Highland Grace (35 page)

* * *

Lady Maclean sat down on the edge of
Jesslyn’s bed and handed the note to her. She anxiously watched the
emotions race across the younger woman’s face as she read it.

Jesslyn’s eyes were riveted on the final
words of the note.
“Fare you well,”
Branwenn had written,
“You will be for evermore in my heart and in my thoughts.”
There was such finality in the words and in the tone, as if
Branwenn expected that they’d not be seeing each other ever again.
Dropping her arm onto her lap, Jesslyn limply held the letter in
her hand. “But why?” she asked at last. “Why would she surrender
herself into this man’s control when our allies are on their way to
aid our cause?”

Maryn, who had been standing a bit away while
Jesslyn read Branwenn’s note, came over to settle on the other side
of her, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.

Lady Maclean took the missive from Jesslyn’s
limp fingers and placed it on the bed beside them. She glanced at
Maryn and then turned her gaze once more to Jesslyn, her mouth
forming into a grim line. “I had hoped to tell you of this on the
morrow,” she finally said, “after you’d had a bit more rest.”

Jesslyn sat up straight, alarm filling her
countenance. “Wha—”

“One of Laird Donald’s scouts arrived earlier
this day with word from the Maclean fortress.”

Jesslyn’s heart leapt into her throat.
Swallowing past the pounding swell of fear that lodged there, she
grasped the older woman’s arm and rasped, “Aye?”

Lady Maclean placed her hand over that of her
granddaughter-in-law’s and soothed it with a soft caress. “One of
my grandsons was injured and is now battling a deadly fever.”

Jesslyn released her hold on the other
woman’s arm and blindly reached up, taking hold of Maryn’s hand
instead. “The scout knew not which of our husbands is ill?”

“Nay,” Lady Maclean replied sadly. “I believe
Branwenn went to the prince’s camp in order to end the siege and
get inside the fortress to see her brothers.”

“Then we must go home as well,” Maryn said
anxiously.

“We cannot. We must first hear that the siege
is done or we risk all our lives,” Lady Maclean cautioned.

“When will we learn if he has withdrawn his
army?” Jesslyn asked.

“Laird Donald sent a scout back to the
battleground the moment he read Branwenn’s missive. If all goes
well, we should know by the morrow. But ‘twill be late in the day,
I fear, for the negotiations will take several hours and he must
wait to find out their terms in order to relay them to Laird
Donald,” Lady Maclean replied.

“So we may be able to leave day after next?”
Jesslyn asked.

Lady Maclean nodded and patted her
granddaughter-in-law’s hand. “Aye. That is as I surmise, but do not
be surprised if they will not allow us to return for several more
days. They may want to bury the fallen soldiers and clear the war
debris before we arrive.”

* * *

Prince Llywelyn sat inside his tent that eve
going over tactical maneuvers with his marshal. He regarded the
drawing of the Maclean fortress, endeavoring to find any weakness
he might have missed the many past times he’d studied the
illustration. “We must break through that wall!” he said harshly,
slamming his fist on the table in frustration. “The demons have
thus far managed to tumble two of my siege towers with their
mangonel.” He looked up, his eyes drilling into those of the other
man. “Destroy that mangonel! ‘Tis the only way we’ll get close
enough to the wall to use the battering ram on it.”

“Aye, Your Highness,” the marshal replied
gravely. “We’ve attempted such already, but as yet to no avail.
We’ll be successful this next attempt, I assure you, now that the
perrier is built. The engine is easily set again and is quick to
fire, Your Highness.”

“Pound the thing with it, then. And protect
the men who man the sling with a hundred bowmen.”

“Aye, Your Highness.”

A shrill screech came from just outside the
tent followed by the sound of an angered girl’s voice. “I have
already surrendered, you idiot! Cease twisting my arm from its
socket!”

The prince and his marshal looked toward the
entry to the tent just as a girl in humble dress was thrust inside,
followed by one of the men assigned to guard the camp. “On your
knees before the Prince!” he stormed.

Branwenn fell forward, taking all her weight
onto her knees and hands, her wrists bent and her fingers snapped
back almost to their breaking point. “Owww!” she yelped, and then,
unable to hold her weight with her injured wrists, collapsed face
down in the dirt.

“Pardon, Your Highness,” the guard rushed to
say, “but this youth claims to be your cousin, the Lady Branwenn,
but I think it the newest plot by the devil Macleans to spy upon
us.”

Branwenn gingerly lifted herself up, first
onto her elbows and then up into a sitting position resting back on
her calves and the undersides of her feet. “I
am
Branwenn
Maclean,” she said forcefully, rubbing the bitter sting from her
sprained appendages. “This is no sinister device to steal your war
secrets, I swear it.” Branwenn gazed at her cousin, this prince who
held her life, her fate, in his hands and was amazed to see that he
was not the demon she’d expected him to be. He was quite handsome,
in fact. And not at all the aged man with the graying hair and
beard that her mind had envisaged all these moons. His hair was
dark, like hers, and he did not shave the bristles from above his
upper lip, instead allowing them to grow in long strips from just
under his nose to either side of his jawline, making an arrow
effect. His eyebrows vee’d, much like her own, above dark,
penetrating eyes. He wore a tunic of the finest scarlet, trimmed in
saffron, over mail armor, the hood of which rested on his shoulders
and back. A crown of gold perched atop the short-cropped mass of
hair on his head, intimidating her more than she was willing to
admit, even to herself.

The prince sat back in his chair and lazily
stretched one leg out straight in front of him under the trestle
table he sat behind. There was a long scroll of parchment with a
drawing on it which he held open in front of him using his forearms
as braces against the curling edges. Unfortunately, it was too far
away for Branwenn to see clearly, but she suspected it might be an
image of her family’s castle.

“I’ve come to surrender myself into your
hands, so you may end the siege of my home.”

Prince Llywelyn looked first to the guard and
then to his marshal and cocked his head in the direction of the
entrance. “Leave me with this youth.” As the two men made their
departures, he studied her. “Why dress you so meanly, lady?” he
said at last. And then, looking past her out through the opening of
the tent, he queried her further, “And where be your Highland
protectors? Had they not courage enough to meet me face-to-face
when they surrendered their prize?” He glared down at the map in
front of him. “There must be some secret passage that allowed
exit,” he mumbled, evidently to himself.

“My brothers know not of my purpose,
Your...Highness,” she said, struggling past the appellation.

Prince Llywelyn looked up from his musings
and gave Branwenn a piercing look.

“With some bit of stealth and cunning did I
leave from my safe haven at the Donald keep. It required that I
clothe myself in the guise of a villein,” she explained.

Prince Llywelyn sat forward. “Your Highland
brothers
”—he sneered when he said the word—“defied the codes
of chivalry and hid my prize from me?” he growled.

“Nay! You mustn’t believe them unchivalrous,
Your Highness. They only sought to protect me, and their ladies,
until the victor of the siege was named. Surely, you can see that a
besieged fortress is not a place for lady wives and their bairns,
nor a dearly loved sister and her aged grandmother.”

Prince Llywelyn relaxed back once more. “Aye,
I can see the wisdom in that decision.
If
it was, as you
say, only for the duration of the siege, and not a ploy to keep me
from my prize.”

Branwenn bristled. “I beg you,
Your
Highness
, cease labeling me your
prize!
Else, I swear, I
shall not remain the calm lady you see before you now.”

Amused, by the girl’s show of spine, one side
of Prince Llywelyn’s mouth quirked in a smile. “This, then, is how
you behave when you are calm? My bones quake at what may be your
behavior when you are truly roused, then,
my prize
,” he
provoked. She was a beauty, he was pleased to discover. Not tall,
and very slight. Seemingly too delicate to have made it here on her
own. The fine bones of her face set into stark contrast her large
violet, tip-turned eyes and fleshy red mouth. Her hair was still
covered by a hood, but her brows and lashes were as dark as pitch
in color. Just as her mother’s had been. Aye, Gaiallard de Montfort
would be pleased with his bride. And the more pleased this relation
to the Earl of Pembroke was in his match, the greater the bond
between the two families, which could only translate into more
power for the Prince of Gwynedd.

Branwenn’s cheeks flamed with ire. She stood
up, even though he’d not given her leave to do so as yet. “Is this
how it is to be then?” she asked, her fingers curling into fists
inside her chafed palms. “I am chattel and will be treated as
such?”

“Nay, lady, not mere chattel, but something
of much greater worth. For, with your union to the Earl of
Pembroke’s nephew, I will gain the means by which to extend my
realm.”

“And so I am to play the pawn in your plot,”
she stated stiffly. “This...this nephew to whom I am to pledge my
troth...is he to be so ill-used as well? Or does he also gain from
this match born of avarice?”

“It is not only greed that drives me in this
contract I draw with the march lord, lady. The Cambrian people have
suffered greatly at the hands of the Norman invaders. I seek to put
our land, our people, back under the control of the natives. That
is my first, and most desired, purpose,” the prince explained. “The
man I seek to wed you to is Gaiallard de Montfort. And he gains
what you gain as well: A vast demesne, its fortress, and
jurisdiction over its tenants.”

Branwenn’s heart nearly leapt from her chest.
She’d believed her new husband would be a member of the march
lord’s household. She hadn’t expected to be responsible for her own
house. Not in Cambria. She had no knowledge of that land’s customs,
nor what would be expected of the lady of the holding. “I...” she
started hoarsely. She cleared her throat. “I am expected to be lady
of a keep in a strange land? Does this man know I was not raised a
lady? Have, in fact, only just this past year begun my training?
Surely, he will be greatly disappointed in me, Your Highness.”

A twinkle came into Prince Llywelyn’s eye as
he regarded her. “Gaiallard is full aware of your upbringing, lady,
fear you not. And I am more than certain that he will be quite
pleased with you, lady skills or nay.”

Branwenn’s shoulders drooped. She sighed and
nodded, saying, “Then the siege is done? You’ll send a messenger at
first light to convey that I have surrendered?”

Prince Llywelyn nodded. “Aye, lady. And
pleased I am that we will for home so soon since my arrival
here.”

“But I will be allowed to say my farewells to
my family before we depart?” she hastened to ask.

“Aye. And forget you not, your brother, Reys,
is prisoned in that fortress you call home. I shan’t leave this
land without his company.”

“Worry not, Your Highness. My brothers have
not harmed your cousin, you shall see.”

“
You
are my cousin as well, fair lady,
forget you not,” Prince Llywelyn admonished gently. He hadn’t
expected to like the girl quite so much, but she was such a
charming mix of beauty and fire, so full of spirit and wit, he
found himself completely enchanted by her. Aye, she’d bring him
what he desired, and in not so distant a time.

* * *

“Christ’s Bones!” Daniel shouted as he
released his grip on his brother’s wounded thigh. He and Derek had
been attempting to hold Bao still while Daniel tried to inspect the
gaping gash left from the arrowhead his brother had yanked from his
groin area where his thigh met his pelvis. “Even in his slumber,
Bao will not allow me to tend this wound!” He looked up, into the
worried face of his second lieutenant. “And that is the one, I
fear, that is causing his fevered stupor.”

Derek nodded grimly. “There is a stench of
putrefaction in that region.”

“Aye, it festers, that is certain.” Speaking
through clenched teeth, he ground out, “I should not have waited so
long to tend it.”

“It could not be helped,” Derek consoled.
“The whoreson prince sends his first volley earlier and earlier
each day, and the battle was already raging by the time we
discovered your brother had not come from his chamber this morn. We
could not bear losing another commander.”

Knowing Derek spoke the truth, Daniel nodded,
sighing. But it still did not sooth the raging guilt he felt. “He
must have received this arrow the same day he got the other one in
his chest, but he never told me of it,” he said finally. Agitated,
he ran his fingers through his hair. “I should have realized when
he became dizzy last eve that he was ill, but he’d had
uisge
beatha
with our meal and I thought him only a bit sotted.” He
glanced at Derek, smiling slightly in spite of his worry, as he
explained, “‘Tis truth that he does not hold his spirits well,”
before turning his gaze back on his brother and somberly
continuing, “I discovered the wound when I helped him to his
chamber and then out of his chain and hose.”

“Did he not allow you to tend it then?”

Daniel shook his head. “Nay. He had it bound
in a bloody rag, but said ‘twas only a scratch, that ‘twould heal
on its own without my tending it.”