Chapter 18

18

“ I never thought you to be a lazy wench.”

She gasped and then laughed when she finally saw him standing inside the cottage already. She’d been so lost in her thoughts, she’d never heard or seen him come in.

“I amna but this day is a bit different than most.” She was determined not to cry anymore. She grieved for her friend but more tears would not help anyone. Finding a way to save the next woman from death after birthing her bairn would be a fitting remembrance of Mildread and her struggle.

He came to her where she sat at the worktable and took her hand, entwining their fingers in that way he always did. Blinking a few times to clear the tears that still threatened, she looked at him and smiled.

“Is there anything I can do for you? Anything I can say?”

“I am fine, Douglas, truly I am. I should be accustomed to death but I thought we had cheated it this time.” He squeezed her hand and then let go, taking a seat opposite of her at the table.

“What are you drinking? It smells good.” He inhaled a few times, testing the scent.

“’Tis betony tea. Would you like some? I made a pitcherful and ’tis still hot.” At his nod she took another mug and filled it with the aromatic brew. “I added a bit of honey for sweetness.”

“Betony? Is that one of your herbs?” He sipped the tea slowly as she watched.

“Aye. Did ye learn nothing of the healing abilities of herbs and plants in yer training, Douglas? Hiv they been forgotten in yer time?”

“I’ve had extensive coursework in pharmacology,” he started and then laughed. “You’re frowning again. Pharmacology is the study of chemicals and drugs and how they work in the body.”

“’Tis sorry I am that I canna understand all of yer words.”

“Please don’t worry about things like that. Herbs have substances in them called chemicals. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ve learned about many of yours.”

He put the mug of tea down and took a small packet of parchment out of his shirt pocket. Unfolding it carefully, he reached for the pen she kept nearby. She moved the pot of ink closer to him.

“Where did ye get that?” Caitlin nodded at the parchment. ’Twas hard to come by and not usually seen outside the laird’s study. Her own sheets had been a gift, protected and carefully scraped clean and reused—not a fragment was wasted.

“I asked Robert for it. He said to ask if I needed any more.” Douglas couldn’t know how unusual his request or the granting of it was. “Now, tell me about betony.”

“Betony is excellent as tea,” she started. “Mix half again as much and steep it for twice as long and ’tis verra helpful for headaches.”

“Half again as much and for twice as long as what? How do you keep track of how much to use?” He was frowning now. Well, turnabout was fair play!

“I couldna resist the urge to tease ye, Douglas. Now ye ken why I use my notes to record my recipes.”

He laughed. “That is an excellent example to follow. I’m ready now—tell me all about betony.”

“Mayhap I should tell you in a different way? If ye name an affliction, I can tell ye what we use for it.”

“That would work, too. All right,” Douglas looked pleased as he divided his parchment sheet into a grid of squares.

“Ye are no’ planting a garden, Douglas.”

“You just wait, Caitlin, you’ll see. Now, start with fever.” He was smiling and waiting, so she began.

“I use daisy or bogbean mostly, borage when we hiv it. They seem to be most effective against fevers when I dinna ken the cause.” She looked up onto one of the shelves over the table for her supplies of those three.

“And how do you use them?” Douglas was scribbling across the parchment as she spoke.

“The leaves are steeped to drink for fever.” She stood and walked to those shelves, looking for her own precious lists. Finding them, she sat down next to him so she could look over his shoulder. The writing on the page was nothing she’d seen before. The letters all looked like little square shapes, not flowing together at all. She looked up and found him staring at her.

“I can’t write in Gaelic, I’m afraid. This is in English.”

“English? Like the Sassenach use?” Her tone must have told of her Scottish dislike for anything English.

“Well, we call it that but it is nothing they use... yet.” He laughed at her again and went on, “My medical colleagues tease me about this, too. Most scribble everything down and it’s so tangled that it cannot be read. I started printing like this,” he pointed to some of his words, “in block letters. I’ve done it now for so long that I’m pretty fast with it.”

“If ye say so, Douglas.” Although from the look of it on the parchment, she’d never be able to read his words.

“Now, what do ye want to speak of next?”

Before she knew it the morning was turned to noon. Her mother coming through the door was the first warning that so much time had passed. Almost all of Douglas’s squares were filled in with his newly found knowledge of plants and herbs.

“Mam, I hivna started our meal yet.” She jumped up to help her mother with the bags she carried. From the smell of it, at least one held food. Her mother removed the heavy cloak she wore and hung it by the door.

“No bother, lass, no bother. Yer da eats with his brother and I must go back out to the castle soon. There are freshly made bannocks in the sack and plenty of cheese in the cupboard. ”

Caitlin opened the sack and removed the oatcakes. She smiled at the aroma. She hadn’t even thought about food all day; now her belly grumbled at the smell. Douglas retrieved their pitcher of tea, still warming on the hearth, poured a cup and handed it to her mother.

“I thank ye, Douglas. The tea will be welcome on such a day as this.”

“Has the rain lessened at all, Mam?” Caitlin put a wheel of cheese, along with the oatcakes and a crock of butter and one of honey on the smaller table. Douglas and her mother sat down as she did, carrying their mugs with them.

“No’ at all, lass. And how do ye fare this day?” Her mother reached out and rubbed her cheek, giving Caitlin a sad smile as she touched her.

“As well as can be expected. Did ye see Iain in the village?”

“Nay, but I will see him later. The bairn is wi’ Peigi for now.”

No one spoke through the rest of the meal. Caitlin was lost in her thoughts and could think of nothing to say to them. And, thankfully her mother and Douglas seemed to know that she had no desire for conversation. When they had eaten their fill, her mother pushed back from the table and walked to the worktable to fill her bag of supplies.

“Douglas, Pol said ye visited him this morn after the burial?” Her mother did not look up as she asked.

Caitlin looked to Douglas for his answer. He had seemed in a different temperament as they worked together.

“I asked him where I could get some surgical tools.” He looked at her and smiled. She was still confused.

“And tell me why would ye be needing those? I thought ye were but biding yer time here?” Mam knew something but Caitlin wasn’t sure what that was.

“How do you know these things, Moira?”

“What things do ye mean, Douglas?”

Caitlin turned to and fro between the two of them waiting for a real answer. This seemed to happen frequently when they started talking to each other .

“I was wrong to ‘bide my time,’ as you put it, Moira. Someone challenged me on it yesterday and I finally realized that I could be doing some good while I’m here. Then, I guess,” he paused and looked over at her, “Mildread’s sudden death made it clear that we do not always know how much time we have left. And squandering it by standing idly by didn’t seem like the thing I should do.”

“Really, Douglas?” Her throat tightened with emotion.

“Really, Caitlin.” He smiled and all she could do was smile back. “Your father and uncle are making some surgical tools that could make some of the procedures you do much easier. When they’re ready, I’ll show you how to use them in what you do.”

“Will I need one of your charts to keep them straight in my mind?” She felt like crying, now even more than when Mildread was buried. He had so much to offer and now he would. And she would be a part of it. This must be what the Fates had in mind for them—working together for the good of the clan.

“No, you’ll need no chart after what I’ve seen you do already with the few knives and needles you have.”

“Well, if ye two hiv things to do, I’ll see to my tasks.”

Douglas picked up his parchment and held it out to her.

“I still have another side to it, surely there are more conditions to be treated and herbs to be used?”

Caitlin knew that the rest of the day would go by just as quickly as this morn did. And she looked forward to it.

“So tell me about Robert and Anice.”

He’d waited until they’d all finished eating before he’d asked. Pol had piqued his already heightened curiosity about the laird of the clan and his wife. From the man’s earlier cryptic comments, Douglas knew there was more to this story.

“I put an end to yer questions this morn because we werena alone,” Pol started to explain. “I wasna certain what ye would ask and didna wish to speak of certain things in front of others.”

“Yer own parents were here for the beginning of the story,” Moira added. “Yer faither was mistaken by most for the old laird’s son and heir, Alesander MacKendimen. The Lady Anice MacNab was betrothed to marry the next MacKendimen laird.”

“My father and this Alesander looked alike?”

“Lad, didna yer parents tell ye any of their adventure?” Pol shook his head in sad disbelief. “Did they tell ye nothing of the history of yer clan?”

“Well,” Douglas started to explain, “they may have told me but I don’t think I believed them.”

Moira let out a screechy laugh and pounded on the table. “Ye thought ’twas a bedtime story for bairns, did ye no’?”

“That’s exactly what I thought,” he answered, more convinced with each day that she, like Mairi, could read his thoughts.

“There is one thing ye must agree to, Douglas,” Pol began. “Ye must promise that what ye hear from us about the laird and Anice goes no further than us.” Pol looked around the table at his wife and daughter and then at him.

“Doesn’t Caitlin already know this?” he asked. Caitlin shook her head as her mother answered.

“No’ the whole of it she doesna. We hiv never spoken of much of the sad story,” Moira explained, “and we dinna want this spread about.”

“Agreed.” Caitlin added a quiet yes to his.

“After yer parents were here and gone, Anice was left with Sandy, as he wanted to be called. Sandy wasna happy with the thought that she haid been looking forward to marrying the wrong mon.”

“My father?”

“Aye, ye faither. He and Sandy were nigh to impossible to tell apart. Struan, the old laird, arranged for Sandy to go back with the king for another year to try to give him time for his anger to lessen and for Anice to prepare.”

The hairs on the back of his neck rose. He already didn’t like the sound of this .

“The delay in their marriage did no good—Sandy was even angrier when dragged back for the wedding. He savaged and beat puir Anice near to death on their wedding night and when he left, she was so distraught that she tried to finish his work.”

“Mam,” Caitlin gasped. Her face paled at this information. This was no doubt bringing back memories of her own attack. Douglas would have liked a few minutes with this Sandy character.

“Dinna worry, Sandy left here bound and gagged and a bit worse for the wear himself. Anice discovered she was pregnant.”

“With Craig?” Caitlin interrupted.

“Aye, wi’ Craig. Robert Mathieson, who was raised as the steward’s son, was called home to help Anice in her tasks as chatelaine.”

“So, Robert is not a MacKendimen?” Douglas still didn’t see how this had happened. The laird of the clan was not of the clan?

“He is, Douglas. Robert was Struan’s natural son, but he was raised Dougal the steward’s son. When the truth was revealed to Dougal, Struan arranged for the lad to train and live wi’ the MacKillops in Dunbarton.”

Pol took up the story. “’Tis a longer tale than we hiv time for and ye shouldna be privy to all of their business. Let’s just say that Sandy was killed by villains on his way home for the birth and no one was unhappy about that.”

“So Robert ended up married to Anice and laird of the clan?” He was still amazed and knew many, probably most, of the details had been left out.

Moira laughed. “That is the long and short of it, Douglas, but ’twas much more than that. And, all haes turned out well for the Clan MacKendimen. Robert is more laird than his faither was or his half brother could ever be.”

“Well, thank you for appeasing my curiosity. I guess I should’ve paid more attention to my parents’ bedtime stories.” He started to laugh but realized the others were looking at him solemnly. “I thank you for the meal,” he said, standing and stepping away from the table. “I should get back to the keep—there are people I need to speak with this evening.”

Caitlin rose with him and walked to the door. He was reluctant to let this day end. For her own reasons, Moira left the two of them alone the whole day, other than the noon meal. He’d spent that time enjoying Caitlin’s quick wit and gaining a true respect for her healing abilities. That was her gift—the knowledge she’d gained through her years of study and practice with her mother. She had no need to claim something more mystical—she was a healer.

Now this day was over, but with his decision to apply himself while he was there, he anticipated many more days with her. They would work together, laugh together, and maybe even... Douglas shook his head at the direction of his thoughts.

“Will you come again in the morn?”

“I’ll be here but later than today.”

“Douglas, stop at the smithy on yer way here. I should hiv some of yer tools done for ye.”

“I will do that, Pol,” Douglas said as he stepped into the shadows created when the door was opened. Drawing Caitlin a bit closer, he couldn’t help but take advantage of the darkness by touching his lips briefly to hers. Too briefly. Caitlin’s answering sigh inflamed him and he fought the urge to pull her from the cottage for some real privacy.

“’Till the morn then, Douglas,” Caitlin stood on her toes and repeated his kiss.

“Oh, aye, the morn,” he answered and stepped through the door.

She knelt to bank the flames in the hearth before retiring for the night. Soft snores already came from her husband’s pallet and she longed to join him there. But yet again the wisdom called to her and she could not resist. Staring into the flames, she emptied her thoughts and waited. Soon the hearth glowed with colors and the light and heat in the room grew. As the fire became more wild, she felt the calm descend.

A cave in the night, lit with a torch and heated by the fire rocks below it. The churning water. The growing heat. Two lovers clinging and writhing in passion’s first embrace. A young lad in need. Another bairn fighting into the world. Denial. Rebirth.

Taking in a deep breath, Moira sat back to consider what this vision had brought to her. Should she stop it? Should she allow her daughter to become Douglas’s lover without warning her about the dangers? Had she ever been able to interfere with the wisdom? Nay, ’twould do no good since the Fates had their plans for all of them.

She stood and settled the fire down for the night. Going about her last tasks silently, she thought about her own gift. Sometimes, as a mother, ’twas a difficult thing to accept. Mayhap ’twould be better not knowing what was to come.

The Fates had decided otherwise and as always she had no say in the matter. ’Twould be as ’twas meant to be.