The MacKinnon’s Bride(93)

She shrieked in startle when he jerked her after him, dragging her out of the room.

“Wait!” she protested. “I’m not yet done!”

“Aye ye are!” Iain asserted.

“But I have to give Broc a bath!” she announced, though she didn’t struggle.

“Oh, no ye don’,” he argued.

“The fleas!” Page protested, stumbling after him.

“What about them?” Iain answered, no hesitation in his stride. “Och, but the lad has been bathin’ himself for four and twenty years—I think he’ll do well enough withoot ye!”

He led her out of the kitchen, leaving those within to stare, grinning, after them.

Lagan’s smile faded the instant they walked out from the door. “Besotted fools!” he whispered to Glenna.

Glenna’s smile faded, as well, as she turned to contemplate the boy she’d raised from birth. “Lagan,” she reasoned, her voice aggrieved. “Can ye no’ be happy for him just once? Can ye no’ see that he’s suffered enough?”

Lagan’s eyes glittered with resentment. “And what of me?” he asked. “Have I no’ suffered enough, as well?”

“Lagan,” she objected. “He is your—”

“We both know what he is to me, Mother,” he scoffed.

“Och, Lagan, but have I not loved ye well?” He stared, unmoved by her question, and she lowered her eyes. “Then at least remember that he is your laird, and do not speak of him so.”

“My brother, my laird,” he whispered into her ear, mocking her. “Damn but it galls. What have I ever had of him?” he asked her, his lips curling into a snarl.

“Everythign that he could give,” she answered him.

“The only thing I have ever wanted was the right to grieve for my own mother.”

“Ye canna, Lagan! He does not know.”

“And, o’ course, as ever, ‘tis him we should be concerned o’er, right?”

“It was the old laird’s wish,” Glenna reminded him.

“And what o’ my da’s wishes? What o’ them? The bastard killed him because my mother dared to love him.”

“It was an accident, Lagan.”

“How can you defend him?” Lagan returned angrily.

Glenna shook her head. “He was as much aggrieved by Dougal MacLean’s death as any. The old laird’s anger drove him to it. How can you not forgive?”

“Och, but ‘tis your own sister’s bairn, your flesh and blood, he denied. Me.”

Glenna hung her head. “I gave you everything, Lagan. You wanted for naught.”

“I wanted for plenty. You were just too blind to see.”

She shook her head, lamenting. “I should ne’er have told ye, Lagan.”

“Aye, but you did,” he returned acidly, his eyes narrowing wrathfully. “And as God is my witness, it shall be made right.”

Her gaze flew to his, searching. “What will you do, Lagan? Dinna do anythin’ foolish,” she admonished, worry etched in her eyes.

“I intend to see that justice is done,” he hissed at her, and walked away, grumbling after.





chapter 29





It seemed no matter where she went, trouble pursued her.

Vowing to keep herself free from provocation, Page decided to remain within Iain’s chamber the next day.

The notion came to her in the middle of the night to refurbish his tower room, and she awoke the next morn with a mission, hoping to complete the task before his return. She waited until he left her, and then enlisted Glenna’s help once more—Broc’s, as well. She began by hauling up buckets with which to clean. That done, she scoured the floors with a vengeance, scrubbing until there was nary a speck of dust or dirt to be found. And when she finished the floors, she moved to the walls, scrubbing until the stone was free of soot and grime.

Glenna set herself to laundering the bedding.

There was little enough Page could do to add cheer to the bedchamber, for Iain seemed to have few indulgences. Search though she did, there was nothing she could find to place upon the floors or walls; no tapestries to add color, no rugs to ward away the chill that seemed to permeate the room and remain forever present—despite that the sun shone brightly outside.

There was, however, one thing she determined would aid immensely, and she started at once for the boarded window, resolving to let in the sunlight. The sun, she was certain, would do wonders to transform the room’s gaol-like quality into something somewhat more gay.

The wooden slats barring the window were heavy and crude, clearly not meant to be ornate. Placed at odd angles to each other, they gave the impression they were hurriedly placed, and perhaps not meant to be permanent. Well, it was long past time they should come down, she resolved, as she wrestled with the bottommost slat. She struggled with the board only an instant before determining she would need help.