reasons Catriona still didn’t fully understand. She knew that Zelda couldn’t bring herself to forgive her mother for being English, which, to be fair, was a sin in the eyes of many Highlanders. But Zelda had also seemed determined to believe the absurd notion that Catriona’s mother was a spy, of all things. Once, Catriona had asked her father why Auntie Zelda said her mother was a spy, and he’d given her a strange look. “Some things are better left in the past, aye?” he’d said. “You canna believe everything Zelda says, lass.”
He had not, Catriona had noted, denied it.
In spite of the ancient discord between the two women, in the last months of Zelda’s life, when she’d been ill more often than she’d felt well, Catriona’s mother had come once a week from Balhaire to sit with her. The two of them would argue about events that had occurred during their long lives, but they’d laughed, too, giggling with one another about secret things.
One of the serving women refilled Catriona’s wineglass. She drank it like water.
With all the Mackenzies crowded into the lodge, there was little room for the games Catriona had planned, and little else to occupy them. Frankly, Catriona had fallen into her cups. No, that wasn’t correct—she was swimming in her cups, an idea that made her giggle.
“There ought to be dancing,” Lottie complained, and shifted uncomfortably under the weight of the bairn she was holding. Another boy. “Something.”
“What do you mean?” Vivienne said. “You canna dance, Lottie.” She nodded to the bairn. Lottie had only recently delivered Carbrey. The birth of a second son had Catriona’s brother Aulay strutting about Balhaire like a bloody peacock.
“Aye, but you can dance,” Lottie said, nudging Vivienne. “And I should like to watch.”
“Me? I’m too old and too fat for it, that I am,” Vivienne complained, and slumped back in her chair, one hand across her belly. Bearing four children had left her with a full figure. “Bernadette will dance.”
“By myself?” Bernadette, wife of Catriona’s brother Rabbie, bent down to stir the logs in the hearth. “Shall I hum the music, as well?”
“And what of me?” Daisy asked. She was wed to Cailean, Catriona’s oldest brother. “I’m not too old for a reel.”
“Or too fat,” Lottie agreed.
“No, but your husband is too old,” Vivienne said, and nodded toward Cailean. He was seated near a brazier with their father, his legs stretched long. A tankard of ale dangled from two fingers.
“’Tis a pity that Ivor MacDonald is no’ here to dance with our Cat,” Catriona’s mother said, and smiled devilishly at her daughter.
Catriona’s inhibitions had been drowned by the good amount of wine she’d drunk, and she groaned with frustration. “You’ll no’ rest from seeing me properly wed until you meet your demise!”
“And what is wrong with that, I ask you?” her mother asked sweetly.
“Yes, what is wrong with that?” Daisy asked. “Why will you not accept Mr. MacDonald’s attentions, Cat?” she asked curiously. “He seems rather nice. And God knows, he is smitten with you.”
Ivor was a thick man, the same height as Catriona, with hair that drooped around his face. In the weeks since Zelda had died, he’d offered his condolences so many times she’d lost count. “He may smite all he likes, but I’m far too restless to tie my lot to a shipbuilder,” Catriona said imperiously, and drained the rest of the wine from her glass. Actually, his occupation had little to do with it—it was most decidedly his lack of a neck.
“I think that’s incorrect,” Lottie said, looking puzzled as Catriona held her glass up again. “He hasn’t smited you, but rather, you’re the one who’s done the smiting, are you no’?”
Catriona clucked at her. “You know verra well what I mean, aye?”
“Aye, I know verra well,” Lottie agreed. “But you’re three and thirty, Cat. Sooner or later you must accept that the last sheep at market must take the price offered or be turned to mutton.”
“Lottie!” Bernadette gasped. “What a wretched thing to say!”
Catriona gave the remark a dismissive flick of her wrist. “Aye, but it’s the truth, is it no’? I am firmly planted on the bloody shelf of spinsterhood. I’ve quite accepted I’m to remain without husband or child all my life, aye? That’s what Zelda did, and quite by choice. I know what I’m meant to do—I’m meant to carry on Auntie Zelda’s work.”
“I should like to think you are destined for something other than living at Kishorn, removed from all society,” her mother said. “You are not Zelda, after all.”
Well, that was just the thing—there was no society for her. There was nothing for her here but endless days stretching into more endless days, with nothing to occupy her but this blasted abbey in the middle of nowhere. “What society, Mamma? Do you mean the Mackenzies and all their married men? Or perhaps you mean the MacDonalds and their representative, Ivor?”
“If you don’t care for Mr. MacDonald, there is more society for you to explore,” her mother argued. “But spending all your time at Kishorn has isolated you from the world.”
“Mmm,” Catriona said skeptically. “I think I may safely say I have explored all available society in the Highlands, and like my dearly departed auntie, I’ve found it wanting, I have. And besides, the women and children of the abbey need me, Mamma. Why should I no’ have a grand purpose?” she asked, and gestured so grandly that she spilled wine onto the stone floor. “I’ve learned all that I could from Zelda. The women of the abbey have no other place to go, and I’m determined to carry on, that I am, for there is still so much to be done, and Zelda would have wanted it so. Donna try and dissuade me, Mamma.” She sat up and turned around. “Where is that serving girl?”
“Catriona, darling,” her mother pleaded.
But Catriona was in no mood to discuss her future plans. “Diah save me,” she said, and stood up, swaying when she did, and catching herself on the back of the chair before she tumbled. She was exhausted from discussing her situation. She felt as if she’d been discussing it for years and years. Poor Catriona Mackenzie, whatever will they do with her? She’s no prospects for marriage, no society, nothing to occupy her but a run-down abbey full of misfits. “I think I should like to dance, then. Is Malcolm Mackenzie about? He’s brought his pipes, I’m certain of it.”
“For the love of God, sit, Cat.” Bernadette caught Catriona’s hand and tried to tug her back into her seat. “You’re pissed—”
“I’ve scarcely had a drop!” Catriona insisted. “That’s the English in you, Bernie,” she said, and wagged a finger at her sister-in-law. “We Scots are far better dancers with a wee bit of wine in us, aye?”
“You could hurt someone,” Bernadette said, and tugged on her hand again.
“You really shouldna drink so,” Vivienne said disapprovingly.
“I shouldna drink, I shouldna dance,” Catriona said irritably. Her few drops of wine were enough to make her feel a wee bit stubborn, and she yanked her hand free of Bernadette’s. But in
