PROLOGUE
“Almost there...go!”
Chrissie Connolly looked up at the rainy sky, panting as she reached the arbor, her blonde curls disarrayed from running. She collapsed onto a stone bench, breathless with excited giggles. Heath was coming back! She could not quite believe how excited that made her feel.
The rain struck the paving with a dull impact out beyond the margin of her shelter. The scent of herbs drifted up with the scent of rain, wild and exciting. The storm was growing. This was her favorite place, the best place to curl up and read. For, surprising as it was for a girl – or for anyone besides a priest, that was – Chrissie could read. Curled up on a bench in the arbor, she opened the scroll. Her slim body leaned forward, her legs tucked up under the long white linen skirt of her gown for warmth.
“And so the princess had to make a choice...”
The scroll was a romantic tale. Chrissie sighed, letting her mind wander. At nineteen, she had plenty of choices to make. The foremost in her mind was the choice of husband. Heath...or someone else?
I can choose whom I like. As the least-important cousin, it is my right. Heath occupied most of Chrissie's heart. He had been away for a few years now, and was coming back. Was he the sort of person Chrissie would like to marry, though? She didn't know. She wished she could ask someone.
Cousin Alina was more like a mother to Chrissie than anyone else, and she hoped to ask her. Soon she would see her, for they traveled to Dunkeld tomorrow.
If only Blaine were not coming. Crude, inelegant, and unmannerly, Blaine was always finding excuses to talk to her, to grin at her, to give her the kind of attention she, at sixteen, found uncomfortable. He is so boorish! Yet I like to know he is here in the castle. With me.
She rolled up the scroll she was reading, hearing the rain becoming faster. If she didn't go in soon, she would probably get soaked through. The courtyard was a tempest of rain. The drops hammered the paving, the sound of the rain muting the roll of thunder. Chrissie screamed as she put a foot out, the icy rain sluicing over her legs and soaking her immediately.
“Chrissie? Chrissie!”
Blaine. Why is he here? Chrissie bit her lip, feeling somewhat irritated. At the same time, her heart began to beat faster. She thought of seeing him, of being carried into the house in his arms...
Stop it! She wouldn't accept help from that lummox. Not without losing her dignity.
“Run!” she shrieked, and, laughing, ran into the rain. She saw Blaine across the courtyard. He drew a thick wool cloak over his head and dashed out into the rain. Chrissie slipped sideways to avoid him, feeling a strange lightness in her chest as she saw his eyes narrow and then widen in sudden consternation.
Good.
Suddenly warm arms descended around her. Chrissie screamed and they gripped her tighter. It wasn't Blaine, because he was on the other side of the courtyard near the armory, staring across at her with a strange expression on his face. She thrashed, kicked, and struggled against the grip, but was easily borne towards the colonnade, where the captor set her down.
“Easy,” he was saying. He reached out and stroked her hair, letting his fingers run down the springy curls of it. “Easy. Easy.”
Chrissie whipped round, ready with some sharp word, or a slap, then she realized who it was.
“Heath!” She would have guessed who it was, had she known he was here. “You saved me! Thank you.”
“I hope to always be of service, Lady Chrissie.”
Chrissie glowed. Heath was so gallant. So perfect. She allowed him to kiss her hand, feeling her heart thud powerfully as his lips touched it. Then she beamed up at him.
“Welcome home, Heath Fraser. Inside?”
“Indeed, Lady Chrissie. Allow me?”
It was not, truly speaking, Heath's home. He had been raised here, though, as a fosterling with Uncle. As Chrissie slipped her slender arm into the arm of Heath Fraser, she glanced back into the courtyard. There, looking after them, his face strangely blank, stood Blaine. Chrissie suppressed a shiver, seeing the expression on his face. He looked empty, his eyes blank, his mouth a grim line. She had no idea at all what Blaine might do; she only knew it seemed a fearful thing. She would have to be watchful, and so would Heath.