“Thank ye for this. May we do it again?”
He rose from the cot. “D’ye want to do it again?”
“Aye, so. If ye ha’ the patience for it.”
“’Twill require nay patience.”
She flung her cloak around her and again secreted the sword in its folds. At the door, she looked back. “As I say, I will repay ye—”
“Nay, mistress. I suspect ’tis a privilege, this, that is beyond price.”
Chapter Ten
Finlay’s day didnot truly begin until he saw Mistress Katrin the next morning. Even though he woke in his borrowed chamber with the first of dawn’s light trickling in the window, following a mass of confusing dreams, and even though he got up on his feet and dressed himself, it felt as if he did not breathe properly until setting eyes on her.
He hoped he might encounter her in the hallway. Had she not said her chamber was next to her father’s and his own? But nay, she must have been astir far too early for that.
Not till he entered the hall with its morning bustle did he spy her among the other women, laying out the breakfast.
She had her hair plaited into a single thick braid and wore a dull-blue gown with a plain, unembroidered overdress. Indeed, for all her lack of ornamentation, she might have been another of the servants.
But he knew far better. He had seen her in a score of dreams, if in various guises, and she drew him irresistibly. Bent over the hearth, she coaxed the fire before straightening to cast her gaze over the hall as if judging its readiness.
Her gaze met his where he stood in the doorway. Would she come to him? Would she speak? Did she see him, rather than just noticing him standing there?
His heart bounded painfully when she did cross the flagstones to him.
“Master harper. Ye be just in time for breakfast. My father is no’here yet, but please tak’ a seat at the head table. He may join ye soon enough.”
“Will ye no’ join me?” he asked humbly.
She hesitated, and he felt sure she would refuse. She had many duties. None to him.
To his surprise, she nodded. “Aye, so. Let me fetch our portions.”
He sat at the board, scarcely believing his luck. None of the Gallowglass warriors were present, so they must have risen far earlier. Indeed, he could hear them already drilling, outside.
Katrin came to the table and set a platter in front of him before sitting opposite. Her clear, pale eyes examined him from the beads woven into his hair, to his tunic, to his hands, before she said, “I hope ye slept well.”
There is a spirit in yon room. He did not say so, telling her instead, “I had a wealth o’ strange dreams.”
“Did ye? I sometimes have those also.”
Och, and he took that as a hopeful sign.Do ye dream o’ me?
She smiled, the rueful smile that so often came to her lips. “I do believe those stories ye told ha’ got inside my head. ’Tis as if I see snatches o’ them disguised as dreams. So talented ye are wi’ yer tales and yer tunes, both fair haunt me.”
“I should like to mak’ a tune for ye.” The words were out of him before he could prevent them. When she stared, clearly astonished, he added, “A planxty—for my patron’s daughter. ’Tis often done.”
“Is it?”
“Och, aye, as a mark of gratitude.” How could he tell her it might take a thousand years and every drop of skill he’d ever possessed to make a song worthy of her?
She blinked at him. “I can’t imagine what ye could find to celebrate about me.”
He could.
“But I would be honored.”
