“Perhaps we should get out, lie down for a while on the shore,” she suggested. “Look up at the sky. Dry off a bit before you have to go.”
I’m not going anywhere.
Yes, they would look at the sky together for a while. Perhaps if he stared at the endless blue sky long enough, the future between them would become clear.
They lay on the spongy, warm grass and she put her head on his shoulder, wrapped her leg around his waist. He held her but didn’t molest her, wanting to shield her from any accidental eyes. She dozed that way a while, or seemed to, then rose and picked up a nearby stick. He watched her start to draw in the sandy earth. She was so un-self-conscious in her nakedness. He was charmed by the careful way she drew in the sand, the concentration on her face as she bit her lip.
“What are you drawing?” he asked finally, curiosity getting the better of him. He sat up and looked incredulously at the sand.
She smiled at him. She’d drawn a rather involved caricature of her and him and underneath, their names, and a heart, and the eternal lover’s question,
Will you love me always?
The writing was sure, bold, smartly written,
even
with a stick in the sand. His smile faded.
“Why did you never tell me you could write?”
Her face clouded and she dropped the stick. “I don’t know.”
“You can read too?”
“Yes,” she admitted. “Is that bad?”
“No. But it’s unusual,” he murmured uneasily after a moment. “Who taught you?”
“My nurse.”
“Your nurse.
What kind of nurse did you have, to teach you reading and writing? What else did she teach you,
Cait
? What else can you do?”
She shrugged.
“Nothing.
I don’t know. I only know my letters and a few familiar words. I never read a book. We didn’t have any. Are you angry with me?”
Duncan tried to hide the anxiety he was feeling. Henna’s frantic words resonated in his mind.
Raised
in seclusion? Hidden away in a cottage in the woods? Then sent to marry an earl at the edge of Scotland? You should guard her better!
It was pointless to question her. He knew she knew nothing of her parents save her unhappy audience with the king. It would only upset her if he brooded upon it, but why on earth would a bastard daughter be taught to read? Why would she be kept so carefully in seclusion? And should he really be worried if she was safe?
“I would have told you. I didn’t think it was important,” she said, scattering the sand with her foot. Her question,
Will you love me always
, wiped forever from the face of the earth.
I will. I’ll love you forever,
Cait
. I just wish I knew who you were.
She withdrew then into her own thoughts, staring off into the distance. Soon after, with a heavy sigh, Duncan suggested they’d better dress and return to the keep.
Chapter Ten
That night,
Cait
was shaky in her submission. Duncan knew it was his fault, that he’d been confusing her by demanding wildly varying levels of obedience.
Duncan watched as she dawdled at undressing. Then, as he’d suspected, she chose not to drop to her knees when he indicated she should. Outside the air was heavy and charged. The beautiful blue skies of the day were giving way to gathering storms. Thunder rumbled in the distance as he considered what to do. “Are you ill?” he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.
“No.”
“You wish to sleep in your own room tonight?”
She bit her lip. “Yes, perhaps.” She peered up at him to gauge his reaction to her softly spoken words.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Wives are supposed to provide comfort to their husbands. They are supposed to please them, Caitlyn.”
“I know.”
“You are supposed to undress in my room and present yourself to me on your knees.”
“I know,” she whispered again, her eyes shining with tears. Her hands came up to cover her body. “Tonight, I don’t want to.”
“Very well.”
Duncan sighed after a long moment. “If that is your choice, it carries consequences. I’ll punish you, and then you are free to sleep in your room for one night to consider whether or not to make this choice again.”
Her lips trembled and she gave him a look that pained him.
Confused, vulnerable, scared.
“Do you love me?” she asked.
“Of course I do.”
“But only if I do as you say.
Only if I follow your commands.”
“No.” He sat heavily on the edge of the bed. “I love you always,
Cait
. But I punish you when you don’t follow my commands. There’s a reason for that, which I’ve explained to you on many occasions. My rules are there to keep you safe.”
“How does it keep me safe to kneel and take you in my mouth?”
His face grew hard. “It does. Believe me, it does.”
Silent tears spilled over onto her cheeks. Duncan wished she would just tantrum and scream.
“I thought you enjoyed the things we did together in this room. I had no idea they made you so unhappy.”
“I just always thought you loved me. But now I don’t know. You frown at me as much as you smile, and you avoid me at all times except when we’re in this room.”
“I took you to the lake today. We had fun together, didn’t we?”
“Until you discovered I knew how to read and write. Then you frowned at me the rest of the day. You always frown at me.”
“I frown a lot,
Cait
. I can’t help it. It has nothing to do with my feelings for you. I love you very much. Now come, lay over my lap.”
She hesitated. “I don’t want to.”
“That may be, love, but you’ll do it all the same.”
“If you love me, why do you hurt me?”
Duncan sighed. “Honestly, we’ve been over and over this. Do I really need to explain it again? I will if you wish it, but you’ll be punished all the same. Now come, let’s get it over with.”
She dragged over to him, weeping openly now. He pulled her between his legs and tilted her chin up to him.
“These tears,
Cait
.
What are you really crying about?”
“I don’t want you to do this. I just want you to hold me.”
“Disobedient wives aren’t coddled and cuddled, are they? You know that.”
He pulled her down over his knee, ignoring her sobbing. Of course he was devastated to see her so upset, but the worst thing he could do would be to let her go now, when she was obviously trying to see where the boundaries lay.
The spanking was harsh and painful, but not angry. He wanted her to feel she was being punished, yes, but to understand that she was loved. Afterward he made her stand again between his legs and look him in the eyes. She was miserable, conflicted,
guilty
.
“Tell me, Caitlyn, what that punishment was for.”
“It was...it was for being...disobedient,” she sniffled through her tears.
“For testing me, yes?
For purposely not following the rules.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Are you sorry?” She was quiet a long moment. If he had to, he would start all over again.
“I’m sorry I made you angry,” she said finally. “I just want you to love me. If I have to be obedient for you to love me,
that’s
what I’ll do.”
“I told you already,” he said, his patience wearing thin, “that I love you always. No matter what you do. No matter if I frown and spend time away from you, you’re my wife and I care for you. I won’t allow you to be unsafe and unhappy, which is why I require obedience of you. Now repeat it to me, so I know you understand me. Do I love you, Caitlyn?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And why must you obey me? What is the reason?”
“To...to...to be safe...and happy,” she said with a fresh torrent of tears.
“Because I love you and I want you to be safe and happy,” he agreed quietly. He hugged her, pulling her close in his arms. “I know you aren’t feeling very happy right now, or very safe when I’m hurting you in punishment. Tonight you’ll dress and sleep in your own room and think over what I’ve said. Tomorrow we’ll try again.”
Her eyes pleaded with his. She didn’t want to be sent away, but he knew she needed time to think. She needed to understand the consequences of fighting his system.
“Go on.” He pushed her gently towards her clothes strewn on the floor. She dressed, still shaking with tears. He opened the door to her adjoining room and ushered her inside.
“Do not come back in tonight,” he said. “I’ve told you what I wish.”
“Yes, sir,” she whispered, just as the first hard rain started to fall.
He shut the door and crossed back to his window, staring out at the pummeling storm. Hard lessons now would assure smoother times later, but it still pained him to wish her good night and send her away. He hadn’t even enjoyed that spanking, not really. He was more worried about the miscommunication that had caused it. For her to believe he didn’t love her...that was the worst thing of all.
Lightning flickered in the distance. Duncan decided to return to the hall to see if any assistance was needed in battening down for the storm. Before he arrived, Connor came striding toward him down the corridor.
“What is it, man?
Danger?”
“No, only something you should see. Someone,” he amended. “She claims to be mother to Lady Caitlyn.”
Duncan took in the uneasy look on his friend’s face. “And who do you think she is?”
“I think she is who she says she is, and much more than that. But she asked to see you and only you, not her daughter. She demanded it,” finished Connor with a frown.
“Where is she?”
“In the hall, my lord.”
“I’ll meet with her alone—”
“Duncan,” Connor warned.
“I’ll meet with her alone! And see that
Cait
doesn’t enter the hall without my permission,” he added as an afterthought.
Duncan stalked toward the great hall. He’d have answers now, at long last, from this woman claiming to be
Cait’s
mother, as if anyone like she had the right to call herself a mother. Abandoning her daughter to be raised like a pauper in the woods, alone with an aged nurse and a king for a father, and no earthly knowledge of who she was or of anything of the world. He banged open the door, worked into full fury, but stopped still as she turned eyes on him that were exact replicas of
Cait
. The woman drew herself up haughtily.
“You may think of me whatever you wish, bold warrior,” she intoned at his expression, “but you will hear my words before you send me away.”
Cait’s
mother.
Duncan had no doubt she was exactly who she claimed to be. To say that she resembled
Cait
was an understatement; it was as if Duncan looked upon
Cait
herself in twenty or twenty five years, garbed in the
woad
robes of a priestess.
A priestess.
She resembled
Cait
in appearance, but that was all. For this woman, though
petite,
had a presence that dwarfed Duncan and made him stop short where he was.
A presence that
Cait
did not in any way possess.