Celia looked up at him, smiling, remembering the scornful way she'd appraised him while all along thinking that he was like a huge, raven-haired Adonis sent down to her.
“And I thought you were ready to put me out that first night,” she said, her voice brimming with laughter. “Admit it. You were.”
“Would I put out an angel?”
“You didn't look at me as if I were an angel, Colin Campbell.”
“I was surprised to see you without your wings and your halo.”
“If you're going to speak flippantly about heavenly beings, then you'd better watch out for bolts of lightning.”
“The sky is a beautiful shade of blue, Celia,” Colin said, looking up at the azure color marked only by the few white patches that were scudding by. “But if you're concerned about the weather, we can go up to my room and finish this discussion.”
Celia inwardly thrilled at the thought, but shook her head with a smile.
“I thought you were having a busy day.”
“As a matter of fact, my day came to a complete halt the moment I stepped into this garden.”
“I'm distracting you from what you should be doing,” she said, trying to edge off his lap.
“Would you come down to the village with me?” Colin asked, restraining her for a moment.
“Wouldn't I be in the way?”
“Probably,” he said with a smile. “Just where I want you. And speaking of wanting you...”
“Aye?” she responded primly, coyly pretending not to understand.
“Tonight,” Colin continued suggestively.
“Tonight?” Celia blushed.
“Tonight we'll announce our intentions to the clan at dinner.”
“Colin, not at dinner. First, I...need to...” Celia stumbled over the words she could not say. There was still Kit. Dunbar's words echoed in her head. And suddenly, thoughts of all the things she lacked came rushing in on her. She couldn't help but wonder if Colin was proposing to her now because of what he had heard. To protect her from the butcher Danvers. Aye, she knew that he loved her...but marriage? Was he just trying to do what he thought best for her?
“Celia, I've waited a long time for you,” Colin said softly. “I can wait another day.”
She reached up to him and kissed his mouth with a fiery passion. Colin answered with his own burning desire. Their passions rekindled in the heat of their embrace, and their feelings for each other poured out in the mingling communion of the kiss.
Colin abruptly pulled away, his eyes riveted on hers.
“Do you want to wait until our wedding night?” Colin whispered in a hoarse growl. He had to ask, while he still had the discipline to honor her wishes. And he didn't know how much more of this pleasurable torture he could take. The wedding would be today, if he had his way.
Celia looked up at him. Every part of her body ached with the need for his touch. She forced herself to try to think this through, to be sensible. But her mind and her body told her only one thing. Celia shook her head slowly.
“When?”
“Very soon,” she whispered.
Colin closed his eyes at her words and opened them again immediately.
“It's going to be very difficult to let you out of my sight, you know.”
Colin wasn't going to let Celia out of his sight, but neither was Dunbar. Father William had been a bit concerned when Celia, Ellen, and Kit had disappeared during the morning, and Edmund's apparent lack of concern made him even more nervous. When Celia had finally appeared in the South Hall beside the black haired giant, the priest's suspicions blossomed.
So when Celia said she was going down into the village with the young warrior, Father William had volunteered to chaperon.
“Chaperon!” Celia blurted out in disbelief. “Father, you aren't serious.”
“Aye,” the priest retorted. “I think—”
“It's a fine idea,” Colin interrupted, finishing the priest's sentence.
Celia and Father William both turned incredulous eyes on the figure looming above them.
“It'll give us a chance to get to know one another better.” Colin shrugged, continuing with a slight smile at Celia. “And we do not want anyone thinking there's anything improper going on up here, now, do we?”
Celia blushed in spite of herself, and quickly turned her face toward Agnes, who was hurrying toward them across the hall.
“Celia, my dear,” she began, coming directly to her and taking hold of Celia's two hands. She looked up at the area where Celia's wounds were. “Has your head started throbbing at all?”
“No, Agnes,” the young woman answered. “I'm fine today. Honestly.”
“Are you sure you're not a little light-headed?” Colin added in a serious tone.
“She's never been light-headed in her entire life,” the little priest snapped pugnaciously.
“Now, you two!” Agnes scolded dismissively. “You really shouldn't overdo it today, child. You need to rest a bit. You do not want to miss any of the excitement later.”
“That's true,” Colin said, taking hold of Celia's elbow.
Celia turned away, trying to ignore his remark, trying to hide the color in her face. She already felt light-headed, as Colin put it, about all that had just occurred and about all that was to come. And his remarks had succeeded in making her inner feelings rush with full color into her face, a face that she tried so desperately to keep calm and reserved. “What excitement, Agnes?”
“Why, Colin didn't tell you?” Agnes responded. “The men are working right now down at the harbor fitting the new cannons into our ships. Hugh says they'll be trying them out before sunset.”
“I'd like to see that,” Celia said. “And I promise, Agnes. If I begin to tire, I'll come back and rest.”
“All right, dear,” she acquiesced with a smile of motherly concern before turning sternly to Colin. “But you watch out for her, and do a better job of it than you did at that disgusting...place...of Argyll's.”
Colin’s raised eyebrows at Agnes’s admonition was all he had time to muster.
“I’m glad someone around here shows good sense,” Father William grumbled.
“Then I simply will not let her out of my sight,” asserted Colin happily.
With a last half smile at Celia, Agnes turned to the small crowd of servants who were awaiting her directions by the door of the hall.
“It's a mistake teaching girls anything beyond what they need to know to be good wives and mothers,” Dunbar pontificated in response to Colin's description of his plans for the village school.
Taken aback, Celia looked at the priest wide-eyed, having heard on a number of occasions Father William argue the exact opposite of what he was now saying. Smiling inwardly, she guessed what he was doing and what his motives were. He was testing Colin, and she was the reason.
Together, the three were nearing the village, and Bear was weaving a path before them. Colin had been walking at a considerable pace, until he began to talk about the changes in the village and about the school. Then his pace slowed as he spoke, and Celia and Father William were able to walk comfortably beside him in the afternoon sun.
“A mistake educating girls?” Colin repeated, puzzled at first by the priest's words. “Father, you are an educated man. I assume that you did a bit of tutoring at court.”
“Aye, lad,” Dunbar replied. “I even tutored the Alexander, the king's son, before he went off to Rotterdam to study under Erasmus.”
“Did you ever tutor any girls at the court?” Colin continued, giving Celia's arm a light squeeze. He knew full well that the priest had taught Celia.
“Aye, a few girls,” Dunbar answered warily.
“Then what did you teach these girls?” Colin persisted. “What makes up a good education for those future `wives and mothers'?”
“This is a foolish discussion,” Dunbar said pompously—and vaguely. “Traditional things.”
Celia turned directly toward the priest, her face showing her amusement at his outrageous comments.
“Oh, I see,” Colin said. “These girls came to you to learn how to run a household.”
“Certainly not,” Dunbar retorted. “These were children of quality. I taught them to read—in English and in French. And I taught them religion.”
“Nothing else, Father?”
Celia thought about all the things she had learned from Father William: how to be pigheaded to the extreme, how to curse more creatively than any of her father's sailors could, and how to be supremely aloof when it came to the shallow, young men at court.
“A few other things, I suppose,” the priest answered. “Why, what else should they be taught?”
“No Latin or Greek?” Colin asked.
Aye, Celia reminisced. Father William had drilled her in Latin, Greek, and Gaelic, as well as French, until she could speak, read, and write fluently in any of them.
“What do girls need Latin or Greek for?” Dunbar asked uneasily. “The romances that girls can read...and they should be carefully controlled...are in French. But too much reading can lead a young woman into dangerous yearnings.”
“Yearnings? Come, Father, no mathematics? Nor logic?” Colin continued, not letting the priest off the hook. “No philosophy of the ancients? No history?”
Aye, all those, too. Reading Boethius had taught Celia to accept that even the most boring of lessons must have a purpose.