“Aren’t ye forgetting Da said they probably think that has already happened? Our fathers can decide to betroth ye to her. To me as ye. To one of us!” Stellan tossed off the rest of his ale, tempted to hurl the cup into the fire for the satisfaction of watching it shatter. They’d known a day would come when the Sutherland would try to settle wives on them. Mariota had unwittingly made that day today. “God’s bones, even if I burn for her, she’s a lass I can never have. Because of the trouble it would cause with MacKay, Da willna accept her for me. And we swore when we thought ye would be sent to the Norse land forever that we would marry only a lass we could bring home. No’ a Norse princess who would keep ye there. And no’ the MacKay heir.”
“We were nine,” Anders replied, his tone dry, his gaze on the low flames in the hearth.
“We were wiser than our years.” Stellan clenched the fist holding the cup. “I ken ye dinna want her, but I might.”
Anders cut his gaze to his twin and raised his cup in salute. “Then ye will find a way. Ye had best plan to go with her so ye can find out if she’s worth the trouble the two of ye will cause.”
The next morning,Mariota made her way downstairs to break her fast. She found a place to sit off to the side where she could look over the entire great hall and watch the comings and goings of the people in it. A lad here and there caught her eye, handsome or tall or muscular, but not having met them and knowing nothing about them, she felt no stirring of interest like she felt for Stellan. Some men merely passed through, others sat and ate with friends or family. Children and dogs moved between tables, playing, begging food and attention, all so normal she might have thought she was still at MacKay.
Except for the twins. They entered the hall together. She couldn’t miss seeing them. They drew her eye, no matter how fleeting the glimpse she got of them. Nor could she look away as they scanned the crowd, many of whom seemed focused on the pair, as well. Anders, she presumed from his grin, saw her first and elbowed his brother. Stellan met her gaze and nodded. They both moved toward her. On cue, her heartbeat picked up its pace and her palms began to grow damp. Anders smiled at her but she couldn’t stop looking at his solemn-faced twin.
“Good morrow,” Anders greeted her with a grin.
Anders’ grin was about the only way Mariota could tell them apart. She summoned a smile to answer him, then turned it on Stellan. “Do ye wish to join me?”
“Aye,” Anders answered, speaking for them both.
Stellan caught the attention of a serving lass and ordered their meal, then sat next to Anders.
Opposite her. Where she could not escape looking at him. Not that she wanted to avoid seeing him. But would anyone notice her gaze locked on him? Would he?
“I hope ye had a restful night,” Stellan said while they waited for their breakfast, his gaze on her as unrelenting as hers on him. Something passed between them, an imagined whisper of his breath on her face that made her toes curl in the slippers Nan lent her. His eyes, the color of old amber or pine bark held her captive.
She sucked in a breath. “I did. Thank ye.” She took a moment to get her wild thoughts under control. Anders’ eyes were the same color, but she felt nothing from them. She prayed he was the Sutherland heir, not Stellan. Only Stellan seemed to be able to make warm tingles swirl through her without actually touching her. “I’ve been enjoying watching yer people while I broke my fast. There’s little difference here from mornings at MacKay.”
“I imagine many of the same things must be taken care of each day,” he said as he accepted a trencher and cup of cider from a lass who lingered to smile at him and Anders, then turned her attention to Anders when only he smiled back.
Mariota wanted to laugh at her blatant interest in Stellan’s twin, but that wouldn’t be polite. Instead, she took advantage of Stellan’s willingness to talk. “I am sorry ye have to fend them off,” she remarked with a nod at the retreating lass’s back, oddly pleased that Anders had sent her on her way. Why, she couldn’t say. It wasn’t as though she was interested in him. She noted that Nan intercepted the lass and spoke a few words to her before she moved on. Warning her to behave? “Or does yer cousin Nan do that service for ye?”
Anders glanced around and caught Nan’s smirk. He gave her a frown in return and turned his back.
“Aye, well, she thinks she must dissuade any lass who shows an interest,” Anders groused. “She doesna always succeed,” he added with a smirk much like his cousin’s.
“I would enjoy making more friends here,” Mariota said, after exchanging a grin with Nan. She shifted her gaze back to Stellan. “Several, in fact. I’m somewhat isolated at MacKay.”
He shrugged off the lack. “There are plenty of lasses here for ye to meet. Ye ken Nan.”
Anders quipped, “And ye have me,” he added with a glance aside at Stellan. “Who else could ye possibly need?”
Stellan.
Stellan’s lack of reaction to his twin’s jibe disappointed her. Had she been reading too much into his care for her? Was he just being the responsible brother?
Anders rambled on about several of the lasses she should meet, and pointed out one of those already in the great hall. As if drawn by his comments, that lass finished her meal and walked by their table.
“Brìghde, come meet our visitor,” Anders directed before she could move past. “Brìghde is a friend of mine,” he told Mariota, “and now she can be yers, too.”
Only a friend? Or was she more than that to him? She found it hard to believe a man as attractive to the lasses as Anders could be satisfied with mere friendship. Then again, he’d offered just that to her.
Brìghde greeted her politely. “I’m pleased to meet our visitor,” she said with a smile. “I heard but little about how ye came to be with us. I’m eager for the rest of yer story.”
Mariota wasn’t certain how much of her problems she wanted bandied about the Sutherland clan, but if Brìghde was friends with Anders, and not one of the lasses trying to hang onto him, she would be a good friend to have. “I’m pleased to meet ye, too. I’ve met only the twins, Nan, and yer steward and healer,” she said.
Brìghde laughed and glanced at Anders. “I can help with that. Join me. I’m off to visit the cobbler to retrieve a pair of boots he repaired. On the way, I’ll introduce ye around. We lasses must stick together, aye?”
Mariota, reluctant to leave the twins, felt suddenly shy. Anders seemed content to interact with the lasses, but Stellan’s gaze was on the door to the laird’s solar. While his lack of attention on her was disappointing, it convinced her that at least one of the twins had more important work to do than entertain her. “Thank ye. That would please me greatly.”
And might give her a chance to see how this clan differed from MacKay. She might learn things that would be useful when she became laird. Not just Sutherland strengths and weaknesses that her da would look for as a matter of course, noting vulnerabilities that she might need to use against them in the future, but also things she could use to help her people. How tasks were distributed among the people of Sutherland, howthey managed their food stores, crops, livestock, what they did for income for the clan, and so forth. She rested her chin on a fist, realizing she both wanted to run away and to learn how to do leadership right— which she didn’t think her father did. There was always so much discontent at home, but she didn’t understand what caused it or why it was so widespread. Perhaps it wasn’t just that Alber was there, but that men like Alber thrived under her father’s leadership.
