss regarding how to remedy that now.

“That is
not
the way I imagined
things would go.” Tess’s sad whisper drew his attention. Her face
was flushed. Her beautiful eyes were brimming with tears. “Will you
ever be able to forgive me for bringing you into the midst of
it?”

“I wanted to come. And now, more than ever before, I
am glad that I was here.” He gently touched her face.

“
I remember
everything
about her now,
Colin,” she said in a low voice. “I don’t want to stay here. I want
to go back to Ravenie. That is where I belong. Will you take me
back to the Highlands with you?”

“I will.” By the main entrance to the hall,
a dozen Burnetts had taken up their positions. He remembered the
army of them in the courtyard. They would have no chance of
fighting their way out. “There are complications that we need to
straighten out, though.”

He glanced again at the door. Tess’s eyes
followed the direction of his look.

“You must stay here tonight with your mother.
Perhaps if you were to speak to her again when things are
calmer…once I’ve left the castle.”

“And where will you be?”

The servant who was supposed to escort Tess
upstairs moved nearer to them. There was no doubt in Colin’s mind
that everything that was said here between them would be reported
to Lady Evelyn.

“I’ll return to the Highlands.”

Tess bit her lip, but a sob escaped
nonetheless. He pulled her tightly into his arms.

His words were a rough whisper in her ear.
“I shall somehow get a message to you, tomorrow or the next day at
the latest. I’ll not leave the Borders without you, even if I have
to lay siege to this castle myself.”

Tess gave a small nod, but when they pulled
out of the embrace, the sadness was still there.

Jenny, the serving woman, was small and thin
and spoke scarcely two words as she led Tess up a winding stone
stairwell to the bedchamber where she was to stay.

“They’ll bring up yer things.” The servant
retreated unceremoniously toward the door.

“Will someone come after me to show me the
way to Lady Evelyn’s room?” Tess called after the woman.

“She’ll send for ye when she wants ye,” the
older woman said curtly from the landing. Without another word, she
disappeared down the steps.

Tess wondered if anyone would really try to stop her
if she were to run down these same steps and out to the courtyard.
Perhaps Colin had not yet left. Going quickly to the door, she
stopped as the sound of footsteps reached her ears. A second later,
two large men come around the bend of stairs. One was carrying her
small trunk. The other stopped and placed the torch he was carrying
in the wall sconce on the landing. He didn’t move even after the
first one had wordlessly dropped Tess’s things in her room and
walked past her at the door and down the stairs.

The guard looked at her without any feeling. She was
being held prisoner.

Colin’s promise of sending word—of not going back to
the Highlands without her—was Tess’s only source of hope as she
closed the door to her small room.

The only furniture in the room was the bed,
and a narrow archer’s slit in the wall served for a window. The
opening was covered with a piece of skin that flapped in the chill
breeze. The wood floor was not even covered with rushes.

Tess had taken one step toward her trunk
when she heard a bar drop in a latch on the outside of her door.
She whirled and tried to pull the door open, but to no avail.

Her mother was indeed keeping her
prisoner.

“Are the Highlanders gone?”

“They are, m’lady. And just as ye ordered, a
company of Sir David’s men are following them to make sure they’re
not hanging about without ye knowing.”

“Very well. Now, then, I want you to take
her some food.” Evelyn spoke impatiently to Jenny as she sat before
the large looking glass while another maidservant brushed her hair.
“And see to it that she has a brazier for her bedchamber and water
for washing…if she asks for it.”

“She was asking to see ye,” Jenny said.

“Harder. Brush harder,” Evelyn ordered,
ignoring the comment.

“She thinks ye’ll be sending for her this
night,” the serving woman persisted.

“Well, she is wrong. I won’t be having
anything to do with her until Sir David gets back.” Evelyn
worriedly touched the dark circles under her eyes. There were grim
lines turning down the corners of her full lips. Her jaw was taut.
Her pale blue eyes seemed to have lost their luster. She looked
old, and it was Theresa’s fault.

“What should I be telling her?”

“That she is being punished for her
heartless behavior toward me.” Evelyn met the old servant’s gaze in
the mirror. “Tell her that all mercy lies in the hands of Sir David
Burnett. Tell her that she should work on improving her manner for
when she meets him.”

“How about if I just tell her that yer
ladyship will send for her when ye’re ready?”

Evelyn turned sharply in her seat to scold
the old woman, but Jenny quickly slipped from the room.

“The devil take you, too,” she said harshly.
“Just wait until Sir David hears about your insolence!”

The thin gray light of dawn filtered through
the narrow window, and Tess drew her knees tighter to her chest. An
untouched trencher of food sat on the trunk at the foot of the bed.
The traveling clothes that she’d washed the mud from herself hung
from a single peg on the wall. Neither the chamber pot nor the
basin of water that she’d used to wash up had been removed from the
room.

Last night, Tess had waited until long after
all the noises of the castle had died away before giving up hope on
Evelyn sending for her. And for the rest of the night, she had lay
awake on the narrow bed, staring vacantly at the red glow of dying
embers in the brazier and trying to make some sense out of her
situation.

During her years on the Isle of May, she
hadn’t been able to remember her childhood. But now she had a clear
recollection of how things had been. Her nurse Elsie had been the
one in charge of raising Tess. Lady Evelyn’s role had been to
scold, to correct, to be critical of everything and everyone around
her, and to list Sir Stephen’s numerous flaws daily to the young
Tess. Her mother had been unhappy then, and Tess guessed that not
much had changed in her mother over the years.

But what were they going to do to her now?
What was the reason for locking her up like this? Jenny and another
servant had brought the food and water and brazier to the room last
night. Neither had said a word. Jenny had refused to answer any of
Tess’s questions.

Her greatest worry lay with Colin. What if
they had imprisoned him in the same way that they had locked her
away? Even worse, what if they had hurt him?

A heavy door squeaked on old hinges
somewhere down the steps. A few moments later, she heard snatches
of a conversation outside her door. Quietly, Tess placed her feet
on the cold wood floor and stared anxiously at the door.

After what seemed like an eternity, a bar lifted on
the far side. Tess stood as the door swung open just enough for
Jenny to enter. The heavy oak door banged shut behind her.

The woman was carrying a single platter that she
placed next to the untouched trencher from last night. She made her
way around the room, checking the chamber pot, adding a block of
peat to the small brazier.

“Good morning,” Tess offered, knowing that, despite
her own frustration, this woman was not the cause of her
troubles.

Instead of answering her, the servant cast a furtive
glance at the door and made a gesture that someone might be
listening there. Tess’s spirit lifted as she realized that she
might have an ally, after all, at Ninestane Castle. While fanning
the flame in the brazier, the woman motioned to her to speak. Tess
nodded her understanding.

“Look,” she said loudly, “I’ve waited long
enough. Why are they holding me like this?”

“I cannot say, mistress,” the servant
replied before dropping her voice to a whisper. “Yer Highlander’s
back. He sends word that he will be waiting for ye, tomorrow at
dawn, past the village and up the river a wee bit…at the place
where ye first stopped when ye saw the castle.”

“But how will I get out of here?” Tess
whispered back.

“Ye and I will be changing places when I
bring yer food in the morning. The guard who’ll be watching
tonight—” She pointed at the door. “—he’s fond of his ale and his
sleep. And this early in the morning, no one will stop ye if ye go
down the stairs, out through the kitchens and head straight for the
village. Servants and workers go back and forth all the time this
early in the morning.”

“Bless you, Jenny.” Tess clutched the old woman’s
hand. “Is there anything I can do for you.”

“I’ve been paid well already by yer
Highlander, mistress. Also, I have been with yer mother long enough
to know ye’ll be far better off far away from here.” The old
woman’s face grew serious. “For sure, though, ye’ll be wanting to
be out of here before Sir David arrives. The master can be a fierce
one, and I’m thinking ye’ll not be liking him one bit.”

“She is Theresa, I tell you. The creature
is
my daughter.”

“And?” Sir David Burnett asked casually,
eying Evelyn, who was pacing impatiently before him. The Lowlander
had arrived at sunset—a day earlier than expected—but before he
could settle down for his supper, he was told that Lady Evelyn
needed to have a private audience with him immediately.

“Do as you have to do to her,” she ordered sharply,
turning to him. “She is like her filthy father—in looks, in
manners, in her arrogance. Send her to hell, for all I care!”

“Things are no longer so simple,” he said
thoughtfully, scratching his beard.

“Then
make
it simple,” she replied
haughtily. “And do it now, as I don’t want to hear from her, see
her, or have anything to do with her. I couldn’t sleep last night.
And all day I have been having visions of that brute Stephen,
appearing from nowhere before me. Bury her alive. Drown her if you
wish, but—”

David’s grip was bruising when it clamped
around Evelyn’s wrist. With a single movement, he yanked her
against him.

“Watch your tongue,” he growled into her
face. “You are behaving like a madwoman. I’ll have no talk of dead
men appearing. And I tell you, after your reception of the
Macpherson lad yesterday, you could find my head on a spiked pole
with that kind of talk.”

“That filthy Highlander deserved to be…”

“That filthy Highlander happens to be a cousin of
the queen herself. That filthy Highlander is a scion of the most
influential clans in Scotland.”

“How dare you treat me like this!” she
hissed, pulling away from him. “But it doesn’t make one bit of
difference, does it? She was better off on that island. But now
that she is here, she must
never
leave. And we both know
why.”

David looked closely into her face. “Nothing
can happen to her while she is under my protection.”

“What do you mean?” Evelyn seethed through
clenched teeth. “Would you like me to send for her now? Do you have
any doubt that she will recognize the face of her father’s
murderer?”

Tess ceased her pacing when she heard the
footsteps coming up the stairwell. A moment later the latch
lifted.

Jenny slipped inside, carrying a clean chamber pot.
Immediately, Tess knew that something was wrong when the old woman
motioned for them to get away from the door.

“He’s here, mistress. He and his men
returned an hour ago.”

“Sir David?” Tess asked, and the servant
nodded nervously. She had so many questions, but she knew this was
not the time to ask them. Things like, how could possibly Sir
David’s treatment of her be any worse than her mother’s?

“Ye had better leave tonight. There’s no
telling where he’ll move ye from here or who he’ll put to keep
watch.” Her voice hushed even more, and the old woman’s eyes showed
her genuine fear. “He is a devil in ways ye don’t know, mistress.
Tomorrow could be too late.”

“You said Colin will meet me at dawn. Can I
leave the castle, get through the gates tonight?”

“Aye…if ye hurry. I don’t know if yer man’ll
be there now or meet ye there in the morn, but spending a night in
the woods would be far safer than waiting here.”

Jenny’s nervousness was rubbing off on Tess.
While the servant rattled off the layout of the castle, the two of
them hurriedly exchanged their clothes.

“Are you sure they won’t do anything to
you?” Tess asked as Jenny pushed the full chamber pot into her arms
and pulled the kerchief lower on Tess’s forehead.

“Nay, miss.” She picked up the wash basin.
“By the time they come in, I’ll have a fine welt where ye dinged me
with this. ‘Twas all yer doing.”