A Rake at the Highland Court: The Highland Ladies Book Four Read online

  “Naught that anyone can do aboot. My father has summoned me home for a visit.” Cairstine’s eyes drifted over Eoin’s shoulder, but he was certain no one stood behind them. Having visited Allyson’s family and witnessed their deplorable behavior toward her, Cairstine’s behavior concerned him. He feared she might return to a home as unwelcoming as Allyson’s. “I suspect my father will announce a betrothal.”

  Eoin straightened as he glanced back into the Great Hall. “Have you any idea who it might be?”

  “None. And that’s what terrifies me. It won’t be anyone from court. I’ve made certain of that,” Cairstine snapped her mouth shut.

  “Lass? I may know you offer the sweetest kisses, but you don’t have a reputation for being loose.”

  “I know. I’ve made sure of the opposite. I’ve made myself appear as vain and self-centered as I could.” Cairstine couldn’t understand why she divulged this to Eoin, but something about him seemed solid and trustworthy. This was ridiculous, as she was well-informed of his reputation.

  “So the young lady we all know isn’t really you,” Eoin said flatly. He detested liars, and while he had found Cairstine spoiled and often hurtful to the other ladies, he never imagined she was one to tell falsehoods.

  “I don’t want to marry. What mon wants a harpy with a barbed tongue and an empty head? None, and so I have no prospects here.”

  “Why don’t you want to marry? Every woman short of those called to be a nun wants to marry.”

  Cairstine’s mien was the sympathetic expression offered to a simpleton. “You can’t possibly believe every woman wants to marry. Your own sister-by-marriage ran away to avoid marriage.”

  “She ran to avoid marrying my brother. She was never averse to the institution of marriage, only the mon she feared the king and her father intended to force her to enter it with.”

  “Well, I have an aversion to marriage. And I don’t care which mon my father places before me. I don’t want to marry.”

  “Are you called to be a nun?” Eoin couldn’t imagine a woman less suited to being a nun. Between Cairstine’s vanity and how judgmental she could be, she didn’t strike him as a woman queueing to take holy orders. Besides that, she’d not hesitated to kiss him, and she kissed with experience. While he was certain she was still a maiden, she didn’t seem very innocent.

  “I will be if that’s what I must do to avoid being sold to a mon who only wants to rut and breed me like a broodmare.”

  “And you believe every mon is like this? That’s what you believed of Kieran MacLeod? Of Ewan? Of me? That all we want is to force ourselves upon unwilling brides for the sake of siring heirs?”

  “Kieran and Ewan fell in love with the women they married, though why Kieran chose a dowdy one like Maude Sutherland is beyond me. Who knows aboot you? You aren’t wed.” She snapped her mouth shut, realizing old habits die hard when it came to being snide.

  As Eoin listened, he deduced that someone had damaged Cairstine’s faith in marriage and, even worse, in men. He wanted to tread lightly, but he was also curious to discover what caused her deep-seated opposition. “Is that how your father treats your mother? Or how your brother treats his wife?”

  “Hardly. My father acts as though my brother was born to my mother’s first husband by immaculate conception, just as my sister and I were by him. He’s a very…” she shook her head. “Very pious mon. Rigidly pious. My brother is kind to his wife. I won’t go so far as to say that he loves her, but he’s fond of her and treats her well.”

  “Then why do you rebel against being married? What makes you convinced all men are pigs when those you’ve seen seem to be honorable?”

  “I have my reasons, Eoin. Please don’t press me. Suffice it to say, I don’t want to return home to discover my father is ready to betroth me.”

  Eoin sensed Cairstine was withdrawing, and rather than pressing for more, he squeezed her hands once again. “Shall we return to the Great Hall before anyone wonders where we are?”

  “Aye, but I appreciate that you’ve stood in the light to ensure no one suspects we’re trysting. Thank you.” Cairstine took the arm Eoin offered, and they returned to the dancing. They went their separate ways, each finding other partners until the night grew late.

  Chapter Three

  Cairstine drew a deep breath of the scents of an early summer morning. The air still held a chill, but it helped wake her as she mounted her horse. She hadn’t slept well, and she appreciated the bracing air to help revive her. Cairstine wasn’t looking forward to the next five days spent riding and sleeping outdoors. She loved to ride and was an accomplished horsewoman, but she hated trekking through the Cairngorm Mountains. She wasn’t a fan of heights or the narrow trails that often chipped away under the weight of a party of riders. She had a dozen guards accompanying her, which made her feel safe from attack but not from falling down a mountain face. She checked the girth of her saddle once more and ensured she’d securely fastened her satchel to her saddle before mounting. She glanced once at Stirling Castle before she and the Grant guardsmen rode out of the castle’s bailey and out of the city of Stirling.

  The summer rain began during the afternoon of their second day on the road. Her maid, who served more as a chaperone than a servant while she traveled with a company of men, complained incessantly about the drizzle throughout the afternoon and into the evening and sobbed when it poured for the entire third day. Cairstine was grateful the woman’s father and brother were among the men accompanying them, and between comforting her and scolding her, they finally made her cease crying when they made camp the third night. Cairstine was wet and cold, and it had stretched her patience almost to the point of snapping. She wrapped herself in her Grant plaid as she leaned against her saddle.

  She had slept no better on the road than she did the night before departing Stirling. Fatigue had threatened to overcome her by the time they stopped for the night, and it had been sheer willpower that forced her to remain awake in the saddle lest she fall and her horse trample her. As she lay gazing at the stars, once again sleep eluded her. She focused on what fate awaited her when she arrived at Freuchie Castle, home to Clan Grant. She missed the z-shaped tower castle. It had been her home until two years earlier when her parents sent her to serve Queen Elizabeth after the queen’s return to the royal court. She’d grown to like the queen, a religious woman who preferred more time spent in prayer than Cairstine’s knees enjoyed. She admired the queen’s fortitude and grace after being imprisoned for eight years by her husband’s enemy. The hatred between the Robert the Bruce Edward Longshanks of England hadn’t dissipated despite the queen’s freedom.

  Cairstine was eager to see her mother and younger sister Fenella. They were only two years apart, while she was ten years her brother’s junior. She didn’t have many childhood memories of her brother, Erskine, since he left to foster while she was a toddler and hadn’t come home often. He was the product of her mother’s first marriage, before she was widowed. They didn’t see one another often because he remained with his foster family, the MacGregors, after marrying a woman from that clan. She commended Erskine for being a doting father; her own father, Laird Edward Grant, had wished to become a monk. He’d been a fourth son with plans to enter a monastery, but when his three older brothers died fighting on behalf of King Robert, the lairdship fell to him.

  “Canna sleep, ma lady?” asked Bram, a guardsman she’d known since she was a babe. Bram was one of the few Grant men assigned to remain with her when she was in residence at Stirling Castle. His Highland burr was a reassuring reminder of life before court. “Did ye have enough to eat?”

  “Aye, thank you, Bram. Do you ken why my father sent for me?” Cairstine kept her voice low. She didn’t trust the other men not to rush to her father to report the conversation.

  “Nay, ma lady. I learned of yer travels when ye informed me. I’ve been at court with ye and nae heard from anyone else.”

  “Did none of the men who arrived with the m
issive tell you why?”

  Bram shifted his gaze, observing the men on watch, virtually invisible among the trees. He shook his head before answering. “They suspect it’s for a betrothal, but they arenae sure. They said several men have visited yer father in the past four moons, and the rumors are they are potential suitors.”

  “Do you ken who any of these men are?”

  “They mentioned the MacGregor’s nephew, but I dinna recall his given name. Bryson Mackintosh was another name mentioned, but he—”

  “Bluidy hell. I will not live among those heathens. They and the Camerons are intent upon exterminating one another, and I’m not eager to die young,” Cairstine announced.

  “I was going to say, ma lady, that the Mackintosh heir has his eye on a MacPherson. She’s bonny as the day is long, they say, and her da wants the lairdship of Clan Chattan. Too much politics for ma liking. They’re welcome to one another.”

  “Anyone else?” Cairstine leaned forward, her hands clasped so tightly that the skin tugged.

  Bram shifted uncomfortably before nodding. “Duff MacDuff apparently has come up more than once.”

  “Dear God, no. The mon is old enough to be my grandfather. He’s a Lowlander. And the MacDuffs are traitors. They have betrayed us all as Scots and betrayed King Robert. The mon’s niece crowned our king, but her brother married the English bastard’s niece. He sides with Longshanks!”

  “From what I know, Duff did what he could to keep Laird Duncan from switching their allegiance to King Edward, but I canna deny his age nor where they reside.”

  Cairstine and Bram exchanged a look of disgust as they considered living in the Lowlands. The Grants were a powerful Highland clan, and while Cairstine had learned to disguise her brogue at court like all the other Highland ladies, her heart beat for the wide meadows and mountain peaks that were the backdrop to her childhood. Marriage was awful enough, but the prospect of a life in the Lowlands felt like impending exile.

  “Is there anyone else?”

  “Brodie Campbell’s name came up,” Bram answered softly.

  “Brodie?” Cairstine’s breath caught. There’d been talk of them becoming betrothed even while they were still children, before she grew to despise marriage, but the Campbells insisted their alliance with the Grants was already strong. They wanted their son’s marriage to secure another alliance. Brodie had always been kind to Cairstine and was one of few people she’d given hint of the secret she intended to take to the grave. He was possibly the only man she had considered marrying, but the relationship was more like brother and sister than lovers.

  “Aye, but I dinna think it was serious. More a reminder of the past.” Bram explained with a gentleness to his voice that made Cairstine wish the bear of a man could still swoop her up in his embrace as he had countless times when she was a child.

  “It’s just as well. You know I don’t want to marry anyone,” Cairstine sighed. Bram was one of the three privy to the secret Cairstine hid. Not even her sister was aware, and she refused to consider sharing that part of her past.

  “Ye might be surprised one of these days, lass.” Bram patted her shoulder before walking to his saddle and bedroll. Cairstine’s eyes drifted closed just before the first rays of light rose over the horizon. Her eyes felt like she’d rubbed them with nettles when she awoke. They itched, making her miserable as they began their fourth day in the saddle.

  * * *

  Cairstine breathed a sigh of relief as she rode under the portcullis of Freuchie Castle. She was home. She dashed to embrace Fenella as her mother, Davina, moved down the keep’s steps with more restraint and grace than her younger daughter. Once she pushed Fenella’s mane of red hair from her face, she caught sight of her father and Fingal Grant. Fingal was a distant cousin, the grandson of Laird Edward’s uncle and his closest living male relative. He was Edward’s heir and tánaiste.

  “He wants to marry me,” Fenella whispered.

  “Who?” Cairstine had been home only a few months earlier and knew nothing of her sister having a suitor.

  “Kennon Campbell!” Fenella named Brodie’s cousin, a man Cairstine sensed had the makings of a suitable husband for her sister. She leaned back and grinned.

  “He’s a braw mon, for certain. How do you ken?” Cairstine smiled.

  “He came to ask Father for my hand. You know we met at last year’s Highland Gathering, but he’s been visiting as often as he can. He came a fortnight ago to request a betrothal.”

  “That’s wonderful, Fenny,” Cairstine fell back on her childhood nickname for her sister.

  “It is, but Cair, Father has refused. Or rather refused for now.” Fenella bit her bottom lip as Davina brought their conversation to a halt when she joined them.

  “Mama,” Cairstine relaxed in her mother’s embrace, the softness of her frame a comfort just as it had been when she was a child.

  “My sweet lass, I’m so happy to have you home once more. It’s not the same without you, and the time seems to grow longer between our visits.”

  “It’ll grow longer once the lass weds. She won’t be able to come and go as she does now,” Edward announced by way of greeting his daughter. Cairstine shot Fenella a glance and understood why her sister had grown hesitant. In an instant, she understood what no one had voiced. Yet. Fenella wouldn’t gain their father’s permission to marry Kennon until Cairstine married. As the younger sister, they would force Fenella to wait. Cairstine gazed at her sister and her heart seized, unable to imagine denying Fenella the happiness she sought through marriage. Cairstine wouldn’t begrudge her sister what she wanted, even if they didn’t share a similar view on the sacrament.

  Cairstine opted to remain quiet until they entered the Great Hall, where people sat for the evening meal. Her stomach rumbled, hungry after only bannocks and thin rabbits for dinner each night and more bannocks while in the saddle. As they took their seats–Cairstine in her usual chair beside her mother and two chairs to the left of her father–she wondered if she could choke any food down if her father decided it was the right time for a discussion about a betrothal. Cairstine sighed as she accepted that it wouldn’t be a discussion, but more of a one-sided diatribe on why she couldn’t remain unwed much longer.

  “Cairstine, I am making inquiries into a match for you. The sooner your marriage is secured and consummated, the sooner your sister can wed a mon who wants her.” Edward made no attempt to soften the blow, and the insinuation that Cairstine would be an unwanted bride didn’t go unnoticed by anyone at the table. She’d made her wish to remain unmarried clear on more than one occasion.

  “Father,” Cairstine spoke softly. “I’ve had time to contemplate this over the past months and especially during the journey here. We are a family of strong faith. You have blessed us by teaching us to love Christ before all else. I feel called to take the holy veil.”

  Cairstine waited for God to smite her in her seat. She felt no calling to such a vocation, but she would accept a solitary life in silence if it meant she never had to submit to a husband.

  “Rubbish,” Edward barked.

  “Father, we know our family was meant to serve God, but others’ choices kept that from happening.” Cairstine toed a dangerous line, alluding to how her father had always intended to become a priest, never wanting the lairdship nor a wife and family. While he was a respected and strong laird, he barely recognized he had a family. She, her sister, and her mother were more like distant acquaintances Edward than his wife and children. “I would fulfill that legacy.”

  Edward scrutinized his older daughter, attempting to discern a lie, but Cairstine forced her face into the visage of serenity and innocence she’d perfected while at court. If her father insisted on pursuing a match, she prayed the potential suitor was familiar with the reputation she’d carefully developed at court. She’d regretted each hateful thing she’d said about Maude Sutherland and how she’d followed Madeline MacLeod’s lead. But the snarkiness fueled other people’s belief that she was self
ish and unsuitable for any man to take back to his clan if he wished for a wife his people would find acceptable.

  “We already give our tithes to the Church; I’m not interested in giving away your dowry, too.” Edward’s response stunned Cairstine. Never did she imagine her father would refuse the Church anything. He’d been prepared to promise his life to serving God, and yet, he refused to consider his daughter’s request to follow in his footsteps. Cairstine suspected he was unconvinced by her plea, but the speed with which he rejected her request still surprised her. Her father’s glare wouldn’t cow her.

  “Father, I listened as a child when you spoke. There is no greater purpose than to pledge one’s self to their faith and to live it daily in servitude to His honor.” Cairstine repeated the words her father had used in his attempt to indoctrinate Fenella and her.

  “And to pledge such without it truly being in your heart is a heresy, so cease now while you’re ahead.” Edward hissed before turning to his right, shifting his attention to Fingal, who offered her an apologetic smile. She’d been summarily dismissed, but her father’s voice drifted to her. “Perhaps I should have you marry the chit.”

  Cairstine’s eyes widened as she shook her head with such vehemence that her neck hurt. Her knuckles were white as she grasped the armrests of her chair. Fenella slipped her hand over Cairstine’s. Fingal wisely remained quiet, and Edward moved on to another topic. She remained silent for the rest of the meal but cheered up when the music began. It was the eve of the Sabbath, and her father did not allow dancing on that day, but she enjoyed the harp and flute as her feet tapped beneath the table.

  “Your father is right,” her mother whispered. “You would hate a life without music and gaiety. You love to dance and sing, and I don’t imagine chanting prayers all day is what you would enjoy. Why are you so insistent?”

  “Because I don’t believe every woman is cut out to be a wife and mother. You and Fenny might be, but I’m not. It holds no interest for me. I don’t want the risk of a husband who ignores me, strays from our bed, or even worse, beats me.”