of sheep and a strong alliance.’
Her words cut too close to the truth. ‘Careful, Fergusson. Who is twisting words now? The deal we made was a matter of diplomacy between your father and me, made by consenting parties—’
‘We’re not consenting. You merely starve our bellies until we feel as if the starvation is somehow our fault! These games you suggest aren’t a compromise, they’re coercion!’
‘I am Colquhoun. I am laird. I do not coerce!’
She smiled. ‘Of course you wouldn’t, how silly of me. We are only here for your pleasure.’
Shaking his head, he looked around. Their words were not going unnoticed. They were outside the gates now, past the camp and too near the village. There were no benches and tables here, but freshly cooked food lay on carts. Many villagers were taking the food and carrying it to the communal tables. Too many villagers who walked slowly and could hear their every heated word.
Bram ran his hand through his hair. Frustrating Fergusson! Did she not know women were meant to be gentle? To smile? To be meek? That was what was needed today, a biddable female. She was unexpected. And he was constantly guessing with her. It wasn’t only her beauty he couldn’t ignore, it was the mystery of her. How she hesitated around her siblings and clan.
How she ignored his status as laird and his coaxing smiles. How she angered at his reasoning. Frustrating female!
He was again brought to a point he didn’t want to be with her. So quick to lose his patience. She put him in a position of defence again and he would not have it. ‘Are you saying you doona want this competition?’
Lioslath pointed to the village. ‘Aren’t we walking so I can show you what you so generously want to improve?’
He’d get no further with her. Stubbornness. She might have eaten, but he hadn’t. He eyed their offered food, but the colour of the pottage wasn’t appetising, so he grabbed two of their rolls and some boar.
Following Lioslath, he took a bite of the bread and quickly spat it out lest he risk breaking a tooth.
‘Bread not fresh enough for you?’
‘Nae, ’tis fine.’ No bread should have stones and pottage shouldn’t be grey. But he wouldn’t admit that. She believed he liked easy and thought him pampered. Confirming this idea wouldn’t get her agreement to the rest of his intentions for today.
The feast was only the beginning of mending relations with this clan. It would take the games event to truly achieve cooperation. Then his plan to remain for the winter would be secure.
As if she knew he lied about the bread, Lioslath smirked and hurried her steps towards the village.
* * *
Restless, agitated and still too far away from her forest, Lioslath wanted the afternoon to end. It wasn’t only Bram and his demands, it was their clans observing each other, observing her and Bram. Though she was outside, she felt trapped. Trapped by the role here that she didn’t know how to do and trapped by her longing to be better.
Barely keeping her temper, she pointed to the roofs, and to the wood rot. Talked of the ploughing still to do in the fields and the trenching through the village. All needing to be done before the dirt froze.
Bram asked questions, and she knew he missed nothing. She felt the familiar prick to her pride. Fergusson keep and land were falling apart.
It hadn’t always been so. When she was a child, her parents had worked tirelessly and the keep had been beautiful; the clan had been prosperous.
Then the wolves had come and raided the village right before a sudden frost descended. The wheat harvesting hadn’t yet been completed and most of the bales of oats and barley hadn’t been stored properly. They suffered too much as the harsh winter continued. Suffered more with her mother’s cough and sudden death.
They’d never suffered a winter like that again, but they never recovered from it either. Her father most of all.
As the years went by her father took riskier chances. Desperation to recover what they lost engulfed his every action. The marriage to the Colquhoun clan was simply another attempt. When the letters of agreement occurred, when her father left to secure his bride, he regained some pride. His sense of purpose, of optimism, returning.
But Clan Fergusson was cursed. For when her father returned from that fateful trip to Colquhoun land, he had no bride. Determined, desperate, he left again and never returned. Then Bram sent his letter offering help, but he never came. When the English garrison stormed the keep in July, they’d been too vulnerable to withstand the demands. The English caused far worse damage than an ice storm. They arrived just as the barley was harvested and they stayed to harvest the oats and wheat before burning the rest.
The clan was gleaning for remains when the Colquhouns arrived. Lioslath had had enough.
She was tired of being told she didn’t understand. She was sick of feeling as though she didn’t understand. She did understand. Laird Colquhoun wrote a letter saying he’d come with aid, but then days, weeks, months had gone by.
So it was up to her to help her clan. She hunted; she provided food. She confronted the English until they left and she intended to confront Bram until he left as well.
She thought closing the gates would be enough. She thought giving supplies to the English would be enough. She failed on both accounts. She wasn’t ruthless like her father, or gentle like her mother. Bram’s very presence was a bitter reminder of how inadequate she was.
When they turned a corner and she saw her siblings playing with Donaldo’s children, she couldn’t go any further. She couldn’t walk through her land with the weight of Bram’s pity on her shoulders like this. It would only be worse if he saw she couldn’t talk properly to her siblings as well.
‘I’m leaving!’ she said, turning away from the villagers and their clans. Turning away from the decimated fields and the derelict keep, and a Colquhoun laird who noticed everything.
His eyes widened in warning, but she marched around him. She didn’t need to see him to know he followed her. It was simply that awareness. Like when he spoke, the low timbre of his voice. It was something that curled inside her. She hated her acute awareness of him almost as much as she hated his accusations and pity.
All day she walked beside him, answered his questions and talked to her clan. All day she watched him. As a huntress, she admired how a man his size strode so stealthily, so deadly and silently.
She shivered. Why was she noticing him? Of everyone she had ever known, why did she feel this...desire for him?
She couldn’t avoid it now. It wasn’t hunger and it wasn’t weakness. Her body was acutely aware of him. After all those weeks of watching him, she knew that her eyes were no longer filled with hate, but something like admiration. For Laird Colquhoun!
* * *
She was almost out of breath by the time they reached the forest on the south side. The forest was deeper and darker here. It was her favourite part of her land and one she could not see from the Fergusson keep.
A few steps inward and she smelled the musty earth and the sharp bite of autumn’s leaves. The smell was freedom
