Hearing her movement, he turned and gave her a languorous appraisal, his gaze slowly raking over her body, eyes narrowing with admiration. “What say you, love? Seems a bonny day for a handfasting.”
She gave him a tentative smile, inexplicably nervous in the light of day. “So . . . a handfasting. Is it like a marriage then?”
“Och, no.” He was at the bedside in an instant, on his knees before her. “I vow I shall give you a proper wedding.” James swept the hair from her face, tracing his finger around her cheekbones, her lips. “I shall drape you in gold and silk finery, feed you with my own hand the finest of foods. No”—he took her hand, twining his fingers carefully in hers—"this is but a handfasting. Some in Scotland see it as but a promise, a betrothal like, while others see it as a union true. But we”—he gave a squeeze and brought her hand to his chest—"we shall give it our own meaning. I shall pledge myself to you until such time as I can give you my heart in the grandest of ceremonies. Before all of Scotland, if I could.”
Certain again, she gave him a wordless nod as she blinked the sudden sting from her eyes. He laughed then, a joyful sound, and she giggled, unable to stop from joining him. He stood, inhaled deeply, and announced, “I’m a man starved.”
“Me too.” Magda smiled unabashedly at him. “Do you think they still have breakfast?”
“Och,” he strode back to the window, “by the sun in the sky, I’d say the brothers broke their fast hours ago.”
As if on cue, chanting rose up through the window, a low, resonant hum rumbling through the priory grounds. “No, hen, by the sound of it”—he stood silent for a moment—"if we rush, we can make the noontime meal.”
“How do you know so much about this place?” Magda rose to dress, tamping down the instinctive and momentary shame at standing naked before him. As if sensing her discomfort, he flashed her a warm smile and set to gathering his clothes from the floor. “And you haven’t told me how you knew I’d be here,” she added.
“When I heard you were captured, we went straight for Campbell lands. It wasn’t long before we heard of your escape. To say you vexed the Campbell would be understating the matter, aye? He combed the lands around Castle Gloom for days.” Magda watched in awe as James deftly wound the yards of tartan around his waist. “I heard tell they lost your trail somewhere around the loch. It was then I remembered this spit of land. I’d hoped . . .” He stopped short, wincing with the pain that flashed in his eyes. Still holding the loose end of his tartan in one hand, he stepped to Magda and tangled the other in her hair, pulling her close to steal a quick kiss. “I’m just thankful you found this place. That I found you.”
He finished tucking the length of wool around his waist. “And a braw thing indeed it was, Magda. Campbell’s men discounted outright that a woman could escape by water. But I knew at once. And I know too what that would have cost you.”
He swept the last of his tartan up over his shoulder. “I couldn’t wait. I had to come for you in the night. I had to see with my own eyes you’d made it safe. Though,” he added with a laugh, “I dare say there’s at least one in my party who’s sore put that our plans to raze Castle Gloom were waylaid.”
Magda joined him in the open doorway, silent for a moment. He smoothed the top of her borrowed cassock, tucking it more snugly under her belt. “And the next order of business will be to get you some proper clothing, my wee mendicant.”
She placed her hands on his arms to bring his attention back to the matter in question. “But you didn’t answer how you know so much about this place.”
“As improbable as it may seem, my family owns these lands. Aye,” he said to her incredulous look. “I speak truly.”
Tucking her arm snugly in his, he led them back down the hallway. “I’ll not know if yours is a path touched by providence or serendipity, hen, but I welcome the stroke of luck all the same.”
They walked toward the distant sound of chanting, their footfalls echoing off the empty stone corridor. “My family has long owned this island, and I’ve a mutual agreement with the monks, allowing them to stay.”
Reaching the door to the dining hall, James added in a rushed whisper, “The Augustinians ignore my choice of church, and I ignore their lack of funds.”
They shuffled into the dining hall as unobtrusively as possible. It was a long, low building, chill and dim despite the noonday sun, filled with the sounds of many men’s voices chanting as one, a great, deep droning that vibrated over the stones. A single table spanned the far end of the room, with four tables extending perpendicular from it. Magda had gathered that important people and guests sat at the high table, and that’s where they headed now. Though the monks didn’t look up from their prayers, Magda nonetheless felt her cheeks burn with embarrassment, the walk from door to table feeling an eternity.
The chanting silenced abruptly just as Magda’s chair scraped back from the table, and she shut her eyes and held her breath for a moment, willing the excruciating self-consciousness to pass.
“Sit, child.” She heard Lonan’s kind whisper, and inhaling, Magda settled herself at the table. “You’ve arrived at least a century too late for the Inquisition. I vow no harm will come to you for being tardy to a meal.”
The twinkle in Lonan’s eyes and a quick under-the-table squeeze on the knee from James put Magda at her ease.
“You are to leave us, I sense. Both of you.”
Magda looked to James and, holding his gaze, nodded. Despite the serious stillness of his features, James gave her a wink and Magda felt a flare of wanting him blast through her.
“I suppose my work is done,” Lonan said.
Thinking his comment a tongue-in-cheek reference to getting her and James together, Magda’s eyes shot to the old monk, but he merely sat there, slowly chewing, looking straight into the distance.
“And quite a lot of work you’ve done, aye?” James set to twirling his spoon in a bowl of gluey oats, the ghost of a smile wrinkling his eyes.
This time she knew she heard sarcasm and kicked James beneath the table. Though there was a low murmuring in the hall, most of the men were silent, and Magda was mortified that undue attention be brought to her.
“Look around you, lass.” Lonan gestured to the monks sitting at the lower tables. “Many of these men are hermits, living in isolation, their prayer as their work. I, though, I have my scholarship, in service to God and to my country. I also have an obligation to tend to those injured in body and mind, to nurture the soul of the wayward traveler. And you, dear Magda, were nothing if not wayward. But now”—smiling, he looked to James, and Magda thought she would miss the old man, scar and all—"now you have found yourself in good hands.”
Lonan turned his attention back to his food and casually added, “Though I would bless your union. I’d not have all these efforts end with your two souls living in sin.”
Magda stuffed the spoon in her mouth to silence her surprised laugh. She’d known the old man would be capable of wit.
