Heart of Stone by Rebecca Ruger

Chapter Eight

Calum wasn’t sure whathad happened in the bare hour since they’d left the house, but he noted immediately upon their return that the atmosphere had taken a decidedly gloomy turn. Julianna no longer held the babe but was busy slicing carrots at the table with Mairi. Beitris was yet engaged around the kettles hung on spits over the hot coals. Young Arabella sat on her knees on the bench, several pieces of carrot before her that held her complete attention. No one raised their gazes at the men returning though Calum thought he spied Mairi stealing glances at Julianna out of the corner of her eye.

This complete reversal from delight was certainly evident to Calum, as he’d had so difficult a time keeping his gaze from Julianna earlier. Hours ago, it had worked in his favor when Robbie and Finn and Artur engaged in a long-winded discussion about the weather this year and the effects of such on the crops. Calum had allowed his gaze to wander as it had often since Julianna had left the table to pilfer the bairn. Mairi had stood next to her and the two had spoken quietly together. The young lass had displayed some thrill for this singular attention, and Calum had found himself grinning at one point that only slivers of seconds passed between the last word of the lass and the response of Julianna. They chattered non-stop, speaking quickly, either or both of their faces alight with pleasure for the other’s company and conversation. At one point, Julianna had said something that included a wee shrug of her slim shoulders and what Calum deemed a saucy grin, to which Mairi giggled quietly, covering her mouth with her hand.

It wasn’t easy to admit to himself that Julianna was bluidy mesmerizing. Physical allure aside, she’d charmed his cousins so effortlessly, diving straight into conversations with people she would never see again after this occasion, seeming to enjoy herself immensely. For a time, Calum had been absolutely spellbound. Never mind that she’d taken up the bairn with so much expertise and joy that he’d been forced to acknowledge that the fit appeared wholly natural. Without any instruction from Beitris, she bounced on her toes, rocking smoothly from side to side that the babe only fussed when her conversation with Mairi was distracting enough that the motion slowed.

Earlier while he’d gawked, Beitris had cut into his view by reaching between him and Tomag, setting a pitcher in the middle of the table. As she backed out, her hand lifted Calum’s jaw, closing his mouth for him. Feigning a chagrin to hide his embarrassment, Calum had met Beitris’s eye, hardly able to believe he might be blushing. Sweet Beitris winked at him, her eyes flashing while her grin was shrewd before she turned to fetch more sparse utensils for the meal that would come.

“Enough wood just chopped to last a month,” Robbie announced now to his wife as he entered, his tone jovial.

As Beitris’ response was muffled and unexcited—indeed, she did not turn from the hearth—Calum’s frown grew larger. While he’d shared the news of the less than successful attack at Kinclaven with Robbie inside the barn, he hadn’t given any thought that Julianna might have done so as well inside the croft. But he had to wonder if the morose expressions that greeted their return should suggest that she had, and with her own insistence that she’d had no part in the plot.

Calum exchanged a glance with Finn, whose brow was also furrowed with some confusion for the mood inside the home. Still, Finn plunked himself down on the bench next to Julianna and bumped her shoulder playfully, stealing a chunked carrot from her pile and chucking it into his mouth. She responded as Calum supposed Finn had hoped, with lightness, and an attempt to reprimand with a glare aimed at Finn, but that showed no animosity at all.

Thankfully, when they sat for the meal, Beitris at least seemed to have returned to her usual cheery self or pretended as much. Julianna was squeezed at the end of the bench opposite Calum and next to Mairi. The two maintained their own conversation throughout much of the meal. And while it appeared very open and friendly, it rarely included any other person, and neither showed any interest in any other talk around the table. He couldn’t imagine that Julianna and a lass half her age would have so much to share with each other, but he was again intrigued by how constant was their private chatter.

To his greater ease, the mood was sufficiently enlivened after the meal. Mairi had invited Julianna to play draughts, and with her agreement, had fetched the wooden board and the game pieces from a corner cabinet. They’d taken up a spot on the floor near that cupboard—much to Beitris’s horror—and after a while, the younger lads, Ailbert and Boyd, had joined them.

The men remained at the table, their ale refilled often. Beitris was many things—a fine woman and good mother included—but och, the heather ale she brewed was exceptional, as were most that were not watered down to be sold.

Calum was imbued with a certain nameless sense, some notion, that this was a fine life here. After her long day, Beitris now sat in a narrow chair in one darkened corner of the room, with Lucas in her arms while she fed him discreetly from her breast. She sang a sweet lullaby, her pleasing voice and the fine song a charming backdrop to the general din of the room. Arabella had at some time wormed her way into Julianna’s lap, her thumb in her mouth while she only stared sleepily and gave no heed to the game. Robbie and the lads continued to talk as there was always so much catching up to do, and news of the world to share. He wondered if, even at Caerhayes, Finn and the lads ever knew such ease as this, what they knew when they visited Robbie and Beitris.

But as the night grew older and more children began to fall asleep, Calum drained the last of his ale and stood from the table. He’d barely stepped away from the table, intent on excusing all of them from his cousin’s home for the night, when Beitris spoke up.

“Ye can make use of the lass’s mattress.” This was given in a low whisper to Julianna, near to her feet.

Robbie had risen as well and collected his slumbering daughter from Julianna, who was then able to stand.

“I wouldn’t dream of putting anyone out of their own bed,” she demurred politely.

At Beitris’s uncertain frown, and a precise look that suggested she was about to object, Calum interceded softly. “Aye, Julianna stays with me.”

A shifting of persons took place. Beitris rose and settled her bairn into his cradle and then disappeared into the bedchambers. The lads all stood from the table as well. Robbie’s lads yawned and stretched, Ailbert pulling himself off the floor where he’d been on his belly, his chin in his hands while he’d watched the play of draughts.

Mairi was clinging to Julianna’s hand, her face animated as she suggested, “You can come berry picking with us tomorrow.” All the excitement left her face though, and swiftly, as she sent a scowl to Calum and then said to Julianna, “If he lets you.”

“I would like that,” Julianna responded, and kissed Mairi’s forehead.

Beitris returned, bearing a homespun coverlet of wool, which she presented to Julianna. “This’ll keep ye warm tonight, lass.”

They filed out, one by one, bidding quiet good nights, and walked beneath a moonless sky to the barn. Inside, as they had so many times over the years, the lads found beds where they might, in any of the empty stalls, and with Peadar and Finn making their beds in the aisles. Last inside, Calum closed the door behind him and pointed to the last empty stall as Julianna seemed to be waiting some direction from him.

Without fuss or any indication that she’d not ever made a bed inside a barn, she fluffed the hay before she sat, taking a few minutes then to stretch out the blanket Beitris had so kindly provided. She did not seek or meet Calum’s gaze even once. All the cheer she’d displayed all evening inside the croft had seemingly vanished with her departure.

Calum unbuckled his belt and sword and leaned them into the corner before sitting down as well, leaving a foot or more of space between them.

“You enjoyed Mairi quite a bit,” he commented, hoping she’d enlighten him about what all they could have possibly talked about, even as he wondered why he should have an interest.

“She is a truly special lass,” was all Julianna allowed. He wouldn’t have ever believed that she lied, but her tone was curt that he supposed she only did not want to talk to him now.

“Aye, they’re a great family—” he said, but stopped when Julianna abruptly turned onto her side, presenting her back to him, pulling the soft cotton coverlet up over her shoulder.

Calum’s scowl remained for quite a while. Mayhap she was still upset about the kiss.

He still wasn’t sure why it should bother him, but he heard himself ask quietly, “Julianna, did something happen?”

“No,” she murmured after a lengthy pause, her small voice carrying over her shoulder. In the bare light afforded only by his eyes having adjusted to the darkness, he thought she shook her head against the hay.

“Aye, I think something did. I canna believe Beitris would have treated you poorly, so I have to—”

“I am just sad, Calum,” she said. Possibly her voice cracked but he couldn’t be sure, her response so softly given. “I don’t want to die.”

He couldn’t ever recall a time he’d been moved by a person’s frailty or despondency, but Julianna’s sorrowful response cut him to the bone. His breath left him, as sure as if she’d struck him hard in the chest.

“We’ll stay another day and night,” he said, the only hope that he could offer her now. He couldn’t promise her more, couldn’t say, You won’t die, you’ll only be a prisoner. It wasn’t his decision to make. His uncle was chief. The crime had been perpetrated against the MacKinnons. The decision belonged to Domhnall MacKinnon.

***

CALUM WOKE LONG BEFOREany others in the morning. He scratched idly at his chest and stared at the timber high above, his mind whirring. Turning his head on the pillow of hay, he saw that Julianna had rolled over during the night—she liked to sleep or often wound up on her left side, he knew—that her face was available to his scrutiny.

As ever, he was captivated by her beauty, but recognized now how often she had compelled other emotions as well. It made no sense, was contrary to the very heart of their circumstance, and it sat very disagreeably with him.

He was allowed many long minutes to stare at her before she began to rouse, moving her face away from him. The morning light glinted off something in the corner of her eye, which had Calum frowning and rising onto his elbow to investigate this.

Tears.

At some point during the night, she must have cried, the evidence of it streaked down her cheeks and away from her eyes, one trail making its way toward her temple and into her hair. The bare light glinted off one wee bit that was yet moist. He supposed then that he might attribute the red-stained tip of her nose to her nighttime weeping as well, and not the cold as he otherwise might have assumed. Immediately, he felt awful that he’d not known, that he’d not borne witness to it. He felt as if he should have suffered through it as well.

Calum plucked at a piece of straw, wound into a tangle of her hair, and then another, supposing she might have wished to have put either the blanket or his plaid between her hair and the hay. He removed several more before her lashes fluttered open. He should have moved, should have taken himself away from her that she did not wake to find him ogling her, but he did not. Julianna blinked several times, her expression almost instantly wary at finding him so close and watching her, his arm hovering over her, his hands at work.

Without a word, he reached for another piece of straw, flicking it away.

“Don’t be nice to me,” she whispered, her voice scratchy but somehow very alluring.

He kept on, pulling more hay from the abundance of golden hair fanned about her until she lifted her hand and clamped her fingers around his wrist.

“Stop.”

He did, but only for the pleading of her tone and the thought that came to him. He didn’t take himself away, though, but lowered his gaze to her. “You want to keep the hate,” he guessed, twisting his hand and his wrist so that her fingers uncurled, and he pressed his palm against hers. She wanted to pull away and he wasn’t entirely sure why he wouldn’t let her, why instead he threaded his fingers between her much smaller ones, folding his down over the back of her hand.

If she were disturbed by this, she gave no sign but to blink again, returning with, “As do you.”

He shook his head side to side before he enlightened her. “It’s no’ hate I feel just now, lass.”

Since he’d first wakened, he’d wanted to kiss her again. Christ, since the moment he’d first kissed her, he’d wanted to repeat the experience. The desire to feel her lips against his overrode all else, was stoked by memory and fueled now by a powerful need.

He wasn’t sure why he might have expected that she would in any way be receptive to his advance, certainly not after her first words to him. Mayhap it was only that he couldn’t help himself, couldn’t resist trying, that he slowly leaned forward, his heated gaze upon her widening eyes. She lifted her free hand between them, flattening it on his upper chest as she shrank into the mattress of hay. But she did not push him away.

He registered only her guardedness and not any true resistance that he wondered if she often or ever relived their one and only kiss as he did.

Before he might have claimed her mouth, she flexed the hand against his chest, halting him as he leaned forward.

“Why would you want to kiss me?”

He understood immediately what she was asking. She wanted to know how a man whom she believed hated her, who’d dragged her across the country against her will, the one who’d told her she would have to give her life for Rory’s, and who more often than not snarled at her rather than show her any degree of kindness could have any interest in kissing her. He could tell her the honest and generic truth, that a man didn’t necessarily have to like a woman to want to kiss her. But that would hint at a lie since he didn’t dislike Julianna at all—he should, but he did not. He could woo her, give her some flowery nonsense to have his way. And while that might get him what he wanted—even as he wasn’t sure he could imagine Julianna, relative innocence aside, falling for any such insincere fawning—it would not be satisfying if she kissed him or allowed a kiss under false pretenses.

Their true circumstance—captor and captive—wouldn’t tolerate any brave honesty. He couldn’t very well say to her, I dinna ken all the reasons—who ever does? Maybe if I hadn’t been riled to kiss you that first time, I’d no’ think about it now. Mayhap it’s the way you stare at me sometimes, lights my blood on fire. Who kens why or how one person can stir desire inside another? You speak and I watch your lips move and I want to taste them. You walk and I watch your hips sway and I want you in my arms. Christ, you breathe, and I want to be near it, enveloped in it.

He couldn’t very well disclose these awful truths.

Instead, he shrugged, backing away from her, so quickly disgruntled by how unfortunate was his desire for her.

“I ken I dinna really have a good reason to.” Pulling his fingers from hers, Calum rolled away from her and got to his feet. While he returned his belt and sword to his person, standing tall above her, still within the confines of the stall, he watched her. She pretended he did not, had shifted onto her back, holding the coverlet in tightly curled fingers at her chest. She gave her regard to the same timber overhead that had received so much of his own contemplation earlier.

Within a quarter hour, they’d returned to the croft where the family was busy already, the children seeing to their morning chores and Beitris already hovering over a kettle in the hearth, young Lucas on her hip.

Julianna approached her straightaway and claimed the bairn, who seemed already to recognize her and went agreeably. Calum noticed that the grim face she’d worn since first waking had disappeared the moment she’d stepped foot inside the house. A larger smile had come when she scooped the babe from Beitris’s arms. But she did not only sit and occupy the babe but asked the mistress what help she might be. At that moment, Beitris straightened again from the boiling pot and placed the palm of one chapped hand against Julianna’ cheek. He would have called the look she gave Julianna significant, though neither said a word. Julianna covered Beitris’s hand with her own and tried to smile for her. The small interaction was somehow very poignant even as Calum had no idea what was said there without any sound.

Mairi entered the croft then, struggling with the weight of a bucket of water. When she sat this next to the hearth for her mam’s use, she went then directly to Julianna.

“I found the old berry aprons this morn,” she said with much excitement, “and mam says if we pick early enough, she will have time to make fruit pie today.”

Soon the house was full, and the table crowded once more. Beitris fed them a hearty porridge, flaky butteries, and crowdie, a soft cow’s milk curd cheese.

“We’ve a busy day, lass,” Beitris said to Julianna as she reached between her and Mairi, “ye’ll be wanting to eat more than that to see you through it.”

Calum, as well, had noticed that Julianna only picked at the breakfast while she sat with the bairn in her lap. Having witnessed how much food she could consume in one sitting in Uddingston and here yesterday, he’d been surprised that she showed no great interest today.

“Gullet’s likely still plump from yesterday,” Artur teased.

Julianna smiled at him, seizing on this, “There is that.”

How easily she smiled for everyone but him. While it came as no surprise to him, he understood some desire to be the recipient of such a prize. Her smile was rapturous, if rare, but he heard again her sharp words of this morning and knew he would be gifted no such boon from her.

Yesterday, while he and Artur had helped Robbie repair one section of the barn’s roof, and while the others had chopped wood for their hosts, they’d had some discussion of what aid they might give to Robbie while they were here. It was decided that they’d spend some time hunting, as Robbie had said he’d killed no big game in recent weeks but would love to provide a fine red deer to Beitris to process, knowing even a smaller doe would feed his family well for weeks.

While Calum understood that Julianna would be berry picking with Mairi, maybe with Beitris as well, he had no concern that she would use this time to make an escape. True, he could easily imagine her trying to enlist Mairi’s help; however, he somehow just knew that she’d not leave the lass before she was required to.

Both endeavors, the berry picking and the hunting, required some preparations, that after they’d broken their fast, most wandered out of doors, with Julianna and Mairi only seeming to wait for Beitris in the yard. It was a fine day, the sky barely streaked with flat clouds and most of those stretched across the western sky, so that the sun was presented in a clear blue sky from the east.

Calum went into the barn, readying his steed for the hunt and when he exited, the reins in his hand and his big black following agreeably, he passed Julianna, with Mairi stilled fastened to her side, in the yard with Artur. He hadn’t any idea what Artur was about. A frown creased Calum’s brow as he saw that the three of them were examining Artur’s dagger. As he neared and while he pretended no true interest, he did lend his ear enough to hear what they were about.

“Lass, you had the blade flat against his skin, which was fine on that occasion because we were right there, but you canna slice in one stroke from this. See? Next time hold it up like this, so just the sharp edge of the blade touches his skin. Then, if he makes a sudden move, you need only one stroke to slice his neck.”

Julianna screwed up her face with plenty of distaste at the very idea. “You are very kind, Artur, but I’m thinking it is unlikely I will have ever need of this information.”

“Aye, and I bet a week past you’d have scoffed if I’d said you’d be holding a stranger at knifepoint.”

While Artur’s instruction and argument were sound, Calum thought the entire scene both unseemly and unnecessary. Julianna was right; as a MacKinnon prisoner, if that were to be her fate, she would not be allowed weapons of any kind. Booth, Tomag, and Finn were already mounted, and Calum gained his saddle as well. He allowed himself one more glimpse of Julianna, as she stood so fetchingly in the yard, her hand at her forehead to thwart the sun as she now exchanged some words with Tomag. She’d donned the lent apron, which was tied around her waist and neck, covering the front of her completely. The rough cotton was berry-stained, mostly near the pockets, in which Julianna had placed one of her hands. She still wore Calum’s plaid, folded several times today, that it only draped over her shoulders. Mairi stood at her side, her matching apron showing a similar age and use, her hair fastened much as Julianna’s was, braided down to her nape and tied with a ribbon that a thick curling tail hung down her back.

“None of that one for the basket, one for me,” Tomag was saying with a grin. “I’ll be thinking about a fruit pie and hoping you dinna collect berries the way I might.”

“You should have wished for such numbers, Tomag,” Julianna returned. “I’ve been known to employ the math of, two for me and only one for the basket. But I’ll try to save some for you.”

“We’ll be inspecting yer tongue for evidence, lass,” Artur joined in. “Blue or purple-striped and there’ll be no pie for you. You’ve had yer fill then.”

“I dinna think you’ll be able to keep her from pie,” Tomag supposed.

Julianna scratched affectionately at the coat of Tomag’s mount. “It might be fun to see you try,” she challenged, the grin she threw up at Tomag quite becoming.

Robbie came from the barn then at the same time Beitris emerged from the croft. As she had no child in her arms, and Calum wouldn’t have expected she would leave Lucas behind, he understood that Beitris was not, then, going with Julianna and Mairi. This seemed to come as a surprise to Julianna as well.

“You must come, Beitris,” she said.

“Och, lass, there’s too much to be done here, waiting on the fruit and the game.”

“But then maybe Arabella wants to come,” Julianna said.

“Nae, she’ll only be trouble,” Beitris assured her. “Off with you now. Mairi’s chomping at her bit, aye, lass?”

So it was that the men and Robbie’s lads, mounted with Robbie and Peadar, left the yard headed east where the forest should provide them with opportunity to hunt more than even the red deer while Julianna and Mairi would take off around the back of the croft, where raspberries and dewberry brambles were abundant at the base and up the side of the mountain.

Calum tightened and pulled the reins left, sending one last look at Julianna, who bent to retrieve a basket at the same time Mairi did. When she straightened, she turned her head on her shoulder, her green eyes finding Calum’s gaze directly. Her expression did not change. She was no longer smiling but there shown in her gaze a sheen of purpose that gave Calum pause. Mayhap it was only her implacable dislike of him that he’d glimpsed just then, but the resolute coldness about her plagued him for quite some time.

***

JULIANNA WAS PLEASANTLYsurprised with the size of their haul. They’d filled their baskets so quickly and so richly that they might have been returned to the house in just over an hour save that Mairi wanted to show her the ridge, where she claimed one could see forever.

“And there’s a cairn up there as well,” Mairi had said.

So up they trekked, abandoning their baskets near the trailing dewberry bushes, intent on collecting them upon their return. It was a steeper climb than Julianna had expected, and she laughed, begging the sure-footed Mairi to wait for her. The lass bounced ahead, seeming to find no hardship in the uphill climb while Julianna moved more cautiously, holding her skirt and apron almost to her knees.

At the summit, Julianna realized Mairi had not lied, had not even exaggerated. The peak was bereft of the taller birch and pine, too rocky for such habitat, that a clear view was presented in any direction. This mountain then became a hill, when contrasted against nearby ranges, taller and wider than where they stood. Rugged gray mountains dipped into purple and green glens; the aforementioned loch winded through another valley, arching its way north, the sun glistening off the blue-black water; a small herd of red deer were spotted far to the north, which elicited a grin from Julianna as the hunters had gone east.

“Come!” Urged Mairi, pulling Julianna’s hand. “The cairn is here.”

Down a slight embankment, but still high on the hill, stood an ancient structure of stone. The rocks were of all shapes and sizes, flattened and rounded, smooth and then rough, but fit so perfectly together that the beehive shaped mound was possibly undisturbed for centuries.

“It’s amazing,” Julianna said with no small amount of wonder. “What a glorious life and home you have, Mairi.”

“I am very lucky, am I not?”

Julianna circled the cairn, marveling at the formation, wondering about its origin.

“Da’ says that in some places, cairns might have been made when a battle was fought,” Mairi said. “Each man who was going off to fight would place a stone in a pile. Those who were fortunate enough to return would take back their stone and the rest would be made into the cairn to honor the dead.”

Mayhap this particular cairn was such a monument, as Julianna was infused with a haunting sense of heartbreak as she walked around it. At the same time, she was aware of a prickle of melancholy that swept across her shoulders. Mairi felt it, too, she knew; her explanation had been given with a soft voice, void of the previous enthusiasm she’d exhibited. Julianna looked over the vista again, pleased that if any soul had been trapped here, they were about as close to God as she was sure one could be.

After a while, they descended slowly, the slope less forgiving in this direction.

“Oh, Julianna,” Mair called from several paces ahead of her. “Come see the jutting garden.”

Jutting garden?They were but halfway down the slope and Julianna pursued Mairi as she skipped through fragrant brush and silver birch, leading them very far off the original trail they used. But oh, what treasure lie ahead. Julianna gasped again at the sight. In the middle of the slope of the hill, an outcrop of grass-top rock protruded out into the air. The space was flat, and the grass was decorated with wildflowers, wood sage and pink lousewort and dainty, yellow-bloomed silverweed.

Julianna laughed with joy, wondering what other treasures were hidden on this mountain. She stepped over a fallen limb as wide as her arm and as long as her leg and out onto the promontory, catching a similar view as she’d had above. Carefully, she stepped near the edge, peering over to see that the drop from here was stark, that no ground was directly beneath for a good twenty or so feet. The entire space of this overhanging garden that pushed away from the slope was not huge but large enough that Julianna happily lay down upon a soft spot in the pretty flora, spreading her arms wide, her face to the sky.

Mairi needed no prompting to join her, lying next to her.

“We shouldn’t stay overlong,” Julianna cautioned, “but we might enjoy a few minutes of this splendor, aye?”

Mairi agreed and then was quiet for only seconds before she asked, “Julianna, what will you do? Why do you still travel with Calum if you’re no’ to wed? Can you no’ stay here?”

Turning her head upon the ground, Julianna faced Mairi and gave her a mournful look. Oh, how she wished. “I cannot, Mairi. I cannot explain everything, but I am still beholden to Calum. I have a debt to pay.” This wonderful lass needn’t have any idea how merciless her Uncle Calum was.

“But you don’t want to be...beholden,” Mairi argued. “It’s no’ fair.”

“It is not,” Julianna agreed. “But it is what is.” With so much sincerity, she pledged to Mairi, “I vow to you, Mairi, if ever there should come a way or a time that I can see you again, I would seize that chance.”

Mairi forced a wee smile, barely appeased, and possibly still confused about the entire situation. But they stayed there upon that ledge, awash in summer’s bounty of blooms, their gowns and hair fanned out around them, the bright sun showing them much adoration. Julianna told Mairi about her sisters and her dear mam, whom she missed so much, and Mairi shared a sweet anecdote about the last trip the family had taken to Glasgow. More than a year ago now.

“Woodland nymphs is my thinking,” said a strange voice, breaking into their idyll.

Simultaneously, Julianna and Mairi jerked upright, pivoting to find two men leering at them just at the edge of the trees, before the small field of wildflowers. Her heart dropped to her stomach at the sight of them, so shrouded with malevolence, that Julianna jumped to her feet and dragged Mairi behind her even as she understood immediately that they were trapped out here on this divine jutting garden. She needed to somehow move them further toward the interior of the trees of the slope.

“Nymphs, fey creatures,” said the other with a negligent shrug. “Dinna matter. She can be bluidy English fer all I care.”

Julianna snatched up the huge limb she’d tripped over earlier and held it out against them with some threat.

They snickered at her, which nearly made her shiver with irrepressible fear.