Page 1 of A Highland Rogue to Ruin

Prologue

Anno Domini 1547, end of July, just before Lughnasadh

“I’ll be right down!” Lady Brighde MacDonald called. “And then I can best ye at Tafl like I did last night! What are the winnings up to? Five coins? Or six?”

“Gambling is unbecoming, sister!”

“Losing sorely to yer sister is unbecoming, brother!”

“We’ll play chess when we get to the faire!” the afeared Devil MacDonald and laird of her clan taunted as brothers did their sisters, still dripping sweat from the training he’d suffered upon his guardsmen that day. “I’ll wipe the board with yer rosy smile!”

“No he’ll no’,” she laughed to Maudie, the wee serving girl, who giggled in reply. Deep laughter echoed from James’s throat, receding as he jingled away in his haubergeon. “He hasna’ beaten me at chess in years.”

Her father had once said it was a shame she’d been born a woman, for she had a sharp mind and would have been hell to outwit on the battlefield.

She took up the lassie’s hand. “Come, Maudie, ye can help me pack.”

This was her first chance at freedom from these lands in years. She’d mingle with clans she’d known in her youth, and perhaps it would be her final chance to catch a man’s eye, since no suitors were calling as she wasted away in Tioram Castle, trapped by a well-meaning, but overprotective brother.

No babes of her own. No household of her own. No dreams of her own. There was a whole world out there to be discovered. While she remained isolated here…

They hurried down the corridor to finish selecting gowns for the sennight of celebration that would ensue at the Royal Inverness Games and Lughnasadh Festival. There’d be the masked dance, the corn cutting, and of course, the horse race, not to mention truces and trade agreements. She loved riding! James hadn’t bested her at that in years, either, and the winning purse at the faire this year was purported to be a hundred pounds!

Bustling through her bedchamber door, the room alight with summer sunshine as birds chirped just beyond her window shutters and fresh lavender floated on the breeze, she flung wide her armoire and began piling gowns on the bed.

“Oh, it’s beautiful, milady,” Maudie said, staring at a mask of crystals and downy feathers embedded on white satin, emulating angel wings, for everyone wore a mask at the Lughnasadh fire dance. “May I touch it?”

“Of course, lassie! Here, try it on.”

“I couldna’! My sister will have me hide!”

“Oh posh. Yer sister kens I dote on ye. Here, it affixes like…so…” Brighde fiddled with the straps to tie it around the girl’s head, then turned back to her armoire as the girl twirled in a gleeful circle.

“Oh, milady, ye’ll look like an angel!”

She selected a matching gown, especially made for her, with a shimmery baronet satin kirtle imported from France, laced stomach, and intricately encrusted crystals upon the hemline, drawing it out, and turned back toward the bed—

The gown tugged in her grip. Resisted. A rip, soft and feeble, followed by the scattering of beads tumbling. They echoed into the chamber like a cannon blast through a ravine as they rolled into the cracks of the floorboards and under the bed. Maudie and Brighde both froze. Looked down. In the child’s twirling, she’d accidentally stepped on the hem and torn it.

Maudie threw her hands over her mouth.

“Oh no, milady.” Her jaw quivered. “I’ve—I’ve ruined yer gown.” She pulled free the mask and set it down carefully on Brighde’s dressing table, tears brimming.

Brighde laid out the gown and lifted the hem to examine the damage. Not a difficult fix. She could repair it with a few materials. “Nay cry, Maudie. ’Twas an accident. Dry yer tears.”

She wiped the bairn’s eyes with her kerchief.

“Go and see about helping in the kitchens. I can repair this easily.” She smiled and sent the child on her way. She then went in search of the seamstress for supplies.

The workshop was in the undercroft. Brighde wound down the stairs, crossed the great hall, then disappeared into the servant corridor, taking the narrow stairs diverging from the kitchens down into the cellar. She shuddered as she passed the buttery, where she’d oft hidden from Laird Tormund MacLeod’s attacks, the afeared Demon of the Seas, and continued on through the barreled arches toward the far end. At least the monster, unwelcome at clan gatherings, didn’t attend the faire. Or else her brother would never let her travel.

“Hello? Madam?”

She peered inside the workshop. The windowless chamber was empty, but the seamstress’s tallow candle glowed in a niche over her worktable among haphazard piles of fabrics and supplies. The woman was likely helping with the packing. Brighde moved to the racks along the walls, where supplies were stored. She needed a handful more crystal beads, a needle for lace trimming, and a spool of white thread, then the gown would be fixed before supper this eve.

She quickly found the needles and thread she needed. But no beads.

Turning in a circle, she frowned. Mayhap the seamstress kept the more precious accessories elsewhere? There was a doorway in the back, probably the seamstress’s storage. She hurried across the floor, around the mannequins with clothing in different stages of production draped on them, opened the door, and scooped up the candle to peer inside.