The Other Highland Laird

‘Oh Brice, do you know I felt something move my heart in a way it hasn’t been moved before…that first moment I saw you…and every moment after that! And that is why I cannot marry Robert.’

They heard voices calling out Marion’s name, and Brice reluctantly pulled away from her. ‘Quick,’ he said, go round the back of this shed and enter the Great Hall through the side door. ‘Come, I’ll show you the way.’ He slid out of the shed, and Marion followed, running away from him reluctantly. She slipped into the side door and made her way to the banquet tables where Lady Buchane found her.

‘Where have you been?’ Lady Buchane asked, and Marion hoped her face bore no tell tale signs of Brice’s kiss.

‘Here, waiting to be seated, so that I may eat something. I’m ravenous.’

‘We were looking outside for you,’ Lady Buchane said, searching Marion’s face, ‘and there are people, even now, out in the cold on your account.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Marion said, with a sweep of her right arm, ‘I was over there in a corner watching the dancers, and then I came here.’

‘I see,’ Lady Buchane said, not entirely convinced by Marion’s story, but seating herself and her daughter at the banquet table to partake of the feast. For one who claimed to be in dire need of sustenance, Marion did no justice to the feast, and the food seemed to wedge itself in her throat, along with all the pent up emotion of her recent encounter with Brice, and the fear of being forced into a marriage with Robert.

CHAPTER II

‘I want to return to England,’ Marion said.

Lady Buchane grimaced. ‘You know we are not going to leave Scotland now,’ she said.

‘You said we were here to attend a wedding,’ Marion argued, ‘and that we would return after that.’

‘Look, my dear, you need to come to terms with the fact that your father is beholden to Lord Murray and that we are compelled to stay here at Arniston House, until certain business is transacted.’

‘You mean we have to stay here until I am betrothed and then married to Robert Murray, don’t you?’

‘Yes, that is correct,’ Lady Buchane replied firmly. Her expression softened and she went over to Marion and stroked her hair. ‘You are going to have one of the finest seamstresses create the most exquisite wedding gown for you, and you are to have an entire array of new and very fashionable clothes so that you are not out of place in Paris.’

Marion threw her mother a withering look. ‘And you think all of this frippery means something to me? Not at all, mother. I am not to be bought by fine dresses and trinkets.’

Lady Buchane pursed her lips, ‘Oh fie!’ she exclaimed impatiently, ‘Do not be impertinent, child! Be grateful you are to marry a man of such high standing and promising prospects.’

‘I see that you will not at any cost rate my happiness above my father’s debt to Lord Murray!’ Marion cried, running out of the room in tears.

Outside the sun shone, but an icy wind sliced through the heather. Marion stood in the morning room, looking out of the window, still crying, when she spied a man on horseback ride up to the house. Lady Buchane breezed into the morning room minutes later bearing an elaborate card.

‘Marion, my dear! Just look! An invitation to witness a tournament! Wouldn’t that be so entertaining?’

Marion turned around dully. ‘A tournament? And how would that be at all entertaining?’

Lady Buchane sighed. ‘Come child, let us decide what you should wear. You will be seated with Lord and Lady Murray while you watch all their three sons jousting. And there will be feasting after.’

‘I see,’ Marion said softly, a little flutter in her belly at the thought of seeing Brice again. ‘Well, a joust might not be all that unpleasant to watch,’ she murmured, and allowed her mama to hold up a selection of gowns for her to choose from…though eventually it was Lady Buchane who chose a gown of pale lavender for her daughter to wear to the tournament.

Marion felt almost delirious during the days that followed – being given to long spells of silence, her eyes glazed over as she replayed the sequence of events in the outhouse by the Chapel. Her fingers strayed often to her lips, feeling them transformed by that gently bestowed, exquisitely emotion ridden first kiss. Her excitement grew as the day of the tournament drew near, and her ivory cheeks were stained pink with anticipation as they set out for Bothwell Castle.