Mairi swore like a man and her mother flinched and made the sign of the cross.
“My exact reaction,” Ramsey said grimly.
“Lyall stayed with you for most of the spring and half the summer,” Beitris said. “Did you see or hear anything?”
“Aye,” she said, still clearly angry. “Months back, in the late spring, he received a message and rode out with a de Hay knight.”
All was becoming clearer and more treacherous, Ramsey thought.
“God, no… Are you certain it was de Hay?” Beitris asked, her voice high and her hand tightened on his shoulder.
“Aye. I saw the man’s badge. When Lyall returned his mood was changed. He was not himself. I asked what had happened and he claimed it was something to do with Isobel.”
“ ‘Tis unlikely since Isobel’s been dead for three years,” Ramsey said wryly.
“And once she died, Lyall wanted naught to do with the family. In particular her father,” Beitris said, not bothering to hide her anger.
“Only because Dunkeldon was lost to him,” Mairi said aloud what Ramsey was thinking.
"Dunkeldon will be the end of him,” Beitris said clearlyunable to comprehend her son’s intense and bleak ties to his father’s lands.
Ramsey did understand Lyall’s torment. A man’s lands gave him worth in a world that judged him on his possession and sword-arm. But Lyall’s drive and his pursuit at any means and in the face of the unattainable was like watching a caged boar beat its head against the iron bars.
“He is a fool,” Mairi said, but the words carried a great and heavy sadness that spread through the chamber.
“He will be hanged for this,” Beitris’ voice cracked and she buried her face in her hands and began to cry.
“Mother…” Mairi ran over to her.
Ramsey stood and started to reach for his wife but someone called to him from behind the chamber curtain. He crossed the room and swept aside the curtain to come face to face with one of his house knights.
“We found their trail, my lord, near Inverness. I rode like the very devil to get here.”
“Good.” Ramsey clapped him on the shoulder and looked out the tower arch. “We have enough time before the sun sets. We will leave immediately. Go find a fresh mount.”
“The grooms are saddling one now, along with your horse, my lord.”
“Go then and have some bread and ale, man—see the cook--while I speak to my wife. I will meet you in the stable.” Ramsey went back inside their chamber. Beitris was sitting in the chair, Mairi kneeling at her feet and holding her hands. She had stopped crying and looked up at him, forgetting in her sorrow to hide half her face.
“My men found their trail.”
“Donnald…” she stood and Mairi stood with her. “Please find him. Save my foolish son from himself.”
“I swear to you I will find them.” He reached out and gently touched her scarred face and she suddenly remembered and her hand quickly covered his and he could read the shame in herlarge eyes. He shook his head, pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard before he turned and left.
Glenna dugher knife into the dirt and pried loose a skinny bunch of carrots, stuffing them into a sack with a few turnips and an onion, and she placed a silver coin worth a hundred bunches of carrots next to the hole, before she crawled down the dirt row to another, where she inhaled the strong scent of leeks. A moment later a handful of leeks hit the bottom of the sack and she left another coin before she glanced up to keep an eye on the moon still hiding behind thick, approaching storm clouds.
Candlelight flickered dimly from a nearby manor house, and the wind carried the soft, distant voices of the guards whose shadows paced watch near the walls. She was somewhere north of the Ness and east of Beauly, smack in the middle of some of the Gordons’ prized pickings.
She sat up, resting back on her heels, eyeing the outlined shadows if the garden bed. Taking only a few vegetables was all she would allow herself—despite the coins she left-- because she was still not completely comfortable stealing from crofters, even those on a wealthy estate. Circumstances were such she could not be selectively generous about who she stole from.
The lands surrounding the manor were rich garden furrows of root vegetables and lush, fruit orchards. In the distance, sheep huddled together in a large cluster of white and the soft, satisfied lowing of cattle came from the byres attached to the crofts. A mill with its distinctive waterwheel stood near the river. All was only a short walk down the grassy hillside. There was not much distance between her and the guards.
Still, leaving the money made her feel less guilty.
What she could see of the manor house up the slight hill was impressive, with a Norman glass lancet on the top floor setinside thick window buttresses and stone walls. A thin thread of pale smoke came from the thumb-like shadow of the closest chimney above the pattern of roof tiles.
Some wealthy noble’s hunting lodge? Its position sat near the Great Forest which was filled with wild boar, pheasant, hare, and hart.
