Five
Brodie woke to a roiling stomach. He rolled onto his back and opened his eyes, vaguely recalling his arrival at Stirling in the middle of the night. Flashes of memories floated through his mind. He recalled meeting and sitting with Montgomery Ross and his second, Donnan, until two other men joined them. Brodie squeezed his eyes shut as he tried to remember who they were.
Shite. Liam Oliphant and his lapdog.Brodie pressed his fingertips to his forehead and yelped.That’s why ma bluidy heid aches. I bashed Nelson MacDougall in his ugly mug. Why did I do that? Och, he insulted Ross’s sister. Laurel. Strawberry blonde hair. I remember her from the last time I was at court, and the time before that, and the time before that. But I also recall her reputation. What did I agree to last eve? Something to do with Laurel. I hope whatever it was, wasna an insult to Monty or Laurel.
Brodie rolled out of bed and swallowed the bile that threatened to come up. He hadn’t drunk more than he usually did, but he admitted that he’d been running on far less sleep and food than was his norm. He’d ridden back to Castle Sween with Eliza’s body. He’d endured her wailing mother and sister and suffered her father’s threats and grief. All the while trying to muster tender feelings, which he believed a husband should feel toward his dead wife. But there were none. It felt as though he’d heard in passing of a stranger’s death. He even wondered if drinking enough might make him feel something more than ambivalence. But the guilt that rushed forward when he drank wasn’t for Eliza’s death or his role in it. It was guilt because he didn’t feel guilty about her.
Brodie glanced back at the bed and considered going back to sleep, but he knew he would do better if he got out to the lists and trained with his men. He would sweat the alcohol from his system and clear his mind of his troubles, focusing on keeping his own head on his shoulders. Once he dressed, he made his way to the armory, where he claimed his claymore before going into the lists. Several heads turned in his direction as he spied his men across the field and made his way to them. He eyed them suspiciously as they looked at him uneasily.
“What?”
“Laird, people are talking aboot it already,” Graham, his second, spoke up.
“Talking aboot what?” Brodie looked around.
“Aboot how you’re going to marry Lady Laurel,” Graham answered. Brodie froze. The rest of the events in the tavern flooded his mind. He’d asked Monty how horrible his sister really was and suggested that he could tame her, as though she were a wild animal. He recalled Monty telling him it had to be Laurel’s choice, that he wouldn’t force her if she didn’t love Brodie. He hadn’t a clue how to go about making a woman fall in love with him.
“I will offer my suit and see if Lady Laurel will allow me to court her,” Brodie corrected. He leaned toward his men. “Does anyone else ken that Oliphant tried to make it a wager?”
“I don’t think so, Laird.” Graham cast a surreptitious gaze at men from several clans watching them. “I think they’re stunned that you are willing to woo her. I don’t think anyone has heard that one hundred pounds were offered up against you.”
“Ye’d do well to hope Lady Laurel doesnae ken,” Michael, a junior guardsman, pointed out. “It’ll be more than just her tongue that lashes out at ye.” The younger man’s grin fell when Brodie cast a dark look at him.
“Let me be clear right now, and you can set straight anyone who wonders. If Lady Laurel becomes Lady Campbell, it’s because she wants to of her own free will. I’ve already had one bride forced to marry me. I won’t have another. I won’t trick Lady Laurel or deceive her.”
“But ye have to make her fall in love with ye,” Michael persisted. “I thought ye only wanted a wife to run the keep.”
Brodie ground his teeth. Michael wasn’t wrong. The only reason he’d agreed to marry Eliza when he did was because his mother had passed three years earlier, and he desperately needed a woman who could be his chatelaine. He would need Laurel to fall in love with him, or at least like him enough to marry him. He thanked the heavens he hadn’t been so foolish as to agree that he would love her in return. He’d been honest a moment ago when he said he wouldn’t trick or deceive Laurel.
“Enough clishmaclaver,” Brodie barked. “I didn’t come out here to discuss marriage and wives. I came to train with my men.”
Brodie spent the rest of the morning sparring alongside his men, but his mind wandered to what little memory he retained of Laurel. He knew she was beautiful and was intelligent, since her sharp tongue surely reflected her sharp mind, but he knew little else than that. He wondered when he would have a chance to approach her. He needed to meet with the king above all else, and he couldn’t dawdle in Stirling. He didn’t trust the Lamonts not to attack his clan again. He would have to be efficient in his courtship, and that was only if he decided he wished to pursue Laurel. Brodie retired to his chamber for the afternoon as he considered his potential marriage and waited for the king to summon him.
* * *
“We shall all be dead before anyone wants her,” Margaret Hay whined as the women strolled through the queen’s gardens during their morning constitutional. Margaret spun around, pointing an accusing finger at Laurel. The lady-in-waiting began her complaints when she was certain Laurel could hear. Any sympathy Laurel experienced for Margaret as the downtrodden sister to Sarah Anne ended with Margaret’s tirade. “It’s so unfair.”
“And it’s unfair that God wasted a pretty face on an empty head,” Laurel retorted, wishing her excuses had worked with the Mistress of the Bedchamber. She’d listened to several of the ladies complain as they left the keep and made their way to the rosebushes. Queen Elizabeth led her entourage, disinterested in the younger women’s conversations. Laurel walked alone, not in the mood for company. But she regretted shooing the Dunbar sisters away, since now she had no way to ignore Margaret.
“At least I am pretty,” Margaret sneered.
“And just as empty-headed as I said,” Laurel snorted. “A sharp tongue is the tool of a sharp mind, Maggie. Having just a pretty face means the Lord got bored when he made you. He lost interest just like—how many has it been—four men now.”
“At least I have suitors,” Margaret snapped.
“Suitors wish to marry a woman. Not a one thought aboot marrying you,Maggie.” Laurel stressed the diminutive that Margaret loathed. She’d claimed only maids were named Maggie.
“What are you saying?” Margaret demanded.
Laurel grinned. “While neither of us has suitors clamoring at our doors, the difference between us is I haven’t lifted my skirts.” Laurel snorted again. “Or dropped them.”
“You—you—Tu es une puterelle,” Margaret snarled, switching to French to accuse Laurel of being a woman of ill repute.
“Your French is horrid. ‘Tu es’is you are. You meant ‘je suis.’ After all, I’m not the one who keeps buying chicken’s blood from the butcher.”
“Why you—” Margaret’s words died as Queen Elizabeth turned toward them.
“Ladies,” Queen Elizabeth’s tone stopped the women from continuing their argument. Laurel dipped into a deep curtsy while Margaret wobbled on unsteady legs.
