Bold (The Handfasting) (11 page)

“Aye,
Aye” the men cheered, the women sighed and wept, caught in the thrill of a courtship
unfolding.

“Ma?” 
Maggie tried once more, but her mother only shook her head.  It was Maggie’s
decision to make, and no other.  In truth, she dinna’ have a choice.

“I
will think on it.”  She hedged. 

Talorc
shook his head.  “No, Maggie, my people, our clan, they are waiting.  They want
me to bring you back with me, to settle you in amongst us before the Feast.”

“It
is not possible,” she countered “I have to be here for Fleadh nan Mairbh.  I
promised Ian.”

She’d
startled them all, judging by the mumbles and grumbles of the people.

“Maggie,”
Talorc watched her closely, “you do not invite the dead to come near.”

“He
was my twin.”

“You
have a right to your life.  His time had come, do not invite yours away.” 
Talorc spoke with caring, for everyone knew that the Feast of the Dead was a
time of caution.  It was a time to hide from the folly of those passed beyond. 
No one would court such danger. 

“It
would be more to your purpose to create new life to fill that void.  To give
your child the name of Ian, in his honor.”

“No."
She backed away from his words as the snare of them tightened.

“The
two of us, together, this very night.”

“But.
. .”

“Marry
him Maggie, Marry him . . .” The cheers rang through the hall, the stomping the
clapping the voices raised in unison to billow and settle around her.

“Not
tonight.”  She cried.

“Then
in the morn, Maggie, for we leave when the sun shows herself.”

The
chorus had died down, all eyes intent on Maggie and Talorc.

Maggie
turned to face them all.  “It is what you want?”  She cried out, one last plea
to the people.

“Oh
aye, lass,” Old Padruig played the spokesman,   “there’s no better for you or
for him!” 

“Do
you all agree?”  She shouted, bringing on another resounding cheer.  “Then I
shall do it.”  She promised with a nod of her head. “And the consequences be
upon your heads.”

Pivoting,
she faced Talorc, “In the morn.  There is too much to do tonight, if I’m to
leave at daybreak.”

He
raised their hands high as everyone joined in cries of delight.  As soon as she
could, Maggie spun away, headed toward the stairs that would take her up to her
room.  Chairs and benches scraped back as her mother and kinswomen hurried to
join her. 

They
reached her first, though Talorc was not far behind, despite the delay of those
who wished to toast his victory.

“Maggie?” 
He stopped her.

“Aye.”

“I’d
thought,” he leaned in, whispered for her ears alone, “that you would prefer to
have our first night together here, with your mother close by to attend you,
settle you.”

She
stared at him, at his lapse in conviction.

“Are
you saying I’m to be so terribly alone when away from here?”  When, not if. 
She’d given her word.

“No,”
he shook his head, frowned, “That’s not what I was saying, have no fears on
that count.  It’s just that a mother is a mother . . .”

“And
you chose to take me from mine.  So be it, if there’s any guilt in that, then
feel free to feel it.”  She snipped.

His
frown deepened, though he failed to respond.  With a tilt of her chin she
swirled away, her entourage of relations a wake of women behind her.

“Tomorrow.” 
Talorc shouted when she was halfway up the stairs.

Maggie
stopped, looked down at the man she would handfast in the morning.  
“Tomorrow,” she promised with a grim determination, so at odds with the
enthusiasm he obviously felt.

Tomorrow
she would be promised to a man, bold in his battles, both on the battlefield
and off.  Life would never be easy.  If she thought getting her own way was
difficult with her brothers and a bear of a father, winning concessions with
this man would be all the harder.  Hadn’t tonight proved that?

* * * * * * * * * *

Maggie
scrambled to hide as the earth quaked and shook about her.

“Maggie
. . . Maggie, wake darling, ‘tis time.”

Groggy
with sleep she stirred, opened her eyes.  A circle of candles surrounded her
bed, lighting the dark of the night.   Kinswomen, her mother included.  Why?

“Oh
Maggie,” Muireall swooned upon the bed.  “Are you not thrilled?  Are you not
the luckiest lass in the whole of the Highlands?”

Still
muddled, Maggie rubbed her eyes. 

“Oh
aye,” Leitis smiled, “if Nigel had courted me like that, I don’t know what
would have happened.”

“I
do!”  Sibeal brought on a chorus of laughter that the older women tried to hush
in deference to Maggie’s innocence.  Quick as the flicker of a candle, Maggie
understood why her kinswomen were here, why they spoke the way they did.

Come
daylight she would be riding away from this place, her home.  “What’s the
time?  Is it anywhere near to morning?”

“You’ve
an hour at most.”  Fiona sat beside her daughter, shooing the other women off. 

They
had all worked late into the night, deciding what Maggie could take with her,
what would need sending, what would be saved for her children.  They had teased
and sighed and ooh’d over Maggie’s fate.  Only Maggie didn’t take to the
fussing.  She remained practical; it was the only way to get through what she
needed to get through.

It
was bad enough that she would have to marry a warrior who came with the near
promise of widowhood.  God forbid she be left as hungry for male company as
Muireall.  And with a warrior, a great huge beast of a man, well . . . she
would have to be just as strong in spirit.  If not, he’d trounce her in every
manner of will-- just as he’d done last night when she was fighting for life as
she knew it.

The
worst of it was that he didn’t know her, and when he did come to see who she
really was, when all the grand stories proved to be no more than a blown up
grain of truth, would he want her?  Or, would he turn to all those other women
who swooned at the mere thought of him?

Could
she ever hope to hold a man such as Talorc the Bold?

As
if to spite Maggie’s thoughts, her mother took her hand, “He’s a splendid
man.”  Then she brushed the hair from Maggie’s forehead, a gesture of comfort
that had Maggie pulling back.  How many times in the past had her mother done
just such a thing to ease an illness, a pain or to soothe the frustrations of
the young?  But those gestures would be too far away to be of any comfort when
Maggie faced the confusion and fear of a new home.

“She’ll
be the envy of every woman?”  Caitlin cawed, unaware of the sudden wariness
between mother and daughter.

“Oh,
aye,” Siobhan responded, “he makes me quiver.”

“How
I wish I could be you on the bedding night.”  Someone else said and they all
sighed and nodded.

The
words poured around Maggie, too many to take in, too forceful to ignore. 
Confused, shaken, she lifted her head to knowing smiles.  They jostled each
other with elbows, raised eyebrows, their comments, now whispered, growing more
suggestive by the moment and suddenly Maggie found a new emotion, a new fear,
to completely overwhelm all the others she’d ever felt since meeting this man.

If
they were all so eager, why hadn’t they asked to be sacrificed?  Why hadn’t
they saved her, possibly the only woman who didn’t want to be in this place? 

Fiona
must have sensed what was happening, for she wrapped a protective arm around
her daughter's shoulders, quieting the others.

“Don’t
go frightening her, now.”  Fiona warned, but the protective care had come too
late.  Maggie yanked free of her mother's hold.

“You
knew what he was up to, didna’ you?”  She snapped and saw her mother's guilty
start.  So that was the way of it.  “Last night, before we even sat to dine,
you knew.  You led me into that, without a word of care.” 

Throwing
off the covers, she scrambled out of the far side of the bed and yelled.  “How
could ya’ do that?  How could you let him put me in that corner, where there
was no turning back no matter how I felt?”

“Oh
Maggie, I didna’ think . . .”

“You
should think!  I’m your only daughter and now I’ve no home here.  Why do I wait
to be bathed and dressed?  Why don’t I just go down there and take his hands
and make my promises and leave?  For you’ve sent me away from the only home
I’ve ever wanted to know.  To a place where who knows what waits?”

Although
she paused, to gather breath, to settle the rising hysteria, the others were
too stunned to break her momentum.

“Do
ya’ think he lived there with no woman in his bed?”  She asked.  “Do you think
I’ll have my own around me when they carry his body back, all bloodied and
broken after a battle?  Do you think I’ll be pleased with a man not of my own
choosin’?”

“Aye!” 
Angrily, Fiona broke through the shock of her daughter’s attack with a succinct
nod, “I do!”  She shouted back, rounding on Maggie.  “For the first time I’m
grateful for your brothers’ interference.  For 'tis true, no man dared court
their sister.  But your brothers would not dare to interfere with the Bold. 
Nor would I have allowed it, as I did in the past.”

She
took her daughter by the shoulders.  “He’s perfect for you Maggie, even if
you’re too fool to know it.”

They
stood, both rigid, linked by Fiona’s hands on Maggie’s shoulders when suddenly
Maggie flung herself into her mother’s arms.  “Oh mama, I’m so frightened!” 
And finally the tears came as mother and daughter clung to each other, each
full of their own sorrows for the parting.

Fiona
would lose her daughter, to fret and worry with no way of knowing how her own
little lass fared.  And Maggie, to face marriage to a stranger, to confront the
unknown, without her mother’s wisdom and care.

“Oh,
lass, you’ll be fine, you will.”  Fiona cradled her daughter’s head upon her
shoulder.  “I’d not let this happen if I thought it would be any different. 
And you remember now, if you just can’t see it in you, to give yourself to him,
then come home.  For this will be your home, forever, for always, even if you
are married with a dozen children, you are always wanted here.”

Maggie
pulled away, swiped at the tears, unaware of the quiet bustle about her as the
others prepared a bath, warmed towels, sorted out the best of her plaids with
discreet peeks at the two women.

“Mama?” 
Maggie asked, now needing to know the whole of it.  “What is it you mean by
giving myself?  Talorc said the same thing, that if I give myself then we are
truly wed, but if we Handfast . . . mama?  Why do you look that way?  What am I
saying that you . . .”

“No,”
Fiona rushed, “no don’t be thinking anything, I was just surprised.  A mother
doesn’t imagine it’s possible to raise a daughter, with so many older brothers,
in a place as busy as our home . . . well . . . where people are so careless
with what they say,” Fiona put her arm around Maggie, guided her away from the
others, toward the window-- still inky black with night, “It’s just that a
mother does not expect her daughter to be quite so innocent of thought.”

"You
didna’ look so much surprised as . . .”

“But
I was surprised.”  Fiona broke in.

“You’re
also thinking to use your words to your advantage, or is it to his advantage?” 
Maggie startled herself by realizing.  “I’m thinking you’ve his interest in
mind over my own.”

“Never.” 
Fiona snapped, “Never.”  She repeated more calmly.  “Though ‘tis true, I often
wonder if you know what’s best for you.”

“That
doesn’t answer my question.”  Maggie badgered.

“About
giving yourself?”

“Aye,
you ken that’s what I’m wanting to know.”

“Well,”
Fiona lifted her chin, “you’ve heard the women talk about the wedding night?”

“Aye,
I know all about that.  That’s when he takes me to wife.”

“You
know what takes place?”

Maggie
snorted in disgust, “You are right on that mother.  This place is not quiet
about such things, nor do the animals care to go into hiding when it comes to
mating.  But what does that have to do with giving myself?  A husband has
rights and he takes them.  An animal has instincts and they follow them.  So
what of me?”

“You,”
Fiona said with conviction, “have a heart to give or to withhold.  You do according
to your heart, you give to your husband, absolutely, or you withhold.  Let your
heart decide, not your husband.  He cannot take what you do not give.”

“Is
that it?”  Maggie sagged upon the window ledge, and welcomed the freshness of
the fall breeze as it brushed over her and rustled her hair.  There was clarity
in its coolness.  “A matter of my heart?”