Chapter Seven

M acInness felt as if he had been bludgeoned with a cudgel on both sides of his head. He shook his head to clear it and descended the steps to the hall. Instead of following his own advice and maintaining distance between himself and the lovely Genvieve, he was drawn to her, spending his free time with her.

As it happened every time he left her presence, the further he walked away from Genvieve, the clearer his thoughts became. By the time he crossed the wide expanse of the hall, he was able to rationalize his reaction to the disturbing woman. Not that he normally spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about any woman. He felt responsible for her. The same way he felt for his sisters, Bronwyn and Moira. He descended the steps and walked outside.

Aye, he thought, making his way to the stables. Think of her as a sister.

Losing himself in the task of caring for his horse, he was surprised when Garrick called out to him. “MacInness!”

He had just finished currying his new mount. He had still not forgiven the Norman infidels for shooting his four-footed friend Duncan between the eyes with an arrow. He emerged from the dimly lit stable into the bright afternoon.

Looking about him, he finally noticed his friend standing atop the raised wooden platform that ran the length of the curtain wall surrounding the entire holding. He walked over and started up the steps.

“Have you met him?” Garrick asked, before he reached the top step.

“Who?” MacInness countered.

“De Chauret,” Garrick answered. “The new Lord of the Merewood Keep.”

MacInness shook his head, “Nay. I’ve been busy in the stables, tending the new mount ye’ve let me use. I’ve yet to thank ye properly.”

“I am sorry that you lost Duncan,” Garrick said quietly.

“I helped him to take his first steps right after he’d been born.”

Garrick nodded.

“I trained him. We’d been through countless battles together, I—”

“’Tis not wrong for a man to admit he misses his horse,” Garrick said, a small smile tipping the corner of his mouth upward.

“’Tis no’ just that,” MacInness said slowly. “I’ve got ta train another bloody mount now,” he said to hide the hurt.

Garrick waited, but MacInness didn’t want to admit, even to his friend, just how much he’d loved that horse. Duncan had saved his life on more than one occasion. They were a team, unbeatable in battle.

“…should be in the hall…” Garrick was saying.

“I dinna hear ye,” MacInness said, realizing that his friend had been speaking to him while he was woolgathering.

Garrick’s brow creased and MacInness could feel the waves of irritation rolling off the other warrior. “I said, de Chauret will be in the hall for the evening meal. Join me, I’ll introduce you.”

MacInness started to mumble that he had no use for Norman dogs, but caught himself before he insulted the new lord of the keep.

The sound of voices raised in celebration reached them as they entered the brightly lit hall. Lady Eyreka motioned for them to join her at the table on the raised dais. MacInness followed his friend, his hackles beginning to rise at the sight of so many Norman warriors surrounding Garrick’s mother. Just then, the giant of a man sitting next to her leaned over and whispered something in her ear, making her laugh softly.

Four of the Norman guard surrounding his friend’s mother smiled. She laughed again. MacInness could not believe what he was seeing. They smiled again. Mayhap he’d have to hold back his judgment of these men until later.

“Garrick.” The huge warrior rose to his feet, extending his hand.

“Augustin,” Garrick said smiling, reaching out to grasp the older man’s hand.

The man standing beside Lady Eyreka glanced at MacInness, and he could feel the warrior’s questioning gaze settle on him, but remained silent as he walked around the table to join them where they stood.

“My vassal, Winslow MacInness,” Garrick said.

MacInness nodded his head toward Augustin.

“Augustin de Chauret, Lord of Merewood Keep,” Garrick added, without a change in the inflection of his voice. MacInness could detect no rancor here. His friend seemed to have accepted his removal as lord. He’d have to consider this later. That his friend would act as seneschal now instead of lord bothered him. Why didn’t it seem to have an effect on Garrick?

MacInness studied the older man before him. His dark hair was streaked with gray, but he was heavily muscled, making him wonder if the man was not younger than he first thought. He noticed then that the man was almost as tall as himself. He smiled.

“You will find MacInness is a man of few words,” Garrick was saying.

“A trait I would gladly live with,” Augustin answered affably, letting his gaze slip away from MacInness and come to rest on the young blond-headed knight who had bent down to speak to Lady Eyreka.

MacInness noticed that Lady Eyreka was smiling, and de Chauret was frowning. So, the new Lord of Merewood did not like his wife smiling at the younger, handsome warrior. MacInness grudgingly admitted that alone was reason to reevaluate his opinion of the Norman Baron. The man obviously cared for Lady Eyreka.

MacInness shifted his attention back to the men still speaking to him, but made an unconscious promise to watch the young Norman warrior. He did not give his trust easily where family was concerned, and Lady Eyreka treated him as if he were her own son. He could do no less than to protect her as if he truly were.

“—stayed for the execution?” Garrick was asking de Chauret.

The older warrior nodded. “While I have no liking for the deed, it serves as a reminder to those who would strike out against king and country.”

“Whose neck did they stretch before spilling the mon’s innards and lopping off his head?” MacInness was sorry to have missed the traitor’s name.

“Owen of Sedgeworth,” Garrick answered, his jaw tight with emotion.

MacInness felt a sense of rightness settle over him. Justice was sweet, though revenge would have tasted sweeter than Merewood’s legendary mead. His thoughts turned toward the woman he still cared for. Sedgeworth had tried to have Lady Jillian killed, more than once. The pain she suffered while living under the man’s roof was reason enough to have the man drawn and quartered. He smiled remembering his own offer to strip the man’s skin from his sorry hide. He would have relished slowly killing the man.

“The king had to make an example of Sedgeworth,” de Chauret was saying. “No one can hold back revenues or try to side with the rebels against King William and expect to live to tell of it,” he finished.

MacInness let his gaze meet Garrick’s. He could feel the violent need within his friend, churning just below the calm surface of Garrick’s stance. He too felt the blood begin to pound through his veins remembering all that Lady Jillian had suffered. Hatred was an emotion they had both learned to harness as long as they didn’t hold it in too long. He knew his friend would welcome a physical outlet—sparring. As in the past, all he would have to do is suggest the place and he knew Garrick would meet him there.

“Lower bailey?” he quietly asked, hoping his friend would be willing to cross swords with him.

Garrick nodded his head.

“’Twill be dark soon,” de Chauret said, though his unasked question of why hung in the air between the men.

“Yer welcome to join us,” MacInness offered.

De Chauret slowly nodded and flashed a thin smile in his lady wife’s general direction, before following the men outside.

*

Jillian and Eyreka hurried through the side door and around the rear of the building.

Though quiet at first, with only the sound of the booted feet of the guards patrolling the raised platform echoing in the late afternoon air, a faint clanging of steel against steel rose above the trill of a night bird and the rush of the wind. Jillian tugged on Eyreka’s arm as they followed the sound to the lower bailey, stopping far enough away from the men so as not to be seen. There was no danger of being heard above the din of hand-to-hand combat.

MacInness’s claymore flashed for a moment, poised to strike. But Garrick’s broadsword sliced through the air to meet the deadly blow. The two men muttered curses at one another, grunting under the force of the blows they rained upon one another, while de Chauret stood back, a broad grin on his face.

“Why are they fighting?” Jillian whispered.

“Releasing pent-up anger,” Eyreka said. “Owen of Sedgeworth was executed while we were in London.”

She watched her son’s wife closely, but still almost missed the flash of emotion that swept across the younger woman’s features. Eyreka recognized it as a mix of pain and anger, and silently praised Jillian for her strength. Jillian stood just a bit straighter, drew in a breath and nodded. “He was foolish enough to think his crimes would go unnoticed.”

Eyreka nodded her agreement. “Augustin wanted to kill Owen once he learned what that evil man had done to you.”

“Anger not released festers away unseen. ’Tis best to get it out, rather than let it destroy you. My husband is a complex man,” she said solemnly. “He and Winslow feel responsible for what I suffered, though neither of them were there through the worst of it.”

Eyreka grabbed Jillian’s hand and held fast. She could feel the younger woman’s pain, wanting to help, but not willing to bring up the past and all its demons. It was a past that they shared, and a good man’s death that they held themselves responsible for, though some would say otherwise.

Eyreka could feel the tension building within Jillian. She had not wanted to be the one to tell her that her former guardian, the man who had taken her into his home not as a magnanimous gesture, but to serve his own ends, had had to pay the piper. Jillian had suffered more than Eyreka would have thought possible, while living at Sedgeworth Keep, but she had an inner core of pure steel. Owen’s wife had not been able to break her spirit. Jillian’s body may be scarred, but her giving soul had not succumbed to the beatings.

The sudden absence of sound alerted Eyreka to the fact that the men had stopped. When she turned her head, she noticed the three men stood staring at them. She wrapped her arm around Jillian and started to move away.

“Nay,” MacInness said, stopping their flight with one word. “Dinna go.”

The sweat dripped down the sides of the tall Scot’s face and as she watched, he swiped at it with his arm. Her son and her husband each took a step toward them and stopped. She could feel Jillian trembling.

Garrick’s voice was rough with emotion when he finally spoke. “I would have told you later.”

Jillian nodded. Eyreka pulled her closer; trying to suffuse some of her own strength into Jillian, hoping it would help.

Augustin looked to Eyreka and then let his troubled gaze slide over to the shaking woman. “’Tis done.” He gently cupped the side of Jillian’s face. “Best to put it behind you,” he said softly, reaching up with his thumb to catch a tear.

Eyreka’s heart swelled with love for Augustin, another man would not have cared. But her husband was not just any other man. When the fates had decided to bless her with the love of a lifetime for the second time, they could not have chosen a better man.

*

MacInness decided to like the man. The Norman did not have to care enough about Garrick’s wife to try to soothe her feelings, but the man did. He would definitely have to take the time to discover more about the new lord of the keep. Though he did not like the looks of the man’s personal guard, and did not trust Normans as a rule, he would make an exception in de Chauret’s case.