Iain’s head twitched, and his left fingers swung inward in a “come” gesture where they lay on his hip.
Harriet laid the vellum atop the blanket and uncorked the inkpot, nearly overturning it. “Oh! Mercy! All right, then. Here we are.” She picked up the quill and dipped it, tapped it as she’d seen Tav do a thousand times, then placed the quill in Iain’s limp grip. She slid a sheet of thick vellum from the roll and then fed it awkwardly between Iain’s wrist and the coverlet, until the ink-darkened tip of the quill shuddered over the top of the page. She was shocked when the words began to sound out on the paper; skittering, quick, shaking. The swift writing was juxtaposed to the man’s blank face, his slowly heaving chest.
Iain’s good eye was rolled down toward the vellum, watching his efforts, although it couldn’t be said whether or not he actually saw the script. It didn’t matter—the story he wrote was vivid in the part of his mind that wasn’t damaged, and he had no doubt that he would remember it all exactly as it happened.
Unlike his daughter’s swiftly composed farewell, Iain Douglas’s note would take a very long time.
Chapter 14
The already long trestle table had been further augmented by the addition of several quickly hewn extensions, and the finely carved chairs were now interspersed with both short and long backless benches to accommodate the scores of guests that had come to Roscraig in anticipation of the royal visit. Sixty-seven, at Tavish’s last count; which brought the number of invitees now seating themselves at his feasting table to sixty-nine, counting himself and his mother.
Only one seat at the table, six places down on the right from where Tavish was seated at the head, remained conspicuously empty. The idea that she would deliberately disobey him by refusing to attend had not entered his mind before that moment. But then he remembered that Glenna was planning to leave him at first light, with the man now seated two down on his left—Captain John Muir.
If she thought so little of him as to leave him completely, surely she would think nothing of failing to appear at the feast. She could be hiding aboard theStygianat this moment,seeking to evade him altogether before her escape.
The idea of it maddened him so that Tavish pushed back his chair and stood, even as the first in a line of servants bearing laden trays appeared in the hall doorway. Dinner be damned—he would find her, and he would bring her to the hall, bodily if need be.
But then the first maid jostled around and slipped sideways back into the darkness of the corridor, and an iridescent wash of violet and green swept through the doorway and came to a swinging halt as Glenna Douglas stared at the scores of people within the hall.
And they all stared at her. Tavish’s breath caught in his throat as her eyes met his.
He’d always thought her beautiful, from the first moment he’d seen her pale countenance and cat eyes within the blackness of the entry corridor in the storm. And it was true that she had grown even more beautiful to Tavish in the interim. But tonight she was exquisite—slender and sparkling like a dark scepter in the gown Tavish had bought for her, the stone doorway around her like a royal fist.
The Lady Glenna, of Roscraig.
She broke gaze with him and gave an elegant curtsey to the room before sweeping across the boards toward the empty seat, her chin lifted. One by one, the male guests pushed back from their chairs or stood from their benches until Glenna had sat.
Only Tavish remained standing now, and he knew that his blatant attention for the woman whose own eyes seemed fixed on the candelabra in the center of the table was drawing awkward glances, but Tavish didn’t care the least.
This was his hold, his hall, his table, his woman. And he would look at her whenever, and for as long as, he liked.
Glenna finally turned toward him, and the way her eyes glittered in the candlelight, holding the memories the two of them had made the night before, nearly caused Tavish to lose his composure and drag her from the feast.
Dinnerandguests be damned.
“Forgive me, laird,” she said. And Tavish wondered if she was speaking for her tardiness or her plot to escape him.
But he was saved from his impetuous urges by the entrance of the servants, and so he finally sat and, as he did so, relieved chatter burst forth along the table in an accompanying clatter of knives.
The meal seemed to last hours. Thankfully, Tavish was kept in distracted conversation by the guests to either side of him, participating when he could tear his attention from the blond woman farther down the table. Glenna herself seemed to be in high demand of the male guests particularly, and once again he heard her laugh rise above the crude clatter, like the tinkling of crystal. When Tavish determined the last course had been partaken of sufficiently, he rose with his chalice, signaling to the guests and the servants that the meal had ended.
The musicians who had been playing quietly in the front of the hall struck up a lively melody to lure the guests away from the clearing efforts, and several couples formed up immediately for a dance, while others milled to greet those whom they hadn’t been seated near. Tavish himself struck out through the crush toward the sparkling gem that was Glenna, but before he could reach her, Audrey Keane had taken her arm and was pulling her toward the dancers, bringing Tavish to a rocking halt on his feet.
The two seemed to have come to some understanding. And he realized that it was perhaps that Glenna was leaving Roscraig—and Tavish—to Audrey.
Tavish watched Glenna swirl into formation, bobbing, kicking out a delicate ankle, clasping hands with Audrey and circling another couple. She was of course graceful on her feet, a talented dancer. And it was clear by her easy smile that she was enjoying herself and filled the role she played perfectly.
Of course she would fill the role perfectly,he said crossly to himself.This is her home. It is I who am standing in the center of the floor like a simpleton.
He felt like a fool, in so many ways. He exchanged his empty chalice for a full one and made his way to stand at the hearth and compose himself. It did not help his sour mood that Captain John Muir chose that moment to join him.
“More people here than I reckoned,” the captain said mildly.
Tavish stared out over the crowd, trying not to strain too obviously for a glimpse of Glenna. “Aye.”
“Glad I’ll be to take up less crowded quarters. This noble life holds little appeal for a seaman.”
“Does it not?” Tavish goaded. “Certainly, not now that you think you’ve secured what you wanted.”
