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"Aye."
She waited for the expected anxiety to appear, but it didn't. Murine still wasn't afraid of him. In fact, she felt completely safe in his arms, angry or not. It was quite a nice feeling. Murine had not felt safe in a long while. Realizing he was waiting for her response to his acknowledgment, she cleared her throat and asked, "Why?"
Dougall scowled and then said, "I do no' ken."
Murine blinked at the admission and then he added, "But it seems we've encountered nothing but trouble since riding through the gates at Danvries. First we had to hide ye to preserve yer virtue from yer skeevy brother, and then ye fainted so that we had to bring ye with us and . . . well, frankly, all ye've done is cause bother and strife among me brothers with yer weak fainting ways. Now ye've got them all acting like ladies' maids trying to dress ye in the woods."
"I did no' ask fer their help," she pointed out with quiet dignity.
"Ye did no' ha'e to," he responded gruffly, and then asked, "Why are ye fainting so much? Saidh said Lady Sinclair had made a tincture that helped ye with that."
"Aye, she did," Murine agreed sadly.
"Did ye forget to pack it when ye fled?" Alick asked with concern.
Murine glanced over Dougall's shoulder with surprise to see that the other three men were directly behind them, following, and apparently listening to everything they'd said.
"That should ha'e been the first thing ye packed," Geordie assured her solemnly when she merely gaped at them. "Surely ye kenned escaping would be easier were ye no' keeling o'er like a lame goose e'ery other minute?"
"Aye, o' course I ken that," Murine said with irritation. "And I did no' bring any o' the tincture because I ha'e none left, I ran out two months ago."
"Could ye no' make some more, lass?" Conran asked with concern.
"I do no' ken how," Murine confessed unhappily. "Montrose arrived with the news that Father had died and we left Sinclair in such a rush that we all but forgot about the tincture until I was leaving. As Joan pressed the vial into me hands, she said she'd send me the recipe, but ne'er did. So when me supply started to dwindle I wrote asking her fer it, but . . ."
"But?" Alick prompted.
"She ne'er responded," Murine admitted unhappily.
"Well, that does no' seem right," Geordie muttered. "Ye saved the lass's life. The least she could do is respond to yer messages."
"Hmm." Conran muttered, and then asked, "Are ye sure yer message was delivered? I would no' put it past that brother o' yers to simply no' send the message. She may e'en ha'e written ye and he ne'er passed on the message to ye."
"That is what I am hoping," Murine admitted quietly. "It is me only hope really."
"Why is that?" Geordie asked.
"Because Jo and Saidh both said if I were e'er in need, I should come to them and they would do all they could to help me," she explained, and then added miserably, "Yet neither has responded to me messages. If they did no' mean it, then I am lost."
Dougall slowed to peer down at her face. "Ye wrote Saidh as well?"
"Aye," Murine murmured, looking uncomfortable. "Yet she did no' respond either."
"Because she did no' get it," he assured her.
"Aye," Conran agreed, moving up beside them to meet her gaze. "There has been no messenger from Danvries, ever, that I ken of. At least not ere we left to deliver horses to Lord Brummel in southern England a couple weeks back," he added. "When did ye send yer message to Saidh?"
"I sent one just a couple weeks past, but sent three others ere that, the first back in the spring when we arrived at Danvries. Just to let her ken we'd arrived safely and see how she was making out at MacDonnell," she admitted.
"Then yer brother must be stopping the messages from being delivered," Dougall said quietly. "Because I'm fair certain none reached her."
"Oh, thank goodness," Murine breathed and had to blink away the tears of relief suddenly crowding her eyes.
"Ye thought the lasses were ignoring yer messages," Dougall said solemnly and Murine glanced to him, surprised by his understanding. The man might look like a big brute with his height and all his muscle, but he obviously understood people for all that.
"Aye," she said softly. "I think that possibility upset me more than anything else that was happening. I ha'e never had friends like Joan, Saidh and Edith before and feared mayhap I'd somehow offended them or . . ." She shrugged helplessly, but then waved that worry away and admitted, "But I could no' think how I might ha'e done so. And then I began to suspect that Montrose was preventing the messages from being sent."
"Aye, he must ha'e been," Alick assured her as they left the woods and entered the clearing where they'd camped. "We would ken if a messenger had reached Buchanan."
"If nothing else, Aulay would ha'e mentioned it, and we certainly would ha'e kenned when he sent the message on with one o' our men to MacDonnell," Geordie added as Dougall paused to set her on a boulder by the now dead fire they'd built the night before.
"Oh, I did send the first message to MacDonnell," Murine assured them quickly as Dougall straightened. "I thought Saidh might spend a week or two there at least. It was only after that I sent them to Buchanan." Tilting her head to peer up at the men now surrounding her in a half circle, all still standing, she asked curiously, "How long did she end up staying at MacDonnell with yer cousin?"
"She's still there," Alick announced with a grin.
Murine blinke
d in surprise at this news. It had been more than six months since they had stopped at MacDonnell on their way to England and left Saidh to comfort her cousin Fenella MacDonnell on the death of her husband. Despite having just learned her father was dead, or perhaps because of it, Murine had wanted to stop and pay her respects to the man's mother, her own aunt by marriage, as well as her cousin's wife, Fenella, on the way home. Fortunately, Montrose had been more than happy to have an excuse to stop and spend the night in a castle, drinking someone else's ale and eating someone else's food rather than suffering their own meager supplies in a rough camp. He'd agreed to Saidh's accompanying them. They'd stopped at MacDonnell for a night before continuing on without her. Murine had expected Saidh to stay a week or perhaps two and then send for her brothers to collect her. She hadn't expected her friend to still be there all these months later.
"Is Lady Fenella still refusing to leave her room?" she asked with concern.
"Fenella's dead," Dougall announced solemnly.
"What?" Murine gaped at him. "How?"
"Stabbed." The word was as blunt as a rock and hit her just as hard.
"Oh dear," Murine breathed with dismay, and then her eyes widened as she recalled that Lady Tilda MacDonnell, the deceased Allen's mother, had been sure that his bride, Fenella, had had something to do with his death. Good Lord, if her aunt Tilda had killed Saidh's cousin in retribution--"Lady Tilda did no'--?"
"Aye," Dougall interrupted.
"Oh dear," Murine breathed again, amazed that Saidh had not written her with such news herself. Montrose must be blocking incoming messages as well, she decided and then sighed and asked, "What has the king done about Lady Tilda?"
