It had beena long, grueling journey from Auchnacree.
Through driving rain and blustery days, Isadora, Niall, Ewan, and Ossian had finally made it to the outskirts of the Ludus Caledonia. The winding road hidden in the darkened hills south of Edinburgh was the last stretch of their trip and there was a sense of anticipation in the air. Behind her, Isadora could hear her brothers hissing with excitement as they approached the crest of the hill.
“Issie,” Ewan was whisper-yelling at her. “Do ye know why we’ve really come? Da wouldna tell ye, but I will. I dunna want ye tae be surprised.”
Isadora rolled her eyes. As the youngest of the three, she’d suffered her share of teasing and harassment over the years from her annoying older brothers.
“Hush,” she turned to hiss at him. “Ye chatter like a woman. If ye dunna quiet yer mouth, someone might mistake ye for a man’s wife.”
Ewan had a healthy respect for his sister’s insult skills, and he was going to get his licks in before she plastered him.
“Ye poor lass,” he clucked. “Dunna ye know why we’ve come? Dada has come here tae buy ye a husband. That’s the only way ye’ll ever get one, Issie.”
Ossian giggled at his sister’s expense as Isadora had to fight down her natural reaction to flare. Had they been home, she would already have a stick in her hand, chasing her brother down with the intention of beating his brains in.
“Coming from a man who has seen twenty years and eight and has yet tae marry, I would watch who I was throwing stones at,” she said. “There’s not a lass in Auchnacree that will have ye, Ewan. Rumor has it ye kiss like a fish.”
That was a touchy subject with Ewan. He thought himself quite the ladies’ man, but it simply wasn’t true. Try as he might, he hadn’t been able to find a wife yet, probably due more to immaturity on his part rather than his looks. He wasn’t unhandsome. Still, it was a difficult subject and as Isadora hit him where it hurt, he wasn’t able to hold his temper very well.
“Is that so?” he growled.
“’Tis.”
“I’ll have ye know—”
“Enough.” Niall’s fatherly voice stopped them. “Ewan, stop vexing yer sister.”
Obediently, Ewan and Ossian quieted, but they were glaring at their sister, who was soundly ignoring them. They were closing in on the top of the hill now, a clearing on high beneath a gentle morning sun. Once they reached the very top, the massive walls of Caelian Hill came into view in the distance.
The Ludus Caledonia in all her glory spread out before them.
Finally, they’d arrived.
It was a thrilling sight, and there was a sense of awe, too, as they beheld the fabled fight guild. As they followed the road around the massive moat, they began to hear noise off to the left and turned to see an arena built into a wide gap between the hills. They could hear the clang of metal against metal and see the men as they squared off against each other.
That, more than anything, had Isadora’s attention.
“Da,” she said as she spurred her horse next to her father’s. She pointed to the arena in the distance. “What are the men doing down there?”
Niall looked to see what had her attention. “’Tis where they have the fighting,” he said. “It looks as if they are training men this morning.”
“Can I watch the fights while we are here?”
Niall frowned. “Nay, ye canna,” he said flatly. “’Tis not seemly for a lass tae gamble.”
Her face fell. “But I’d like tae watch them fight.”
Niall sighed heavily. “If ye want tae watch them fight, then go watch them train,” he said, pointing to the arena. “I have business with Sir Clegg that ye dunna need tae be part of. Go down tae the arena and wait for me there.”
When she reined her horse to a halt, Isadora’s attention was divided between the arena in the distance and her brothers as they passed by. Ewan made a face at her and she stuck her tongue out at him.
Leaving her horse tethered to a tree, Isadora headed down the hill and toward the arena, its stone benches gleaming in the sun. The closer she came, the louder the chimes of metal against metal, and she made her way to the top level of the arena, experiencing the thrill of her first visit to the Ludus Caledonia.
Since the arena was built into a gully, one entered from the top with the fighting field far down below. There were rows of seats cut into the rocky hillside. But Isadora didn’t want to stay at the top, so far away from the action. She went down, closer to the field, so she could watch what they were doing in detail. There was a group of men down there, battling under the watchful eye of a trainer. Stranger still, one of the fighting men looked oddly familiar.
When he finally turned in her direction, it was a moment she would remember for the rest of her life.
*
