laird’s glance rested on me for a moment, as though attempting to read my motives. “I suppose we could.” With a heavy sigh, he said, “All right, then. Ailie, you make up the beds. Christie, you’ll sleep with Roses. Effie, you’ll see to the lass—the shoulder of her tunic is stained with fresh blood. She appears to be injured. You’ll tend to the lass’s wound. Kade, you’ll check in at regular intervals during the night.”
Once, it might have occurred to me to question or protest this blatantly inappropriate scenario of sleeping in the adjoining chambers of a man, and one I barely knew. In fact, I felt wildly relieved. I wouldn’t be cast out. And I could be near him, this warrior whose blood had mingled with my own and whose eyes and mouth and fingers had already provoked a longing in me that I could neither explain nor deny.
Effie began to gather her equipment.
One of Wilkie’s sisters went ahead, through the door of the adjoining chambers, and the other helped me extricate myself from Wilkie’s grip. She took my arm. “Come, Roses. We’ll show you to your bed.”
“First,” said Kade, “we’ll divest you of your weapons.”
The abundant weaponry slung across his body, along with his size and slightly wild-eyed look, was wholly daunting as he approached me. I did as he asked. I removed my belt, holding it out, along with my small sword and knife. Kade grabbed the lot.
I remembered Laird Ogilvie’s officers’ passing descriptions, then, of the Mackenzies. Lethal. Armed to the teeth.
Aye, Kade Mackenzie was armed to the teeth. But his blue eyes appeared more curious than cutting; he seemed mildly intrigued by this unusual turn of events and at Wilkie’s sudden desire to have me close. “Your weapons,” he said, “will remain in our care.”
“I trust your accommodation will be suitable,” said the laird, nodding once in a brief bid good-night. The gesture was polite, oddly, and somewhat foreign to me; it was the gesture of a nobleman, and one that might be delivered to a woman of his own class. Something I was most definitely not. It occurred to me then that he wasn’t aware of my lowly status. Tomorrow the truth would be told, but tonight, I would enjoy the plush chambers of the privileged few.
* * *
THE ANTECHAMBER WAS a long, narrow room with a stone-bound window seat at one end, generously adorned with fur cushions. At the opposite end of the room was a fireplace, laid with a recently lit fire. Two single beds were being draped with thick, luxurious coverings. Merely the sight of a warm fur-piled bed amplified my fatigue.
Now, in the close quarters, I could get a better look at Wilkie’s sisters. I had noticed immediately the strong family resemblance between the Mackenzie siblings. His sisters were indeed quite beautiful. Both regarded me with blatant curiosity.
“I’m Ailie, Roses. And this is Christie.”
“Roses,” said Christie, the younger sister, whose manner was open and vivacious. She took my hand. “’Tis a pleasure to meet you. However do you find yourself in Wilkie’s bed? You’ll be the envy of legions.” She was exquisitely petite, and her hair was a minky shade of dark brown, which she wore loose so it waved gently around her shoulders. Her eyes were an unusual shade of light blue and sparkled with a hint of mischief. Eager questions bubbled out of her, as though she couldn’t contain them. “You must tell us the story. What has happened? And where did you come from?”
“Stop interrogating her, Christie,” scolded Ailie. She was the taller of the two, slim and elegant in the way she held herself. Her more reserved manner suggested she was the elder sister. Her black hair was swept up in a fashionably braided twist. And her eyes were such a deep shade of blue, they might have been described as violet. “We’ll talk of all that tomorrow. Roses needs to have her injury treated, and she needs sleep. Here, Roses, lie here on this bed so Effie can look at your wound.”
I lay on the bed, so very grateful for its warmth and its softness.
Effie came to me, setting down her tray filled with teas and medicines, bandages and ointments. As she leaned over me, I looked more closely at her face for the first time. She was perhaps twice my age, short and rounded, with a busy bunch of red curls framing her kind, pink face. “Can you sit up, dear? I’ll need to remove your tunic. And the oversize trews you wear, whatever for I wouldn’t guess at. I daresay you look like you’ve been through the wars.”
I could hear Kade and the laird in Wilkie’s adjoining chambers, in quiet discussion. Then the door closed.
Effie helped me remove my outer clothing. I made sure to keep my back hidden, aware of my tattoo, as always, and careful not to reveal it. My hair still hung loose, covering me, and I lay back as Effie attended to me. She treated and bound my wound, chattering gently of its successful healing thus far, despite the blood. She described her methods as she worked, to make me feel at ease, perhaps, as Ailie and Christie watched intermittently, and attended to tidying up the room. And I was grateful for their chipper yet restful presence. Effie gave me some tea and a dose of medicine. She felt my forehead and expressed concern at the warmth, but she hoped that the medicine was administered in time, that it would override the beginnings of any danger. Then she tucked the furs to my neck and patted them.
“’Tis brief, your underclothing,” she whispered, putting her face close to mine. “But ’twill hardly be an issue, lassie.” She was smiling kindly, with only a hint of chiding curiosity. She seemed to be most entertained by the near-scandal of my presence in Wilkie’s antechamber and pleased to be privy to the drama of it. “Ailie and Christie will find clothing for you on the morrow. Something more...suitable.”
I wanted to thank her for the offer and assure all of them than it wouldn’t be necessary; I would be on my way on the morrow, if I could just get some bread. Some pears, maybe. But I was asleep before I could even get the words out.
* * *
“ROSES.”
The darkness was too thick, the sleep too deep.
“Roses.”
I sat straight up, utterly bewildered. For the briefest, panicked moment, I thought I might be in Ogilvie’s dungeon, cast forever into the fetid gloom for my brazen desertion. My mind flashed then to the cave. Was I alone? But I could see now: the pattern of the stone-laid floor near the dying embers of the fire. The shadowy outlines of the bed and the room.
“Angel, where are you?” came the muffled, husky murmur. “Come back to me.”
My awareness settled into place. I could see that Christie was asleep in her own bed; she didn’t stir. I eased myself from the warm cocoon of my furs and went to the door of Wilkie’s private chambers. It was unlocked. No one was with him, and his chambers were quiet. I entered and closed the door behind me. Wilkie lay in his bed, his eyes closed, but he was writhing slightly, murmuring. His hair was in disarray and damp from his own sweat.
I went to him and held my hand to his forehead. Still feverish.
At the touch of my hand to his skin, his eyelids fluttered but did not open. He groaned softly in a spoken word. “Roses.”
“Here I am, warrior,” I whispered to him, leaning close. Wilkie’s room was dark save the flickering light of a fire that had been loaded with wood, to keep the room warm for him. But it was too warm, I thought. He was overheated. I pulled the furs down from his chest, draping them back over his bandaged side, to his waist.
I
