Chapter 29

Had Rob felt this nervous afore he married Melinda? Nhaimeth didnae think so. Rob had gone about arranging Nhaimeth’s wedding with a real sense of purpose—one that allowed naught and nae one to get in Nhaimeth’s road on his way to the altar.

In Nhaimeth’s opinion, when his friend wed he hadn’t looked like a bridegroom, frowns being an almost permanent expression on his face. Nhaimeth had decided it made Rob look aulder and, God’s teeth, now he was spending his days frowning in just the same way. Worry would do that to a man. Years ago he had himself worn a grimace practically all the time, the exception being when he had to act the Fool for Astrid, trying to make her laugh. At times when he couldn’t escape his obligation, he had even acted the jester for his father, Erik the Bear. The Bear’s frown had put his own to shame, and now he could admit that once he had relished the knowledge, and his capers had become even more outrageous because his father watched.

Tomorrow he would be wed to Rowena, and today his frowns were frae trying to assure that absolutely everything would be perfect for her. His future wife deserved perfect.

A wee while ago, Rowena had joined him at his favourite spot, high atop the keep. The pair of them stood hand in hand looking out through the crenulations. It hadn’t been a bad winter. The snows had already melted and showed only on the distant peaks of the Highlands. Every now and then a guest would ride down the brae to the land bridge that joined Cragenlaw to the mainland—Chieftains mainly, accompanied by family and attendants. Graeme McArthur was the first of them to arrive, with Iseabal Ruthven, his wife, who was sister to their good friend Jamie. Graeme had once been Constable here until Euan had made his cousin head of a McArthur Sept and built him a stone Keep on Cragenlaw’s boundary. Jamie, too, had arrived with his wife, Evie and their bairns, as well as his father, head of the Ruthven clan.

Each time a group of guid friends arrived, he explained the family connections to Rowena, though with her gift, she probably didn’t need his help. Once he had said to her, “If ye keep getting insights into every happenstance around us, we’ll soon run out of conversation.” She had laughed but always minded to discuss the day’s happenings with him frae then on.

“Is there many more folk to come?” she asked, and he remembered her eyes while the crowd of guests gathered for supper, kenning that tomorrow would be worse.

“My half-sister, Kathryn Comlyn with Gavyn Farquhar, the man King Malcolm ordered her to wed.” He smiled, “And a grand notion that turned out to be. They’re happy together. They’ll be last because Dun Bhuird is the farthest away, so it could be growing dark by the time they arrive. Ach, and then there’s the Buchans—Evie’s father and her brothers—but we’re not certain about them. I dinnae think their memories of Cragenlaw are very pleasant.”

Rowena’s green eyes grew round and, unusually for her, she gasped. “Are they the family at the centre of that murder in the Great Hall?”

“Aye. For many years the Buchan and Ruthven clans were at either end of a feud. Not quite at war, though they did keep heaping fuel on the quarrel betwixt them. That’s all done with now. If a murder could be said to bring guid fortune, it was that one, for the feud nae longer exists.”

He frowned again, hoping his supposition was correct and that the feud had really died.

Rowena reached out, her fingertips attempting to smooth the creases frae his brow. “Why are ye so worried all the time? Whether I am able to see our future or not, we are going to have a grand life together. I feel it in my bones.”

“I just want this day to be perfect ye ken, that all the best in life will flow yer way,” he said, then blurted out, “Sometimes I doubt I’m the man to make ye happy.”

“I have no doubts about it, nary a one.”

“I also worry about our wedding night, with us both being virgins I’m uncertain—”

Rowena cut off the rest of the sentence with a finger to his lips. “Can ye not see Nhaimeth that’s what will make it perfect, the two of us bringing our innocence to the marriage as well as our love. Simply perfect.

Nhaimeth leaned forward and kissed her, and when they were done, he looked up and saw Kathryn and Gavyn with the Comlyn men cresting the brow of the hill and he was thrown back to the days when Erik Comlyn had done the same, riding down the brae past where his daughter Astrid was buried. The difference frae now was that on that day the Bear had been ready for battle.