But he was yet the Black Douglas in Tosia’s eyes. No amount of washing cleansed that cursed name from him.
She wiped her face with the draping sleeve of her kirtle — she was flushed from sleep and at being discovered crying.
James remained by the door, keeping his distance. He said nothing, waiting for her collect herself. Tosia sat up fully on the bed and patted at her hair. She must be such a sight!
“Lass,” he said, his voice surprisingly tender, “I canna imagine the distress ye feel right now.”
Her lips quivered, but she held her tongue as she slowly shook her head. Nay, he could not imagine.
“But I am not unfamiliar with loss,” he continued in that same lulling tone.
Tosia tipped her head, intrigued by his words. Nay, he wasn’t unfamiliar. If anything, he was as intimately acquainted with it as she.
“The king has granted ye a sennight to settle in at Auchinleck ‘afore we are wed. We will then stay here until the king decides our next movements, then I will relocate ye to my temporary keep at Threave. Your brother will remain by my side as my squire, and thus be near to ye until our battles take us elsewhere with the king.”
His kindness at detailing what her future held touched something deep in her heart. She’d feared she’d be wed to the man the same day they arrived. Knowing she had a bit of time to grow accustomed to her new surroundings, mayhap get to know her future husband, and have her brother nearby for the meantime, lifted a weight from her shoulders.
And the tone of his voice . . . She’d not considered the beast to have a tender side at all.
His words regarding his own loss were raw. Perchance she’d judged the man too harshly.
Then he moved suddenly, and she stiffened as he knelt on one knee in front of her. He was so close! Why did her body feel like a fire blazed at the hearth with his nearness?
He clasped her shaking hands in his calloused ones and gazed at her with eyes as more green than gray, reminding her of a loch in spring.
“The king has commanded we join our lives, and I would have ye know that despite the horrors ye may have heard about me, I would never bring you harm.” Then he bowed that black head and his hands tightened, his grip impossible to break. “I vow to ye, Tosia Fraser, the protection of my body, the security of my sword, and would lay down my life for ye if necessary. No matter what ye’ve heard, I vow to keep ye safe from all manner of violence, even mine.”
Tosia couldn’t move, yet her insides quivered from his nearness and the power of his words. Her heart pounded against her chest, and she struggled to take in a breath. This was nothing of what she had expected. The monster of Scotland on his knees, swearing an oath to her? Had the world turned upside down? How had she been put on this strange road to the king of the Scots and his men?
James didn’t move. He remained on his knee, his head bowed, his hands clasping hers.
Is he waiting for something?She cleared the lump from her throat.
“Why?” she whispered in a wobbly voice.
His head lifted, and his shimmering moss-green eyes, so different than the hard gray flint from earlier, searched her face.
“I swore fealty to the king. What the king commands, I do, and he’s no’ led me astray yet. His latest venture is to bind me to you. And I protect what is mine.”
Mine.
The word held such weight, and a shiver coursed over her back.
His in every sense of the word.
But he had vowed not to harm her. Perchance ‘twas a start.
“And I am yours,” he continued. “Your needs, your desires, I will fulfill them as best I can.”
Hers.
She hadn’t considered her part of the marriage in that way. Or that he would think of her like that.
Aye, she’d have to reconsider her presumptions of the man.
Tosia withdrew her hand from his and lifted it, unsure of what she was doing in that movement. At first she thought to rest it on his freshly washed head, to touch that sinfully black hair. But her nerves got the best of her, and she instead dropped it where it rested on his forearm.
His eyes flicked down at her hand, as if assessing her touch. He’d assuredly had women before — he was a man after all — but a soft touch in such a hard life? By a woman to whom he had a claim?
