Tatiana March (6 page)

He walked away, reminding himself that his marriage was only about land.

* * *

Brenna watched Laird Olaf instruct the two teams of villagers. Their new laird had turned out to be a good master, willing to listen to suggestions, fair in his decisions. She no longer lived in fear that he would try to dominate her.

And yet, the sum of her fears remained unchanged.

Instead of fearing him, she feared the day he’d leave twice as much.

Romantic love ruined lives. She’d known it from the start. She’d fought against the lure of the warmth, the sense of safety and protection she’d gained from her union with Olaf Stenholm. She hadn’t been able to resist those, any more than she’d been able to resist the demands of her own body, the passions he aroused in her as they lay entwined on the big canopied bed.

She kept her feelings hidden, though.

It was better that way. It would hurt less when he left, for leave he surely would, like everyone else she’d ever allowed into her heart.

Brenna retrieved her sword from the snowy ground, wiped the blade clean, and set off to join the others in the mock battle. Before she’d reached the two teams of villagers, the frozen earth started trembling beneath her feet.

Laird Olaf detached himself from the skirmish and surveyed the horizon. “Riders arriving from the east,” he shouted, and raised his arm to command the attention of the villagers. “Everyone inside except Robert and Ian and Alistair.”

To muttered protests, the villagers, including the women and children who’d been watching the battle, some even taking part in it, retreated into the stone tower. They’d never felt the need to hide before. Surely, their new laird was taking caution too far? On such a fine winter’s day, everyone valued fresh air more than the illusion of safety the dank shelter with the animals might provide.

When Laird Olaf curled his hand around Brenna’s arm to haul her in after the others, she braced her feet and held her body rigid. “I’ll stand beside you,” she told him in the fiercest tone she could manage. “That was your wedding promise to me. To be your equal.”

She waited, tension coiling inside her as Laird Olaf studied the four approaching riders. Then he ushered her forward on the path. “So be it,” he said. “I’ll consent this time as we outnumber them, but we shall discuss this later.”

Brenna shot him a rebellious glare.

“Don’t move,” he warned her. “And don’t speak unless I invite you to.”

“Kilgarren is my birthright.”

“And I’m your husband, and it’s my duty to keep you safe.”

Inside the heavy oak door, the bolt thudded in place after the retreating villagers. Alistair and Ian settled beside Brenna, and Robert stood on Laird Olaf’s right. Robert possessed a sword of his own, and Brenna had lent her brother’s and father’s weapons to the tall Viking brothers. Together they made a human wall of five warriors. Laird Olaf wore a padded wool doublet and no armor. She had on her hauberk but no helm. The others had leather jerkins that they wore for protection while they practiced warfare.

Brenna was the first to recognize one of the riders. “Erskine.”

Laird Erskine thundered up to them and drew his horse to a halt. Lather had formed around the animal’s mouth, and the burly rider strained for breath. Brenna shuddered. It had to be bad news. Erskine wouldn’t have driven his mount so hard unless he had something to gloat about. He wore steel armor around his huge torso but no protection on his arms and legs, indicating that speed had been more important to him than safety.

“The king will be pleased to see me take Kilgarren,” Erskine said. In a haughty gesture, he waved at one of the riders who had accompanied him. The slight young man drew a letter from the pouch by his saddle. Nudging his gray gelding forward, he handed the parchment to Laird Olaf, taking care not to drop it on the snowy ground where the ink might smudge.

“A message from King James,” the man said and stifled a yawn.

Brenna gritted her teeth. She accepted that the messenger had ridden long days across the windswept moors, but it grated on her nerves that anyone could treat the fate of her ancestral lands with a show of boredom.

Laird Olaf unfolded the parchment and studied the text. He lifted his gaze to Erskine. “The king hasn’t given Kilgarren to you,” Laird Olaf pointed out. “He has merely granted you permission to lay siege to the estate once the Christmas festivities are over. You’ll have to conquer the castle and the lands.”

“And I will.” Erskine sent his mount into a circle of showy prancing and drew his sword, pointing it toward the clear blue sky. “I will take Kilgarren and everything and everyone that goes with it,” he yelled at the top of his lungs, making sure the people barricaded inside the stone tower could hear him. Calming his horse, he halted in front of Brenna. His eyes raked over her, his mouth twisting into a leer. “Everything, including the laird’s widow.”

He swung his horse around. The pair of knights flanking him followed, and the three warriors cantered out, their raised swords glinting in the winter sun.

“Am I offered shelter overnight?” the king’s messenger asked.

“Of course,” Laird Olaf assured the man. “I have a letter to send. I’ll write it tonight so you can leave at first light in the morning.”

Brenna closed her eyes, the icy winds seeping into her. It was no use. The king wouldn’t change his mind. Erskine had four times as many men as Kilgarren. It was only a question of how long they could hold out in a siege. They would have to surrender or die, and she knew that Laird Olaf would never surrender. She had feared the day he would leave, but now she had gained a new fear that eclipsed the old one—that he would stay and die.

Chapter Six

Humility didn’t sit well on him. When King James had accused Olaf’s brother of treason and stripped away the Stenholm earldom, both the title and the lands, awarding them to Stefan Navarro, Olaf had sworn never to look back, never to dwell on what he had lost. And here he was now, writing to Navarro, begging for a favor.

In the armory at Stenholm Castle—or whatever name his ancestral home went by under Navarro’s rule—there should be a suit of armor Olaf had worn as a boy. A suit of armor that would fit a small female.

He finished the letter, torn between sacrificing his pride and the need to protect Lady Brenna. Protecting his wife won, as he knew it always would. She’d never agree to stay out of the fighting. He’d promised to treat her as his equal, let her be a knight, and she would hold him to that promise. The best he could hope for was to equip her with proper armor, and trust that he had taught her well in the use of a sword.

Olaf gave the sealed parchment to the king’s messenger, who would pass by the Stenholm ancestral lands on his way back to Edinburgh. Then Olaf took a small tour of the village, as he did every night, to check that all was well among his vassals. Upon his return, he secured the castle entrance and made sure the animals were resting peacefully at the stable.

All tasks completed, he went up the ladder to Lady Brenna. Since their wedding night, she’d developed a habit of getting into bed while he did his evening rounds, and he’d come back upstairs to find her huddled beneath the covers like a frightened virgin.

She responded when he touched her, he couldn’t complain. But she never touched him first. Never came to him at daylight and tilted her face up for a casual kiss, never whispered any words of affection to him. Olaf wasn’t sure himself when his marriage had ceased to be just about lands. At some point in the past two weeks, he’d started yearning for that devoted look in Lady Brenna’s eyes, the look he’d seen in the eyes of women who were in love with their husbands.

However, today she was not asleep in bed but waiting for him, sitting in one of the two chairs that flanked the small, square table. A fire roared in the chimney, unusual because they tried not to waste firewood. She wore nothing but a thin linen shift. Her hair fell in a tumble of midnight curls around her shoulders.

“Why are you not abed?” he asked.

“I’ve waited to talk to you.”

“We can talk in bed.”

“I...” Her brows gathered into a worried frown as she looked up at him. “It’s no use writing to the king. He won’t change his mind. He’ll let Erskine have Kilgarren.”

“We’ll fight Erskine.”

“No. I mean...surely, you should leave now.”

“Leave?” The rough sound of his voice echoed around the room. “What are you talking about, woman?” He clenched his fists in anger. “Is that how little you think of me? That I’d run away like a coward? That I’d turn my back on the people who have accepted me as their laird? That I’d abandon my wife, betray my honor as a knight, and be forced to hide from my shame in foreign lands, never returning to Scotland again?”

“I...I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Then what
did
you mean, my lady wife?” he asked, his voice dangerously soft.

Lady Brenna blinked, appearing startled by his anger. “Everyone I care about always leaves,” she told him. “I lied to you about my father. His death was no accident. He drove his horse down the cliffs. My mother chose to leave, my father chose to die, and my brother died, although it was through no fault of his own.”

“You thought that I would leave too?” The first stirrings of relief eased the sharp edge of Olaf’s anger. Was that why she’d kept her distance? Had he finally discovered why Lady Brenna had erected barriers around her feelings, closed him out of her heart?

She nodded but didn’t speak.

Olaf strode over to the bed where her treasured Moonbeam stood propped against the corner post. “I told you that if I ever betray you by lifting my hand against you, you can cut off my arm.” He hastily stripped away his doublet and the linen shirt beneath. Picking up the sword, he covered the three steps between them, stood before her, and pressed the tip of the blade to his bare chest, angling it upward between his ribs, pointing at his heart.

“If I even betray you by leaving, you can cut out my heart.” When Lady Brenna didn’t move but merely stared up at him with wide, terrified eyes, Olaf reached out one hand and pulled her up to her feet. The force of the motion pushed the tip of the blade he was holding with his other hand deeper into his flesh. “Do it,” he growled. “If you think I’m planning to leave you, take your sword and push it through my heart.”

“Stop,” Lady Brenna cried. She sank down on her knees in front of him and pried the sword from his hands, leaning back to get the weight of her entire body behind the motion. She tossed the sword aside and scampered to her feet. “Dear God, you’ve drawn blood.” Using the hem of her linen shift, she patted away the thin trail of blood that ran down the muscled ridges of his stomach.

Olaf ignored her frantic ministrations. He curled his hands around her upper arms and pulled her up to her feet, hauling her body close to his. “Show me,” he said in a rough murmur. “Instead of worrying that I’ll leave you, show me that you want me to stay.” Tightening his hold on her, he lifted her on tiptoe and bent his face to hers, halting with his mouth a fraction away from hers.

She raised her gaze to him, and in her eyes Olaf could finally see the look he’d been searching for. And yet he waited, his mouth poised over hers. Blood thundered in his veins. The need to kiss her burned on his lips, swelled inside him until it was greater than the inky black moors outside. But still he waited. Waited, until she craned her neck, a tiny movement that brought her mouth against his.

Her lips were soft and gentle, the kiss shy and tentative, but it was enough to break his restraint. He took her mouth fiercely, his tongue delving deep. Lady Brenna made a startled sound and sagged against him. Too impatient to seek the bed, too impatient to undress, he eased her over to the wall, trapping her body with his, one arm around her shoulders to shield her back from getting scraped against the rough stone.

Not breaking the kiss, he unfastened his codpiece with one fumbling hand and shoved the leather out of the way. Reaching beneath the hem of her linen shift, he slid his hand down her thigh, to the back of her knee, and lifted her leg to hook around his hip.

He fitted their bodies together and thrust with his hips. A long, powerful stroke, burying himself to the hilt in her slick heat. He could feel her tighten around him, first in resistance, then holding him in, meeting his force with her own. He paused for a second. Waited. When Lady Brenna rocked her hips in a silent plea for more, he started moving again, powerful surges that brought her to completion almost instantly.

“Say it,” he growled as his wife came apart in his arms.

“I want you to stay,” she replied.

He thrust again and took his own satisfaction, marred though it was, because he had hoped for a deeper declaration of affection from his wife. He’d seen the look of love in her eyes. That was enough, for now, Olaf told himself as he soothed Lady Brenna, cupping her face in his hands, stroking her hair, bringing her down from the fevered peak.

He picked her up and carried her to the canopied feather bed. When they settled down to sleep, Lady Brenna drifted off in seconds, rolling over to the far side of the bed, away from him, as she had done every night. Olaf waited. Once he heard her breathing grow slow and steady, he pulled the covers from her. It took a moment for the chill to penetrate her senses. He spent the time admiring her pale skin and feminine curves. Soon, a tiny shiver of chill shook her, and she inched forward on the mattress, curling up to him in her sleep, seeking his heat. Satisfied, Olaf slipped his arm around her waist, hauled her into his embrace, and spread the covers over both of them.

* * *

Freezing fog rolled in from the sea and enveloped the castle roof. Brenna surveyed the dawn breaking over the horizon in the east. It was the third day after Epiphany and yet there had been no sign of Laird Erskine and his men-at-arms.

She wore her chain mail hauberk. Laird Olaf wore steel armor around his torso and arms. Robert and Alistair and Ian had padded gambesons beneath their leather jerkins. Those could stop an arrow shot by a skilled archer, even from a close range, and the lower halves of their bodies were protected by the crenellated castle wall.

“Where in devil’s name are they?” Alistair said.

“Probably still recovering from the festivities,” Ian replied.

“I wish they would hurry,” Brenna fretted. “I can’t bear the waiting.”

Despite the impending danger, the whole village had celebrated Christmas, bestowing small gifts upon one another. They’d had a proper feast, singing carols, eating goose, drinking wassail. They had prayed too, and Robert, who knew a smattering of Latin, had conducted the Mass. Before setting fire to the Yule log that they had burned for the whole twelve days of Christmas, Ian and Alistair had carved runes in the timber, representing the ill fortune they wished to consign to the flames.

Unfortunately, Brenna didn’t believe it had worked.

“They’ll come soon,” Laird Olaf said calmly. Legs braced, fair hair fluttering in the wind, he stared into the distance. Brenna had learned that he could stand guard for hours on end without giving in to fatigue.

“They might have built a trebuchet to grind us into rubble,” Robert said.

“They won’t need to.” Relaxing his alert stance for an instant, Laird Olaf pulled off his gauntlets and blew into his palms to keep his fingers from going too numb to control a bow and arrows. “Nor will they bring a siege tower. A castle this well secured can’t be breached. They might tunnel underneath to burn us out, but it would be difficult because the ground is frozen solid. That only leaves the possibility of someone letting them in, or a long siege to starve us into submission.” He raked his gaze over the others, sending them a grim smile. “As there are no traitors at Kilgarren, it will be starvation for us.”

Brenna listened to the man she had grown to love, and the bitter truth settled over her. She would never have expected that instead of fearing the day he would leave, she would regret that he had stayed. “You should have left when you could,” she told him fiercely. “If Erskine can’t kill you, he can’t make me into a widow and force me to marry him.”

“If I failed to stay and defend the castle, the king would give Kilgarren to Erskine without a fight. I’d sacrifice my honor and you’d lose your home anyway. That would be a bad bargain.”

“Dying for Kilgarren is a bad bargain for you,” she countered. “I was born here. This place is my home. My life. For you, it is nothing but a worthless piece of moorland on the remote edges of Scotland.”

He pulled his gauntlets back on. “I’m a soldier. A soldier expects to die on a battlefield. Without you, I’d have died in some foreign land, with nothing to mark my falling, no one to mourn for me. If I die for Kilgarren, I’ll have a proper grave to rest in, people who will remember my name. It will be a good death, better than I could have hoped for.”

“Riders in the east,” Robert called out.

Brenna whirled to fasten her eyes on the horizon. The rising sun silhouetted a row of men on horseback. She counted five. And behind them—Lord have mercy—behind them she saw a row of foot soldiers that seemed to stretch a hundred yards from left to right.

* * *

Olaf pressed his hands against the sides of the cooling cauldron for warmth. He had been wrong to think starvation would be their worst enemy. Kilgarren was built around a well. With unlimited access to water, they could withstand the enemy for weeks, perhaps months, until they had eaten all the sheep and the two milk cows, possibly even the horses.

Their worst enemy had turned out to be the weather.

Nature had delivered a hard frost that turned his breath into icicles inside his helm while he kept watch on the castle roof. For now, they stoked the chimney day and night. Once the firewood ran out, they could burn the furniture. Then they would slowly freeze to death. If the weather eased and spared them from frostbite, starvation would weaken them until those still alive would be too weak to do anything but surrender.

Laird Erskine knew it too. For three weeks now, he’d made a halfhearted show of sending out a volley of arrows each morning and noon. Why waste ammunition, or damage the castle he already thought of as his? Most of Erskine’s men spent their time scouring the seafront, collecting driftwood to burn in bonfires.

Waiting.

Waiting.

Waiting for them to die or surrender.

The water in the cauldron had grown cold. Olaf called Robert to help him, and together they poured the contents over the side of the castle, creating a coating of ice that would make it harder for intruders to climb up the wall. Olaf gritted his teeth in frustration at defending the castle against an attacker who couldn’t be bothered to attack.

When he pulled off his helm, the north wind bit into his face. “I want to talk to Lady Brenna,” he told Robert. “Sound the alarm if they make the slightest move.”

Robert nodded in reply, his face too numb to let him speak.

Olaf found Lady Brenna in the laird’s chamber, sitting at the small table, two piles of pebbles in front of her. Clad in chain mail, boots on her feet, a helm and a sword by her side, she didn’t abandon battle readiness for one second. When she turned to look at him, Olaf knew he couldn’t let her die.

“How many days?” he asked.

“We use half a stack of firewood every day.” Using the pebbles to mark the number of days and the stacks of firewood they had left, Lady Brenna counted. “Two weeks.”

Up to now, Olaf had resisted the urge to seize the initiative. He’d told himself that although it was in the nature of a soldier to seek a fight, sometimes caution served better. As the laird, he had to think of women and children, of continuity, of preserving life so there would be a future. Now he accepted that the plan he had abandoned as too bold, too foolhardy, was the only one that offered them a slim chance of survival.