The Night Side (3 page)

George grimaced and they exchanged a sympathetic look. Neither of the cousins cared for these assigned
chores, but in the present circumstances they were necessary and one could only shirk so much of one’s duty in one day.

“Do you know, Frances, I truly wish that my father or grandfather was still alive.”

“Why,
petit?
Other than the obvious reasons, of course.”

“Because then I needn’t become a laird, and practice archery, and live in this drafty old castle. I could have remained in the South and attended university.”

Frances sighed in sympathy. “I understand,
mon cousin.
I understand. I do not like living in a drafty castle either. But be of good cheer. Our new Master of the Gowff shall be here soon. That will be pleasant,
oui
?”

In behint yon auld fail dyke,
I wot there lies a new slain knight;
And naebody kens that he lies there,
But his hawk, his hound, and lady fair.

—
“The Twa Corbies”

Colin entered Dunnvegan through the sea gate that waited silently at the end of the deep fosse where the lightly-crewed galley was moored. Given a torch by one of the sailors, he was sent up alone to the castle gate, a matter he and the silent MacJannet found most curious and even a bit alarming. But ever a slave to curiosity, he waved his concerned servant away and took the long, dark climb up the curving, rough-hewn stairs at a brisk pace without checking to see that his sword and dirk were still in place beneath his cloak. An angry ghost with a cloven head and a bloody hollow in his chest where a heart once resided followed him closely. Barely ashore and already the ghosts were gathering.

It struck Colin as more than odd that he was not to receive the welcome of the prodigal son, Highland hospitality being what it was. But except for a lone man with a lantern at the top of the stairs, there was no one living to greet him as he stepped into the castle.

So, his visit was clandestine. This added another layer to the mystery of his summons.

His nocturnal welcomer—if such was the man—was elderly and seemed to understand only Norwegian. Fortunately, Colin had a facility for language and still retained his native tongues of Gaelic and Norse, so he was able to answer the garbled greeting politely. This earned him a certain level of approval, though not so much approbation as to cause the oldster to actually smile upon him.

They traveled down a deserted corridor, which felt especially cold and dark in its loneliness, though the evening was not at all chill and the torch shed adequate heat and light about them as they walked. Perhaps it was the unhappy ghost that cast a pall over the passage.

The old man knocked once upon a heavy, ironstrapped door, and then opened it without a word. He jerked his head, indicating that Colin should enter, and then backed away, taking his lantern and the ghost with him.

Colin wondered if perhaps the man’s tongue had been torn out. If so, by whom? Probably not Alasdair. His cousin was capable of cruelty, but he tended to simply kill people who annoyed him. He hadn’t the patience for torture that his father had possessed.

The room beyond was well lit by a large fire burning on the deep flags and several torches set in sconces in the wall. There were two large wooden chairs pulled up near the hearth, neither presently occupied. Above the hearth was a stone carving, a bull’s head embedded into the rock of the wall. As art, it was not appealing. As a reminder of the MacLeod’s absolute power within the castle walls, it was most effective.

Heavy footsteps approached, and Colin turned to greet his cousin. He had only a dim memory of his time with Alasdair, but the memorable features of a prematurely stern face and the scar at the corner of his left eye were easily recalled.

“Greetings, cousin,” Colin said softly, watching as the big man closed the heavy door behind him and set a bolt in place. It was confirmation of the MacLeod’s desire for privacy, had Colin truly possessed any doubts about the nature of his visit.

“Health upon you, cousin,” Alasdair responded, finally smiling. “You had a good journey?”

“Favorable winds all the way.” Colin shed his cloak, partly because the room was warm. Partly to be better able to reach his sword.

“That is a good omen. Freya is with us.”

The two men approached one another and embraced cautiously. Both were armed with swords and dirks and had
sgian dubhs
tucked into their boots. Thanks to their other silver ornamentation, they clanked when they took one another’s arms.

“I am glad that life among the sassuns did not stunt your growth overmuch,” Alasdair said.

Colin found himself glad of his extra inches. Though he did not expect to be molested, and was counted a deadly swordsman thanks to his ambidexterity, he had come as a near-stranger to a land of giants, and it would not do to be the only dwarf among these chesty, arrogant leviathans.

“Let me pour you a glass of the Lowland wine they tell me you favor, and tell you why I have brought you here when winter is approaching.”

“Certainly,” Colin said with a smile, but inside he was lifting a brow. Such haste and lack of pretense—
even with a stranger—was unseemly, and a violation of all manners and protocol. To use it with a family member only just returned home was unheard of. The situation had to be most urgent and secretive.

That usually meant that someone—typically the laird—was in circumstances inimical to his health and or power. Someone or something had to be threatening the new MacLeod. And whatever it was, it couldn’t be removed with a battle-axe or broadsword, or else Colin felt sure it would have been dealt with already.

This knowledge, rather than providing a sensible notice of alarm, only served to further whet Colin’s curiosity.

“We are the sons of Frey,” Alasdair began, handing Colin a goblet and waving him toward a chair. The chalice was made of silver, not gold, but beautifully crafted. Most MacLeods favored silver because of their connection to—and fear of—the faeries. “All MacLeods have a blood tie that cannot be broken. There are neither mountains so hard, nor seas so vast that these bonds will ever be sundered. I reckon my kin to the hundredth degree.”

He drank. The MacLeod managed not to shudder at the wine, but plainly he did not care for it. He probably considered it an effete, womanly drink.

Colin sipped politely to acknowledge the toast, enjoying the fine Madeira his cousin despised. He waited while Alasdair took his seat. He tactfully did not mention his mother being cast out of the bosom of her family for marrying a foreigner and also for having The Sight. Perhaps the ties of blood “to the hundredth degree” did not extend to the females of the line, especially if they were suspected of being witches.

“You have heard of the fate of Michael Balfour,”
Alasdair said abruptly, either abandoning his appeal for clan loyalty or else feeling he had said enough on the subject. MacLeods were not sentimentalists.

“Indeed. The story is already legend. There are Balfours in the South and they can speak of little else.”

“Thanks to this stupid war, this Balfour is survived by only two relatives. The lad’s name is
Seoras.”

Colin mentally translated: the boy was named George.

“The other is the daughter of Michael, one Frances Balfour. She is the heiress of Noltland Castle and all its lands and monies. She’s a comely wench, too, even though she has the look and manner of the French about her.”

Colin stared carefully at his cousin’s face, wishing that he could see it without the tricky wavering of the firelight. Alasdair’s tone and the use of the girl’s sassun name suggested that he was either very wary, very respectful, or very interested in this heiress. The fact that he had commented on her attractiveness was interesting. Heiresses could be missing limbs and teeth, as ugly as a Highland sheep with mange, and still be considered desirable. Consequently, their appearance was not often dwelled upon.

“Aye?” he prompted, wishing more detail.

“At present she is well enough protected by her father’s remaining men. Thank goodness the braggart was not so stupid as to leave the castle completely unguarded or the wolves would be upon her.” Alasdair shrugged, looking more annoyed than gratified in the dead laird’s foresight, in spite of his grudging words of praise. “However, if she does not choose a suitor soon, I fear that come winter some of her neighbors may attempt to take the castle and force her into marriage.”

“Are any of them likely to gain her cousin’s consent to wed? Or the regent’s?” Colin asked carefully.

“Seoras
is but a boy. ‘Twould be an easy matter to get rid of him. And the regent…” Alasdair shrugged. “Well, Mary of Guise is very far from here. Busy as she is in the Lowlands defending herself from the sassuns, all could be accomplished before she was even aware of events.”

“True. The regent is presently much occupied with things in the South.” Colin’s own tone was bland. He didn’t mention John Knox and the troublesome reformers who had begun to spread their militant religion over the land. It was not just witches who were burning.

“Aye, she’s getting a rough wooing from the English and their cursed religion—a pox on them all!”

Colin took another sip of sweet wine. “So, being that the regent is elsewhere occupied, out of the goodness of your heart you wish to offer the Balfours some protection?” he suggested.

“Aye—protection.” Alasdair smiled happily at this tactful, though mostly untrue, summation. “The only thing that will make Noltland safe is for the girl to marry someone strong enough to hold the keep.”

“And to keep
Seoras
safe until he is grown and can look after the keep himself?” Colin suggested.

Alsdair shrugged again, but said, “Well, aye. Of course, if she wanted him kept. And if the Bokey hound does not claim him.”

Colin blinked at the implied ruthlessness and then asked: “Bokey hound?”

“Aye, a fiend, a hound of Hell that howls when the laird is to die. They say the beast has been lately seen abroad.” Alsdair actually looked a bit uneasy. He was a Christian, but only nominally, and his Viking roots
were still firmly grounded in the world of vicious monsters and fearful alchemies.

“And this hound is going to kill the boy?” Colin found this tale of a hound to be rather convenient, and suspected it was an invention designed to terrorize either the MacLeod or the youngest Balfour. If the former, he had to wonder who at Noltland Castle had invented the tale. If the latter…well, that matter needed further cogitation. And though suspicious, Colin himself did not dismiss this wild tale out of hand. He had yet to see an actual hellhound, but he had seen enough other things that he did not rule out the possibility of one’s existence.

“Well, perhaps it shall. Who knows what devilish beasties may do? But what of it? The lass will have no need of him once she is married. He would only be in the way of her own children,” Alasdair pointed out with the ruthless logic for which he was famous.

Colin blinked again, and wondered if Frances Balfour could be anywhere near as cold-blooded as Alasdair seemed to think her. “And you have approached the girl with your offer of protection?”

“Aye—and the stubborn lass won’t have me! She says she is still mourning her father and brothers and isn’t prepared to wed anyone until the year is out.”

“That is not unreasonable, surely,” Colin suggested. “She did lose thirty-one of her family after all.”

“Aye—aye! But they were Balfours—just bags of prideful wind. How sad could she be?”

Deciding to be direct, Colin asked: “And my role in this affair is to be what? An emissary to plead your case to Mistress Balfour?”

“Nay. ‘Twould do no good. I’ve had emissaries aplenty there and gone myself. I even offered her the
choice of my kinsmen who would take her to wife—though why she would want another when I am willing to wed her is beyond all kenning.”

Colin, noted for his tact and delicate diplomacies, did not comment.

“What I need, cousin,” the MacLeod went on. “Well, I need someone inside the castle. Someone who can earn her trust—someone to persuade her that the MacLeods are not greedy and cruel, and that she should trust me.”

The irony of this request did not seem to present itself to the MacLeod, who doubtless considered himself to be only normally ambitious and merely firm in his dealings rather than merciless.

“I see. And I am to be that person?” Colin asked. “But why? Surely there is some other who could do this.”

Alasdair shook his head. “You are dark like her father and a Lowlander as well. Mayhap that will lead to some liking. She does not seem to care for blond men.” Alasdair did not appear concerned with the fact that his proposed bride did not favor his golden looks. “Also, you have skills as an intelligencer. You Mortlocks have always been subtle and sneaky.”

That was true, though Colin rather thought of himself as being less devious than perceptive. “And MacLeods were always as stubborn and unbending as steel,” he muttered in the English tongue. He found that he was beginning to feel very sorry for this unknown Frances Balfour. A determined MacLeod was a pitiless thing indeed.

“How do you suggest inserting me into the household?” he finally asked. “Or is this for me to plan?”

“Well, cousin, there is the beauty of it. The girl has spent much of her time in the Lowlands and France, and she has acquired a taste for gowff. You are a Lowlander, too. It will serve in this instance.”

Somehow this sounded vaguely insulting, but Colin let the matter pass. All Highlanders and islanders had low opinions of those who dwelt in the Borders and the sassun lands beyond.

The rest of the plan, however, was too ridiculous to let go without comment. “Alasdair, this is a preposterous and unsensible notion. And dishonest,” Colin added scrupulously, though he knew the argument would fall on deaf ears. “What will she care about my being a sassun Lowlander? There are better ways to go about this wooing. Send her some tributes. Or let her go to the MacKays.”

“Now, laddie, don’t say that! She is likely to be my future bride—if I can get rid of that MacDonnell wench my father plighted me to. I must keep her safe until she comes to her senses. I could lay siege to Noltland, but she would not like it—and the bloody MacKays would likely be there, too. And if there are MacKays, then there will soon be Gunns. This is a much better plan—much less wasteful. You will soon come to be friends with the girl, convince her that she and the boy need my protection. And later, if she remains stubborn about marriage, you can open the gates for me and let my men in.” The treacherous betrayal of his hostess was suggested casually.

Colin reminded himself that, while he had been raised with the chivalric tales of love, the Norse had no such romantic notions to hamper them. Expediency was the order of the day.