The Chieftain's Curse Read online

  Comlyn however, was a man filled with vain conceit; he couldn’t envisage fate being so contrary as to gang against him. And so he had sent Astrid to her death.

  In Nhaimeth’s eyes, Astrid’s happiness had been the only bright facet of the last year of her life. The McArthur had been kind to her and that in itself would have been enough to make Astrid love him had she not been heart-struck at first sight of the man.

  Oh, aye, the McArthur was an easy man to love. From his lowly position, a Fool finds it easy to read the heights.

  Nhaimeth pushed off the crenel in battlements meant to shelter archers atop the tower. It was time for him to play least in sight. He would steal some food from the kitchen to share with the lad Morag had brought with her, while he hid from Comlyn in the stables.

  Aye, least in sight that was the way o’ it.

  From the narrow window, Morag watched Euan’s progress until the gatehouse hid him from sight. She was certain he would feel hot, dirty and tired after venting his anger on the fallen tree.

  Knowing her father’s aversion to facing guests looking less than his best, she hurried down the winding curve to have water carted upstairs so that Euan might bathe before the noonday meal. Her heart tripped as she ran.

  By the time Euan entered the great hall, yelling orders, Morag and auld Mhairi had laid out clean linen cloths to dry his wet skin. Over the chest lay a shirt, a fine worsted plaid, and all the accoutrements of his office, including a bonnet decked with two feathers auld Mhairi said he had stolen from a golden eagle’s nest on the highest crags of Ben Nevis.

  Mhairi fussed around after her, readying the room, though to Morag’s keen eye, little was out of place.

  A closer look showed her a lick of fear behind Mhairi’s eyes. “What is it?” Morag asked.

  “I hope there won’t be any fighting.”

  Surprised, Morag gasped, “Do you think that’s likely?” Had she and Rob jumped from one viper’s next to another?

  Mhairi limped out of the bedchamber into the solar. “One way or another, there will be tears before morning, you mark my words. I’ll send hissel’ up. You’ll have to tend to him. His squire fell off the cliff trying to equal a feat of Euan’s. Foolish lad heard the McArthur once climbed down to collect seabird’s eggs and was foolishly determined he could do the same.”

  Chin tilted, Morag’s gaze pinned the old woman as she stepped closer. “I think the McArthur would be insulted to know you’re insinuating he needs a nursemaid.”

  A sly glint sparkled up at her from Mhairi’s faded blue eyes. “No, lass, I’m no so foolish. He’s a man grown. What he needs is a woman.”

  The blunt words sent out a prickle of shock that straightened Morag’s spine and sharpened her voice. “And I’m not so daft. My certes, his wife isn’t yet under the sod.”

  “What has that to say to anything? Men will be men and women will open their legs for them. ‘Tis the way of the world,” she cackled.

  The room hazed around her and an echo from her past shimmered into place like a dream of the cave where she had lost her virginity. Had she been too willing, pretended he wanted her as much as she had wanted him? There had been days when the fever in him flared and…

  No, a man out of his mind couldn’t have made her feel so much, couldn’t have drawn the essence from her very soul. Oh, to feel that again. She shivered and surfaced from her daze, to hear Euan’s old nurse say, “I’ve seen you watching him.”

  “Away with you, Mhairi” she snapped. “And stop talking a such nonsense. There’s too much to be done to stand around nattering.”

  But Mhairi was determined to have the last word. “Why, then, out of all yon maids were you the wan offering to tend Astrid?”

  The elderly woman must have known, must have heard the foot on the stairs, yet nary a flicker of warning crossed her face. “If you must know, I felt sorry for him!” she all but shouted as Euan stepped into the solar.

  As Morag watched, Mhairi, shoulders hunched in her usual aged posture as if she hadn’t spoken crude as a fishwife, but moments before. Then with a smirk on her lips, she said, “I’ll see rooms are redded for aw yon Comlyns. The west tower, aye?”

  Euan scowled. Morag wondered how much he’d heard. “Duncan will have it well in hand.”

  “Aye, perhaps he will, but a woman has a different touch,” she told him, knowing he wasn’t aware his auld nurse’s pointed answer was more intended for Morag’s ears than his.

  Ignoring them both, Euan strode into the bedchamber, Morag at his heels. “There’s water in the basin and extra in the ewer for-by,” she rushed as if to cancel her earlier outburst. “We’ve laid all your clean clothes on the chest -”

  He wasn’t listening.

  She saw his head turn toward the corner where the crib had stood. Mhairi had taken it away. Before she could blink, he turned on his heel and fixed her with his gaze. She felt her skin shrink around her bones and beneath her hair, the back of her neck flushed red.

  The eyes that held hers were dark as hell, but the flame in them burned cold. She shivered as he asked, “Do I look as if I need your pity?”

  She sensed rather than saw his fists clench by the way his shoulders flexed and his chest expanded. “Please… I meant no insult, Mhairi made me angry…”

  “No more.” His mouth tightened, nostrils flared as he dragged in air. “Your pity is as nothing to me,” he muttered, showing Morag his shoulder. The scent of him reaching out to her as he moved, filling her head as he walked away.

  So much for Mhairi’s notion that he wanted a woman, for sure he was going the wrong way about it.

  The twinge of hurt Morag felt took her by surprise.

  It was his protection she wanted, she told herself, not his body, but he was hard to ignore as from his superior height he surveyed the things she’d laid out.

  “There’s a kist in the solar. You’ll find my best belt with the McArthur buckle; it was my father’s. I was hoping to leave it to my son one day. And bring me the dirks and swords as well.”

  The last was said as he pulled his grubby linen shirt over his head, muffling the words, but revealing his long spine. As she hurried into the solar to do his bidding, her brain searched out memories long forgotten. They made her skin feel itchy in a way it hadn’t in a long while.

  The kist lay against the far wall, the wood dark with age. She unlatched the clasp. The lid felt cool against her heated skin as she bent her knees to push it open. She lifted the belt first and ran her fingers over the McArthur crest decorating the buckle, which meant polishing it with the hem of her kirtle to remove the fingerprints. On her knees, she laid the belt in her lap then looked down into the kist. Did he really mean her to fetch him all these blades?

  Was Mhairi right to expect trouble?

  She gathered an armful of blades, sheathed, thank heaven, and took heart from seeing the intricate carving on hilt and sheath, designed to show the owner’s consequence.

  The thought made her feel better. The burial would take place this afternoon. The Laird of Comlyn’s arrival was opportune, for though Astrid’s body lay in the chapel, the weather had turned sultry, as if urging Euan to should hurry.

  She looped the belt over her shoulder. The weight of the buckle bumped against her hip as she walked. The blades she hugged against her breasts to prevent them slipping as she hurried into the bedroom, intent on laying them upon the bed. The bloody linens and covers had been burned, replaced with a huge fur rug and a cover of thick rough wool that was bound to scratch his skin. It was as if Mhairi wanted to disguise that his wife had ever slept there—had died in that bed giving birth to his son.

  The bed curtains were slightly open, but not sufficiently so to heave the longest of his swords onto the bed. Its hilt caught the edge of the curtain, pulling as she stepped backwards. Finally, she looked up and, in doing so, had her breath stolen.

  At the other side of the bed, the curtains hung wide, framing Euan. He had cast off more than his shirt. His
plaid too was gone. For her sanity’s sake she thanked God the height of the bed hid him from the hip down.

  Angled away from her, his face was hidden by a fall of hair darkened by the water pouring over his head. He tilted the ewer, leaning over the basin to catch the water in its hollow. Tautly rounded muscles curved into his lower spine, the cleft between them shadowed and masculine. His back—long, lean strength without bulk—marred only by the scar of the crossbow bolt she’d removed from his shoulder.

  She recalled the soughing noise the bolt made as she pulled it out, remembered sawing through the shaft with his dirk, as Euan had asked. It was a mercenary’s weapon, probably shot by one of the Frenchmen her father had hired. She’d been sure it would kill him, for at fourteen she’d had scant experience of tending the wounded; but there was no one else—no one with enough courage to help their enemy.

  Back then, she had thought him the most handsome man she’d ever seen. He was all that now, and more—exuding strength and power. Was it any wonder Euan’s wives had been willing to risk their lives to stay in this place with this man? She knew he was a wonderful lover. She had given him her maidenhead and deep in her heart still craved for more of the magic he had wrought inside her.

  Her womb clenched, ached for all she had lost when he’d healed and left her behind to return to Cragenlaw.

  Euan shook his wet hair back from his face and caught her staring at him.

  Her insides quivered.

  Eyes wide, she let out a gasp as he hurried around the foot of the bed toward her. Before she could catch her breath, the assortment of blades began sliding from her slackened grip and hit the rush-covered floor.

  Chapter 6

  In the days before it became common knowledge that he’d been cursed, many women, aye and young lassies too, had looked at him with the same heated gaze he saw in Morag’s eyes. Still, he had set aside temptation, keeping faith with his wife.

  But had any of them been Morag, who could tell what the end would have been?

  Euan wrapped the swatch of linen round his hips as he traversed the width of his big bed. The best of the McArthur clan’s blades clattered to the floor and were in sore need of rescuing. That’s what he should be keeping in mind, not that he had felt the look in her eyes lick over his skin and it had made him sweat. He was almost disappointed when he reached her and found her eyes closed. All he could see were her eyelashes shadowing the light flush across the high curve of her cheekbones.

  Her chin was dipped, as though embarrassed that she had gazed at his naked body while he washed the scent of hard work and raw wood away. As he hunkered down at the side of the bed to retrieve his blades, Morag backed away as though frightened of him. He quickly grasped the hilt of his father’s sword, murmuring words of reassurance, “They haven’t come to any harm. All the McArthur weapons are sturdily made. Don’t be afeared, I’m not vexed with you.”

  She backed farther away as he straightened his spine, arms full of lethal steel. A swathe of her dark hair had come loose. With her head still dipped, her expression was shielded. He had a distant memory of hair like jet, but the face in his mind was rounded, youthful, unlike the fine-drawn features and hollow cheeks that shaped Morag’s face.

  Experience, that’s what made the difference.

  She had told him she was barren. How else could she know if she hadn’t had lovers, been married even or, as he had wondered before, was perhaps a widow.

  Before he spoke again, he had imagined a whole history for her, one that suited his purpose well. Laying aside the McArthur weapons, he reached out. His fingers, lifting the hair away from her face, touched her nape at the moment his palm cupped her cheek. Her skin was smooth like velvet, but without Astrid’s pallor.

  All the better, when he took this woman, he wanted no reminders of his late wife.

  As he pushed her chin higher, the dark fringe of her eyelids lifted. She gave him stare for stare, blue eyes clashing with brown, which sparked another instant of recollection, a pinpoint of light one moment, gone the next, the way a star might blink out in the heavens. Their lips touched. Her taste filled his mouth, his senses. Everything else was as nothing.

  Need filled him as his tongue thrust between her lips. Its surface scraped against her teeth and the first tentative slide of her tongue against his, shouted innocence. He pushed the thought aside, feeling he had too much at stake, too much to lose. Her mouth widened in invitation, and her assent ripped a moan from the pit of his stomach that surprised.

  He hadn’t realised how much he needed this … this freedom to take a woman without trying to get her with child, without fearing that pushing his cock inside her might take her life.

  With one hand holding her head, he kept her mouth pressed close against his. His other hand slid down to her hip, pulling her belly tight against the aching surge of his erection. The strip of linen he’d wound around his hips slid to the floor.

  Stark naked, with the woman in his arms clothed from neck to ankle, he wanted to feel her hands on him. As if in response to his silent demand, her palms slid up the planes of his chest to mould his shoulders, to knead them with her fingers—fingers he wanted circling his thrumming prick.

  Euan could wait no longer. He clutched a handful of kirtle and underskirt, baring her leg, making room to slide his rough-haired thigh between hers.

  “Augh! It isn’t enough. I want to see you.” If he couldn’t touch the hard beads of the breasts pointing into his chest, he would … he would … Euan twisted and fell back onto the bed with Morag on top. His swords were a cold brand against his heated back, an agent to cool his blood, to recollect his senses.

  “God’s blood,” he yelled. “Why am I whoring with you while my wife lies in the chapel awaiting burial?”

  His senses received another awakening when Morag slapped his face, hard. “I’m not your whore.”

  Euan gripped her chin between a finger and the flat pad of his thumb and raised his shoulders from the bed and the now warm graze of his swords. “That’s as may be, Morag of Roslyn, but you can’t deny you were a willing participant.”

  Rising farther from the bed, he narrowed the space separating them, taking her lips in a kiss so hot it seared.

  There was danger here, danger in being caught once more in the toils of passion, of forgetting that Comlyn awaited in Cragenlaw’s Great Hall.

  He catapulted them both off the bed in one swift movement, gripping the tops of her arms in case she had a mind to run. “Bring your belongings here to this bedchamber. From this night forth, you will sleep with me in this bed. No whore for a quick release, you’ll be my leman. It’s a role well fitting for a woman who’s barren, better than you’ve a right to expect after lifting your hand to your laird.”

  He set her away from him, turning his back with no fear that she might take up one of his dirks and stab his naked back.

  Facing away from her, he lifted his shirt from the chest. Arms raised, he pulled the garment over his head, aware all the while she was staring at his arse. Smoothing it over his chest he pulled it down until it covered his still rowdy shaft, unconcerned about making its disappointment known.

  He looked through a stone slit down into the bailey. His stable lads were running back and forth from the stables, holding horse’s heads until their riders dismounted. From the laughter that floated in through the window, the lads were enjoying the work. From this height, the bailey was a patchwork of colour, yet he looked down on it, brooding. If it weren’t for Erik the Bear’s colourful entourage arriving downstairs, he would have had Morag.

  One kiss and he burned for more.

  Euan needed all his control to leave her untouched.

  It shamed him to admit that Astrid, with her pale hair and skin, had never stirred him so. Guilt was as good as a dash of icy water.

  At last, he could turn to face Morag without waving his erection at her. It did no good to show a bonnie lass how powerfully you wanted her.

  He motioned her closer wit
h a jerk of his head. “My squire drowned a week ago and I’ve yet to replace him. I’ll need your help if I’m to look respectable.” It was hard not to lay blame, the lad was dead, but if everyone hadn’t been searching the shore for young Doug, Astrid’s quickening might have been noticed in time to fetch the midwife before the storm arrived.

  As he regrouped his thoughts, he realised Morag was staring at him with an impatient twist to her lips. “Don’t look so dour. Come help me fit my plaid. I’ll fashion the pleats, then you can hold them in place with belt.”

  That said, the belt was transferred from her hands to his waist. She stood by, holding the hose essential for a Laird’s dress costume, while he arranged his plaid across his chest, fastening it with the silver pin—another piece inherited from his father, bearing the McArthur coat-of-arms. “I’m certain the notion of getting down on your knees in front of me, goes against the grain, but without my squire handy, I’d like you to fasten the cross ties over my hose.”

  “How can I gainsay you? Aren’t you my Laird and master?” she grumbled, yet went about the task with a will, which meant she kept her head down and her thoughts hidden.

  Hell’s teeth, she had been willing. He refused to feel guilty and covered the emotion in a spurt of anger. “Save your impudence for your equals, lass,” he warned. “You may see your position as my leman as a sinecure, but if it takes my fancy to have you on your knees before me, then you’ll do so without complaint.”

  She lifted her face, chin tilted as if to prove he that he might be the chieftain but he didn’t overawe her, this woman who had slapped his cheek. He still felt the sting. “My brother travelled with me to Cragenlaw. He might not understand.”

  “You think he would draw steel on me?”

  “No, he is but a youth, barely out of his childhood.”

  By the time Euan had finished fastening all the crossed belts and buckles of his weaponry, he’d had time to decide how to proceed. “I will speak to your brother.”