“Aye, and it’s starving you were before your clan stole everything the Carsons had, tricked us into giving you rights to our bounty.” Murdoch rose. “It was we who used to have the plenty. We who prospered. We havena had fodder enough to keep our sheep alive for years!”
His men sounded their agreement.
“You cheated us,” Murdoch continued. “Archibald Blair cheated us. And now that he’s dead and we know the truth, it is up to you,Blair, to set things right.” Murdoch paused. “We Carsons arena unreasonable people. Unmerciful people. We only want back what we have lost. And once we have gained that, we are willing to grant Town Blair two days of the run.”
“Two days to harvest salmon enough to last all the year?” Harrell exclaimed. “That’s nae en—”
“Two days, or none at all,” Murdoch pressed.
Marcas stared at the man without expression. “What else?”
Murdoch set his mouth. “Half your stores now, and half your grazing in all the green months.” He sat down while, again, the room erupted.
After Harrell had succeeded in calling everyone to order, Marcas challenged quietly, “And if we do not agree?”
Murdoch shrugged. “War, again.”
Harrell laughed and looked about the room. “With this spindly lot of a dozen? I fear they might faint just from smelling my fair Searrach’s cakes.”
Murdoch Carson’s mouth quirked. “Spindly we may be at the moment. But it’s nae only a dozen of us come. I left a score of our men in the wood just at the edge of town. By now they’ve surrounded the Blair’s house and the store as well. With torches. Should they see signs from our man over there”—here, Murdoch nodded toward the Carson standing in the doorway—“we’ll fire the lot of them. Burn your town to the ground, just as ours was burned.”
“Our wives are in the Blair’s house, preparing him for burial,” Marcas growled.
Murdoch nodded. “And I thank you for that added leverage, Marcas.”
There was dark murder in Marcas’s glare. “Should we agree to your demands today, you simply go away?”
“Nay,” Murdoch said. “It’s a new treaty I’m proposing. Our clans will at last live in peace together. Fairly. We share the resources, after we have recovered what belongs to us.” He turned in his chair to look over his shoulder at Lachlan, and all eyes fell on him once more.
“Everythingthat belongs to us, I’m thinking.”
Chapter 5
Finley sat uneasy in her saddle; the roar of the falls, while easily drowning out the raucous springtime calls from the birds, did nothing to quiet the revelry of the wedding party surrounding her. There were at least one hundred Carsons—most of the town—clogging the path after the bridge. Only Finley, her mother and father, and the clan elders had the privilege of riding. And, of course, Finley’s maid of honor, Kirsten.
All the unmarried lasses in Carson Town had begun vying for the coveted spot at Finley’s side when she married almost in the same moment that Finley herself had learned she would wed. Everyone had heard tales of the fearless, bonny Lachlan Blair, and all the little Carson girls had for years admired his escapades and fantasized about his daring and appearance beyond earshot of their parents. So Finley had no shortage of volunteers—even those with whom she shared a mutual dislike were eager to ingratiate themselves to be chosen. The feud was over, after all, and there were men at the Town Blair.
Finley had chosen meek, diminutive, blonde Kirsten Carson not only because she was the least obnoxious of the lot of them, but because Kirsten was really the only girl who’d cared to be friends with Finley since they’d both been small. And Kirsten seemed genuinely happy for Finley that she would marry, even if Finley herself was not so sure.
Lachlan Blair, the man who was once a daring legend slated to become a chief, was now nothing more than a disgraced, half-English bastard being sacrificed by his own people, if the rumors Finley had heard were true. But if the rumors were indeed true, Lachlan Blair also somehow had Carson blood in his veins.
She wondered how eager he was to marry her, what he looked like. Her thoughts went again to the Blair clansman she’d met in almost this very spot; no giant, as Lachlan Blair was rumored to be, but he’d been strong. Handsome in a gruff, careless way. He’d had a finely shaped mouth, a quick laugh, and a spark in his eye.
The crash of hooves sounded from up the hill, and a rider emerged at the crest of the path: a Carson man who had gone ahead to witness the burial of Archibald Blair, dead now these past seven days. Only once the funeral had concluded and all the trappings were hidden away in the Town Blair could the wedding party proceed. The man raised an arm high and gave a broad wave, and the townspeople answered with a cheer.
There would be a wedding.
Finley’s father reached across and took hold of her horse’s reins, prompting the mount to move forward over the bridge. Her mother was on Finley’s left, the bride cake carefully wrapped in cloth and held at the front of her saddle. Ina looked over at Finley with a proud smile as they traveled slowly up the hill, and Finley thought she must be admiring the pale gown she and the other Carson mothers had worked on so diligently, day and night, for seven days.
“You look beautiful, lass,” she said.
Finley knew she had never been a beautiful lass. A capable lass, a strong-willed lass, a lass with a quick tongue and a penchant for rows. But never beautiful like fair Kirsten, even in such a fine gown as she had ever worn, with her red curls piled up twice as high as her own head, sprigs of new, woody heather studding the twists.
She felt her cheeks heat and muttered, “I think I need a wee.”
Ina laughed. “It’s only nerves.”
“It’s the mug of cider I drank,” Finley argued.Two mugs, she silently amended.
