“King of France, my arse,” he muttered before yelling back the only reasonable response. “Do yer job, you slackard. I’d have you bring the MacQuarrie himself to settle this.”
Time lengthened as they waited until at last the chains holding the portcullis groaned and the gate began its slow ascent, allowing them access. The tunnel through the wall of rock seemed longer and darker than he remembered, though common sense told him it was the same ten feet it had always been. He hated small, dark places. With a quick glance back to assure himself Leah followed closely, Robert fixed his eyes on the arch of light ahead of them that opened into the inner courtyard of his family’s castle.
Four guards, spears at the ready, stepped out to block their path as they came through the archway.
“Stay yer mounts,” one of them ordered. “You’ll wait here for his lairdship. And keep yer hands where we can see them.”
Robert glared at the man, a look well calculated to cause discomfort. Only when the guard dropped his gaze to the ground did Robert look away. While he waited for his father, he scanned the inner bailey, absently noting the subtle changes since his last visit.
There were many.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of brown. A young lad, no more than six or seven, raced across the courtyard to the chapel, his hair flying back from the sides of his head as he ran. Before he reached the small building, a woman emerged, her slow, heavy steps carrying her from the chapel toward the great door of the keep.
As the boy drew level with her, she leaned down to him, her head snapping up when the boy pointed in Robert’s direction.
She started forward, her stride accelerating as she approached.
“Robert?” she called out, her voice firm, sharp, familiar.
Robert leaned forward, squinting to make out her face more clearly. It wasn’t possible. The voice he knew, but not the form.
“Mother?” He barely breathed the words, so unsure the appellation belonged to the woman whose steps toward him had turned to a slow jog.
He slid from the back of his horse, taking no more than a footstep in her direction before he was met with a spear point laid at his chest.
“Halt!”
She’d drawn close now and he could doubt it no longer. It was his mother, her eyes, her expression so well-known to him, all encased in a face that had aged so much more than he expected. What could have happened to her in the months since he’d seen her last?
She ran now, lifting her hands to cradle his cheeks when she reached his side. “Robbie?” She whispered his name, tears filming her eyes. “Praise the saints, it is you. I kenned in my heart you’d return home to us one day.”
The spear held to his chest wavered.
“You’ll move that this instant, you worthless oaf,” she ordered, slapping away the spear pointed at his heart before throwing her arms around him.
The guard took a faltering step back as if unsure of exactly what he should do next.
Margery MacQuarrie, though barely tall enough to reach Robert’s breast, had always been a force to be reckoned with. He was glad to see that hadn’t changed.
He enfolded his mother in his embrace, holding her tightly to him for only a moment before she pushed away, again lifting her hands to his face.
“I can hardly believe my own eyes. They told us you were killed in the king’s service. But I’d no given up hope, Robbie. When they couldna bring yer body home to be buried, I told yer father they had to be wrong. I said my prayers and lit my candles daily. And now you’ve returned to us as I prayed you would.” She let go of him and wiped a hand over her damp cheeks.
Robert stood silently watching while this amazing woman morphed from Mother to Lady Margery in less than a heartbeat. Her back straightened and the emotion swept from her face in the transformation of composing herself, as if only now she realized that everyone closely watched her actions.
“It’s yer son, Hugh,” she called, her eyes focused over his shoulder. “Come home to us at last.”
Robert turned his head, words abandoning him for perhaps the first time in his life as he watched the large man headed in their direction, his progress slowed by a decided limp. Hugh MacQuarrie? The man was far too old to be his father. How was this possible?
Could their time travel have missed its mark by a few years?
The guards scattered backward as Hugh approached. He moved in closely to stare into Robert’s face. After a moment or two, apparently satisfied, he threw his arms around his younger son.
“Welcome home, my lad, welcome home. We’d all but given up hope.” Margery cleared her throat and he added, “Well, yer mother never did.”
When his father stepped back, Robert was shocked to see a glassy sheen of tears in the old man’s eyes.
“Mind yer manners, Hugh. Robbie’s brought someone with him. A wife perhaps?” Margery rested a hand on Robert’s forearm as she spoke. “Though much too young for you,” she added quietly, her disapproval clear in her tone.
