Chapter 18

Watching Andrew and Murie leave the dais and seeing Mag finish off the goblet of wine he had just poured for himself before following them, Rob wondered if Murie had got herself into the suds again.

"You must not keep Andrew waiting," Lady Margaret said. "I have enjoyed our talk, sir. I will send my condolences to your lady mother straightaway."

Thanking her and suggesting that she precede him up the stairs as far as Andrew's chamber, he bade her goodnight on the landing there.

Waiting until she had vanished around the next curve in the stairway, Rob rapped once on the door and entered at Andrew's command. As he stepped in and shut the door, he saw Mag and Murie on two back-stools in front of Andrew's table. Andrew sat in the chair behind it. Two other stools stood empty just beyond Mag.

As Rob moved to take one, Andrew stood. "Never mind that stool, lad," he said. "I've summat to show ye."

Exchanging a look with Mag, who revealed nothing, Rob looked at Murie, who seemed to be having trouble sitting still.

Andrew moved to the corner where the cat, Ansuz, had emerged on Rob's earlier visit to that room. The basket of maps or charts still stood there, so he suspected that Andrew wanted to discuss their route to Inverness.

However, the older man began instead to hand the scrolls to Mag, telling him to set them on the table for the nonce. When he handed over the large basket as well, Rob noted that the innocent-looking shutter fastened back against the wall, although apparently meant to cover the abutting, deeply set window in the event of extreme wind or rain, extended from just beneath the ceiling all the way to the floor.

Leaning down into the corner, Andrew clicked something unseen and then straightened. Reaching toward the top of the shutter, he flicked the hook there out of its eye and slid his fingers behind the wood. A similar click sounded, and he slid a bolt into sight, releasing the shutter. To Rob's astonishment, as Andrew "shut" it over the window, he revealed a dark, narrow doorway behind it.

"Throw the bolt on yonder door, will ye, lad?" Andrew said.

Rob did so at once and turned back only to have his gaze collide with that of his grinning wife, who might just as well have crowed, "I told you so!"

Shaking his head at her with a smile, he said, "Do we need a torch, sir?"

"Nay, lad, we'll do if Mag will light them candles yonder on the shelf."

Murie's delight threatened to overwhelm her, but she did as she had done when she had wanted to soothe Lady Euphemia's anger and imagined herself donning a cloak of dignity similar to her mother's or Lina's.

Feeling as if she were in control of herself then, she obeyed Rob's gesture and preceded him to follow Mag. All three men held candles, so she could see well enough, but the twisting stairway was perilously narrow, making her grateful for the rope banister bolted against the stone wall.

They came to a landing almost large enough to serve as a storeroom. Light came through a small hole in one wall there, and by standing on tiptoe, she saw through it to the hall dais. "Faith, it's another laird's peek," she muttered.

"Another?" Andrew growled from too close behind her.

She turned to him guiltily, but he only shook his head much as Rob had and murmured, "Doucely now, lass. Yonder be where I kept the charters." He pointed to the opposite wall, and she discerned a narrow stone bench built into it. Looking closer, while Rob held his candle so she could see, she saw that the top of the bench was a waxed wooden plank. Lifting it, she discovered only an empty space within.

"They dinna be needed yet," Andrew said.

The disappointment in his voice tore at Murie's heart. She wanted to reassure him, but a strange sensation stopped her. It was as if her mind had twitched and was tickling her memory in some odd way. Trying to make sense of it, she shut her eyes.

"What's amiss, lass?" Rob asked. His voice seemed far away, and fading.

Annie's voice in her head was stronger: "When them charters do be needed, they'll show theirselves, another 'n another. That be all I can tell ye…"

Collecting her wits, Murie said, "Father, are there two charters?"

Andrew shook his head. "I have charters for Arrochar from the days of King Alexander to the latest one from Robert III. I'd need only that latest one, though."

"You have two laird's peeks, sir," Murie said, persisting. "Might you also have two such benches in which to hide things?"

He frowned thoughtfully. Then he said, "Not to say ‘benches.' " Pausing as he glanced from one to another of them, he added, "I did note long ago that there be a space farther downstairs where, if things went amiss, I thought I might…"

When he paused again, Rob said, "Where do these stairs end, sir?"

"At the cliff face," Andrew said. "Sithee, they be as ancient as the tower. Beyond the next landing, they straighten and emerge at the back of a wee cave near the high tide line. Boulders conceal its opening from the water, but it be big enough to hold a good-sized coracle and oars. Even so, the only time it would be safe to launch it is whilst the tide be on the turn." After another brief hesitation, he added, "There be a crevice nearby. When I first saw it, I thought it might serve as a hiding place if we had to wait long or if someone found us afore we could get away."

"Show us, sir," Murie said.

Mag produced another candle from his plaid, lit it, and handed it to her.

A short time later, the two younger men and Murie watched as Andrew reached an arm deep into a rough, narrow crevice in the stairway wall some yards before the archway opening to the cave. In the candlelight, Murie saw his eyes widen. Moments later, all four of them stood staring at an oilskin-wrapped bundle.

Unwrapping its contents with care, a smiling Andrew revealed his charters, their red wax seals gleaming in the candlelight.

"Murie-lass," he said, "I've told nae one else about that crevice, so I dinna ken how they got there, nor how ye knew to look further than their own hiding place. I'm thinking the Fates meant it to be, but if ye can explain yourself, I'd be grateful."

Searching her senses, and feeling naught to discourage her from telling all of them, she said, "As I told you, sir, Annie said they would appear when you needed them. Her exact words were ‘When them charters do be needed, they'll show themselves, another 'n another.' "

Glancing at Rob, and seeing only encouragement in his expression, she added, "I might not have thought of that earlier had I not noticed the laird's peek and said aloud that it was another laird's peek. When I looked into the space in the stone bench, I heard the echo of my own words and yours, repeating them. The word ‘another' just stood out, and I remembered that Annie had said it twice."

"Aye, well, the woman's as much a Seer as your mam is, but I can tell ye I'd no have thought as ye did, lass. I'm glad I brought ye along. Now that we've found them, though, we'll no linger at Tùr Meiloach. I heard today that Pharlain be setting out for Inverness on the morrow. I dinna ken why he's going. Mayhap he hopes to gain royal acceptance for himself as Chief of Clan Farlan. But whatever he's about, I'd liefer be there afore he can wrap his grace round his thumb. Your mam willna want to leave on a Sunday, but we won't wait 'til Wednesday, either."

When they returned to Andrew's chamber, Rob sent Murie up to the solar and went to find Alf and Eamon, to tell them that Andrew would send a man with them in the morning and to keep their mouths shut in the meantime.

"As I told you at Ardincaple," he reminded them, "we must not let word of your journey reach enemy ears. Nowt is more important than getting our message to Lochindorb, so the Lord of the North can convey it to his grace."

Since both men knew Rob well, he left it at that and went upstairs to find his lady and take her to bed. If the two events occurred rather farther apart than he had intended, the outcome was completely satisfactory to them both.

Waking early Sunday morning to find Murie more than willing to repeat much of their nocturnal exercise, he lingered in bed with her until Hamish rapped and said through the door, "The laird wants tae ken if ye're sleepin' all day, sir."

Grinning at Murie, Rob shouted back, "Tell him we'll be right along."

Since all he had left to do in preparation for the journey was see that someone loaded their baggage onto the garrons that would carry it, and Murie assured him that she and Tibby could have their own things ready in a trice, Rob made himself available to Andrew and Mag for the rest of the day.

That evening, Andrew announced that, unless anyone had an objection, they would depart the next day at dawn. So grim did he look that no one dared object.

"Aye, good," he said. "As it is, it will take us nigh a sennight to get there."

In fact, due to uncooperative weather and a circuitous route—through Andrew's north pass (well-guarded against trouble), across the narrows of Loch Lomond and north along east Lomondside, through Glen Garry to Rothiemurchus and Loch Moigh, and on westward to Inverness—it took their party of nearly twenty-five men, three women, and a dozen sturdy garrons ten full days.

They reached Inverness Castle before midnight on Friday the tenth day of May and learned at the gate that Parliament had begun at midmorning that day. By the King's invitation, Andrew, his family, and their three servants were to stay inside the recently renovated castle. However, also by royal command, members of every nobleman's armed escort had to camp outside the castle walls.

To Rob's relief, no one objected to Scáthach's entering with him.

In the castle keep, they learned with shock from Sir William Fletcher, Jamie's boyhood friend, now steward and confidant, that due to widespread "failure of his most powerful noble guests to comply" with the law regarding the size of their retinues, his grace had put many of them "in ward" within the castle and warned them that, although they were free to move about as they chose, any who went outside the wall before Parliament ended would be punished for high treason.

"Does that restriction apply to me?" Andrew demanded indignantly.

"Nay, my lord," Will Fletcher said with a smile. "I'd advise ye to tread softly with his grace, though, for he's in a dour mood. See you," he added with a nod to Rob, "after hearing Lord MacAulay's warning of likely trouble, his grace decided tae keep the most quarrelsome chiefs under his eye and away from their armed men. Them chiefs gave him cause, too," he added. "Every one o' them came with an army, many more men-at-arms than his first Parliament's law allows for noblemen's tails. Sakes, Campbell o' Lorne alone brought four hundred men."

Rob said, "Did his grace meet any trouble on his way here?"

"Nay, but as ye ken fine, m'lord, that journey itself were a great risk tae him. Afore we left Aberdeen, he asked his principal nobles tae swear allegiance tae her grace, separate from hisself. He believes nae Highlander would slay our Queen."

" 'Tis unlikely, aye," Rob said, hoping he was right.

Fletcher nodded. "But ye must all be weary now and longing for your beds." Summoning two gillies with a gesture, he added, "These lads will show ye tae your chambers. Come morning, we'll all meet in the great hall tae break our fast and begin the second day o' Parliament."

"Did the Lord of the Isles come?" Andrew asked.

"Aye, sure, and he be one o' them enjoying the King's ward, for he came wi' near regal ceremony and leading a fearsome great host."

"He does believe that he is equal to the King," Rob pointed out.

"Aye, but if we are tae have one law for all Scots, we canna have two kings," Fletcher said. "One will ha' tae bend a knee tae the other."

Noting that Andrew was on the brink of asking another question and doubtless another after that, Rob said, "If we are not to be late in the morning, Sir William, we should let your lads show us upstairs."

Fletcher grinned. "Aye, ye should. If today means aught, tomorrow will provide us much pompous posturing and fierce fratching. Sleep well."

Noting that Murie's eyes were alight with curiosity, Rob put a firm hand on her shoulder and nodded to Will Fletcher as he bade him goodnight. He was glad to see Lady Aubrey rest a gently insistent hand on her husband's arm and even happier when, obedient to that urging, Andrew and his lady followed the gillies.

As Rob offered an arm to Murie, she rose on tiptoe and tilted her face up to murmur, "I want to know more about what happened today. It sounds as if we missed much that our people at home and others will want to know, too."

"Not from you, though," Rob murmured back. "Certainly not tonight."

When she made a saucy face at him, he gave her a stern look. He did not want to argue about such things then, or at Inverness Castle, come to that.

Murie wished again that Rob would not look at her so, but she dared not protest lest he forbid her to attend the Parliament. He still had not kept his word to the Brehon, after all, and might easily seize on such an opportunity to make it good. To have come so far and miss seeing Parliament in action was unthinkable, but if she gave Rob cause, he might just order such a penance. And how many seanachies ever had an opportunity to be present when Parliament sat?

Biting her lower lip to insure that she would keep her tongue behind her teeth, she walked with Rob behind her mother and father and wondered how Lady Aubrey persuaded Andrew to heed her. The thought that her ladyship's occasional ability to foresee events might be the key to her persuasiveness was daunting.

It was also unlikely, Murie decided. Although Lady Aubrey was widely rumored to be a Seer, and Lina had experienced similar incidents, both women maintained that other reasons likely existed for what they had seen.

Even if Lady Aubrey had passed their gift on to her, Murie had not come to Inverness to prove her gifts to Rob. She had come to see Parliament and hoped to learn enough about what had happened to Elizabeth Napier to ease the guilt that she knew Rob still harbored for the daft wench's death.

At the stairway, Rob motioned for Murie to go ahead of him and follow her parents. Tibby, Andrew's man Sorley, and Rob's Hamish trailed after Rob.

When her mother and father reached the second landing, their gillie opened a door there, saying to Andrew, "I hope this wee room will do for ye and your lady, m'lord. See you, we ha' more folks in the castle tonight than we'd expected tae have."

"Aye, we heard that," Andrew said. "Thank ye, lad. We'll be comfortable, but where be ye putting Lord MacAulay and his lady?"

"Just here across the landing, sir. 'Tis a gey wee chamber, m'lord," he added with a wary look at Rob.

Rob merely nodded, but Andrew said on a bark of laughter, "They need only a bed, lad. If ye've got one in there big enough for the two of them… Sithee," he added confidingly, "they be but newly wedded."

Murie's cheeks burned, and she avoided the gillies' eyes and hurried inside when the younger one opened the door. Tibby would help Lady Aubrey first, and Sorley and Hamish would doubtless see to the baggage.

Rob followed Murie into their room, and she heard the latch snap to.

Turning to face him, she wondered at first if she had irked him. Without thinking, she raised a fingertip and pressed its budding nail against her upper lip.

"Don't," he murmured.

"I wasn't," she said, hastily putting the offending hand behind her. "I just—"

He bolted the door. "If you want activity for your lips and tongue, mo chridhe, I can think of one that will entertain us both for a time. Come here."

Smiling, she moved into his arms and raised her lips to his.

The next morning, entering the great hall, they found it full of trestles and people, mostly men, breaking their fast amid a clamor of voices. Andrew and Lady Aubrey, however, had saved places for them to break their fast at their table.

As Rob took his seat, he heard Lady Aubrey say to Murie, "We women will all sit together in an area near Queen Joanna when the session begins, dearling. She will sit on the dais, so take care to stay near me as we make our way to and fro."

"Aye, Mam," Murie said.

Her reply came without hesitation or emphasis. Nevertheless, Rob could tell from her expression that she had something in mind other than the honor of sitting near Queen Joanna. Tempted though he was to warn her to behave herself, he kept silent. He had seen enough of his lady wife's skills with other people, primarily his mother, to know she could look after herself if only she did not somehow, at the same time, plunge herself into jeopardy.

The hall was crowded. Although the din was less than that of a hall full of warriors or more common folk, it was still noisy enough to make conversing difficult, so Rob focused on his food.

When increased activity at the high table drew his eye to the dais as Will Fletcher, evidently having left the seat beside his grace, returned to it, Rob saw that Murie was already watching. Fletcher leaned to speak into the King's ear, and as he spoke, Jamie looked increasingly vexed.

People on either side of them took evident, unseemly interest.

A gillie hurried to the dais, drew Fletcher's attention, and spoke into his ear. Then Will spoke to Jamie again, and Jamie gave what must have been an order, because Fletcher got up and strode toward the main stairway.

Deciding they would learn no more, Rob returned his attention to his food.

"What do you suppose that was about?" Murie asked, speaking just loudly enough for him to hear her.

"Whatever it was, we will either find out later or we will not," he replied.

"We will," she said confidently.

Delighted by her proximity to the King and Queen, Sir William Fletcher, and the nobles who sat with them on the dais—the King and Queen less than twenty feet from her and all of them facing the lower hall—Murie had been watching them for some time, with fascination and profound curiosity.

Neither her mother nor Rob, sitting on either side of her, tried to converse over the din in the hall, so she could indulge her curiosity as she liked.

Nothing happened after Sir William's departure, though, until the Queen arose from her seat and the ladies with her did, as well.

Lady Aubrey said quietly, "We will refresh ourselves now and meet her grace in a chamber behind the dais. Our gillie told me this morning that the inner chamber has a private entrance. He will show us the way."

Accordingly, they went upstairs, quickly washed and tidied themselves, and followed their gillie to what had evidently become her grace's sitting room.

Entering, they saw the Queen and several other ladies just as they all fell silent. "Must we stay here throughout the Parliament, Mam?" Murie whispered.

"I do not know," Lady Aubrey admitted. "The King did say that he wants ladies present during Parliament to keep his nobles' tempers in check, so I surmised that we would see and hear all. But we must make our curtsies now, love. 'Tis likely that her grace will tell us just what we must do."

Queen Joanna's beauty and tender heart were legendary. Her graceful figure; dainty, tip-tilted nose; and smooth, wide forehead were, Murie knew, especially admired. At present, her large, long-lashed eyes seemed to take in everyone around her, and her full, expressive lips smiled often and warmly.

As Joan Beaufort, daughter of England's powerful Earl of Somerset, her grace was undeniably English but now used the Scottish form of her name and had declared that her love for her adopted country matched what she felt for her beloved husband. Many had said that she was his grace's most valuable asset, because wherever she went, people fell in love with her just as Jamie had.

Curtsying deeply when her mother did, Murie looked up to see Joanna's gaze resting on Lady Aubrey. In a delightfully musical voice, the Queen bade her rise before saying how pleased she was to make her acquaintance.

Thanking her, Lady Aubrey added, "By your leave, your grace, I would present my youngest daughter, Muriella, now Lady MacAulay of Ardincaple."

Joanna smiled at Murie, who remained deep in her curtsy but had not taken her eyes from the Queen. "Ye may rise, too, Muriella," she said. "I have heard much about the MacFarlan sisters. I am gey pleased to meet one of ye at last."

"You are kind to say so, your grace, but the honor is mine," Murie said, rising as she returned the Queen's smile and feeling wholly at ease with her.

"We may talk more anon," Joanna said. "Since they must have finished rearranging the hall for his grace's Parliament, Lady Sutherland will soon show ye both where to go." She indicated a handsome woman of thirty-five or forty years, standing nearby. "Ye must remain standing until after James enters," Joanna added. "I will enter before he does, though, so just watch me and sit when I do."

"Does not the Lord Chancellor tell everyone what to do?" Murie asked. She faced Joanna, while obliquely eyeing Lady Sutherland and trying to decide if her ladyship might be too haughty to talk with one so much younger than she was.

"If we had a Lord Chancellor, he would," Joanna said on a note of dry amusement that returned Murie's full attention to her. "But as we do not yet have a replacement for dear Bishop Lauder, his grace will conduct Parliament himself."

Murie nearly asked if the reason they did not have a Lord Chancellor was—as she had heard—that the Pope had refused to accept the King's choice to succeed the bishop, and the King had refused to have anyone else, insisting that his Lord Chancellor would serve him, not the Pope. However, aware of Lady Aubrey's stern eye and the likelihood that Rob would hear of it if she did ask such a question, Murie recalled her fervent desire to speak with Lady Sutherland, if possible, and held her tongue.

She had her reward when an older woman approached Lady Aubrey and inquired politely about her health and family. Lady Aubrey had no sooner presented her to Murie as Lady Nisbet, a Border cousin, than Lady Nisbet said, "Ye must be wondering what we were discussing when ye came in, Cousin Aubrey. Sithee, six o' the great Highland chiefs did leave the castle overnight, thus breaking his grace's ward. He has ordered them captured and returned to face dire punishment."

"Which chiefs are they?" Murie asked.

"I dinna ken all six," the woman said. "But Lady Douglas sat nearer to his grace than I did. She heard him say Mackenzie o' Kintail and Campbell o' Lorne. I kent fine that your mam, being kin to the Campbell, would want to hear that news."

Lady Aubrey said politely, " 'Twas kind of you, cousin. My kinship to Campbell of Lorne is distant, though. He is a second cousin to my grandsire. I doubt that I have ever met him, but I can tell you that Argyll is not amongst those who defied his grace. Nor is the Mackintosh, since his lady stands yonder."

"Aye, well, I dinna ken many o' the Highland chiefs," Lady Nisbet said. "We rode here from Aberdeen with the Douglas's party. Sithee, his grace did accept the Douglas's offer o' men tae escort him, so some Douglas chieftains and others also brought such o' their ladies as would ride wi' them."

Lady Nisbet continued chattering eagerly, about unrelated topics, so Murie received with relief Lady Sutherland's signal for them to return to the hall and wondered if she would be able to find Rob and her father there.

Following Lady Sutherland, they entered the hall near its dais end. Benches awaited them in a corner formed by the ladies' end of the dais and the side wall.

At the center of the dais, where the high table had been, an elaborately carved and gilded armchair awaited his grace. A table draped with cloth of gold over white linen stood nearby, and two less impressive chairs sat behind it. A second armchair bearing a red velvet cushion sat near the front of the dais on the ladies' side, apparently for Queen Joanna. Two plain back-stools stood behind it.

Delighted that she would be close enough to hear and see everything more easily than most of the men in the huge chamber, Murie took her place, standing between her mother and an unknown woman. The Border cousin, Lady Nisbet, claimed the place on Lady Aubrey's other side.

Turning so that she could see the rest of the crowded hall, Murie thought at first that she would never find anyone she knew in such a throng. To her shock, though, the first recognizable person to catch her gaze was Dougal MacPharlain.

The second was his father, sitting beside him.

She half-expected to see the Brehon justice on Pharlain's other side, but she did not know the man who sat there.

Glancing at her mother, wondering if she ought to direct her attention to them, she realized that Lady Nisbet was still talking to her.

A man in priest's robes mounted the dais and stood behind the cloth-draped table near the elegant armchair. Sir William Fletcher stood next to him.

Trumpets sounded, and everyone turned toward the hall's main entrance. When the echoes faded to expectant silence, the Queen entered with her two chief ladies behind her. They walked up the central aisle and took their places on the dais.

To longer, more tuneful trumpeting, the King entered, strode alone to the dais, and stood near the elegant chair. When silence reigned again, he nodded to the priest, who offered a prayer that was, to Murie's relief, blessedly short.

She had not come to hear prayers but to watch history take place.