An hour later, Dougall was seated in the Thistle and Thorn, with Davey to the left of him. Across the table was one of the Glen Craggan Douglases, a young man named Thomas.
In one hand, Dougall clutched a cup of ale. It had already been refilled twice. His other hand held a cold, wet rag, which he pressed to his throbbing nose. The bleeding had stopped, but the swelling had not even begun to subside. The cold was soothing, both to his face and to his soul. He would never admit it to the others, but it felt as though by holding the cloth to his face, he were holding himself together. Were he to remove it, Dougall was not certain he could maintain his composure.
He regarded this last day as the biggest failure of his adult life. He was horrified by the evidence of his complete incompetence, and would make no excuses for it.
They’d had it out—all of them—right there in the inn chamber after Will had attacked him. Blood poured down Dougall’s face and into his mouth as he’d argued with the men and with Lady Eleanor. Sitting in the Thistle and Thorn now, drinking his ale and holding his wet cloth to his face, he recalled the scene with self-loathing.
“I ken why ye’re here,” he’d accused, calling on what little ferocity he could muster, despite the pinpricks of light that danced in front of his eyes. “There can only be one reason Douglases would come to Stirling now. Dinna think me so daft as to assume ye’ve all come to be of comfort to the Arkinholm prisoners while they’re hanged.”
One of the men behind Gregor, a heavyset man whom Dougall recognized only vaguely, stepped forward. “Ye’ll be keeping yer voice down,” he threatened. “I’ll slit yer throat before I let ye run yer mouth where half the city can hear. Ye’ll have the king’s men coming down upon us, ye will.”
“Perhaps that’s what needs to happen,” Dougall challenged.
“Oh, aye. Bright idea,” barked Will. “They’ll take the Lady Eleanor away and all. Brilliant, sir.” He clapped his hands mockingly.
“Then we’re all in agreement,” he’d said, with similar mocking. “The Lady Eleanor isna safe here, so ’tis best she come back to Kildrummond wi’ me. Lady Albermarle awaits her in England.”
“I’ll be doing no such thing.”
Dougall’s head snapped to her. The dancing lights flared painfully.
“My Lady, there is no reason for ye to stay,” he argued, fighting a wave of headache. “Yer clansmen here can only bring ye trouble. Have ye no’ stopped to think why so many of them have come? ’Tis to free His Lordship. They plan to commit treason and orchestrate an escape. I ken it in my gut, that’s what they’re planning.”
He’d expected her to be shocked. To gasp. To look to her companions with horror. Just why he expected such a reaction, he could not say in hindsight. She had shown herself to be nothing but a hellion since he first encountered her. He hadn’t, however, expected the thoroughly disgusted look she threw him in response.
“They?” she laughed derisively. “Nay, sir. ’Tis we. ’Tis what we are planning.”
Dougall sputtered. Gregor, too.
“Ye canna mean to say ye’re planning on taking part in this…this…whatever it is,” the old man balked.
“For God’s sake, Gregor,” the heavyset man snapped. “Nay so loud. I like ye, but I’ll slit yer goddam throat, too, if ye give us away.”
“My Lady,” Dougall insisted in disbelief. “D’ye ken what this means for ye? What danger ye’ll be putting yerself in?”
Lady Eleanor had stared up at him from that bed, with her wrists tied over her shoulder. In a cold, calculating voice she’d answered, “I dinna ken what image of me ye have in yer head, Sir Dougall. But ye’d best be forgetting it. I’ve lived wi’ this danger for nigh on a month now, and that is how long I’ve been prepared to die to help my father escape. I’m staying put.”
He’d lost his composure then. “Over my dead body,” he shouted.
A second man who was vaguely familiar to Dougall also, tall and stoic, withdrew his sword and aimed it at him.
“That can be arranged,” he promised.
“Now, Gabhan, there’s no reason to shed blood,” the lady intervened. “No’ yet, anyway.” Turning her gaze to Dougall, she said with exaggerated politeness, “I’m late for work. If ye’ll kindly untie me, I’d be in yer debt.”
“Eh—ye’re no’ going anywhere,” Gregor demanded. “Dougall, tell her. She’s no’ going anywhere.”
“Ye have no choice,” Eleanor argued, a pleased smile drawing across her face. “If ye dinna untie me now, my clansmen will kill ye. But if ye do, and ye let me go to work, I give my word that I’ll offer ye an explanation once my shift is over.”
She was right. Dougall hated to admit it, but he had no choice. Not one that would allow him to convince her to come back with him immediately. He’d agreed to untie her—with her express promise that an account of what she meant to do was forthcoming.
Eleanor—or Nolie, as she was called now—flitted about the half-full tavern, performing her duties as naturally as one who had been doing them for years. Halfway into her shift, she had assured him that serving was all she did. She had not fallen into the other line of work that tavern wenches were infamous for.
God above, Dougall needed her to be telling the truth on that score.
His third goblet of ale drained, he was in the process of waving Lady Eleanor over for another when the door to the tavern blew open, letting in a gust of wind and the cheerful, boisterous voice of a woman. Dougall craned his neck to see what was going on—too quickly. His face throbbed at the sudden jolt.
“Roisin, ye’re late,” barked the tavern keep. His name, Dougall learned, was Angus Beag. Up close, he was even uglier than he’d been from across the room when Dougall saw him the night before. He was hulking and unwashed, with one clouded, jelly-like eye that looked to the left no matter where the other one looked.
“Aye, aye,” the wench called Roisin acknowledged theatrically. A customer near the door reached for her behind as she passed. Roisin giggled and bumped his hand away with a playful swing of her hips.
“Ye’d forgive me if ye kent why, Angus,” she exclaimed. “Me dear old mam were poorly. She insisted I leave her be, for I had work to do. But I couldna leave her, no’ in the state she were in. She sends her fondest regards, by the bye.”
“Ballocks! Yer mam’s dead.”
Roisin grinned devilishly. “Well she would have sent her regards if she were alive, so take pity on a lass, will ye?”
With nothing else to do until the end of Lady Eleanor’s shift but observe the tavern’s activity, Dougall watched the wench Roisin sweep to the back of the tavern, a grand figure despite her small stature. In the opposite corner where Will Douglas had taken a seat, and where he had, until now, been glaring at him from beneath his shaggy hair, Dougall noticed the man follow Roisin with a veiled gaze of longing. It was a brief gaze, and when he caught Dougall watching him, Will’s sullen glare turned murderous. His long, narrow fingers clutched his own goblet fiercely. But the fire in his eyes could not hide the distinct pink stain that spread across his whiskered cheeks.
Well, this was an interesting wee morsel. Dougall assumed that Will’s protective manner toward Lady Eleanor was because he fancied her. Apparently he was wrong. He knew the look of love for a woman in another man’s eyes. He’d seen it from Lachlan Ramsay for Moira, from Alex MacByrne for Glinis. Even from Old Lord John for Mistress Lillian MacInnes, Moira’s mother. Dougall saw it now in Will when he looked at that Roisin wench.
Interesting indeed! He tucked that piece of information away for later use, should the need arise.
Will’s attraction to this particular wench was confusing, however. She wasn’t much to look at. A thin, unruly mop of dark curls framed a plain, uninspiring face and a mouth that was missing a number of prominent teeth. And she was painfully thin, not a curve or pillow to be had.
Although, the more Dougall watched the lass—and the more he watched Will watching the lass—he thought that perhaps he saw some of the appeal after all. This Roisin, this boisterous tavern wench, had a radiance to her that transformed an unremarkable face into a uniquely alluring one. From the moment she picked up her tray she was the life of the tavern. Every drunken, rough, haggard man’s darling…in a strange, depraved sort of way that could only make sense in an establishment like this.
She couldn’t hold a candle to Lady Eleanor, of course. But she certainly was appealing in her own right.
Lady Eleanor, on the other hand, now she was majestic. Even clad in a plain, threadbare, nearly sacklike gown as she was, she looked every bit as noble as was decreed by her birthright. Not even that brown hair (which bordered on unsightly) could diminish the effect. She, too, was lively and appeared to be well-liked by the patrons, but Dougall suspected that some of this vivacity had been learned, adopted for her role as tavern wench. Like a hired player.
He felt a strange clutch in his chest watching her at work, one that almost made him forget he was angry with her. No noble lady should be made to do such base labor. Eleanor Douglas did not belong here. She needed protecting, guarding, stewardship. It fell to him to fill that role.
He caught Will glaring at him once more. Now it was Dougall’s turn to avert his eyes and flush pink.
“Fill yer cup?”
He looked up to find Eleanor standing over him. A tray was balanced expertly on her upturned palm.
“If ye’re fixing to get me drunk so ye willna have to talk later wi’ me, think again, lass.”
“I’m fixing to get ye drunk, Dougall MacFadyen, because that’s what men do in a tavern.”
“Among other things.” Dougall’s eyes slid to Muirne, who was leading her fourth patron this evening up the stairs.
“Ye want a turn? Muirne never lowers her rates, no’ even for friends, but I’m sure I could convince her to throw in a brew for afterward.”
Dougall pinched the flesh between his brows. “My Lady, it pains me greatly that ye’ve had to live here like this all this time. D’ye have to make it worse by being so vulgar? Ye’re a lady. And a lady must no’ speak so commonly.”
“I am no’ a lady,” she hissed, bending close to his ear. “And if ye say it again, I’ll slice off yer left ballock and send it back to Kildrummond to His Lordship.” She marched away, back to Angus Beag to refill her tray.
The image she’d conjured with her parting shot was so vivid, so unexpected, that Dougall began to chuckle. Then to laugh. Davey and Thomas, too, laughed incredulously, affected by Dougall’s mirth.
“What on earth do ye find so funny about that?” Thomas questioned as Dougall wiped tears from his eyes.
“Can ye imagine?” he answered. “His Lordship—Lachlan Ramsay, Earl of Kildrummond—receives a parcel, opens it up, and wonders what the bloody hell he’s got in his hand. And all the while ’tis my left ballock.”
This set them to laughing loud enough that the men at the next table gave them strange looks.
“Even better, can ye imagine his face when he figures out what it is he’s got in his hand?” Davey added.
They all howled, this time so loud that Eleanor heard them on the other side of the room.
“Cheers, love. I needed that,” Dougall teased, and raised his cup in salute. She scowled furiously.
A clatter from upstairs put an end to the merriment. It was followed by Muirne, who tore down the stairs. Angus Beag was quick to approach, and from there, a lively conversation ensued, though Dougall could not hear what was being said over the din with any clarity. Muirne gestured sharply toward the stairs then pushed her finger into Angus Beag’s chest twice, railing at him all the while. Whatever she’d said made Angus Beag respond with an angry gesture of his own, to which Muirne responded with a final gesture—one no lady should ever make.
Rubbing his unshaven face, Angus Beag scanned the tavern.
“Roisin,” he called, then nodded to the stairs.
Will had witnessed the transaction as well. When Angus Beag called upon his ladylove, the man’s jaw clenched so hard, Dougall thought his teeth might shatter.
“No’ today, Angus,” Roisin called back. “Ye ken I’m no in that line, no’ really.”
Her assertion was met with a good-natured groan from some of the patrons.
“Ah, Roisin, lass. Ye break my heart. I had high hopes for tonight that ye might be on the game,” said one man.
Angus Beag looked to his other ladies. “Beth?”
The wench named Beth, who had been sweeping the room for her next customer, shrugged.
“Why no’?” she sighed, and went to the stairs with about as much interest as if she were being told she must watch sheep eat grass.
At his table, Will was still clutching his ale cup sullenly, covertly watching the spritely Roisin as she went about her business serving ale and flirting with the customers. Fuming, Muirne had retreated to a room at the rear of the tavern.
“Nolie,” Davey called to Eleanor. “Nolie.”
Eleanor came reluctantly, a pitcher in her hand and an empty tray tucked into her hip. Automatically, she refilled their cups.
“Aye, Davey, what is it?”
“What were all that about?” Davey nodded in the direction Muirne had gone.
Eleanor glanced over her shoulder. “’Tis a long story. And one I’m no’ about to tell ye, if it’s all the same. I may no’ be a lady, but I still have some notion of propriety.”
Casting a pointed glance at Dougall, she left.
“There’s ye told,” Thomas chortled, nudging Dougall’s forearm.
Dougall took a sip of his ale, hiding a grin in his cup. Whatever he might say about her, the lady had the fighting spirit of her Douglas kinsmen.
***
The midnight hour had long come and gone. It was well on its way to dawn by the time Angus Beag finally relieved Eleanor and Roisin of their serving duties. All of the men who had been in Dougall’s chamber when Lady Eleanor was discovered were waiting in the tavern. When the women retreated to the rear to collect their earnings, they all stood from the table they’d shared in the corner. Will, who had been sulking by himself in the opposite corner, rose as well.
Poor Thomas, and the young Kildrummond man whose name Eleanor learned was Davey. They looked the worse for wear. The pair had been in that tavern since the morning with little sleep, even less to eat, and far too much to drink. Davey, at least, would have to learn to hold his liquor if he meant to go on as a guardsman under the great Dougall MacFadyen’s command.
“Why dinna ye take them out back to Cook,” Angus Beag suggested to Eleanor, plunking her earnings one after another into her upturned palm. “Roisin, ’tis best ye wait here, lass. This doesna concern ye.”
Roisin had been around these Douglases long enough to know what the matter was about. “Say no more, Angus. I’ll keep my nose out.” To Eleanor she added, “D’ye want me to wait for ye?”
“Nay, ye go. I have a feeling I’ll have an escort to see me home safely. What about ye? Can ye manage, or d’ye want a lad to walk wi’ ye?”
“Oh, I always want a lad to walk wi’ me. But seeing as how all the handsome and honorable lads seem to be tied up in this wee business of yers, I’ll take my chances on my own.”
“All right then. Ye’ve got yer blade?”
“Always.” Roisin lifted the hem of her tattered green tunic to reveal a rusted, jagged sgian dubh strapped to her calf.
Eleanor had asked once why she kept such a rusted blade. Could she not grind some of the rot off? Roisin’s answer had been, “Nolie, love. If I only manage to cut a man who means to do me harm instead of kill him outright, there’s a good chance the rust will poison his blood days later and finish him off. Such beasts deserve no less.”
Eleanor smiled at the memory. She gave Roisin a brief but tight hug before the dark-haired wench departed the tavern, flirting with her customers as she went.
“She’s a lively one, is she no’?” Dougall observed, coming up behind Eleanor.
“That she is, sir.”
“Will she be all right on her own? Should I send Davey wi’ her?”
“He’s yer man. Send him if ye will. But dinna underestimate our Roisin. She’s deadly wi’ that blade. Angus has been teaching her since she were a wee lass.”
“She’s still a wee lass.”
“In looks only. In years, in life, she’s older than ye could guess.”
“Oh, aye? How old is she then?”
“I couldna say for certain. She doesna ken her birthday, ye see, same as many ’round here. But she figures she’s closing in on thirty winters now; somewhere between twenty-five and thirty.”
Dougall raised a brow. “She doesna look it, ye’re right.”
“She’s a good friend,” Eleanor added wistfully. “Truer than any I’ve ever had in Kinross. The lads, too. Gabhan, Manus, Thomas, and dear Will. They’ve come to mean more to me than anyone ever has, save my father and my siblings.”
“And yer mother? Does she no’ mean as much to ye as these men who were near strangers less than a half year ago?”
Eleanor gazed thoughtfully at the handful of patrons who were still gorging themselves on Angus Beag’s ale, pottage, and bannock.
“I love my mother. I do. ’Tis just that, when she fled Glen Craggan, she were prepared to leave my father behind. She were prepared before that, even, for I kent she were planning on leaving for England in the event that Arkinholm went badly for us. She could have taken refuge with any number of kinsmen across the land. Instead, she chose to flee to England. To England! She’s given my father up for dead.”
“And for that ye can never forgive her,” Dougall concluded.
“Nay, ’tis no’ that. No’ exactly.”
“Then what is it?”
Her brows drew together as she considered how to say what she felt. “It isna a question of forgiveness. ’Tis more that. I canna look at her the same anymore. She were always the loyal, steadfast wife. I thought she would do anything for my father. Now I dinna ken what I think of her.”
She blinked, on the verge of tears. She did not want to cry, not in front of Dougall. She could not allow herself to look weak in front of him. It was for naught. The struggle to contain her tears was plain upon her face. And he saw it.
“Why dinna we go through to the kitchens and have a proper chat wi’ the rest of the lads, aye?” he suggested gently.
Eleanor nodded and turned away before the first fat tear slipped down her cheek. By the time they’d crossed the small enclosure and reached the rear kitchen building, she’d stuffed her grief back down where it belonged. Grief would not help free her father, and it would not help persuade Dougall MacFadyen that she’d not be returning with him to Kildrummond, much less join her family in England.
Will, Gabhan, Manus and Thomas were waiting inside the kitchen alongside Davey and Gregor. Eleanor was grateful for the presence of her friends, for their support. The men with whom she had come to Stirling, and who had shared her hardships over the past month, were fully aware that she had no intention of leaving, and unless she had it wrong, they wanted her with them. If anyone would convince Dougall MacFadyen she was staying, it would be them.
She took up a spot beside Gabhan, who was leaning against the stone wall, and crossed her arms over her chest.
Dougall stood across from Eleanor, on the other side of the cooking pot. His man, Davey, stood beside him. Gregor, who was a Glen Craggan Douglas like the others, put himself in the middle of the two sides, in a more neutral position. He looked from one side to the other, unsure of where his allegiance now lay.
“So then,” Dougall began, “getting back to the business of why ye’re all in Stirling. From the talk this morning, and from what Lady Eleanor suggested—”
“Nolie,” Eleanor corrected.
“Nolie,” Dougall allowed, slicing a glance in her direction. “Is what Nolie suggested true? Ye’re in Stirling to free His Lordship?”
No one spoke. The silence confirmed Dougall’s question.
“I see.” He nodded. “Do any of ye think it a wise thing to have Lord Albermarle’s own daughter, a lady of noble birth, here wi’ ye? D’ye really want her to hang for a traitor should she be caught? Stirling is a dangerous place to be—for any Douglas—right now.”
It was Will who spoke. “No one here disputes this. And to speak plainly, I dinna think anyone’s going to stop ye from taking her. We dinna want her here, after all.”
Eleanor’s jaw dropped. “Will! Ye lying, traitorous—”
“For yer own sake, lass,” he was quick to interject. “We are only thinking of yer well-being, not that we dinna want ye wi’ us.”
“I’m no’ leaving!”
Will shrugged, and looked at Dougall. “And therein lies yer problem. The lass is strong-willed, and I dinna think anyone here has much desire to force her to do anything she doesna wish to do.”
“She should never have been brought here,” Dougall accused.
“What would ye have had us do instead? It were Lady Eleanor that ran from her escort to Kildrummond. It were Lady Eleanor that lost herself the chance to escape to safety. What should we have done? Left her to meet Agnew and his men? We brought her here because it were the only choice at the time.”
Eleanor was well aware of the small lie Will told about the circumstances of her escape. Or rather, the omission that he’d provided her with the means to escape. Dougall seemed to believe Will’s account. He didn’t, however, accept it.
“If ye cared at all for the lass, ye’d do what’s good for her, no’ what she wants.”
Eleanor drew breath to protest—but was beaten to it by Thomas.
“And is that good for her? To be carted away while her father’s left in a cell to be executed? Will that make her life any easier, to live wi’ the regret and guilt of having done nothing?”
Gregor jumped in then. “I love and respect Lady Eleanor as well as if she were my own lass. But have ye all forgotten yerselves? Lady Eleanor is a woman. A woman of noble birth. Her place in this world is no’ to go dashing off to Stirling for a bit of treasonous misadventure. ’Tis to marry well and secure the line of her husband.”
Again Eleanor meant to protest. This time she was beaten to it by Manus.
“She were more than that to Lord Albermarle. Is more than that. Dinna deny it, Gregor.”
“Aye,” added Gabhan. “And let me ask ye this. If Lord Albermarle himself were standing right here, if he had a say in this, given all that has happened, what would he want the lass to do?”
“What of Lady Albermarle?” Gregor shot back.
“Lady Albermarle is a beauteous, delicate woman. Lord Albermarle loves her dearly, we all ken that. But he raised his daughters to be strong and loyal and honorable. He raised them to follow in his footsteps, no’ hers.”
Eleanor was left speechless by her kinsmen’s unwavering support. In truth, she had until this night wondered if perhaps they regretted taking her, and were only tolerating her by virtue of her birth and stubbornness. The way they rallied to her defense now was moving. Humbling. Eleanor wanted to embrace them all and squeeze as tight as she could—but heaven above, she could not seem to get past the lump that had suddenly formed in her throat.
The group of men fell silent. As one, they looked to Dougall, who had not added a single word to the argument.
“And ye, Lady Eleanor,” he said at length. “D’ye think this is what yer father would want ye to do? Is this the woman he would want ye to be?”
She stared hard at him, summoning the force of will she knew was inside her. None of it would come. Instead, the lump in her throat thickened, and tears sprang to her eyes—good God, not again! Not in front of her kinsmen, not like this.
“Nay, Dougall. This is no’ what my father would want for me. My father would want me to marry and have bairns. He would want Brandon home again, and Edward alive, and for himself no’ to be rotting in a cell awaiting the executioner’s blade. But what he wants no longer matters. Now there is only what can be done to save him. And I canna leave him, no’ while he’s still alive. No’ until I ken for certain there is absolutely no hope left.”
There it was, that traitorous tear. It rolled down her cheek in a plump, slippery drop. Eleanor scrubbed it away angrily with the back of her wrist, only to have another take its place.
Dougall watched her for long moments, an unreadable expression on his face. Eleanor looked back, wrestling the slight wobble that had settled in her chin.
“What is this wee plan of yers then?” he said after long moments. “What fool plot have ye hatched between ye?”
“We’ll be a damned lot of buggers if ye think we’re telling ye, sir,” Manus scoffed.
“I’d wager ye’re damned either way,” Dougall shot back. “But ye will be telling me Lady Eleanor’s part in it.”
When he turned his eyes on her, Eleanor’s cheeks grew hot. “I—I dinna have one. No’ as yet. But I mean to,” she added forcefully.
Dougall met her challenging stare, her fire clashing with the ice-cold calculating of his Highland mind. When he spoke, it was with unquestionable finality.
“Davey,” he said evenly, “at first light, ye and Gregor will ride back to Kildrummond. Tell His Lordship we’ve found Lady Eleanor alive and well, and we’ll be bringing her home shortly. Dinna tell him what we’ve learned here about Douglases in Stirling, and dinna tell him the state in which we’ve found the lady. Tell him only that we’ve found her.
“I assume,” he continued, addressing Eleanor, “that this will give ye enough time to reconcile yerself to yer father’s fate. Either yer kinsmen will free him, which I very much doubt they’ll be able to do, or he’ll be executed. God rest his soul if that be the case. I expect by the time Gregor and Davey have made it back to Kildrummond we’ll have our answer either way. But ye’ll have no part in this plan of yers—whatever it is.”
“Ye’re bloody dreaming—” Eleanor spat. But Dougall cut her off before she could say any more.
“If ye want to stay in Stirling, that is my offer. Ye may stay, but as an observer only. And mark my words, My Lady: If I smell one hint of immediate danger to yerself, I’ll drag ye from the city by the roots of yer hair. D’ye understand?”
Eleanor’s fury seethed beneath her skin. Her fingers itched to strike him. In less than twenty-four hours he’d swept into the city and ruined everything she’d fought so hard to achieve. But she held herself in check, gritting her teeth until they hurt. He would let her stay. He would not take her to Kildrummond this night. That meant she would have more time to embed herself firmly into the plan that was already under way—a plan she herself had helped devise.
She made no promise, but neither did she protest.
“What about ye, Dougall?” questioned Davey in the interim silence.
Dougall held Eleanor’s gaze; his own was unsettlingly penetrating.
“Oh, I’m no’ going anywhere. I’m staying right here, by Lady Eleanor’s side. I’ll no’ be letting her out of my sight. Ye see, My Lady, I’ve been charged wi’ a duty to protect ye and keep ye safe, and to see ye returned to the arms of yer mother. I’m sure ye can understand that I mean to see that duty fulfilled.”
“Ye canna be around her all the time,” Thomas put in. “The lass has to sleep, does she no’?”
Dougall was silent.
“By God, ye’ll be doing no such thing,” Will insisted. “Ye’ll no’ be sleeping wi’ her. ’Tis wholly improper, and I’ll no’ allow it.”
He took a step toward Dougall. Before he’d taken another, Dougall had unsheathed his dirk and held it at the ready. A dangerous glint was in his eye; it was enough to stop Will in his tracks. The others hastily grabbed for their weapons, too, but in such close confines, everyone was aware that Dougall had the upper hand.
“Ye bested me this morning,” he told Will slowly. “But make no mistake, I’ll no’ be letting that happen again. The Lady Eleanor doesna leave my sight, or I’ll be the one to inform old Fiery Face of yer treason myself!”