He paused before Finlay and lifted shaggy brows. “Harper, ye here?”
“Aye, laird.”
“’Tis nay called for, ye ken. Ye be no’ sworn in fealty to me.”
Not to him, no. Finlay followed a far older demand.
“How is a bard to make braw songs o’ battles if he is no’ there to see them?”
Anders scowled. “There is time for ye to go back. No’ now, when we ha’ made camp. But in the morning, perhaps.”
“Aye, laird, I will consider it.”
“Will ye turn back?” asked Gregor after Anders had moved on.
“Nay.”
“I did no’ think so. There is a tale in it, I am thinking.”
“Best get some sleep. I do no’ doubt we will be marching again by dawn.”
Gregor, wrapped in his own thoughts, either slept or did not. Finlay did not even try, but instead lay reliving each of the previous nights, touch by touch and kiss by kiss.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Rolled in herblanket and far too upset to have a hope of slumber, Katrin worried her way through the night. The encampment, if it could be called such, was far from quiet. Men shuffled about and mumbled in their sleep. Despite orders, they spoke to one another. They got up and went off up the hill to relieve themselves. They snored and farted and…
If their army’s safety ever relied upon silence, they were doomed.
Somewhere back in that seething mass of men lay Finlay. Frustration swamped Katrin every time she thought of him. Frustration and anger and—och, helpless longing. Terror so bright it set her heart to pounding.
Nay, she had no hope of sleep.
After they’d paused for the night, she’d moved back through the troops, hoping not to see him, dismayed at finding him clad like an ordinary clansman with a bundle that could only be his harp on his back.
The man was mad.
After she’d failed at convincing him to turn for home, she’d gone to her father. “Mayhap ye can persuade him, Da. He does no’ belong here.”
Da had given her a long look. She could almost hear him thinking,Nor do ye. But he had gone on a round of their forces, speaking encouraging words to all the men, only shaking his head at her after.
So she’d gone to Reagan.
His troops alone had camped in marvelous order, each man seeming to know his tasks and none making a fuss about it. Katrin found him speaking to one of his captains and drew him aside.
“He is here,” she said.
He fixed her with a tawny eye.
“The harper. He is back among the footmen.” She swallowed hard. “He has a sword. And his harp.”
Emotions flickered across Reagan’s face. He asked, “Wha’ am I to do about it, lass?”
“Speak to him. Go and tell him he has time to turn back.”
He sighed. “We ha’ already spoken o’ this. He is not under my command, any more than ye be. I ha’ no cause to tell him anything.”
“As a friend, ye do. Ye know war. He does no’.”
