Chapter 17

DUN RINGILL CASTLE - JULY 5, 1385

L éo woke early in his old bed, in the garret room at the very top of Dun Ringill. As he put his feet to the rough wooden floor, he half expected to see Maman open the door and tell him it was time to begin lauds. He'd slept hard, harder than he had in more than a year and a half, comforted by the old familiar smells and the weight of the quilt his mother had stitched for him when he was not yet born.

The pre-dawn darkness of the tiny room assailed him, and he felt sudden fear that the room was closing in on him. Staggering to the window, he ripped it open and almost cried out in relief. The deep purple sky was beginning to streak with pink along the horizon. Hundreds of birds chirped and trilled in the bushes along the loch and a persistent cricket continued to sing. Breeze moved over the still loch and he breathed it in, a comforting reminder that he was not in prison. He looked around the room—yet he was still a distinct outsider.

A little more than two years ago he'd traveled here in order to assist with Elspeth's marriage negotiations. Tales of his success and wealth had reached Niall's ears, and for the first time in his life he was afforded a chamber on the family's floor. He had been greeted warmly, as a brother, thanked for his assistance with the marriage negotiations, and accepted into Niall's confidence .

Instead of making him feel at ease, the gestures of acceptance had given him a growing feeling of disquiet. Malvina, who'd never missed an opportunity to hit or insult him, had been over polite, tending to his every need and calling him ‘son'. It confirmed his suspicions. They wanted something.

They knew he had gold. Quite a lot of it. And he knew they had a dwindling treasury kept in a crude cave on Staffa that would run out in only a few years if their harvests did not improve. They'd desired the negotiations with the MacLeans because of Hector's promise of fertile land on Morvern to supplement their harvests and income.

Yet three months later, no one seemed upset that a marriage alliance that was supposed to restore their wealth had failed. Nor did they seem concerned that Elspeth had been passed over for a common Irishwoman of no noble blood or standing. Not even Elspeth had continued to act upset after they left Mull's shores.

But never had he expected his family to offer Elspeth to Tavish MacFadyen, and for them to participate in a complex overthrow of the MacLean brothers. Now he knew the Wolf's gold, and a desire to claim Léo's treasury was the impetus. The disembodied sound of Elspeth's scream as she plummeted over the parapet wall, a mere pawn in their scheme, haunted his memory. What a waste.

Léo had never been one of them, and as he grew older, he preferred it that way. He raked frustrated hands through his hair. Except now Moira was one of them. Perhaps it made it easier for her, but her father would be devastated by the brazen way she acted with Niall, her body angling toward his, her touches, and her return of Niall's open-mouthed, slobbering kiss. Not even his mother had allowed his father to treat her thus in public.

It devastated him to see the change in her. The tamed spirals of sunlight-colored curls plaited and pinned just so. The cursed coronet upon her head. Her peach lips painted a lurid shade of rouge. The tan of her skin now faded and as pale as his own. Her tall, strong body clothed in the icy blue of the cotehardie. She was tamed, one of the most beautiful women he'd ever laid eyes on, an object of elegance and desire, just like Maman. And none of it suited her.

The submissive look of the leman in her eyes had hurt him most. None of the glittering brilliance that lived in her frost-colored eyes remained. For only a bare second had it appeared as she recognized him, before it was blinked away as swift as it had come.

She was resigned to her fate, and Niall's mouth upon hers had confirmed it. Niall had found a leman who pleased him in every way. A wave of nausea had hit him so powerfully at that remark he'd almost gagged. That was the way of it then. He'd envisioned himself saving her, but she didn't want to be saved.

Heart hardening, he wandered to the table forcing himself not to think of her. If she wouldn't help him, he would continue the plan without her. He called the faces of Gillie and Eoghan to mind. There were others to save, and he needed to get to work.

Having enjoyed his first bath in over a year and a half the night before, he picked up the hand mirror and looked at his appearance hoping that it had improved. He frowned. He looked even older.

Cracking the lid on the musty trunk from his youth, he located a few items that smelled clean and doffed the homespun tunic and trews which had clothed him every day for more than a year. The leather trews were a bit tight in the thigh, and the shirt and doublet a bit tight in the arm and chest.

Léo smirked. It wasn't just the tunic Moira had sewn. He was the first Cràdh prisoner to ever gain muscle and weight during their stay. No wonder Niall had been so annoyed by it.

Looking in the hand mirror again, he felt a bit more like himself. He located an old shaving kit and combed his unruly beard, trimming it close to the sides of his face and a little longer around the apex of his chin in the French style. Satisfied, he created a bit of lather in the wash basin and used the razor to create a clean line at his cheeks and neck, then trimmed his mustache away from his lip. He patted his face dry, savoring the smell of lavender and oak.

He checked the hand mirror. Much better.

Using his wide-toothed comb, he combed through the waves of his hair and trimmed the scraggliest bits away until it fell in an even line at his collarbone. Resolving that it was the best it would be, he secured it at his neck with a leather tie.

He murmured endearments in French as he relished the weight of his old estoc, touching the familiar brassy places along the hilt, then strapped on his baldric. He pulled on an old pair of his boots and picked up the soiled clothing.

Stoking the fire, he wadded up the tunic and was ready to throw it on, but a few embroidered stitches on the inside neck caught his attention. He'd never noticed them before. He angled them toward the firelight. In blue thread one shade lighter than the linen of the tunic Moira had stitched words around the lining of the collar. Because he hoped in me I will deliver him. He knew the psalm by heart.

Grief cramped his chest, and he folded the tunic, placing it upon the bed. The heart of one who had sewn a verse of promise into his clothing. What had happened to her?

As the sun came up he wandered toward the kitchen and found Isobel setting up the servant's hall. She looked up and dropped the table linen she was holding, rushing to him and squeezing her arms tight around his middle. Even smaller than Cara MacLean, she barely reached past his navel.

Her wrinkled face creased into a smile and her blue eyes filled with tears. "Oh my Léonid, how wonderful to see you. I've prayed for you every day, dear boy."

More dear to him than a grandparent, his chest swelled at the thought of her prayers covering him. Leaning down, he wrapped his arms around her, and lifted her off her feet while she hooted and swatted his arm.

"I smell food."

Isobel's eyes lit up and she pulled him through the doors into the kitchen. She gestured to the table he always sat at as a boy to break his fast. "I've got some good pork and eggs for you, laddie. Here, come sit with Moira."

At the sound of her name, Moira looked up—cheek balanced sleepily in her palm, curls riotous from a fitful night's sleep, the imprint of a pillow still on her face. Instead of yesterday's court clothing, she wore the same simple leine of light pink he'd last seen her in at Cràdh, and a gray shawl over her neck and shoulders.

Crystalline eyes raked over him, and then herself, a pattern of thought passing over her, but he could not guess the mystery. An expressive eyebrow lifted in distress as she touched her unruly hair. He would not smile. He would…not…smile.

She swallowed and held her left arm level with the ground, her right arm swooping up beneath.

Isobel stuck an elbow in his ribs. "She's telling you good morning."

Oh. "Good morning."

Taking the seat beside her, he placed the napkin in his lap. Isobel put a steaming cup of warm milk in front of him. "Thank you."

Moira rested her forehead in her hand, her eyes closing, fatigue evident in every part of her body.

Isobel clucked as she made him a trencher of food. "Why don't you talk to her?"

Léo shifted, his heart doing battle with his iron will. "She's mute."

Moira's head pivoted to the side and she rolled her eyes and pushed up from the table.

What? He hadn't done anything, why did she take that attitude?

Isobel waved her hands. "Oh no, now don't leave, love. She's not daft, Léo, she can understand what you're saying. Moira and I sit here and chat for the first hour of the day every morning. She's not much of an early bird, but she's a lovely listener."

Moira's mouth pinched and she sat down, crossing her arms in front of her like a petulant child.

He rolled his eyes. Between the two of them, he was the one who had cause to be disagreeable. Annoyed, he felt his old combativeness rise to the surface. "What's the matter with you?"

She turned her head slowly toward him and mouthed words. What, the mornings are devoted to prayer?

Isobel went to the far side of the kitchen to retrieve something. He dropped his voice. "Do you mean yesterday?"

Hurt registered in her eyes and she nodded slowly .

He scoffed. "What was I supposed to do, stare at you openly in front of Niall? I endanger you the more I look at you."

Her mouth moved. You. Hurt. Me.

Temper rising, he picked up his eating knife, poking at the battered wooden table top. "You want to speak of hurt? How about watching you wearing my mother's coronet? On my brother's arm. Hearing him talk about how you please him day and night. Seeing you caress and kiss him."

Her eyes rolled and she mouthed another word. Ardis.

Shame overcame him, but he tried to remember why he'd done it. Jealousy had seized him so intensely he'd asked for a woman just to hurt Moira as she was flagrantly hurting him. His conscience accused him, and he tried to think of a reasonable explanation that wasn't the truth.

Tears shone in her eyes and she shook her head and formed words with careful enunciation. Did Mowbray not tell you?

"Tell me what?"

Something flickered across her face.

Isobel put a trencher in front of him. "Here you are, love. You need fattening up still. Pork and eggs, just the way you like."

Overcome by the smell of a hot meal he said a swift blessing and began shoveling food in his mouth. Moira pushed her chair back and crossed her long legs, watching him eat. She tapped her fingers on the table top. A deep black smudge covered three of her fingers on her right hand.

"Still sketching?"

Her eyebrows raised in silent question. He reached across the table, lifting her fingers, then rubbed at it. It wasn't charcoal. It was sticky. She jerked her hand away.

He swallowed a thick piece of pork savoring the salty flavor. "Sorry. I forgot. Not mine to touch."

Her fingers came to her temples in frustration and she made an annoyed grunt.

"Moira!"

The door to the kitchen burst open, and she startled—the barest flicker of emotion crossed her face. Faint, but he'd seen it. Fear.

Malvina stomped across the kitchen. "What on earth are you wearing? You look as if you just rolled out of bed."

Moira looked at her crumpled leine, shrugged, and mouthed two words. I did .

He snorted into his cup of milk and brought the napkin to his mouth and Malvina gave him a look. "Sorry. Went down the wrong way. "

Malvina took her arm and jerked her toward the door. "You're needed upstairs. Niall is in the most terrible state and needs soothing. Don't bother changing."

Eggs turned to ash in his mouth. He didn't want to know.

"And you. Where were you last night?"

It'd been fifteen years since he left home, but Malvina still treated him as though he had asked to be born illegitimate and disrupt everyone in the household every time he was around. "What do you mean? I was asleep in my bed."

Malvina scoffed. "Do you think me stupid?"

Better not answer that question with honesty. "No."

"The very first night you are out of Cràdh Prison and the Wolf's camp on the Point of Sleat is obliterated? The siege engine destroyed."

He struggled to understand. "Sorry?"

"Quite the liar. Just as you always were. Come, we're going to Niall's solar."

Shoveling the last of the eggs in his mouth, he followed Malvina, hand on his estoc. As they climbed the stairs to the solar, Moira's hand slid into his, tightening.

The unexpected gesture nearly made him stumble. Astonished, he looked over his shoulder at her. Eyes lifeless, fear seeping from her face, he wondered if he was wrong about her motives and was filled with a sudden urge to pick her up and run—he still remembered the way out.

Malvina pushed open the door to Niall's solar and Moira let go of his hand, hurrying over to her lover. His heart ached as the same hand he'd just held caressed Niall's forearm and she looked at him with beseeching blue eyes. Niall kissed her, and she returned it. Again. He hadn't imagined it yesterday.

Malvina slammed the door shut, interrupting their kiss. "I've brought Léonid. Must you do that in the open? It's wholly nauseating."

Léo frowned. It was the first time he and Malvina had ever been on the same side.

Niall stomped across the room. "Where were you last night?"

Léo drew up to his full height and looked down at his brother, a gesture he knew aggravated him. "Asleep in my bed. Is there something wrong? "

"Three hundred of the Wolf's men were engaged in an incendiary attack last night. Fifty men are dead. Their encampment destroyed. The forest destroyed. Irreplaceable equipment destroyed. All on the night you return from prison. You're going back."

Terror spread over Moira's face and she pulled on Niall's arm, shaking her head. Niall shoved her away and she tumbled across the wooden floor. "Enough, wench."

Léo's hand tightened around his estoc and he began to pull it when a voice sounded behind him.

"I was with Léo. All night." Ardis stepped forward and met his eyes, giving him a wink. Léo's mouth went dry. She was covering for him—in the most humiliating way possible. Moira got to her feet looking appalled.

Malvina gave Ardis a withering look. "All night?"

"I brought up his bath at compline and was with him until lauds this morning." The woman was a bold liar, but he was in no place to judge, needing her story to keep him from going back to Cràdh.

Moira's chest heaved, and he felt a twinge of remorse knowing that she thought him a scoundrel. His heart hardened. But he wasn't. Unlike she, who went to Niall every afternoon and night.

Niall's shoulders drooped a bit. "Then I suppose that clears you from suspicion, Léo. You can understand my temper, brother. A devastating loss for my clan."

Léo nodded. "Aye. Any idea who's responsible?"

"I suspect it may be the Beithir. Though usually MacLean does not take life from men who are not engaging with him. Of course, you would know better than I, wouldn't you?"

Swaying caught their attention just as Moira fell backward to the floor, her head bouncing off the wooden boards. Niall stared at her flabbergasted for a few moments, then called for Isobel to be sent up, rushing in the corridor hollering. Ardis cleared away cups onto her tray, looked at Moira, and laughed. Malvina looked bored.

Surrounded by idiots, and unable to stop himself, Léo crouched beside Moira. His arms wrapped around her shoulders and he eased her up, pushing her head between her knees. He gathered her soft, bed-frazzled curls in his hands so that cool air could touch her neck and his pinky snagged on something. He paused. There beneath his fingertip, tucked under her shawl, was the heavy chain from Charles V. His heart slammed into his ribs. She still wore his necklace.

Isobel hurried into the room and crouched beside her. "What's happened, love? Go a bit peely-wally? You should have eaten more this morning. Perhaps you're in the family way."

The family way. Another blow hit him in the heart and he moved away from her, reminding himself that whatever they had once shared was now gone.

Moira shook her head back and forth and burst into tears. Isobel helped her to her feet, and Moira crouched, wrapping her arms around the old woman, rasping and sobbing with utter heartbreak. Léo tried to hang onto his disgust—but he couldn't. Had he really wanted to hurt her this way?

Isobel patted her back. "I'll take her back to her chamber, she needs a lie down."

Niall winced against the sounds of her rasping wails. "I suppose I was a bit harsh with her just now."

A bit? Léo's heart clenched and he longed to follow her as Isobel guided her out of the room. The door closed and Malvina and Ardis stared at it.

Niall made a noise of frustration. "Ardis, see that my things are packed. I leave this afternoon for Lochindorb. The Wolf is meeting me there. I'll be gone for a month so make sure I have sufficient. Everyone else, get out. I cannae hear my own thoughts. Trial by fire…the dream is coming true."

Curious. Who had been the one to destroy a siege engine? It could have been Hector, but somehow he didn't believe it. Fifty men killed and a forest destroyed? Hector was a swift and efficient warrior.

He strode out of the room and down the corridor. As he passed Elspeth's old chamber he heard the sounds of despairing sniffs. He lingered and wondered if he should knock and let her know that Ardis had lied to save him, that he would never spend the night with anyone he wasn't married to. That he was sorry for hurting and insulting her. That he loved her, and only her.

"I've got my eye on you, Léonid. "

Malvina's pinched face and white streaked black hair lent her the appearance of a banshee lurking in the shadows.

"Haven't you always?"

"No, not always. But perhaps I should have. Then my daughter would still be alive."

In an instant, he was reliving the vision of Elspeth tumbling forward over the parapet, her scream as she hurtled toward the rocks. The thud as she hit the earth. It had been the evil in his family that had killed Elspeth. Ambition, power, greed. Things that would pass away.

"Your daughter wouldn't be alive even if I hadn't been there."

Malvina's green eyes lit with hatred. "If you say."

Whistling sounded from the stairwell and Gordon exited onto the second floor. "Ready? We're on Kyleakin today and the rest of this week."

Léo studied Malvina's hard expression, her eyes traveling from Elspeth's door to himself, parsing something out.

"Aye. Whatever I need to do to get out of cursed Skye."