Tender Feud

Averting her gaze, she bit her lower lip, regretting her jeer even more than she feared for her life. It had been cruel to say what she had about Ellen.

“I’m sorry,” she muttered. “I had no right to taunt you so.”

Raith didn’t reply, not trusting himself to speak. Not that he would have had an answer to her accusation in any case. Her remark about murder had been closer to the truth than he cared to admit. The thought of Katrine with the old crone had sent him pelting after her the moment Lachlan had told him of her intent. He had felt an absurd fear for her. A fear he couldn’t explain or justify even to himself. And now he was feeling a helpless fury—due as much to his usual male reaction to her provocative female form, as to her rash observations.

The heavy silence lengthened between them. Only the muffled beat of the horse’s hooves could be heard as they crossed the meadow. Encouraged that Raith wasn’t going to murder her himself, Katrine wondered if this might not be an opportunity to reason with him.

“I don’t think I was in any danger from this Morag,” she said quietly. When he maintained his rigid silence, Katrine tried again, keeping her tone calm and persuasive. “Haven’t you ever considered that your judgment of the woman might be the tiniest bit unjust?”

“You know nothing about it,” Raith snapped, the words forced.

“I know what Flora told me…that you cannot abide the sight of Morag because she couldn’t save your wife and son. Because she wasn’t able to play God.”

The oath he vented under his breath singed her ears.

Katrine bit her lip, wishing she could make him see how totally unfair he was being to an old woman who had done nothing more than use her skills to the best of her ability. She made another attempt, her tone becoming pleading. “Surely you can see that your attitude is bordering on unreasonable. You shun a woman because of an unavoidable tragedy, you force your clan to shun her, too—”

“I don’t impose,” Raith snarled, “my unreasonable views on my clan. They’re free to call upon Morag’s skills whenever they choose.”

“What is the difference?” Katrine exclaimed in frustration. “Your prejudice has the same effect as a direct order. Your clan is afraid of displeasing you so they—”

“That’s quite enough, Miss Campbell!”

“But don’t you see—”

“God’s blood, I said enough!”

She stiffened at his bellowed command, but mercifully ceased her harping.

God’s truth, Raith swo

re again to himself, if he could have changed history at that moment he would have. Never would he have abducted this infuriating wench who was able to arouse his temper and body with such maddening ease. The instant Lachlan had appeared with this bonny Campbell in tow, he would have galloped off in the opposite direction.

When she took a deep breath, as if preparing to argue, he cut her off. “Hold your tongue,” Raith threatened savagely, “or you’ll find yourself locked away for good, if I have to dig a dungeon myself!”

His tone was edged with a violence that in years past would have been enough to send Ellen cowering from him in fright. But when Katrine turned to glare at him now, there wasn’t a trace of fear in her expression. Instead there was a defiant snap in her eyes that promised this battle wasn’t over yet.

When they reached the yard, she slid off the horse without waiting for Raith’s assistance. She nearly fell to her knees, yet she was too angry to care. Snatching up her skirts, she stormed into the house and ran up the servants’ stairs, not caring who heard the reverberations as she slammed the door to her small chamber.

She spent the next ten minutes fuming. What madness had ever possessed her to wish for a man who could match her spirit and fire her blood? Raith was a match for her spirit, certainly, but the fire he had just lit in her blood had nothing to do with passion—unless it was a passion for vengeance. She wouldn’t submit meekly to his unreasonable demands or quail at his uncivilized threats any longer, Katrine vowed. She wouldn’t!

At length she recalled the drawing lesson she had planned to give Meggie, but she knew better than to go near her new charge while she was in this state. She would frighten the poor child to death.

It was while she was pacing the five short steps across her floor and back again that Katrine came to a decision; she had to force the issue of her release. Only then would this intolerable situation with Raith end. His capricious moods were driving her to distraction. One minute he was kissing her senseless, the next shunning her or threatening to lock her up. She couldn’t bear it any longer. She had to end this indecision, this turmoil of uncertainty that was tearing her apart.

It was time she made some demands of her own.

Trying to calm herself enough so she could put her wits to good use, she eyed the bar on the chamber door. It wasn’t sturdy enough for her purpose. If she were to force Raith’s hand, she would have to take refuge in some safe place, where he couldn’t threaten her, where he couldn’t even reach her.

Nor would any of the other rooms in the house do, Katrine discovered after a quick perusal. The laundry had possibilities, but it had more windows than she liked. When she inspected the buttery, however, she knew her search had ended. It was easily defended, and it had the added advantage of preventing access to both the dairy staples that the household depended on and the armory of weapons Raith’s violent clan had stashed in the hidden caches.

The next half hour she spent gathering up items she would need for a long siege—or rather, a siege in reverse. A branch of candles, several blankets and a pillow, a plate of freshly made bannocks that she purloined from the kitchens when no one was looking, a chamber pot, a basin of water and soap to wash with—all these she carried out to the buttery. She had to make one final trip to the library, where she gathered enough reading material to last a week, since she wasn’t sure how long she would be away.

Finally satisfied, she returned to the buttery, lit a candle, barred the door with the heavy iron bar and fastened the shutter to the one small window. Then she sat down to wait.

Her defiant action was first discovered by one of the servants who came to fetch a brick of cheese and was sent away. When Flora herself came out to investigate, Katrine calmly explained through the door that she had converted the buttery to a dungeon and that she didn’t intend to come out until she was allowed to talk to her uncle in person—a demand she knew was unlikely to be met, but one that should at least get Raith’s attention. Only by making her requirements extreme, Katrine was persuaded, could she eventually negotiate Raith’s taking some action to hasten the end of her captivity. She would settle for the delivery of her ransom note, but she meant to make him break this untenable deadlock, or die trying!

Raith first learned of her demand from the housekeeper, who told him that “the lass has gone daft, locking herself in like that.”