At The Laird's Command (Sword and Thistle 3)

Almost as if he’d planned it that way.

The thought made me so furious I threw myself back from the table. “Pardon me, Lady Fiona, but I must speak to the laird.”

“Don’t humiliate yourself in such a way,” the lady sniffed, her distaste for me as plain as ever. “That one has likely sowed a hundred Macrae bastards in the countryside. But my son actually cares for you. Which means, in turn, that I must make you my concern.”

I didn’t know if I should be glad or terrified to be of concern to the lady my laird had once called a dragon. “I believe you are mistaken, Lady Fiona.”

With that, I rose to find the laird. But Lady Fiona stopped me with a hand on my elbow. “If you’re off to share the news with our chieftain, you needn’t bother. My nephew has given orders that you’re not to be admitted to see him. He’s made very plain to everyone in the castle that he’s done with you.”

I knew it. I had despaired of it. Wept of it. Wanted to hide away in shame. “But he will want to hear—”

“He will not,” Fiona insisted. “Besides, if you go to him with this now, it will be a distraction he doesn’t need in negotiating his marriage.”

The pain I felt at hearing these words was crippling. I nearly doubled over of it, as surely as if she’d thrown an elbow into the softness of my belly. “His—his marriage?”

Lady Fiona clucked her tongue. “Don’t you know how sieges are settled, you poor, delu

ded girl? The chieftain of the Donald clan has an unmarried daughter. He’ll offer her to the laird in exchange for giving up the castle and breaking his alliance with the MacKenzies. Without reinforcement it’s likely our only way out of this standoff. I don’t like it; I never thought I’d live to see the day a laird of this clan would surrender the castle at Eilean Donan. But I’m not one to hide from the realities of this world.”

I sat—no, fell, really—back into my chair. The laird had told me from the start that he wasn’t interested in marriage. I suppose I had put too much stock in it. That was before he was pushed into this position. It made more sense now—why he’d sent me away from him. Why he’d fobbed me off on his second-in-command. And though a part of me railed against the laird for speaking words of love to me and promising to be as true as any husband while considering a marriage proposal, another part of me rejoiced to think there might be some way out of this that would not cost him his life.

Seeing that I had nearly swooned, Lady Fiona pursed her lips. “I might feel sorry for you if you weren’t such a strumpet, allowing yourself to be passed from man to man. My nephew isn’t the sentimental sort.” I started to protest that she obviously didn’t know the laird if she could say such a thing, but she interrupted me. “But my son is. Under his gruff exterior, Ian is a very sentimental man. So I will insist that you behave as respectfully as a mistress can behave, for his honor. And for his heart. Because if you don’t, I will come after yours with a butcher knife.”

I’d never before been threatened in such dulcet tones, with such promise of violence, and for such an entirely ridiculous reason. “My Lady, you need not fear. I cannot endanger your son’s heart. Ian has disapproved of me from the moment I entered this castle.”

She gave a delicate snort. “Don’t be a clot-headed fool. A woman of your station has to be wiser in the ways of men. My son doesn’t bother to disapprove of anyone he doesn’t love.” With that, she pushed both bowls in front of me again. “Now eat.”

The very same lady who had refused to let me help her sew for the war effort lest she be seen in the same room with me now sat beside me, imperiously supervising my every last bite. I ate, silently. Numbly. Trying to make sense of my situation. Trying to understand what I should say or do.

Understanding only one thing…

If there truly was a babe inside me, I had to worry about more than just my own broken heart. It changed everything somehow. A child would have to be provided for, whether it was the laird’s get or not. Because the child was mine.

Unfortunately, Lady Fiona was right about one thing. The laird would not see me, even when I managed to slip up the stairs to his chambers. Young Rodric, posted outside his door, stopped me there. “No one passes. Least of all you.”

“My laird!” I shouted. “Please speak to me.”

But there was no answer from beyond the heavy wooden door.

“I’m not leaving,” I told Rodric. “I will camp here, in the hall, all night if need be. Surely the laird must come out of his chambers.”

Rodric turned a bit red at the tips of his ears. “You’ll make it harder for me to do my duty, woman.”

Woman? To take such a tone with me when Rodric looked scarcely past the age of eighteen! I quite nearly boxed his ears, but I supposed he could have called me worse things. “I want to see the laird.”

“He’s given me orders to escort you away if you should come,” young Rodric said. “I’ll do it if I must, but that will leave his door unguarded.”

And I remembered what happened to him the last time his door was unguarded. He was nearly murdered. Yes, I remembered. Though my hands and knees had healed of their scrapes, the wound was as fresh as ever in my mind. So, it was with despair and defeat that I returned to Ian’s chambers, my belly filled with such anger at my laird that I could almost imagine doing what he’d asked of me, in revenge.

That’s what I need from you. To bed down with him. To make him love you as you made me love you. To find love with him, if you can.

It had been worked out between Ian and I a sort of schedule. He kept to the bed during the days so that he could man the walls at night. And I slept at night whilst he was gone. In the few hours of overlap, we sometimes read together, talking of the books we both loved so much.

But this time, when Ian returned from his rounds, I demanded, “Do you love me?”

Ian froze where he was, his shirt half-on, half-off. “What?”

“I asked you if you loved me, and I will have an answer.”