A Promise of Love Read online

  Malcolm MacLeod watched his host with shuttered eyes. No Englishman called him friend. Nor, did he doubt that the proposition soon to be offered to him also carried with it a threat. No Englishman had ever played fair with a Scot and hadn’t they a millennium of history to prove that?

  "I issue no credit. I have never done so, and will not do so now. Hold man!" the squire said, half-rising in the chair as the other man made to leave.

  “An’ why would ye not tell me that in the beginning? Ye think the MacLeods have barrels of gold for yer English sheep?”

  "I will give you one hundred Leicester sheep," William Cuthbertson continued, forced to look up at the angry Scot. "In exchange for something."

  "Name your bargain," Malcolm said curtly. He would play this stupid game to its conclusion, and if it was an Englishman’s trick, Malcolm would just as soon gut the fat pig with the dirk hidden in his boot.

  William turned to his daughter, who had remained motionless and mute since her entrance into the room. He noted her sudden pallor with indifference.

  "The sheep are free if you take my daughter with you," the Squire said, glancing back at the Scot with a small smile playing around his thin lips.

  Malcolm looked at the young woman whose presence he had noted and then dismissed. She was tall, and too thin, with hair the color of old, rich leather. He had seen the squire's family, but this one was as unlikely a relation to the others as a Highland deer was from a sheep. She was not petite with plump rounded curves like her sisters, she was lithe and willowy. Nor did she flutter in the silence as if afraid of it; she’d simply stood and waited silently.

  She glanced over at him, as if sensing his look and his curiosity. Her eyes reminded him of the waters of a deep loch at gloaming. And like the deepest lake, they were cold. No, they were blank, as expressionless as the eyes of a corpse.

  "I am not much of a prize," she said, calmly, addressing her remarks to Malcolm. "You would do well to look elsewhere for a wife."

  Her father stirred in his chair, his eyes trained on her as if to pierce her with his look.

  "Damn girl," he growled, "I don't care if he marries you, swives you, or makes you his scullery maid!"

  Judith looked down at the oak floor of the room, as if suddenly fascinated with the shape of the boards. She looked up only when Malcolm spoke into the silence.

  "I've no wish for a wife, girl. One wife for one life, that's all I need." His words were kind, but it was the softening in his eyes that made her look away again.

  "You are married?" she asked quietly.

  "I was. Twenty years. I've no wish to repeat the act."

  "It's either you, or Elizabeth, girl," the Squire said peremptorily. "Make your choice. My house is full to overflowing as it is."

  "Elizabeth?" Judith could not mask her look of horror quick enough. The squire only smiled, a thin lipped smirk of satisfaction.

  "It's high time the chit was married, girl. God knows I've tried it with you. If you cannot find a suitable union, then Elizabeth surely can."

  Judith thought of her sister, whose sole occupation during the day consisted of wandering from room to room clutching her rag doll. Elizabeth, who could not dress herself, who loved flowers and singing, who flinched when voices were raised either in anger or excitement. Elizabeth, whose mind still remained infantile despite their prayers and their efforts. What would marriage bring to Elizabeth? Judith could not bear to think of it.

  "Can you not allow me time to find another position, father?" She clasped her hands tightly in front of her, so that he could not tell they trembled.

  "Now, Judith," he said curtly, ignoring her question. "Which of you shall it be?"

  "If I go," she said, looking full into his face for the first time, "will you leave Elizabeth in peace? Will you promise not to marry her off?"

  "I'll make no promises to you." The squire stood, placed both palms upon the table, and leaned forward, his small eyes riveted upon his daughter. There was no love in those beady black eyes, Malcolm thought. No concern, no compassion, no emotion at all. He almost felt sorry for the girl. "Either you go, or Elizabeth will find a bridegroom within the month."

  Judith had known, then, that her father would do anything to rid himself of her. Known, too, there was no welcome in England.

  CHAPTER 1

  “Tynan.”

  It was a benediction of sound uttered from an otherwise silent Scot. He extended one finger and pointed, as if Judith could not see their destination.

  It was twilight and the sea and sky darkened together, a perfect backdrop for the giant black behemoth which huddled at the end of the narrow promontory, its back to the sea. The closer they came, the more Judith could discern the outline of the castle from the ebony shadows of the surrounding moor. The Devil's own lair could not have been more intimidating. It stood like a silent sentinel, guarding the cove and the entrance to the sea, one of its twin towers reduced to rubble, the other scraping the sky with crenellated teeth. An arched doorway, like the maw of some ancient beast, stood open. If not welcoming, it at least beckoned.

  Judith shivered.

  Her companion said nothing more, but the quick jerk of his head was command enough. Judith sat erect, controlling her fears and her mount with the same dogged determination, eased the mare into a trot and followed Malcolm MacLeod single file down the narrow track, around the curve of the inlet and past the gentle waves lapping at the rocky beach.

  The sheep grazed in the field behind them, under the watchful guardianship of the twins, David and Daniel. Glancing back, Judith thought the flock looked more like a fog with legs, white clouded shapes in the encroaching darkness, their incessant bleating more annoying than their odor. Truth to tell, Judith did not like sheep much. They were stupid creatures, with a stubborn will, not at all like the sweet faced and fluffy pets people would make them out to be. This long journey had neither changed her opinion nor accustomed her to their eternal stench.

  Malcolm watched her out of the corner of his eye. She held herself proud, shoulders straight, hands clutching the reins with a little more force than necessary. She seemed alert to any sound or movement, as if she were a forest creature and scented danger at every tree or corner. She did not speak much, but he was used to, and grateful for, her silence. Instead of whining and whimpering, her stoicism had garnered his reluctant admiration during the long trip north.

  It had not been an easy journey following the sheep, sleeping on the chilled ground, rising before the sun tipped the trees, riding until it was too dark to prod the sheep further. It had been difficult traversing the distance between England and the Highlands, the drizzling rain drenching them most days, the oozing mud hampering their steps. Even the sheep had become stolidly accepting of the mire after days of trudging through it.

  Not once had Judith complained. She did not fit his idea of an English woman. Even now, when most women would have been swooning or filling their handkerchiefs with tears, she simply looked at him with an impassive stare. It was, Malcolm thought, a Scot’s trait that sat oddly on an English Squire's daughter. As they neared the open courtyard of Tynan Castle, Malcolm marveled at the more than equitable trade he had made. Not only had he managed to acquire a hundred Leicester sheep for his laird, but he had done something much, much more important.

  He had gotten them for free.

  Judith’s presence did not disturb him much. He had plans for her, too.

  He turned back to watch the track behind him. Even though they were only steps away from Tynan, it would not do to forget the threat of mounted English patrols. They crisscrossed the Highlands constantly, seeking violators of the Disarming Act. Malcolm touched the dirk hidden in his boot, well aware he was breaking the law. Yet, only an idiot would have made the journey he'd just finished without being armed. Nor would it be the first time he had broken that lunatic decree. Inside his shirt, pinned next to his heart, was a shred of plaid he had torn from his kilt before he had buried it in the secret place
.

  They entered the narrow opening of the keep-gatehouse and into a large courtyard shadowed by approaching night. The stone of the castle had mellowed to a deep rose and not the black Judith had originally assumed. The lofty curtain walls, with their flanking towers of massive masonry, rose high above her head. Only one tower was intact, the other pitted and scarred, rubble mounded around its base. At the entrance, stone steps rose four deep to a bronze portal marred by smoke stains that licked around it in memory of hungry flames.

  There was an air of decay here, and ruin.

  A figure shuffled from the shadows, her passage marked by the imperious click, click of her cane. She was tiny, her stooped frame clad in black, her shining white hair wound into a regal crown on top of her head.

  She reached Judith's companion first, tapping his knee with the tip of her cane. He remained mounted, looking down at her; his craggy face might have been wreathed in a smile. Except that Judith was certain her companion of the past weeks never smiled.

  "Malcolm MacLeod," the old woman said, her voice sounding rusty and unused, like a gate not often opened, "have you no sense than to come riding in at gloaming? How would we know that you're not the Devil's henchman, or the English come to pay another call?"

  "Sophie," he said gruffly, but not unkindly, "All you have to do is look out yon gate and see those damn bleatin' sons of Satan."

  Despite her fatigue and her anxiety, Judith almost smiled.

  At that moment, the old woman noticed the stranger. She peered through the gloom and then turned to Malcolm with a questioning look. He chuckled and dismounted, bent down and kissed her swiftly on the cheek.

  "Peace, Sophie," he said, pulling her tiny, bent frame into a hug. "Ye're still me only love."

  "Malcolm, be still," she said brusquely, but Judith could see that she was pleased by the gesture. "Well," she said, addressing her question to Judith, "who are you?"

  "In a moment, Sophie, ye'll find out soon enough." When Judith made a motion to dismount, he waved her back into position. She stifled a groan. If she were to travel any further tonight, she didn't think that she could manage it. As it was, she felt permanently welded to the saddle. Riding astride might have been safer during their journey, but weeks of it would no doubt have lasting consequences upon some portions of her anatomy better left unmentioned.

  The bronze door opened with a bang, and a white shirted figure bounded down the steps. He hugged Malcolm with pleasure, gripped his arms and pulled away as if inspecting for damage.

  "You did well, Malcolm. I saw them from the battlements. Well done!" He noticed the direction of the other man's gaze and followed it.

  The twilight shadows had deepened in the courtyard; the only way Judith knew he turned in her direction was that the shirt moved as if it belonged to a disembodied ghost.

  Judith tensed as the white shape moved closer.

  Malcolm quickly strode between them. With one hand, he gripped his laird’s well filled sleeve. With another, he grasped the hem of Judith’s riding habit. He grinned, which should have given Judith some indication that all was not well. Unfortunately, either she was too bemused by the sight of those teeth gleaming in the darkness or too exhausted from the long trip to feel much anxiety.

  However, Malcolm managed to shock her from fatigue with his next words.

  "Judith, meet the Lord o' Tynan, Alisdair MacLeod, yer husband. An'," he quickly amended, before either of them could say a word, "Alisdair, meet Judith, yer wife."

  "Wife?" Alisdair roared.

  "Husband?" Judith’s grip upon Molly’s reins was so tight her hands felt burned by the leather.

  "Did ye hear that, Sophie?" Malcolm asked calmly of the old woman.

  "Yes, Malcolm, I did at that." Her thin lips were pursed in a smile.

  "Well, I did, too. Congratulations, ye are now wedded according to the laws o' Scotland."

  CHAPTER 2

  "Are you all right, child?" Sophie asked kindly. Judith nodded, bemused. How could she explain that she was teetering between incredulity and a certainty she was dreaming?

  "That was simply a farce, was it not? Some odd Scottish greeting? I cannot truly be married." Her face was too white; Sophie wondered if the girl was about to swoon. Her hands were clasped tightly in front of her, the knuckles so bony it was as if no flesh covered them at all.

  Sophie passed Judith a candle from its perch inside the double bronze doors. The pitifully small wick did little to illuminate the deep, shaded corners of the Great Hall, merely danced wildly in the draft, casting unfriendly shadows against already blackened walls. Whoever had burned the castle had done a fine job of it.

  The older woman led the way to the rear of the main floor, waved Judith to a chair close to a fire burning brightly in the hearthstone fireplace. She leaned heavily on her cane and studied the young woman. There was a studied lack of expression in those dark eyes and she held herself too tightly, elbows pressed against her sides, hands clenched together.

  Terrified, that was plain to see.

  Sophie bent laboriously, thrusting a long twig into the fire, using its burning tip to light more candles on the mantle, playing for time while her thoughts raced.

  “There are four ways to wed in Scotland, my dear,” she said finally. “To be wed in the Kirk, by promise of marriage followed by coupling, by living together as man and wife.” Sophie looked over at the young girl made luminous by candlelight. Her midnight blue eyes betrayed no emotion, yet she trembled like a foal new born. In that instant, Sophie made her decision. “And by announcing legal ties in front of two witnesses.”

  A pale face gave way to one suffused by red.

  Surely the Scots were not so barbaric as to indulge in this heathen custom. Her wedding to Peter had been held in the small village church; her vows to Anthony had been spoken in her family home. Both ceremonies had been presided over by clergy, duly sanctified unions, blessed by man and supposedly by God.

  It was a nightmare, wasn’t it?

  Judith looked down at her hands. There were scratches on the backs of them and dirt beneath her nails. She was aware of her unkempt appearance, the fact that she'd not bathed in so long she smelled like sheep. Hardly a bride. And yet, if she believed this sweet looking woman, that’s exactly what she was.

  “I’ve been here a scant two minutes and in that time, I’ve acquired a husband?” Surely, this was one of her nightmares. Except, of course, that Judith could feel the chill air upon her skin. Her lashed lids were too heavy, her eyes felt filled with sand, her fingers trembled even as she clutched them tightly together. And the incongruous smell of turnips. You didn’t smell turnips in your dreams, did you?

  “I must admit,” Sophie said kindly,” it’s a strange welcome we give you. Perhaps as odd as your presence here.” It was a softly coaxed invitation, one subtly offered. Later, Judith wondered why she said anything, let alone spoke the truth. Perhaps it was due to the fatigue of her journey, or the feeling of being abandoned in a strange country, subjected to odd customs. Or perhaps it was even the sudden wish to cry. This woman with her strange, lyrical accent, her face lined with a hundred small wrinkles despite her face being heavily rouged and powdered, and her lively, sparkling blue eyes seemed only kind, not censorious. The story of her father’s barter poured from Judith like water from a pitcher.

  “Yet, what did you think would happen to you here?" Sophie asked Judith when she’d finished her tale.

  It was not something she’d allowed herself to contemplate. Each day, she’d occupied herself with what needed to the done, focusing on ignoring the discomforts, enduring the endless rain, living each day as something whole and complete, as if the journey itself were more important than the destination. She’d not allowed herself to think of the future; it was an interminable pit of blackness into which she could not inject one small spark of hope.

  "I had thought to be employed, if nothing else,” Judith said finally. “As it is," she said, looking at the pots piled high in
the corner, at the crumbs of food scattered over the kitchen table, adorning the floor and every other available surface, "it seems as though I have found work aplenty. I do not have to be married to accomplish it.

  “Is there no way to undo this?”

  Her eyes appeared like deep pools, Sophie thought, through which one might glimpse the soul. Again, she listened to the voice of her heart before she spoke.

  “I’m afraid my dear, that the only way to rid yourself of a healthy spouse is to either be an adulterer, or dessert your husband for four years.”

  Sophie extended her hand, with its wriggling blue veins and horrid brown spots and placed it on the Judith’s young, unlined hand. She looked down at the contrast in their skin, the differences fifty years can make. She was ancient, Judith was only at the beginning of her life. Yet, how like this young girl she had once been, so sure of what she wanted that she did not allow room for fate.

  Fate had a way of making things happen.

  Especially if it was prodded a bit.

  ****

  "You old fool, how dare you meddle in my life!"

  Alisdair MacLeod wanted to hit something, quickly, and although Malcolm was twenty years his senior, he would do. The fact that Alisdair had to struggle in order to best his old tutor in hand to hand combat added another fillip to the situation. He was in the mood for a good fight, a brawl, a skin tearing, flesh bruising, bone- crushing bloody melee.

  Malcolm eyed the MacLeod warily. Although they were both only long shadows in the courtyard, there was enough light to see the look on the MacLeod's face. It was intent, single-minded, and madder than hell.

  Malcolm had thought long and hard before doing what he did. The past two years at Tynan had not been pleasant ones. At first, they’d been too busy trying to survive to spare the time to grieve. But then, memories had a way of seeping in through the cracks of everyday life, hadn’t they? He could not help but remember Anne. The laird’s young wife was a sweet girl, but had none of the fire a young, healthy man needed. Hadn't he seen the lad, tight lipped, with a warning glint in his eyes each and every time Alisdair had gone for a long, cold soak in the cove? And hadn't there been too many of those nights?