The Highlander (29 page)

"I did not know you well enough to know that when I first came here. I was desperately afraid you would turn me over to the English once you discovered who I was."

"I am a Highlander. I don't hand anyone over to the damn bloody English."

"Well, I did not know that, and not everyone in Scotland feels that way. It was common knowledge in France that the Scottish nobility— even in the Highlands—held beliefs more in line with the English than the Gaelic-speaking clans. And what about you?—telling me that the Black Watch was drawn almost entirely from the Lowlands, where hatred of anyone who spoke Gaelic ran deep."

"And later...when you came to know me, when you knew I would never hand you over to anyone? Why didn't you tell me then?"

"By then it was already too late. I knew you could never forgive me for deceiving you. You were going to marry Gillian. You had made me your mistress. You were a peer of the realm. If you discovered that I was the king's granddaughter, you would have been forced to marry me.

"And would that have been so bad?"

It was the softness in his voice, the raw pain in his eyes that was her undoing. She could not bear to look at him, to see the anguish in his eyes. Be angry with me. Strike me. Lock me in the dungeon. Do anything but look at me like that, she thought. To see you thus, breaks my heart.

I cannot bear this, she thought.

She turned away from him because she could not stand to see the pain she had inflicted, although there was precious little comfort in it for her. There was no way to escape her shame. She wished with all her heart the floor of the castle would open beneath her feet and she would disappear.

He grabbed her by the arm and spun her around. "Damn your lying eyes. Do not turn away from me. I asked you a question, and by all that is holy I will have my answer. Would that have been so bad?"

"Yes," she shouted. "Yes, it would have been bad. Do you think I wanted to be the one who ruined your future? What kind of life would it have been for you to be married to a woman you were forced to marry, a woman you did not love. How do you think I would have felt, knowing I would spend the rest of my life with a man who was in love with another woman?"

"I was never in love with Gillian."

"Well, how was I supposed to know that? You never mentioned it, and you certainly made it clear to me...on more than one occasion, I might add, that you planned to marry her."

She paused, put her hands to her head and began to shake it. "This is all so pointless. The fault is mine. I have ruined everything for both of us. If Gillian knows who I am, that means the English know. They will come here looking for me. I cannot stay here any longer. I must leave."

She made a move to turn away, but he yanked her back against him.

"You are no longer in control of what happens to you. You relinquished that right when you set out to deceive me. You are not going anywhere," he said, his voice cold and sharp as icicles.

"But the English—"

"Damn the English, and damn you. I have no right to call myself a man if I cannot hold off a band of puny Lowlanders who serve the bloody English crown."

"You cannot keep me here. It isn't safe for either of us."

He ignored her. "You will remain here, as my prisoner, until I decide what to do with you."

"You cannot hold me here against my will." She twisted away from his grip and made a dash for the door, but he caught her before she was halfway there.

She fought him, trying to free herself. "Let me go. Please. You do not understand what will happen. They will find me here and take me to England, and I will be forced to marry Rockingham. I would rather die than accept such a fate."

He released her. "Rockingham?" He almost spat the word out. "You were to wed that bastard the Duke of Rockingham?"

She rubbed her wrist. "It was none of my doing, I assure you. I was running away when the ship ran aground. I was going to Norway. I was nothing more than a pawn. My betrothal was arranged between my cousin, King Louis, and Rockingham. I was not informed of what negotiations took place, but I do know there were advantages for both sides."

"Your words fall on ears that will not listen, lass. There is nothing you can say. Your lies have taught me well. I do not believe you."

"What are you going to do with me?"

"I told you. You are^my prisoner. You will be confined to your chamber. You will be kept under guard, night and day. You will remain here until you are too old to walk across the room, much less leave. And you will give yourself to me willingly...when I choose...where I choose...and for as long as I desire it."

"I would rather die."

"That, too, can be arranged."

She was wild-eyed and so beautiful he ached; yet her lies tore at his heart. He knew he could never trust her again.

There was nothing quiet about her desperation as she began to fight him, to beg and plead for her freedom. He knew she was desperate, although it did not soften him, and he easily subdued her.

He held both of her hands in one of his and, with the other, he turned the lock and opened the door.

Bran was standing guard outside the door and Jamie shoved Sophie toward him. "Take her to her room and lock her in. Stay outside the door until I send someone to relieve you. No one is to enter, save me. Not even you. Understood?''

"Aye," Bran said, and, without asking why, he led Sophie away.

Sophie refused the evening meal when it was bought to her by the guard—a man she had seen a few times and knew only by his given name, Colin.

"I will leave it on the table, then."

She waved him away. "Take it back. I do not want it. If you leave it, I'll throw it through the window."

Colin removed the tray and did not say anything.

After he was gone, Sophie began to pace the floor. She went to the window and looked out. No escape there, she thought, for there was nothing but a sheer drop, straight down into the sea.

When it was too dark to see, she lit a lamp and removed her dress, and clad only in her shift she went to her bed and lay down. She purposefully tried not to think about anything that happened today. Her mind needed to be free of clutter, so she could decide on a way to leave, to plan some avenue of escape.

And still, thoughts of Jamie crept into her consciousness. She heaped every vile word she could think of upon his head—using the full resources of her vocabulary, in five languages. When that did not seem to relieve the anguish, the frustration and the disappointment over his treatment of her, she did what any young woman her age would have done.

She cried.

But even crying has to come to an end and, when it did, she drifted off to sleep.

She refused breakfast the next morning, and lunch, and dinner.

When the next day came around, she refused food again.

The fourth day she did the same.

Jamie was out most of the day, and when he returned, it was already dark. He went into the kitchen, to see if there was any dinner left.

Maude, the cook, was putting the last of the kitchen in order for the night, but when Jamie asked if he might have a piece of bread, she included with it a bowl of soup.

"I'm glad there was some soup left," he said, when he finished the last of it.

"There wouldn't have been if yer lass had eaten her dinner."

"I have no lass," he said.

"Aye, 'tis true enough, for she willna be alive much longer."

"What are you talking about, old woman?"

"The French lass," she said. "She has not eaten a bite since ye locked her in her room. She said she wouldn't eat anything that belonged to you."

"She will...if she gets hungry enough."

"I wouldn't be so sure of that, if I were you." Maude cleared the last utensils from the table. "Tomorrow will be the sixth day she's been locked in her room, and she hasn't eaten a bite since she's been there."

Damn her stubborn pride. If she thinks this will soften me toward her she is mistaken, he thought. She will not break me.

He did not consider that it might be Sophie who would break.

He returned to his room, undressed and went to bed.

An hour later, he was still awake. He folded his hands behind his head and watched the shadows from the fireplace dancing in place on the ceiling. He kept seeing images of Sophie's face, her long hair, and the feel of it, silken and cool, when wrapped around him in the heat of love-making.

"Damn you," he said. He left his bed, grabbed his shirt and kilt and dressed as he walked to the door.

Five minutes later, he approached the door to Sophie's room and said to the guard, "Unlock the door and lock it after I enter."

He had seen men possessed of an utter absence of hope, and knew it could be born of a sense of futility or defeat. In Sophie, he saw both the spirit of hopelessness and the belief that her continued efforts to save herself would only end in failure.

She stared at him with empty eyes, showing no recognition, and giving no response when he spoke to her.

He sent for the doctor, and waited with her until he arrived.

Jamie had known Dr. Macrae all of his life, but that did not earn him the right to be present while Dr. Macrae examined Sophie. "I will speak with ye when I have finished," Macrae said.

Jamie did not return below stairs, but waited outside the door for almost an hour before Dr. Macrae stepped out to have a word with him. "She suffers from a despondency that arises from her inability to believe anything can save her. Ye cannot hold her prisoner any longer, Jamie. She is like a trapped animal. She will not eat in a captive state."

Sophie stood at the open window, feeling so weak she had to brace herself against it. She turned her face into the cold wind.

A thin, wispy fog was the only reminder that a thunderstorm had passed over the castle on its blustery way down the coast. Overhead, the moon found a clearing, and the moonlight seemed to shatter into a million tiny fragments that floated upon the surface of the water.

Two days ago, she had wondered how things could get much worse. This morning she found out, after another wave of nausea hit her and she realized this had been happening with some regularity for the past few weeks. The tender breasts, the bouts of nausea...how could she have missed the signs?

Until Dr. Macrae told her, why did it never occur to her that she might be with child?

She thought of the way she had used her unborn child to persuade Dr. Macrae not to tell Jamie. The doctor tried to persuade her by saying it was his duty to tell Jamie. In the end, it had been Sophie's threat to continue her refusal of food that won the doctor's concession.

"Very well," Dr. Macrae said, "as long as you stay healthy, I will remain mute."

That night, she ate a little barley soup and a few bites of bread.

When she finished her meal she went to her desk, still weak and sickened by nausea, yet she managed to rummage through the drawers until she found what she was looking for—a silver letter opener.

She carried it back to bed with her. If the opportunity arose for escape, she would take it.

She slipped the letter opener under her pillow and laid her head upon it. For quite some time she did not move as she tried to think about escape, but it was difficult to think with a clear mind when her heart beat so painfully in her chest.

Jamie, she knew, had a right to feel betrayed. She recognized he had a right to be angry. True, she had lied to him, but she expected that he would have been somewhat understanding.

It was his inability to forgive her that hurt.

With him, there was no middle ground and no halfway point. It was all or nothing, and nothing was what she was going to get—no compassion, no understanding, no sympathy, and certainly not one ounce of feeling.

She finally realized what it was about all of this that hurt her most. How could he have made love to her so many times, so tenderly and with so much feeling, and then turn so cold?

How could she have misjudged him so?

She thought he cared for her, but the truth was, she was nothing more than a receptacle for the fruit of his passion, and now she carried the proof of that in her womb.