The knight inclined his head ever so slightly. “Forgive my disagreement, but that is not so, sir. I spoke at length with the man myself little more than a month ago in London.”
The murmur of the crowd increased to a mumble and Lachlan felt his brows drawing together in a frown for the second time that day. He glanced at his grandfather and saw that Archibald’s rheumy gaze was fixed determinedly on the ground before his feet as he continued to sag in the townsmen’s arms. Lachlan thought he saw his grandfather’s head shake ever so slightly.Nay.
Lachlan looked back to the knight. “Disagree all you like, but you have been played false. What would make you certain enough of an imposter’s claim to make such a long and dangerous journey?”
“Thomas himself wasn’t certain of your existence, true,” Montague allowed. “But he wished for me to seek out Town Blair, and Edna Blair in particular, so that if he had indeed left issue behind, I could convey the truth to her.”
“My father died in battle.Before I was born,” Lachlan reiterated calmly, but a strange feeling sank into his guts with long, sharp spikes and Lachlan couldn’t fathom why. “He sacrificed himself in order to save our town from an attacking clan. That is truth all here well know.”
“Fabricated,” Montague rejoined crisply. “Thomas Annesley deserted the Blairs’ fight against the Clan Carson and has only just been hanged in London for murder.”
Lachlan’s breath caught in his chest as the air of the green filled with the ringing hiss of steel being withdrawn from sheaths. “Take care what you say about my father in the presence of his clan, stranger.”
Lucan Montague quirked his brow again as he glanced around at the scores of weapons being pointed at him. Now, at last, his mount seemed wary, alert. The knight calmly reached inside his quilted doublet, then withdrew his hand slowly.
“Only a parchment,” he announced, holding a square packet between his fingers so that those threatening him might see. He held it out toward Lachlan. “I am but a messenger, and a scribe of sorts. Here it is, put down in his own hand, meant for the Blair fine. But as your grandfather has refused to summon his council to order, I suppose…”
“Give it to me, then, ye bloody bastard,” Archibald demanded hoarsely.
But Lachlan stepped forward as if in a dream, taking the wax-sealed packet into his own hands. It was smooth and warmed through from being held so long against the English knight’s heart. The sounds of the spring day, the crowd around him, faded away, and even the warm breeze that blew his tail of hair over his shoulder seemed removed from Lachlan as he stood staring at the red wax seal.
“Council,” his grandfather wheezed, breaking the spell of the parchment. “I call the council. Harrell, Harrell, where be ye? Turn me loose, Cordon. I must find—”
“Aye, Blair, I’m here.” Searrach’s father stepped to the old man’s side, from where, Lachlan knew not. He leaned his ear near Archibald’s head, listening. Then Searrach’s father nodded and strode to Lachlan, holding out his hand. “Give it over, lad.”
Lachlan looked at the older man and felt his fingers tighten on the smooth, waxy packet. Beyond Harrell’s shoulder, Archibald was being helped away from the green—half-carried, half-dragged—toward his own door.
“It’s meant for the fine,” Harrell reiterated, and then plucked the parchment from Lachlan’s reluctant grasp.
“You canna call a fine; Marcas hasna returned from the hunt.”
“I’ll send a runner,” Harrell said, and then turned away from Lachlan to speak to the knight. “You’ve leave to dismount. See to yer horse in the chief’s stable, then he’ll hear ye.”
Lachlan stood as if frozen for a moment, his hand still suspended as when it had gripped the square of parchment, as Montague swung down from his horse. Then he shook himself and marched toward his grandfather’s longhouse after Harrell. He was about to duck through the doorway when the man turned and placed his hand against Lachlan’s chest.
“Let me pass, Harrell,” Lachlan said. “I’ve every right of the fine.”
Searrach’s father shook his head. “Nae this time, lad,” he said solemnly. “The Blair’s word.”
Lachlan looked deeper into the long, dark room, his eyes straining to penetrate the gloom. Cordon Blair was lowering Archibald onto a pallet near the central fire, and Lachlan could see that his grandfather’s face was now the same color as his fleecy hair. The Blair raised his hooded eyes to meet Lachlan’s own for the briefest moment before his gaze skittered toward the banked coals.
Pressure on Lachlan’s chest drew his attention once more to the man who would soon be his family in marriage, as Harrell pressed him back from the doorway. Lachlan had the sudden urge to break off the man’s hand at the wrist. A black shape brushed by Lachlan’s left, and he realized it was Montague. Although lean even in his black-quilted gambeson, the knight was taller than Lachlan would have guessed, besting his own height by half a hand, and it further increased Lachlan’s already growing anger.
Montague paused in the doorway to meet his gaze boldly. “You have my apologies.”
Lachlan huffed as a young boy dashed from the longhouse between the two men—Harrell’s runner. “What care have I for the empty courtesies of a scurfy Englishman?”
The knight’s face was solemn, and Lachlan had the faint and ominous suspicion that he was missing a point of great importance.
“You have them any matter.” Lucan Montague entered into the Blair’s longhouse fully, and the last thing Lachlan saw was Harrell’s grave face as he shut the door.
Lachlan turned back to the green and was startled to realize that the majority of the town was still gathered on the grassy lawn, some of the men still gripping the weapons they had readied at the insult to the name of Lachlan’s legendary sire. They’d all witnessed his barring from the council and now seemed to be waiting for some explanation.
“Go on,” Lachlan said in a voice full of bluster. “It’s like as nae only a bit of political nonsense from the south. I’ll keep watch for Marcas.”
It wasn’t entirely untrue, but it brought about his desired result of dispersing the curious crowd whose stares seemed to penetrate Lachlan. It wasn’t as though he was unused to being the center of attention; as the son of the man who had managed to turn back the entire Carson clan single-handedly and saved Town Blair from massacre, Lachlan was accustomed to admiration.
But just now, the scrutiny made him feel uneasy, as if there was a hint of something…less than deferential in their gazes; questions and doubts in their eyes that Lachlan himself didn’t understand.
