One

1304

The land didn’t want her there.

That was nonsense, and she knew it was nonsense. She knew that she was one woman, unarmed and heavily burdened. She knew that there had been no disasters save the weather, and that her more native traveling companions saw nothing unusual or particularly bad in that. She didn’t know whether the land had a consciousness of its own, but she’d never felt anything, whether welcome or hostility, anywhere else she’d been, and it was unlikely now. Sophia knew this.

And still she looked at the road ahead and the countryside around her—white ground, dark rocks, dead-gray sky overhead—and thought, This place wants me gone.

She huddled deeper into her cloak and kept walking, following the horses.

“Not much like France, is it?” asked Bayard, coming up behind her with a genially scornful laugh—whether for his soft companions on the road or the forsaken corner of Scotland they’d come to, Sophia wasn’t sure. “Don’t worry, my ladies. MacAlasdair’s odd, but there’s none can fault his tables, or his hall for warmth.”

Across the back of the packhorse, Sophia exchanged a look with Alice. Neither could actually read the other’s expression, given the scarves and cloaks concealing their faces, but Sophia would have wagered that Alice’s blond eyebrows were lifted and she was half smiling in a we’ll-see-about-that manner, just as Alice probably knew Sophia was looking carefully neutral. They’d known each other practically since childhood. They’d also both gotten a look at the castle ahead, the one that reached up into the sky like a vast dark hand.

Hospitable wasn’t the word that came to mind. Warm, maybe, given everything. Sophia could see that. But welcoming? No.

Worry was pointless. It had been for days, since she and Alice had found Bayard and his company, the one group of traders who were actually going to Loch Arach so early in the year, and had paid probably too much money to join their company. The time for second thoughts might have been even earlier, before they’d sailed to Dover in the first place. Here, there was going forward or there was freezing to death, or perhaps starving. Neither she nor Alice would last long in the wild.

Sophia ran her hands quickly over the packs on her horse’s back, checking for broken glass or slipped padding, a habit of such long duration that she had to fight to keep it from becoming absentminded. She straightened her spine as they approached the castle, smiled politely at the guard who came out from the gatehouse, and thought, This isn’t the first time I’ve been unwelcome. We live through these things.

All the same, her stomach was small and huddled, and she felt the smile pulling on her face, too heavy for the muscles there to hold easily. She was suddenly glad of the cold, that her cloak might hide the better part of her face and that her hands might shake without anyone knowing the true reason. And when they’d crossed the drawbridge and the portcullis had descended behind them, she couldn’t help stopping and looking back over her shoulder.

The sun set early in winter, earlier still in the Highlands, and there was barely any of it to begin with. She saw the light at the mountains’ edge, sullen red against the gathering dark. She tried to remember that she was a scholar and a sensible woman, that she had a purpose, and that the journey would hopefully have a reward.

She tried very hard not to think about blood.

* * *

Inside was better. It shouldn’t have been—now escape would be even more difficult—but the mind didn’t always do the tricks one wished, responding instead to stupid cues like scent and sound. The courtyard of Castle MacAlasdair was darker, colder, and emptier than the streets of Lille or London, but it held stock and people, more of them in one place than Sophia had encountered for weeks. Even the odor of cattle and the shrieking of an angry infant sent subtle waves of reassurance to the base of her mind.

“Civilization,” said Alice, echoing Sophia’s thoughts. “Such as we’ll get here.”

“Be kind.”

“Why? We’re not speaking French or English, and none of them have Hebrew.”

“It’s certainly good I brought you along,” said Sophia, shaking her head and smiling, “since you know everything.”

“I know if you’re not inside before I’ve found a place for us, I’ll come drag you in by the ear.”

“If anything breaks, there’s not as much point in us being here,” said Sophia, retreading the steps of their old and comfortable argument. “And it’ll be harder getting home.”

“If you freeze to death, of course, that will be much more helpful,” said Alice. She followed Bayard into the great hall while Sophia went to the stables with a few of the other travelers.

Naturally, she didn’t have the time or space to unpack completely, but she settled her packs as carefully as she could before handing her horse off to one of the men of the castle—like most, a dark, bearded fellow in a draped length of red-and-blue-plaid wool, who watched her with the distant curiosity she’d gotten at a dozen inns and cottages. At first, the scrutiny had made Sophia twitchy. Then she’d gotten used to it. They couldn’t tell anything about her; she looked and dressed like any other woman. They just hadn’t seen anyone new for months.

She got the same kind of looks as she made her way back across the courtyard. Nobody stopped to stare—they had their duties, and it was cold out—but even in the dying light, she saw a few glances back and forth, and caught unfamiliar words that nonetheless had familiar tones. Who’s that? Oh, she’s with the traders. They’ve just come in. French, I think.

Gossip was the same everywhere, as far as she could tell, especially gossip in winter. That was another reassurance.

Within the great hall, the smells were much better, objectively: roast meat and fresh bread, oil from the torches on the walls, and smoke from the fire in the great hearth. Humanity was in there too, but the smell was not nearly as bad as it had been on the ship coming over, or even in some of the inns. The hall was a decent size, and perhaps thirty people sat at the table within, halfway through supper from the look of it.

“Lucky girl,” said Bayard, slipping up by Sophia’s side as she stood and wrestled with her damp cloak. “You missed being presented.”

“I thought he was hospitable.” Sophia glanced up toward the high table, a place not very distinguished in this particular castle. A tall man with tawny hair sat at its head. Between the struggle with wool and the pages serving food, she couldn’t make out any more.

“Wrong MacAlasdair. Lord Dougal—Douglas…however they pronounce it—hosted us last time, and the times before, but he’s not back from their damned war yet. This is Cathal, one of the sons.”

“Oh.” In theory, a son would work just as well for her purposes, at least if what she’d heard was correct. Bayard’s voice was not promising, though. “Doesn’t he—”

“Don’t know. Didn’t have much to do with him before. He’s not in a good mood now, though. I’ll swear that.”

“I see.”

“Ah, don’t worry overmuch,” said Bayard, and patted her on the shoulder. “He did say we could stay the night, and he’s willing to talk with us tomorrow. I’d think he’d be in a much better mood for a prettier face than mine.”

Sophia reminded herself that Bayard meant well.

The people around her seemed in decent spirits, at least. Not knowing the language—it seemed to happen far back in the throat, mostly—she couldn’t tell much from the conversation, but they didn’t have the faces or the manners of people who feared their lord. She took what heart she could from that and let Bayard guide her to the high table.

“He’s treating us well, bad mood or no,” she whispered on her way.

“None of us speak Gaelic. He knows that…or has reasoned it out.”

“Ah,” said Sophia, and then she was bowing before Cathal MacAlasdair.

Up close, he was… Well, he was a soldier, and it showed. When he rose out of courtesy, he was almost a foot taller than her, his chest and shoulders broad and thick with muscle. His jaw was square; his nose had been broken at least once; and beneath the blue wool tunic he wore and the blue-and-red plaid draped across his chest, one shoulder was thick with what Sophia thought were probably bandages. Good cloth and fur trim on the tunic said knight rather than common soldier but otherwise this was a man who spent his life fighting.

His eyes were bright green, almost like new grass, a shade she’d never seen in eyes before. It was the first sign Sophia had that she might have found what she was seeking—that the rumors might have truth to them.

She caught her breath.

“You’re French as well?” he asked, using the language more easily than she’d expected, though with a rough burr of an accent.

“Yes,” Sophia said. There would be time to explain the whole truth later, if things went well. If they didn’t, it wouldn’t matter. “My lord. Thank you for your hospitality.”

“You’re welcome to it. The roads are dangerous, especially in winter. Eat, pray, as you wish. When you tire, one of the maids will show you and your friend to beds.” Cathal looked her over quickly, without heat or even the curiosity his servants had displayed. Even as she sat down, he was turning back to Bayard. “You were describing your wares.”

That was that. The conversation turned to prices and supplies, leaving Sophia behind.

She didn’t mind, exactly. It was enough work figuring out what she could eat—picking out onions, turnips, herring, and bread for herself, unobtrusively slipping the beef to the dogs—that she was glad not to have to put more thought into conversation, and her brain felt half frozen anyhow. Still, it wasn’t a promising start.

“I’m not sure,” Alice murmured, passing the wine cup and leaning over, “whether he learned manners from a goat or a toad, but I don’t envy you a bit either way.”

Sophia stifled laughter. “It’s not what we’re used to.”

“Thank goodness.”

It was the I don’t envy you that lingered. Sophia didn’t mind Cathal’s manners for themselves. As an omen of things to come, not quite so much.

A still-romantic part of her was surprised that she had an appetite. The rest, the scholar for fifteen years, would have expected nothing else, given the cold outside and the scarce rations they’d been on for the last few days. When she could eat from a dish, she helped herself generously—and wished she could have fooled herself about the meat.

Occasionally Bayard tried to redirect the conversation, to bring her and Alice in, but Cathal never made more than a cursory effort, and Bayard was a man of business. If his host and potential customer wanted to focus on the price of pepper, then the price of pepper would be the topic at hand. He already had Alice and Sophia’s money, after all. Cathal’s was less of a sure thing.

By the end of the meal, Alice was looking both vexed and bored, but she put a hand on Sophia’s shoulder as they rose and drew her aside. “Shall I come with you?”

“No. If he’ll speak at all, it’ll be in private.”

“I’m certain,” Alice said. “And if he offers you insult or grows violent—”

“Then I’ll scream.” For all the good it might do. She didn’t need to say that, and neither did Alice. They’d been walking into the lion’s den all along, and they knew it. “But he doesn’t seem the sort, and he doesn’t seem interested.”

In a way—a way that Sophia would never have said aloud, even to Alice—that had been a disappointment. She didn’t want to put that particular pawn on the board, wanted to squirm with discomfort thinking about it, and yet…it would have been another option, although a distasteful one.

“I’ll be all right,” she said.

* * *

Standing at the door to his rooms, hand still raised from knocking, Sophia still wasn’t sure she’d spoken the truth. Behind the door she heard footsteps. Then Cathal jerked it open and fixed her with a surprised glare. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” she said, talking around the heartbeat she could feel in her throat. “I wanted to speak with you in private.”

He still wore his plaid, but his fur-trimmed mantle was off, and his hair was disheveled. Sophia didn’t see a woman in the room beyond, which was perhaps the only thing that saved her from death by embarrassment when Cathal spoke again. “I’m not looking for a wife, and I don’t need a leman just now. You should go back to bed. I won’t tell anyone you were here.”

If he had propositioned her, if he’d even cast those emerald eyes down the length of her body before he’d spoken, Sophia would have been less humiliated. “I wasn’t…offering!” she gasped, floundering for a few seconds for the last word. “I—”

“No? I ask your pardon then,” he said, though it was clear he didn’t care whether he received it or not.

Sophia had prepared a speech, a well-reasoned argument that subtly disclosed what she knew and what she was asking. It might have stuck in her mind through fear. Embarrassment and exasperation were another story.

“I heard that your family could turn into dragons,” she said with enough presence of mind to lower her voice. “I have several reliable sources. And if that’s true, I was hoping that you could help me.”