The Truth of Her Heart (Highlander Heroes Book 5) Read online

  It was the McEwen laird’s turn to frown. “Lass, I said I’d show you the direction. I’ll no’ be driving my men one hundred miles in the opposite direction, when we’re so close to home.”

  Of course, she could not force him. And they had already done so much for her. She nodded, trying not to show too much upset. When the idea had formed in her head yesterday afternoon, she’d had no plan for an escort, had thought she might negotiate the countryside alone to reach the abbey; she would be then, when they parted ways after the storm, in the same circumstance as yesterday, only with three feet of snow to trudge through. Maggie bit her bottom lip and glanced down, flexing her cold fingers now in front of her. She lifted her gaze again to him, found him watching her intently, his smile gone.

  “Is it really a hundred miles?”

  His broad shoulders lifted and fell again. “Sixty? Eighty? One hundred? ’Tis all the same in this clime, aye, lass?”

  Maggie’s own shoulders slumped with dejection. “Aye, I suppose.” She guessed she might just hold out longer inside the cave, maybe even after the McEwen Mackays had gone, wait until the countryside offered a kinder earth to negotiate. Absently, she plucked another berry from the nearly bare cluster he still held. She chewed thoughtfully, considering any other option until she felt his eyes still upon her. Straightening her shoulders, she tried to smile for his benefit. Of course, this man shouldn’t be concerned with any stranger’s ruined plans. ’Twas neither his concern nor his business. And it would be even less so if he discovered that she was actually set to marry a Sutherland.

  “Aye now, dinna fuss,” he said as some consolation. “We’ll figure out how to get you to your nunnery.”

  The laughter had returned to his voice, she thought, but shone not in his eyes just now when she met them again. Though the berries had left no mark or stain, she swiped her hands together and asked, “Shall we return? I think I might manage the trek myself, since you’ve so kindly made such a nice path.” She stepped forward, considering the slogged through snow disgruntledly. It was not actually a very clear path, only deep snow with deep impressions of each of his steps.

  She gathered her skirts at the front of her, thinking she might hold them aloft, out of the snow when she was again scooped up into the arms of the McEwen laird. A startled, “Oomph,” escaped with her surprise.

  “It’s still too deep, lass,” was all he said, holding her high up against his chest.

  Maggie shifted, meaning to bring her arms up around his neck but he stopped suddenly, just outside the hut and turned right, toward the hill.

  “Pluck some berries, lass,” he said, tipping his head toward the smoothed bark tree growing on the side of the hill, “for the lads.”

  Maggie glanced up, and did as instructed, using both hands to snap off several berry clusters, wrestling with a few stubborn ones. There were not so many left and the clusters she could reach no longer contained the usual generous number of berries, likely having been feasted on by birds and critters since last fall. But she collected several, laying them against her folded belly, until the laird said that was plenty and conveyed them back to the cave. While he walked, Maggie organized the clusters so that she held them efficiently by the broken part of each thin branch, all in one hand.

  Chapter Six

  IAIN SET HER DOWN GENTLY once returned to the much warmer cave. Maggie brushed off what little snow the hem of her cloak had accumulated and presented their bounty to the men while Iain McEwen again went about removing all the snow from his person.

  Maggie walked around, doling out near equal shares to each man, saving two extra shares for Archie and Craig who were not yet returned. She took her spot next to Duncan and the laird sat on her other side in the next moment. Stretching her hands out to the low burning blaze, she glanced around. They were all so quiet, munching on the gift of the berries, most gazes occupied by the mesmerizing lure of the fire—save for Hew, who was watching her from the other side of Duncan. Reflexively, Maggie smiled at him. He nodded and smiled back with some stiffness before removing his gaze from her.

  And while she by no means considered herself an extrovert, rarely having found herself in larger gatherings, she thought the air about them was both dull and depressed. Perhaps they were accustomed to it, the silence; perhaps it was only awkward to her because she was the outsider, was unused to keeping company with all men. But was it normal that they only sat and stared and made no conversation? Not even the twins, who had seemed to her so jovial and garrulous earlier, made any attempt at chatter. The one she thought was Daimh—she hadn’t truly determined any significant difference in them; if they changed seats, she would not know—had fallen back on his pallet, one knee bent, the other leg thrown over it, his foot swinging.

  Another minute went by. Maggie listened. Yet even the fire made no noise.

  Turning toward Hew, she found his gaze upon her once again. She liked the lad, guessed him about an age with her, and thought there were possibly many a lass at home who were charmed by his easy good looks, pitch black hair and intense blue eyes, his face as of yet unbothered by so much facial hair. Mayhap with persons he was more familiar with, he would behave with less...intensity.

  “Have you a big family, Hew,” she wondered, “awaiting your return?”

  He shook his head before he spoke. “Only me and my mam, lass,” he said, moving forward on his pallet, so that less of Duncan blocked his view. “Da’ was gone at Stirling Bridge and my brother at Falkirk.”

  “I am sorry to hear that,” she said genuinely. “Thankfully, you still have your mam.”

  “Aye,” said Daimh, from his prone position, “but ever’one’s had Hew’s mam.”

  Donal guffawed at this and Duncan shook his head, though he said nothing. Maggie watched Hew’s telling cheeks pinken once again.

  Maggie frowned and turned toward the laird at her other side. He shook his head as well, giving her a look which she interpreted to mean, leave it, it’s just what they do.

  Her brow furrowed more. That was unacceptable to her. But then it wasn’t her place, certainly, to take these men to task over their behavior. However, she could remove the attention from the lad, so that they were given no opportunity to tease him.

  “And what about you, Duncan? Wife? Bairns?”

  “Nae, lass,” he said, his fingers entwined, hands dangling over his bent knees. “Just me. Had a wife, way back when. Aye, but she’s long gone.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, afraid to ask anyone else of their familial situation, lest she uncover more sad stories.

  “I’m no’,” Duncan said, keeping his gaze on the small flames. “Aye, she were a shrew, truth be told. Ran off with some farmer, went down to Glasgow. I dinna care enough to chase her. Jesu, bring back all that nagging and caterwauling?” He harrumphed. “No’ for me.”

  Maggie couldn’t decide if his tale or Hew’s was the more sorrowful one.

  “But what about you, lass?” Duncan thought to ask.

  Maggie shrugged. “Same as most, I’m sure, lost some person to war. My father is alive but my brother fell at some place called Roslin” —several of them nodded, Donal made a critical noise, all of them apparently acquainted with the battle— “which left only me and my sister, and she married years ago, went down to Perth and perished with her babe in the birthing.” She found Donal’s sympathetic gaze on her. Seeking to improve the somber mood, she said with some lightness to the twin, “But you two are the only children of your parents, I’m guessing.”

  He lifted a brow at her. “Aye, but how can you ken this?”

  Daimh sat up, frowning quizzically at her.

  “You both have an air about you—sometimes very charming—that says you’ve not ever been denied too much,” she said, and added, mischievously, “from your mam and mayhap not any woman.” While Maggie had always had what some called an unnatural ability to read people, this guess was easy—these brothers were entirely too lighthearted, all things considered, to have
been anything other than spoiled bairns.

  Duncan barked out a laugh beside her. “She’s pegged you proper, lads.”

  Daimh squinted at her. “What else do you think you might ken about us?”

  Maggie considered them and recalled their play and conversation earlier. “You are the firstborn,” she guessed—correctly, it seemed, when Duncan chuckled again beside her. “And you,” she said to Donal, “are the more intelligent one.”

  “Canna argue with that,” said Donal.

  To both of them, she speculated, “Everything is a competition between you, but neither of you think you are better than the other.”

  The twins glanced at each other, Daimh shrugging while Donal nodded with consideration.

  “Might be,” said Daimh.

  There was some noise then just outside the cave. In amazing synchrony, every man around her leapt to their feet and drew their swords, only relaxing when Archie and Craig appeared at the entrance. Neither of the two hunters seemed aggrieved by the poor reception, Archie lifting his hand to show a line of strung fish, his scowl evidently a perpetual thing, not removed with the advent of his success. Those two spent some time near the entrance, not advancing to the group and the fire until they’d removed what snow they could.

  Iain McEwen did not retake his seat, but met the two men, receiving the fish from Archie while Craig showed his laird a bundle of twigs and sticks in his meaty, ungloved paw. The three men hovered near the front, possibly making some preparations to the fish.

  “Aye, do me now,” begged Hew, getting back to Maggie’s seeming ability to read a person as he sat back down.

  “Och, you’d like that, would you no’, lad?” Teased Daimh, pretending to misunderstand Hew’s request.

  “Enow! Quit with your prattle,” Duncan chided, finally with some conviction.

  “What might you ken about me?” Hew persisted.

  Maggie likewise ignored Daimh and pivoted on her bottom to face Hew, giving him the same calculating look she’d given the twins. “Hmm, I’ll state the obvious, of course, that you are the most sincere in the group,” she turned her gaze around, over the others, “no offense, good sirs.” She faced Hew again. “You aren’t afraid of things that you should be but show fear over those that you should not.” The lowering of his brows, while he considered this, suggested she might be on to something. “Altogether, you are the extreme in almost any group in which you find yourself—the most sincere, the most intelligent, the most respectful, the most loyal perhaps–and yet you doubt yourself the most.” And then she smiled at him. “But of course, you should not.”

  He nodded at her and Maggie sipped from the shared flask, which had lain at her feet. She hoped that Duncan or the laird didn’t ask for an intuitive reading, as she was quite sure she didn’t know what to make of either of them. The captain was solid and dependable, she guessed, a calm and reasonable presence when needed, but with some ability to fly off the handle when his hackles were raised or his patience at an end. The laird...? She could only know, as of yet, that he was considerate of others, very easy to look upon, and that his eyes could delve deep into her soul, so probing and intense were some of his stares. And that he believed her a liar.

  She felt Hew’s continued scrutiny as she lowered the flask. She smiled at him, not at all unnerved by his constant attention. She felt only that he wished to talk but didn’t have any ideas about what he might say.

  “Do all of you have specific jobs inside the army, Hew?”

  “Aye,” he said, pushing his body forward. He went nowhere, simply expressed his readiness to talk, perhaps thankful for the question. “Of course, we’ve all the single goal of Scotland’s freedom, but I, myself, am normally tasked with the logistics of any move.”

  She was sorry she didn’t know what this meant, but then pleased to ask, thus giving him further reason to speak, as it seemed to be his want. “I’m not familiar with that. What does that involve?”

  “Well, whenever we plan for a large movement, like the one that took us off on the last campaign, there is much to organize. The chief will plan the route and the captain will put out the call to arms, but all the little things—which turn out to be quite significant—need to be readied.” He ticked off on his fingers the different examples. “Horses need to be provided, if we’ve called more than soldiers; food stuffs need to be prepared, stored and transported; wagons of replacements of arms and boots and shields and a myriad of other things need to be collected, and drivers hired; and log books kept, tracking each item and person included on the campaign.”

  The more he spoke, the easier it became for him. Maggie was very pleased by this.

  “You are likely perfect for that job,” she supposed, “as I imagine this requires great attention to detail and a very deliberate sense of order and efficiency, at which you likely excel.”

  “Aye, it does,” he responded with some bit of awe, that she’d deduced as much about the position, and him. “Of course, this now, what we’re about, is different, as we broke off at the end of the campaign,” he explained. “We’ve had to address our needs day by day.”

  Archie came to the fire then, looking older and wearier than before he’d left. Maggie stretched around the fire to hand a branch of berries to him. He seemed surprised at the offering, or that the gesture had come from her. But he took the fruit, giving a curt nod of thanks.

  The laird and Craig joined them after another few minutes, Craig carrying a tray of sorts, which he’d obviously woven together from those twigs he’d clenched in his hand moments ago. It was flat and not completely solid, resembling the wattle fence Maggie sometimes wove for her kitchen gardens at home. The fish, eleven small cod unless she was mistaken, were laid out haphazardly to fit across the top of the tray. Maggie was surprised when only a few rocks were rearranged to hold the tray of fish, being only a few inches above the highest flame, seeming precariously close.

  “But won’t the woven sticks catch fire?” Maggie asked.

  “Aye, they’ll burn,” said Iain. “But they’re wet and by the time they burn through, the fish will be cooked.”

  Archie said, through a mouthful of the rowan berries, “The lad made some traps, set them under the ice in the loch. Might be easier tomorrow, just go down and collect what’s caught, if any.”

  Maggie remembered the last cluster of berries and passed them around to Craig.

  “How’s it look out there, further away?” Duncan wanted to know.

  “Snow is everywhere,” Craig said simply, having taken his seat between Hew and Daimh, accepting the fruit from Daimh without any question as to its origin.

  Archie rolled his eyes at this vague description, and further explained, “It’s no’ an easy go, even half mile away from this hill. The horses dinna like it so deep and heavy, had to prod them along constantly. We’ll go nowhere anytime soon.”

  “Have any of you ever been stranded like this?” Maggie wondered. “For any length of time?”

  “Winter of ’03, just before Roslin as a matter of fact,” Duncan said, inclining his head past Iain to Archie. “You recall that storm? Nestled us in with the Cameron army for nigh on a week. Out in the heather, no’ a cave or hill or tree around, trying to get down to Comyn and Fraser—nearly missed the battle.”

  “Could’ve done without that one,” Archie said.

  The twins, perhaps enlivened by the prospect of a meal, maintained a steady stream of conversation once again. At one point, Daimh very casually said to Archie, “You’d heard about the poor simpleton down there in Dunbeath, aye?” At Archie’s blank look, Daimh went on, “The one delivering the babe? Och, but she was in some pain and the ordeal was getting on too long that the midwife, with candle in hand, made to inspect her secret area, to see if the bairn was coming at all. The poor creature says to the midwife, Aye, look on the other side also as my husband sometimes takes that road as well.”

  Equal amounts of groans and laughter followed this, while Maggie lowered her
head to hide her own smile at this bawdy yarn, delivered so sincerely that she’d expected a true story coming.

  Without missing a beat, Donal said, “Aye, and wasn’t she the mam to the little boy who’d wanted to ken if the father he’d never met might have some disfigurement as well that had given the boy the lump on his back. The mam wondered, Why would you think that? and the boy says to her, I just have a hunch.”

  This absurdity was greeted by decidedly more moans than chuckles. Maggie clapped her hand over her mouth, caught by surprise again at such silliness from these warriors. She caught the laird’s eye, her own crinkled with laughter over her hand.

  He rolled his eyes and told her, “You are fresh ears to their old jokes, lass. Hunker down, they’ve got more to share.”

  “Good heavens, but I hope they improve,” she said, keeping her grin while she lowered her hand. “Those are awful.”

  “You can do better?” Donal challenged, his grin as handsome as the rest of him.

  Gamely, Maggie said, “I think I can.”

  “Let’s have it, lass,” enthused Daimh.

  Hoping they didn’t require too many examples, as she had so few to share, she said after a moment of thought, “Well, one day I came upon a group of lads having some competition,” she began, hardly able to refrain from smiling while she told the tale. “They were using bows and arrows, trying to shoot an apple off some poor lad’s head, if you can believe it. So the first lad takes his turn and slices the apple perfectly in two, each part falling down either side of the boy’s head. The shooter thumps his chest proudly and declares, I’m William! so that all will know of his triumph. The lads all cheer. The next archer takes a shot and he, too, slices another apple right down the middle. He exclaims with his success, I’m Robert! Another boy takes his turn, but his aim is not so good,” she said with a grimace, “and he shouts out, I’m sorry!”

  Maggie held her grimace, while no one made a sound.