“A bandage, Clovis.”
Gabriel had barely uttered the request and the healer obliged him, Magdalene watching with more amazement as Gabriel deftly wrapped her foot.
“Does that feel better, Maggie?”
His voice so husky and stirring, she nodded, strangely mesmerized by the unexpected act of him ministering to her needs.
Within moments, her other foot was wrapped and Gabriel rose from the bed.
“I hope you can find it within your heart tae forgive me, wife. I had no cause tae treat you so callously and I’ll make it up tae you, I promise. Rest now.”
She stared up at him, astonished, the words slipping out before she could stop them. “You’re leaving?”
He nodded, sighing. “Aye…but I’ll be close by if you need me.”
With that, he gestured for everyone to clear the room, Euna and Donella snuffing out several candles on their way out so that only one burned in a wall sconce.
Gabriel was the last one to leave, casting a glance at the bed with an expression she could not fathom and then closing the door behind him—though he left it open just a crack.
Wonder seeping through her like a calming potion, Magdalene stared from her bandaged feet to the door and back again…and then around the sumptuous room with its own fireplace where a warming fire banished any chill.
Richly colored tapestries upon the walls and thick rugs upon the floor.
Intricately carved furnishings that looked as if fashioned by the finest artisans, including the massive bed where she lay with its goose down pillows and soft blankets.
Laird Gabriel MacLachlan’s bedchamber on the third floor of the keep, or so those women had told her.
Not a small dank room in one of the towers at all, a glance at the pair of narrow windows telling her that dusk was falling outside.
Sighing softly as exhaustion overwhelmed her, Magdalene settled down into the plump mattress, pulled the covers up to her chin and fell blessedly asleep.
Chapter 7
“What news of my valiant warrior MacLachlan and his crazed bride?” Seoras demanded of the mud-splattered messenger who bowed deeply before him. “Home again in Argyllshire?”
“Aye, Earl Seoras, they returned this afternoon.” The young man straightened and shuffled his feet nervously as if fearing some censure. “I would have ridden here faster, but the lashing rain slowed my progress…terrible lightning and thunder the entire way—”
“Delightful, a storm tae dampen my sister’s screams. No doubt she didna take kindly tae her husband exercising his marital rights—the wretched lunatic. First my mother and then Magdalene, both of them driven mad by grief. Did you ever hear of such a ridiculous thing tae succumb tae insanity over a death? Death is everywhere, day and night!” Seoras leaned forward in his massive chair to glare at the messenger. “You could have slid into a ravine and broken your neck! Leave me and take your feeble excuses with you!”
The messenger did, his face grown so pale that the mud splotching his forehead and cheeks stood out in stark relief. Seoras waved for serving maids to bring more wine to fill his courtiers’ cups, the rowdy lot of them hurling curses and insults at the young man as he fled from the cavernous hall.
“Drink up! We’re celebrating a bedding this night—unless MacLachlan grew impatient and took her in the woods on the way home! I’d wager he had tae bind Mad Maggie tae the bedposts before he plowed her—what do you say?”
Drunken shouts and raucous laughter greeted his coarse query. Och, how he loved the sound of his courtiers’ acclamation!
The stamping of feet grew louder, brimming cups raised high in the air, which made Seoras drink, too. With one long swallow, wine spilling down his chin and staining his reddish-blond beard, he toasted his successful coup against Gabriel MacLachlan.
Seoras had brought him to heel, humbled him, and humiliated him by making him wed a madwoman in exchange for gold—Gabriel’s long-expected request having played right into Seoras’s hands.
He had been surprised that Gabriel had lasted the winter before coming to beg for coin—yet everything had worked together so perfectly! Now Seoras owned him, Gabriel’s allegiance ensured forever by his marriage to Magdalene. A ruler couldn’t risk his barons becoming too powerful…especially when he had never known the respect as that held by Gabriel.
“Damn him,” Seoras muttered, sickened by that thought, which had haunted him since long before he’d become earl to the MacDougall clan seven months ago. He was puke green with jealousy, he knew it, Gabriel’s captains—Cameron and Conall Campbell, Alun MacSorley, and Finlay MacLachlan—filled with more undying loyalty for Gabriel than Seoras would ever know from his entire people.
That fact could have made Gabriel extremely dangerous to him, but the problem had been solved. The worrying dilemma overcome by a masterful series of moves—starting with eliminating Malcolm MacLachlan early last autumn in what had appeared an unfortunate tumble from his horse.
His neck broken, aye, so it had looked, but instead forcefully half twisted from his shoulders by one of Seoras’s henchmen was more the truth of it.
“You’re a genius,” he muttered, congratulating himself with another long draught of wine.
