Moon Craving (33 page)

Scotland's king did not send a messenger to his favored laird, Talorc of the Sinclairs, in reply to his laird's latest words. He came himself. To meet the woman that inspired such loyalty, he said. Though, it soon became clear he had a secondary motive.

He wanted Barr to rule the Donegal clan until young Circin had been trained and reached an age to lead the smaller clan.

Talorc left the choice up to Barr. Barr accepted with the stipulation that Osgard could come with him. The old warrior had admitted to setting both Talorc's horse after Abigail and putting pebbles on the stairs so she would trip. It was clear from his rambling confession that the old man had begun to confuse the present with the past.

He had not intended Abigail serious harm, though both pranks could have resulted in her death. He had wanted to show Talorc what a liability she was to the clan, so he would petition to the king for dissolution of the marriage.

Talorc wanted to kill him, but Abigail pleaded for mercy, and Barr's suggestion was accepted as a workable compromise. Barr left with the four Donegal youths a week after the king.

Una left two days later, after once again countermanding one of Abigail's orders.

Talorc overheard this time and took immediate exception, sending the housekeeper back to her family's clan, since the widow had joined the Sinclairs through marriage. Word came a couple of months later that Una had married, taking on a widower with four children under the age of six, and was blissfully happy.

Abigail enjoyed sharing responsibilities with Guaire as seneschal too much to take over Una's position completely, so she promoted one of the other cooks and was well pleased with the results.

But nothing was more pleasing than the gift of each day with her beloved Talorc.

Her werewolf was the most amazing and wonderful man that had ever lived, she was sure of it. And she was so very, very grateful that she was his mate. She did not understand it, but miracles were by their nature incomprehensible.

She only knew that far from being cursed as others might claim because of her deafness, she was blessed with this rare gift of life and love.

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CHILDREN OF THE MOON SERIES

Moon Awakening

by Lucy Monroe

Available now from Berkley Sensation!

"And so the werewolf carried the lass off and neither was ever heard from again."

Joan's sepulcher tones faded as the dark shadows in the kitchen reached out to wrap around the two young women listening so avidly to her every word.

Emily Hamilton tried to imagine being carried off into the wilds by a werewolf, or being carried off anywhere for that matter, but couldn't. She was nineteen, well past the age when most ladies were married, or even dowered into a convent. She would spend her life as her stepmother's drudge.

She sighed. Not even a werewolf would risk Sybil's wrath to carry Emily off.

"Are there truly werewolves in the Highlands?" her younger stepsister, Abigail, asked in careful Gaelic.

Joan shook her head, nary a wisp of her gray hair peeking from the housekeeper's wimple she wore. "Nay, lass. Though if ever there were a place such monsters might thrive, it would be that harsh and hilly land."

"I thought you said the Highlands were beautiful," Emily inserted, her own Gaelic more natural than Abigail's.

But that was hardly a surprise. Her younger sister speaking at all was the result of Abigail's tenacity. When the fever had almost taken her life three years before, it
had
taken her hearing. It had also destroyed what existed of family harmony in Emily's home.

Deafness was considered a sign of the damned by some and a curse by most.

Sybil made it clear that she would have preferred her daughter had died rather than be so afflicted. Overnight, Abigail had gone from being an asset her stepmother counted on to advance her own place in the world to a problem best avoided. It was left to Emily to coax her younger stepsister back to health and into living amidst the household again.

Out of fear that Abigail would be rejected by the rest of the keep like she had been by her own mother, Emily had done her best to hide her sister's affliction. The younger girl had helped, working hard to learn to read lips and continue speaking as if she heard the voices around her.

So far, the deception had succeeded. Few people within the keep knew of the fifteen-year-old's inability to hear.

"It's a beautiful place, or so my mother always told me . . . but a harder land to live in. Och . . . The clans are so wild, even the women know how to fight."

Emily thought it sounded like a magical place.

An hour later, the rest of the family and the servants were in bed. Everyone, that was, except her father and stepmother. They were in the great hall talking. Emily was usually the last of the family to go to bed and she burned with curiosity to know what was important enough to keep her parents from their slumber.

She stopped at the top of the stairs leading to the great hall and moved into the shadows. Eavesdropping might not be ladylike, but it was a good way to satisfy her curiosity and her need to stay informed of her father and stepmother's plans. Too many others depended on her to protect them from Sybil's machinations and her father's cold indifference to their welfare.

"Surely, Reuben, you cannot expect to send Jolenta!" her stepmother cried.

"The king's order is quite explicit, madam. We are to send a daughter of marriageable age to this laird in the Highlands."

Emily ducked behind a small table, making herself as diminutive as possible. It was not difficult. Much to her personal chagrin, she was not precisely tall. It was a fact tossed at her by Sybil often. She had no "regal bearing," as befitting the daughter of a landholding baron. She supposed there was nothing regal about hiding behind a table, no matter how tall she might have been. And that was that.

"Jolenta is far too young to be married," stormed Sybil.

"She has fourteen years. Emily's mother was a year younger when I married her."

Sybil, Emily knew, hated any mention of her husband's first wife, and responded with acid. "And a baby can be betrothed in the cradle. Many girls are wed when they are a mere twelve years, but almost as many die in childbirth. You could not wish such a fate for our delicate flower surely?"

Her father made a noncommittal sound.

"You might as well suggest we send little Margery as send my dear Jolenta."

In her hiding place, Emily had to smile. Margery was a mere six years. Even the Church refused to recognize marriages contracted between parties under the age of twelve.

"If Jolenta is of an age to marry, then surely Abigail at fifteen is also. This will doubtless be her only opportunity," Sybil said callously.

Bile rose in Emily's throat. She'd always known the other woman was cold, but such a suggestion was monstrous and her father had to know it.

"The girl is deaf."

Emily nodded in agreement and inched out of her hiding place so she could see her parents. They were sitting at the head table almost directly under where she stood and were too intent on each other to look up and see her.

Sybil said, "No one knows except the family and a few servants who would not dare to reveal our secret."

But Abigail could not hope to hide such an affliction from a husband, which was exactly what her father said.

"By the time he realizes she is so flawed, he will have consummated the marriage.

Then he will have no recourse," Sybil said dismissively. "He's a Scotsman after all.

Everyone knows they are barbarians, especially the Highland clans."

"And you are not concerned about what he will do to her when he realizes?" Sir Reuben asked.

Emily had to bite her lip to stop from screaming at the selfish woman when Sybil simply shrugged delicately.

"I have no desire to end up at war with one of the Highland clans over this."

"Don't be foolish. The laird is hardly going to travel this distance to take his anger out on you."

"So, I am foolish?" Sir Reuben asked in a dangerous tone.

"Only if you let old-womanish fears guide you in this decision," Sybil replied, showing how little her lord intimidated her.

"Aren't you the one who recommended I send the bare contingent of knights to assist my overlord in his last request for warriors?"

"We could hardly leave our own estates inadequately guarded."

"But his anger over my stinginess has led to this request."

"I was right though, wasn't I? He did not sanction you."

"You do not consider the loss of a daughter a sanction?"

"They must marry sometime and it is not as if we do not have a gaggle of them."

"But only one of whom you consider utterly dispensable."

"The others could still make advantageous matches."

"Even Emily?"

Her stepmother's scoffing laughter was all the answer her father got to that small taunt.

"I will send word to the king that he can expect my daughter to travel north to Laird Sinclair's holding within the month along with her dowry."

"Not Jolenta?" Sybil asked, her voice quavering.

Sir Reuben sighed with disgust. "Not Jolenta."

He meant to send Abigail. Horrified, Emily shouted, "No!"

Both Sir Reuben and Sybil started and turned their heads toward her like two buzzards caught picking over a carcass.

She flew down the stairs. "You mustn't send Abigail to such a cursed fate!"

Sybil's mouth pursed with distaste. "Were you eavesdropping again?"

"Yes. And I'm glad I did." She turned to her father, her heart in her throat. "You can't think to send Abigail so far away to a husband who might believe her affliction is a sign from God that she is unclean."

"Perhaps it is such a sign," Sybil inserted, but Emily ignored her.

"Please, Father. Do not do this."

"Your stepmother has pointed out that it may well be Abigail's only chance at marriage. Would you deny it to her?"

"Yes, if it means sending her to a barbaric Scotsman who will be furious when he realizes how you have tricked him." As her father's face hardened, Emily forced herself to rein in her temper. She did not wish to lose the battle before she'd begun because her demeanor offended her father. She lowered her eyes, though it was hard to do. "Please, Father. Do not be offended, but I believe Sybil is wrong. I do not think a proud leader of a Scottish clan would take such deception in stride and be content to spend his fury on his hapless wife."

The fact that either of her parents thought that an acceptable alternative was more than she could bear.

"You believe the clan leader would declare war?"

"Yes."

"What does she know?" Sybil scoffed. "She knows nothing of the world."

"I have heard the tales of these fierce people, Father."

"Tales told to frighten foolish children," Sybil said.

"So my daughter is foolish as well?" Sir Reuben asked, proving he had not forgotten his wife's earlier insult.

Sybil's hands fisted at her sides as if she realized she'd made an error in speaking so plainly now that they both knew the conversation had been overheard. Her father's pride might accept such intransigence from his wife in private, but he would not tolerate others—even a lowly daughter—seeing him in a light that could make him appear weak.

Emily was determined to use that to her advantage. "Father, you are one of the wisest of the king's barons. Everyone knows that."

"Too wise to risk war with a barbaric people simply to placate an overmanaging wife?"

Emily knew better than to answer, so she remained silent while Sybil gasped in outrage.

"Who would you have me send in her place?"

"Jolenta?" she asked.

"No!" Sybil cried and then she grasped her husband's sleeve. "Consider, my dearest lord, the betrothed of Baron de Coucy's heir died of a fever not a month past. The baron will be looking for a new bride to contract very soon. His mother has already made it clear she finds Jolenta pleasing."

The younger girl had spent the last two years at Court, an honor Emily had never been extended.