Heaven and the Heather (29 page)

Niall held Sabine tight with one arm. He stared up at the hulking figure in the doorway, silhouetted against the blue-grey light of a new day. He grappled for his claymore, but it was woefully out of reach, laying beside the trough.

“What spine ye have disturbing this cottage!” he shouted.

Rory stepped into the light of the hearth.

“Och, ye’ve been putting our domicile to good use, aye? Well done, lad,” his friend remarked.

“Bastard,” Niall said drawing his fingers frustratingly through his hair. Rory could test the patience of the sunrise if he had a mind. “Now, would ye bugger off?”

“Aye,” Rory said, stepping backwards, ducking under the lintel. He paused outside of the doorway. “Just in case ye were wondering, I rallied the men. They’ll be here for the gathering this night.”

Niall nodded. “Good work. Good man.”

Rory closed the door just as his chief had ordered.

Niall looked at Sabine. “Now, where did we leave off—?”

He stopped. Sabine’s eyes were wider than his mother’s best trenchers. She looked as if she had seen a terrible apparition, one that chilled her. She shook in his arms, and he held her tighter.

chapter 16

Sabine’s Secret

A
cool breeze brought afternoon mist into the glen. Gossamer fingers snaked up the face of
Beinn Tulaichean
, thickened and obliterated everything but the heather plants closest to Niall.

The paper in his fist fluttered damply trying to loosen from his fingers. He held it tighter and read the nasty edict against the queen for the hundredth time that day knowing he could never take this paper to Her Majesty. A MacGregor could never approach the queen and not suffer arrest. His one try at Her Majesty’s masque had proven that.

But there was another whose name had fallen into recent ill-repute by Campbell’s word, one who could possibly vanquish the charges against herself and his clan with the evidence set forth in the paper Niall held.

“Sabine,” he said, the name like honey on his tongue.

She was loyal to Her Majesty. The queen had just to look into her eyes to know the endless depths of her fealty. Sabine did not have the capacity to feign loyalty or anything, if the night’s past held the depth of her truth. There was no doubt in his mind that she would find a way to see her queen. And find a way for
him
to see Her Majesty as well. Sabine had done it before, only this time there was much at stake.

He had to make a decision and soon. As Chief of Clan Gregor there was only one decision for him to make: to take Campbell’s order of murder to his queen. It was undeniable proof, signed and sealed by Campbell. Sabine would have to help him, but it was far too dangerous for her to get near the queen with Campbell about. She would be tossed into the gaol once she showed her pretty head in court. Sabine would have to stay behind with his clan, whether she wanted to or not.

Something moved in the mist.

Seizing the handle of his claymore with both fists, Niall slid it soundlessly from the leather sheath and took steady aim.

“
Có thusa?
” he demanded.

No reply.

He raised his sword higher, ignored the tug of pain in his healing shoulder. The mist thickened about him. He stood in the damp heather, legs braced apart, feet firmly on the ground. His arms did not tremble, but his soul did. He had yet to kill a man with his claymore. That day, he feared, would come as certain as his own death.

“
Có thusa!
” he shouted to the mist.

A lock of hair fell over one eye. He dared not remove a hand from the claymore to brush it aside.

Something stepped up to him through the mist.

“
Có thusa!!!!
”

“
Comment?
”

But the reply was too late. He had already stabbed his blade forward…into the basket Sabine carried.

Shrieking, she leapt backward. Niall reached out and grabbed her by the wrist keeping her from falling.

“Dinnae tumble down the ben,
cherie
,” he said. “How did ye make it up here, alone, in the mist?”

Breasts straining against her brocade gown, as she caught her breath, Sabine stared at Niall. He smiled at her, loving the way her dark eyes flashed.

“
Imbecile
,” she scolded. “I was born near mountains higher than this.” She paused then said, “You could have skewered my belly with that weapon. ’Twas
fortuit
that you skewered your
petit déjeuner
instead.”

The basket hung ridiculously from the end of Niall’s blade. He peered inside. A bannock was speared through, the meat was spared.

He grinned. “My blade is swift and sure when I wish to halve my bread. Care to join me in this fine repast?”

“’Twas my intention,” she said with a small smile. “But,
s’il vous plait
, sheathe your sword.”

Niall slid the blade from the basket and placed it neatly over his shoulder, into its leather sheath. “Does my blade frighten ye?” he asked watching her bend down to take the basket from the heather, watching the way her gown hung smooth over her fine, firm bottom.

She stood up and stared him down. “’Tis not your blade that frightens me so, Highlander, but the sureness of your wielding.”

He stepped forward, took her by the waist and pulled her close. She must have felt his growing passion. The small gasp that burst over her lips told him that she had.

“I’m glad ye’re here,” he said. “Ye’re the most wonderful thing that has happened to me.”

She looked into his eyes. “I shall say the same, Niall. For I have never been so light-headed with happiness as when I am with you.”

“’Tis the Highlands that have lightened yer head, my love. Ye’re up where the birds soar.”

He kissed her, burying his fingers into her hair, which he noticed she had worn loose ever since she had come to the glen. She was herself here, free to roam the bens and glens without fear, protected by his kith and kin, free to let her hands slide up his kilt—

“Why,
mademoiselle
,” he purred, “ye’re a wee minx.”

“I told you, Niall MacGregor, ’tis not your swift sword that frightens me.
Au contraire.
It intrigues me.” She sealed his lips in a strong kiss. A moan escaped his throat as she unashamedly massaged him, bringing him to full fruition, until he thought his breath would leave him for good.

He took her down to the heather, on top of him. With both hands he slid her gown up her legs. She shoved his kilt up his thighs, bunching it to his waist, revealing him to the mist. Then she straddled him. He smiled in the knowing that he had played a part in embolding her, taught her what he knew in the ways of lovemaking. She was a very good student.

He reached up, cupped her breasts through the brocade. Sabine arched her back, sliding her body flawlessly over him. Niall grasped her rounded hips and pulled her harder against him. She wrapped her hands around the back of his neck and kissed him.

He closed his eyes. Bliss could exist inside him. There were more important things than his name. The first one was the completeness of his soul. Without that, how could he solve the problems that existed in the glen below them? He opened his eyes and wished he could draw, wished he could express in some material way the beauty of body and spirit before him.

He drew in the deepest of breaths and rode with Sabine through the mist.

“Ye make me complete,” he breathed. “Ye give me strength.”

“A gift that is mutual,
mon amour
,” she whispered.

They remained coupled for an eternity that lasted at least until their stomachs rumbled for the food Sabine had brought.

“Y
ou are wanted in the valley,” Sabine told Niall around a dry bite of Scottish cake. “By your subjects.”

“I’m not a king,” he said taking a large bite of meat. “I’ve told ye that many times. Is yer head full of
fromage?
”

She tilted her head, cocking one eyebrow at him. “Are you making fun of me, Highlander?”

“
Non.
” He grinned.

She would never slap such smugness from his face. It was too much of an endearing part of him that she had grown accustomed to. “We should not tarry.”

Niall gave her shoulder a squeeze. “I like the way ye tarry, my love.”

Sabine smiled. “Your mother told me to get you.”

“
My mother?
” he asked aiming a finger into the swag of plaid across his shoulder. “She told ye that?”

“’Tis not so crazy, Niall. I think she knows about us, has come to some agreement in her own mind. She helped me assemble this repast.”

“My mother comes to no agreement. She decides when things are the way she wants them to be and gives her consent.”

“She consents to me?”

“Ye impressed her by sitting at the
waulking
table, participating without pretense. If there’s one thing my mum hates, that’s pretense.”

“We often despise what we see in ourselves,” Sabine said. Where had that come from?

Niall had the very same question, just different words. “Did ye just pull that one out of the mist? Or d’ye really believe it?”

Sabine shook her head. “We should go.”

“The gathering is not until sunset. We have time.”

A breeze blew a thick pall of mist between them. Something landed on Sabine’s lap. She looked down. It was her drawing of Niall.

“Tell me, Sabine, why d’ye look so darkly when ye gaze upon this picture?”

“’Tis not the sketch, Niall.”

“’Tis a bonny drawing. Looks just like me, too much like me. I pray Her Majesty willnae get a muckle eyeful when I show her the other side of this paper.”

A bell as loud as the one in the belfry of Chamoinix cathedral, tolled in Sabine’s head.

“
Non!
” she cried. “You cannot show it to my queen!”

She reached for the paper but, Niall grabbed it and held it beyond her reach.

“Please,” she said, “give it to me,” refusing to plead for what was hers.

Niall lowered the paper. She took it from him, folded it several times and tucked it into her bag. She did not raise her eyes to meet his.

“Why did ye act so?” he asked.

“No one can see this sketch,” she said, the memory of long ago, of a woman-child who had witnessed the most grotesque of horrors rose in her mind. “Because you will die…Agnes was right—I have brought your death.”

Niall took her in his arms and held her tight. She could feel his heart pounding against her own.

“Tell me why.” He did not demand, he did not order her. His words and the way he said them were from his heart. She could not help but want to tell him everything, allowing the pain of memory out into the misty Highland air.

Sabine took a deep breath, and soon the words rolled icily over her lips. She had been on the cusp of telling him early this morning, but had joyfully been interrupted by their lovemaking. Would she be so fortunate a second time? Not likely after their most recent bout of bliss.

“Five years ago, I returned to my father’s
château
from an outing near Mont Blanc. I had been sketching, had waited in vain for
mon maître
to join me afield, but he did not arrive to teach me more.”

She swallowed down the lump forming in her throat.

“Inside the
château’s grand foyer
hung a massive iron chandelier. It was old and looked like a giant spider web that hung from the vaulted ceiling by four thick lengths of chain. Some of the candles were lit, some were guttered into nothing more than reedy drippings, frozen on the black iron and…stained with the blood. I looked up and droplets of blood fell like rain on my arms, the palms of my perfect hands, and my face.”

“Who was it, Sabine. Who’s blood fell on ye?” she heard Niall ask from so far away, from his place in another life that she wished could be hers forever.

“
Signore
Rinoletti,” she whispered. “
Mon maître.
His neck was severed, almost all the way through.”

“Oh, dear God,” Niall breathed into her neck, his forehead pressed to the side of her face.

Sabine continued, her words rolling from her mouth.

“My father’s servants must have put him there. He could not have lifted
Signore
Rinoletti or raised the chandelier…”

Niall held her closer.

“…But ’twas my father who murdered
mon maître
. His hand could wield the knife, that I know. He left the body for me to find.
Signore
Rinoletti was a respected guest in our house, until Father found my portfolio. I killed—”

“No, Sabine,” Niall said. “Ye dinnae kill anyone.”

The truth attacked her with the ferocity of a mid-winter blizzard.

“Everyone I have ever loved has died.
Ma mere
, she died when I was eleven, of the consumption. My brother, Yves, died in the war with the English a year later. Father became so protective of me. He suffocated me. Kept me prisoner. ’Twas no wonder that he thought
Signore
Rinoletti a threat when he found those sketches.”