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I didn’t know the hour. He’d had time to clean himself of the blood he’d spilled the evening before. And I hadn’t heard the bell that announced mealtime, though I couldn’t have eaten a bite. Perhaps I had slept the whole morning away and it was late afternoon. Yet, I didn’t want more rest.
Most especially I didn’t want to go with him.
In spite of the pleasure I’d given and taken from him, I resented being traded away. Given, like a book. I couldn’t let him read my pages. So I took the carved Rune jar and followed Ian Macrae silently, sullenly, lost as I had never felt before in my life.
When we entered his chambers, I saw that my pitiful little collection of belongings had been given over to him. The vial of rose perfume. And the pearls the laird had given me, too. Setting the rune jar beside them on the windowsill, I nearly sobbed to see them.
The Ian surprised me by saying, “I’ve made up a pallet on the floor. You may take the bed.”
I could make no sense of this offer. It was a sign of Ian’s status in the clan that he retained a chamber of his own in the castle—especially given the crowded conditions of the siege. That a man of his importance, especially one who the laird considered his heir, should offer me his bed while he took to the floor was unthinkable. And I worried that even after having been inside my body, he still held me in contempt. Too much contempt to share even a bed.
“I—I don’t take up much room,” I offered, tears brimming in spite of my efforts. I valiantly swallowed them back, but I wasn’t yet adept at artifice. I suppose if this was to be my profession, I would have to learn. “I can be comfortable on the floor if that’s where a man should want me.”
Ian glanced over his broad shoulder, a look of consternation on his face. “Where I should want you…you’re not sated yet, woman?”
A flare of embarrassment burned my cheeks. Embarrassment I didn’t think I was still capable of feeling. Anger, too. When the laird shamed me for my wanton ways, it was with always with approval. But Ian’s shaming I couldn’t bear. “I—I didn’t mean it that way. It’s only that growing up, I slept on the floor sometimes and left the bairns to cuddle together upon the bed. I meant that if you didn’t want to share the bed, I wouldn’t mind the floor.”
Perhaps I wouldn’t mind it, given that I felt so cold and hollow inside already I couldn’t imagine the floor would make any difference.
“What kind of man would I be to make an injured woman sleep on the floor?” Ian asked, mindlessly readying himself for bed, taking off his white linen shirt.
Remembering how we came to be in this situation, I answered, “The sort of man who needs rest so that he can relieve the watchmen on the walls. I’m not the only one injured.”
Ian glanced down at his bandaged forearm, “Och, I’ve taken worse. I wouldna taken it at all if I hadn’t been taken unawares, and fighting in the dark.”
“But you were taken unawares in the dark,” I said softly. “I think it half a miracle that you were able to find your sword.”
“I like to know where it is at all times, even when…” A blush actually came to his cheeks. “I s’pose it makes no sense to pretend that what’s passed between us hasn’t passed between us. That we haven’t—that you aren’t…”
I would have helped him in his struggle, but I was struggling too. “No, and I don’t suppose sharing a bed now might make any difference.”
“Except to him,” Ian said.
At which point I began to cry.
And Ian Macrae, the most unfriendly, disapproving man I’d ever met, fell to pieces. “Oh, no, lass. No, don’t do that! For the love of God—” He rummaged about and found for me a little cloth for me to blubber into as I sank down onto the foot of the bed. He put a hand to my shoulder, patting it awkwardly as he said, “Please stop that, I beg of ye.”
“Why should I?” I sniffled. “It’s not the first time you’ve seen me cry.”
Ian winced, perhaps remembering the day I dropped to my laird’s feet and wept, begging him to take me instead of my father’s life. My father had earned the laird’s wrath; his execution would have been justice. But I couldn’t let it happen, I knew I’d have done exactly the same again, even knowing where it would lead me.
“Listen, lass,” Ian said, clearing his throat. “I don’t stand proud of how you’ve been treated. Not by the laird and not by me. I realize what last night must have been like for you and don’t wish to make it worse.”
“Then you must know the laird doesn’t care if we share a bed together,” I said, anguished. More anguished to know it wasn’t true. He did care. In fact, he wanted us to share a bed. But I was too raw to be precise. “Or didn’t he prove it to you last night? He’s done with me now. I’m his cast off leavings, so you needn’t worry—”
“Stop,” Ian said, breaking through the litany of my upset. “Please. I canna have my mind filled with women troubles right now. You need rest. It’s what we both need. You will feel better with some rest. So leave off your crying, climb into the bed and sleep unmolested by me or anyone else.”
That’s what we did that night. We slept. Him far to the edge of his side, me far to the edge of mine. We didn’t touch. Not even accidentally in adjusting the covers. I had found my way into Ian’s bed, but as for the rest…it still somehow felt like a betrayal of my laird and my he
art. I would not, could not, do it.
And neither could Ian.
So it remained, night after night, as the siege on the castle went on and on.
Chapter Nine
Brenna was the first to fall sick.
