they’d met on her journey here from her home and clan. Nearing manhood, Tavis never shunned Ciara’s attentions or company, even though most young men that age would have. At least not until this last year, when something had clearly happened between them—something that had widened the gap.
‘I had such hopes of him acknowledging his feelings for her and saying so by now,’ Margriet, Rurik’s wife, said.
‘He watches her even when he does not realise it,’ Jocelyn offered. ‘But ’tis time for him to step forward and claim her.’
‘Before it is too late,’ Marian whispered, knowing that once Ciara left on her journey there would be little or no opportunity to stop the coming marriage.
Or mayhap it was? Or they were wrong in their belief that he was the right match for Ciara? Her heart worried so much for her beloved daughter and for the things Ciara did not, and hopefully would never, know about her true parentage.
Because of those secrets of the past, Ciara’s wealth had been inherited from a settlement made by Marian’s brother, the laird of the Robertsons. It was a powerful enticement for offers of marriage, as was her connection to the influential Robertsons and to the powerful MacLeries. There had been a number of offers, each met with polite uninterest on her daughter’s part.
However, about two months before, Ciara had suddenly accepted the match with young Jamie Murray. Marian knew that something had happened to make her resigned to marry, but no amount of questioning got an explanation. Unwilling to force it from her, Marian accepted her silence on the matter and hoped for the best.
Jocelyn stood then and lifted her cup, waiting for the rest of the women gathered there to do the same. Though she felt little hope that true love would win out in this situation, she raised hers and fought off the tears that threatened.
‘To the best husband for our beloved Ciara,’ Jocelyn offered.
‘To the best!’ the others chimed in, touching the rims of their cups and then drinking from them to seal the words.
Marian drank the contents of her cup in one mouthful and shook her head. She did not have a good feeling about this or about Ciara’s happiness. ‘From your mouth to the Almighty’s ears,’ she said, offering up a prayer that He would pay attention to a mother’s earnest prayer for a beloved daughter.
Chapter Three
Ciara could not stop herself from seeking him out in the crowd. This feast was in her honour and she’d hoped against hope that Tavis would attend, but once more, she was foolish to harbour such desires. They’d not spoken since that humiliating night and she’d not had the courage to approach him since. Even if she wished to admit that he’d been right about her infatuation with him, she could not take the step to tell him so. Now though, as she prepared to take this next huge step in her life and begin to move from this clan to another, she wanted to speak of it—to remove it from plaguing her thoughts and her heart as she left the MacLeries.
Elizabeth sat at her side and Ciara smiled when her friend touched her hand in silent acknowledgement of her sadness. It was a sign of her faithfulness as a friend, even when she knew not the whole truth of the matter.
‘You need only tell your parents you do not wish this match to go ahead and they will find a way out of it, Ciara,’ she whispered.
‘I know that. My parents would not force me into a marriage I did not want, Elizabeth. But Tavis was right when he said I must grow up and seek an appropriate marriage.’
The words sounded calm and very mature, but they burned her tongue with their bitterness. Doing the adult thing and accepting and liking it were two different matters and she feared the second would come much more slowly than the first had. Worse, her parents’ efforts to find her a suitable husband had not slowed one bit, despite her efforts to break three betrothals. The feeling that she was being pushed away grew, even though she knew they loved her.
However, a Robertson girl raised by the MacLerie clan was never really part of either family. That fact was hard to ignore.
‘This match has much to offer both clans,’ she repeated the line she’d used before, this time as much for herself as for Elizabeth.
Elizabeth squeezed her hand and smiled. ‘If you are certain, then?’
‘I needed only to see that my feelings were just the ones from my days as a bairn,’ Ciara explained as she tamped down any reaction to Tavis’s entrance into the hall. ‘’Twas never true love.’
Her heart pounded so hard she was certain Elizabeth and anyone within ten feet of her could hear it, but they did not react to it as she did. Ciara had mastered the skill of forcing her wayward and inexperienced heart to ignore Tavis, but as he caught her gaze and nodded at her, her stomach joined in, revealing how much he did yet affect her, tightening and threatening to expel the few morsels of her dinner that she had eaten.
She could have, and she would have, regained control if he had walked in the opposite direction or if he’d called out to someone across the large room. But when he made his way over to where she sat with Elizabeth and some other young women of the clan, there was no way to do it.
‘Elizabeth, Margaret, Ailsa, Lilidh,’ he said nodding to each of her kinswomen or friends as he named them. Then he turned his gaze to her. ‘Ciara.’
He smiled at her and she did the same. For a moment, he looked on her as he always had, at least, as he had before that humiliating night. Tavis held out his hand to her.
‘May I speak with you, Ciara?’ She nodded as she stood, willing, though not expecting, this at all. She clutched her hands, trying to calm the trembling that shook them and revealed his effect on her to anyone observing.
‘Certainly, Tavis. Have you eaten yet?’ she asked.
Ciara always remembered her duties even as she allowed him to lead her away from her friends. He shook his head in reply, so she nodded at the tables that were bursting with foods of all kinds. Ciara pointed to an open place on a bench and they sat. Her chest hurt from the tension in her, her throat and mouth grew dry and she tried to remember how to think.
So much for putting her feelings for him in their proper place.
One of the servants brought over a platter, another brought over a mug of ale and soon Tavis had food and drink enough to feed an army. She watched the dancing while waiting for him to eat before expecting him to speak. They’d shared many meals in the past, but somehow she knew that this one was different. Several people walked by, offering her their best wishes, though none remained long. Finally, Tavis finished eating, took the just-filled cup and turned to her.
‘I want to wish you well in this betrothal,’ he said, his voice low and deep. ‘And I wanted to explain why—’
She shook her head, stopping his words. ‘You were right, Tavis,’ she admitted while glancing away. Saying the words somehow confirmed it in her own heart. ‘My feelings were childish. I have spent the last year regretting what I did.’
He took her hand in his, pulling her gaze back to his, and smiled at her. Her heart pounded from the intensity of his gaze and she swallowed, trying to lessen the tightness in her throat.
