On a Highland Shore (8 page)

Which brought Margaret to another matter: that of her own faith. Had she been looking at her life and fate incorrectly all these years? Her dreams had been haunted by the old woman’s words about the golden man: “He will be unlike any man you’ve known. He will bring life after death.” Had she misunderstood the prophecy by assuming the golden man was flesh and blood? Had she been brought to where she was now because she was meant to choose a life of contemplation away from the world? Was being a bride of Christ her true destiny, her golden man a molten image of a dying Jesus? Had Lachlan betrayed her because she was not meant to marry any man, but to join Judith at Brenmargon Abbey and, using the power of prayer, slay the dragons of sin in the world?

She could not be more confused.

I
t was Rory O’Neill himself who came to get Gannon and Tiernan. It was a bright summer day when the chieftain of all Ulster, Ireland’s northernmost province, arrived at their stepfather’s fortress with a large retinue. And dressed for war. Rory O’Neill was a large man, broad-shouldered and barrel-chested. He looked the same as Gannon had remembered him, though it had been years since he’d seen his mother’s cousin. His chestnut hair was streaked with gray, but his dark eyes were as bright and clever as ever. He burst into Patrick’s courtyard with his men and greeted Patrick, then, pulling off his helmet and running a hand through his hair, turned to Gannon, wasting no time with niceties.

“God above, Gannon, I would ha’ kent ye anywhere as yer father’s son! Ye look enough like Magnus to make one think of spirits rising from the grave.”

Gannon nodded. He’d heard it all of his life.

Rory continued with hardly time for a breath. “I’ve come to take ye and Tiernan back to Haraldsholm. Yer uncle Erik has asked for my help. If he needs me, he needs the two of ye. And it’s time anyway, lads. Yer mother’s been gone the year.”

Gannon saw Tiernan’s surprise, but felt none, only an acknowledgment of what he’d know was coming. Change. “What has happened?”

Rory shook his head. “Dinna ken all of it. That’s what we’re going there to discover. There’s trouble is all I ken for sure. Pack yer things, lads. We’ll eat some of Patrick’s fine food and get back on the road. And ye’ll no’ be comin’ back here, the two of ye. Ye need to be with yer own people. From here on ye’ll either be with Erik, or ye’ll be with me.” He laughed at their expressions. “Ah, family ties. Are they not marvelous?”

Gannon took a deep breath as they left the forest. The perfume of the pines was fading and he could smell the sea, could hear their horses’ footfalls on the rocky road, now clear of the carpet of needles that had covered it under the trees. Ahead, Rory O’Neill rode with several of his men; more rode behind Gannon and Tiernan. The terrain was changing as the land leaned toward the sea. The wind lifted the edges of his clothing, heavy with the promise of rain later, but for now the sun shone, and he lifted his face to meet the light. He was pleased to be returning to the coast, whatever the real reason was for their travel. The sea called to him in a way that no inland water could. It was in his blood, he thought, this love of the shore.

His blood.

He was the son of Magnus Haraldsson, who had been born and raised on the northeast coast of Ireland, but who could trace his line back two hundred years to King Harald Hardrada of Norway. Magnus had been proud of his blood, explaining to his sons that they were descendants of the Vikings who had first come to Ireland to pillage and steal, but who stayed to marry and farm and raise families.

It was a familiar story. For hundreds of years, first the Danes, then the Norse, had attacked, claiming a great deal of land in Ireland, England, Wales, and Scotland, settling what they’d captured by force, mixing their blood with the people who lived there until those who called themselves the descendants of Norsemen lived with those they’d once fought, accepting Christianity and much of the local cultures. They became powerful political figures in the lands they’d settled. In Antrim, in the northeast of Ulster, at the edge of the sea, as in so many other places, the Norse allied with the Celts to form a strong union against all outsiders. It was only in Orkney—and on the western islands that lay between Scotland and Ireland—that the Norse had stayed Norse, were still under the control of King Haakon of Norway.

Magnus had taught his sons that their heritage was one of courage and valor, and Gannon, the oldest, had loved to hear his father’s stories, reveling in the blood-lines that had come to him. Until the day his father died. From that day on, Gannon had turned his back on his Norse blood, had no longer called himself Gannon Magnusson, but instead the Irish form of the name, Gannon MacMagnus. He’d tried to forget why they’d left Haraldsholm, of his life before coming to Maguire’s Bridge, but now he was about to face it again.

Tiernan came alongside him, throwing Gannon a sharp glance. “Are ye going to be silent the entire journey?”

Gannon smiled. Tiernan was ever one to wear his heart on his sleeve. If he was worried, all knew it. If angry, there was no mistaking it.

“Not the entire journey,” Gannon said. “Perhaps just the most of it.”

Tiernan laughed, then gestured at the road ahead. “What d’ye think happened that’s got Rory O’Neill himself going to Haraldsholm?”

“Something important.” Gannon suspected it was something very important indeed, that death was once again roaming the northern shore. And that this time it would not go unavenged. Rory O’Neill was not a man to arm himself without reason, and the chieftain and his men were both well armed and wary. “I keep asking, but he keeps saying nothing more than before.”

“How long has it been since we were at Haraldsholm?”

Gannon gave his brother a glance. “Fourteen years.” A lifetime when one was Tiernan’s age. A lifetime for him as well, for so much had changed.

“Wonder what we’ll find,” Tiernan said.

Gannon shrugged. That was but one difference between them. Tiernan couldn’t wait to discover the future. Gannon was mistrustful enough of it to let it unfold as it would.

“If we dinna like what we find,” he said, “we leave. If we do, we stay. We’ve nothing to hold us anywhere. We’ll make our own future, Tiernan.”

Margaret felt her mood sink as the ponies descended down to Brenmargon Pass. They’d left the crofthouse where they’d slept shortly after dawn, the world still damp from the dew and the ponies not thoroughly rested because the darkness was so short. Their journey was made more difficult by the lowering clouds that opened at midday and drenched them. She covered her yawn. She’d been awake for much of the night, lying in the dark, thinking of the decision she would soon have to make. Nell no more wanted to marry Lachlan than Margaret did. What a horrible choice Father had given her. How foolish she’d been to think that he might love her as more than simply one of two marriageable daughters. She was nothing more to him than a cow, one as like another to the farmer who killed it. And yet…she remembered the tears in her father’s eyes when they parted, his warm embrace and kiss.

None of which helped her to sort out her emotions.

They arrived at the abbey in pouring rain, shivering and soaked to the skin. They climbed from their ponies in the walled courtyard, handing the reins to the two young lads who waited for them. Judith, standing in the doorway of the long wooden structure with a wide smile, hurried them inside, helping to remove their dripping cloaks, which were handed to waiting nuns. Margaret shook out her skirts, brushed her wet hair back from her face, and gave Judith what she hoped was a bright smile. Behind Judith lay the main hall of the abbey, with its spartan tables and benches, a large crucifix on the wall the only decoration. Several nuns clustered there, waiting for Mother Judith to introduce them.

“I wondered if you would find us in the storm,” Judith said, leaning to kiss Nell, then moving to Margaret, her lips papery on Margaret’s cheek.

“Another hour and we might not have,” Rignor said sourly. “We’d have spent a night on the wet ground.”

“I’m glad ye won’t have to,” Judith said serenely. “We have food and beds ready. Yer men may sleep in the stable. Rignor, ye’ll be in the apartment over it. I trust ye will find it comfortable.”

Rignor nodded with a frown, and Margaret knew he’d forgotten that men were always housed in the apartment; the handful of lads who worked at the abbey lived there as well. The women lived in the main structure, a few with a genuine calling for the Church, the rest widows or unwed daughters with nowhere else to go. It was their money that kept the remote abbey, home to forty women, solvent. The Church paid it little attention except for the bishop, who was a frequent visitor and did not hide his enjoyment in the food the abbey supplied. And Judith’s company, some said, but that was hardly surprising; he was her brother-in-law. Judith, a widow herself for years, had married his brother shortly after the bishop had been ordained. It was his influence that had made Judith a candidate for abbess when her husband had died.

It had been years since Margaret had seen her. Judith had aged. Her cheeks were more sunken, her skin a finer texture than in years past, her bones more prominent. But she was still tall and regal, capable of a sudden smile that lit her face and made her seem almost girlish. That smile was hidden now, as Judith embraced Margaret and, placing a hand on each of her shoulders, turned Margaret so her face was lit by the wall torches.

“I was surprised when I received yer father’s message, that ye were on yer way. And why. How are ye, child?”

Margaret felt dangerously close to tears. How was she? How could she tell Judith that she was heartsick, that she’d cried endlessly over Lachlan and Fiona’s betrayal? That it had taken these two days of being away from Somerstrath for her to begin to get a sense of what had happened. And as for her mother—what had she done to deserve that? She looked over Judith’s shoulder, to the crucifix on the wall, the golden carving of Christ gleaming.

“I am well,” she said.

“Are ye, lass?” Judith said softly, her eyes seeing far too much. “We’ll talk.” She turned to clasp Nell’s hand in hers. “And Nell, such a lovely child, now a lovely young woman. Are ye excited to go to court?”

Nell nodded, her eyes sparkling. “Oh, aye, madam. I’ve heard ever so much about it. I canna wait to see it for myself.”

Judith smiled. “I hope it lives up to yer expectations. Now, come, all of ye, I’ve warm food and ale and wine for ye, and the sisters are anxious for news. Tell me all that is happening at Somerstrath.”

It was long after Rignor had braved the rain to go to his bed, longer still since Nell had let herself be led off to the room she would share with Margaret, and after the rest of the nuns had retired, that Judith led Margaret into her own room. The abbess’s chamber was larger than the usual cells the nuns occupied and full of furniture from her past life as the wife of a wealthy landowner. At one end was a box bed made of sturdy oak, carved with vines and flowers, its bedcoverings brocaded and hangings silk. In front of the warm fire, another luxury rare in an abbey, stood the two wooden chairs, their legs curved and crossed over each other, that Margaret had been told had been brought back from the Holy Land. Judith led her to the chairs, settling into one and folding her hands on her lap.

“Talk to me, Margaret,” she said.

Margaret did, telling her all that had happened, about the head on the beach and Lachlan’s betrayal, about Fiona’s defiance and the old woman’s forecast of a golden man, about dragons and marriage. Judith listened silently, her lips pressed together tightly, her derision obvious.

“A seer, Margaret? A woman, not of God, who roams from town to town telling people what they want to hear, that their lives will be dramatic and meaningful, that everything she tells them has significance? That she can see the future? Ye listened to such a woman? Ye’d have been wiser to pray.”

“But she…” Margaret began.

“Was hired,” Judith said. “But she doesna matter. It was a long time ago. Do ye have a calling to be in God’s service?”

“I…I’m not sure,” Margaret answered.

“I wasna either. At first I came here to retreat from the world, but soon I realized that this was my correct path. Tell me what yer parents have said about all this.”

Margaret talked then about her mother’s anger, about the choice Father had given her. Judith’s expression was thoughtful, then she gave Margaret a half smile.

“A lot has happened since I saw ye last. Now talk to me of yer faith, lass, and tell me why ye’re even considering a life here.”

“The old woman…” Margaret began, but Judith shook her head.

“Not the old woman’s beliefs, child. Yers. Has there ever been a moment before all this happened when ye thought of being a nun?”

Margaret thought of the peace she felt in the abbey, of the songs the nuns sang as they worked, of the calm manner in which they went about their tasks. “It might be wonderful,” she said.

“And it might be all wrong for ye,” Judith said, her tone more astringent than Margaret had ever heard. “I was a woman of the world for many years, lass. I’ve seen much and suffered much, and this abbey affords me the peace I seek. But ye—no. I see some of Nell’s excitement in yer eyes when ye talk of going to court. I see the lads, few as they are here, looking at ye, and ye looking back, as lasses will, nothing wrong with that.”

Judith fingered the cross around her neck, then looked to the crucifix on the wall. “Ye no more belong at Brenmargon than Rignor does. Ye must seek yer golden man and dragons elsewhere, child, or, better still, forget the words of an old woman who received gold for her fortune-telling. Life has mystical moments, aye, but dinna change yer life to suit a handful of words that like as not were thrown out without thought. Dinna confuse her words with prophecy, which only belongs to God.” She held up her hands to still Margaret’s protests.

“Dinna mistake me. I would welcome yer company were ye to join us. We’re an aging group now. Ye’d liven up this quiet place and bring youth back. But I’d be wrong to encourage ye to do so. Ye might find it a refuge at first, but soon I think ye’d regret it, and not thank me for taking ye from the world. There are worse things than discovering that yer husband is unfaithful.”

Margaret gasped, and Judith smiled wryly, holding up her hand to still Margaret’s protests.

“I’m not belittling what ye’ve experienced,” she said. “I’m merely telling ye that it would be wrong for ye to come here; ye’re a lovely lass, and a spirited one, and ye shouldna be living the rest of yer life behind these wooden walls.” She paused, threading her fingers and straightening her back. “And then there’s yer duty to yer family. I’m sure ye’ve heard of all the tensions of the last ten years or so, between the Comyns and the Durwards. Yer Aunt Jean’s family is presently verra powerful, but they need every weapon in their arsenal to stay that way. Ye, with yer beauty and yer liveliness, would be a welcome addition to their side. They’re no doubt counting on ye to charm the king and queen and bring more favor to the Comyns. And there’s yer mother.” Judith sighed heavily. “I dinna need to tell ye that she’s counting on ye to pave her way back to court.”