Dougall woke with a sore head. He’d not lied to Eleanor last night—that truly was as far in his cups as he’d been in a long time. But unlike her, who did not have the practice with drink that he and the lads did, he was much more adept at hiding his drunkenness. He could not, however, hide that he was suffering the consequences of his indulgence quite so well. He felt every ounce of it this morning.
He lay in the bed, one arm draped over his eyes to block out the light. Outside, it was raining. The patter of raindrops on the mud ground, accompanied by a chill, damp breeze coming from the poorly covered window, filled the chamber. But for the fire, which smelled as though it had been recently lit, the room would be unbearably cold.
He’d certainly not been cold last night. Eleanor’s lithe, pliant body had kept him warm. Their heat together beneath the quilts was more than comfortable. They had stayed together all night, his arms around her, her body snuggled tightly into his. It had been heaven. He dared not ruin such a gift by thoughts of regret then, or of wondering what the morning would bring.
But now the morning was here, and Eleanor was no longer in the bed. Opening his eyes, Dougall found her plaiting her hair by the window. When she realized he was awake, she smiled tentatively.
Dougall stretched his arms upward. “How’s yer head this morn?”
“Like a battering ram is having at my brain,” she answered. “Yers?”
“The same.”
“I still canna believe ye were all that far into yer cups. Ye didna look at all affected.”
“I told ye. I’m good at hiding it—to a point. Ask me to pick up a sword and defend yer honor, and my state will become as plain as the nose on yer face.”
“Ye think my nose plain?” she teased.
“I think yer nose more beautiful than any on this earth.”
They shared a grin, before the moment of joviality died and Eleanor grew shy again.
“What time is it?” he asked.
“Oh—past noon.”
“Past noon?” Dougall struggled to sit up, bracing himself against the mattress with his hands behind him. “Should ye no’ have started working already?”
“I should have. But Angus will forgive me just this once. I figure if anyone deserves a lie-in, it is we two, after what we accomplished for the cause.”
“True. But ye dinna want to push his good nature, so let me get dressed and we’ll head over.”
He swung his legs out over the bed. His kilt fell to below his hip, exposing more of his abdomen than he’d intended. He caught Eleanor staring; flushing pink, she turned away quickly.
Getting dressed and leaving the burgage was a silent task. The walk to the tavern was little better. Dougall tried to initiate a conversation, but it was clear that Eleanor was embarrassed by last night’s failed attempt to lose her virtue.
He hoped it was embarrassment. He prayed it was not regret.
After seeing her safely deposited at the tavern, he excused himself to continue walking and to think. Angus Beag and several of the Douglas men were there—or were still there, if they had not gone home yet (and by the looks of them, that was a reasonable assumption). Angus Beag gave him a listless wave of acknowledgment, his head firmly cradled in his big hand.
Roisin was not there. And neither was Will, come to that.
He gave a hopeful glance to Eleanor before leaving. She glanced back sheepishly.
Outside, Dougall turned his face upward to the rain. He enjoyed the sharp, cold spatters on his face, enjoyed how they turned to rivulets that ran down his cheeks and neck. It was a welcome contrast to the heat in his belly and the worry in his heart.
And the throb in his head, by the bye.
Had last night been a mistake? Was Eleanor now wishing it hadn’t happened? He fervently hoped not, for he considered last night to have been sheer bliss. The only thing that would have made it even more blissful was if he hadn’t put a stop to what was about to happen.
But he had stopped it. Stupidly, he decided. The truth, which he now understood in the light of day and with a clearer head, was that breaking into Stirling Castle provided a sharp reminder of his own mortality. After seeing the earl, seeing how sorry a creature he’d become, and seeing Eleanor’s pain, Dougall had plucked away the last thread of reserve that prevented him from joining the Douglas cause entirely. And if he was going to allow himself to be fully involved—and to accept the consequences that may come with that involvement—then he may very well be facing the last days of his life.
Now, he understood that life truly was too short not to take what was there for the taking.
Eleanor had been for the taking last night. He should have been thanking his lucky stars, for he wanted her. He wanted her, by God. He could no longer hide from the fact that he wanted her in so many more ways than just in his bed. He wanted her smiles, her tender glances.
And her love. Dougall wanted her love above all else, because he could no longer deny that she had his love, fully and completely.
Before now, he’d been saving himself for his wife—whoever she may be. He let people assume what they would about him, neither correcting their misconceptions nor denying the truth if he was presented with it. At the core of the matter, though, his mother and father both had instilled those values in him, and he’d believed in them. But if it wasn’t to be, if his life were to be cut short, then he wanted his first time to be with a woman he loved. A woman he respected and admired. He wanted his first time to be with Eleanor.
Yet he’d stopped things. And the reason he had wasn’t because he wanted to preserve his purity, nor even that he wanted to preserve hers, as selfish as that may be. He’d stopped things because he didn’t want his first time with Eleanor to be had when they were both in a state of inebriation. He didn’t want it to be clumsy, or awkward, or half-forgotten when morning came. Above all, he didn’t want to be worried that she might come to regret what they’d done. He wanted to look into her eyes and know that what they were doing, the gift of virtue they were sharing with one another, which they only had to give once in their lives, was right.
If she was wary and awkward in the day, it was because she did not know the true and complete reason why he had put a stop to her efforts. But she would know. Dougall would make damn sure she knew how he felt about her.
And there was no time like the present.
Confident in his choice and emboldened by the rain, Dougall marched back to the Thistle and Thorn.
When he got there, however, he was too late.
Standing in the middle of the tavern was a rain-soaked figure in a cloak. Dougall did not recognize his face, but surmised that he was a Douglas by the way Eleanor, Angus Beag, and Thomas surrounded him. The men looked very grim; Eleanor was wide-eyed, with tears streaming down her cheeks.
“What is it? What has happened?” Dougall strode forward, his heart in his throat.
The cloaked man looked him up and down.
“Dougall MacFadyen of Kildrummond,” Thomas told him. Then to Dougall, he explained, “The Red Douglas has folded. He has withdrawn his objection to Lord Albermarle’s execution.”
“Our informant amongst the Red’s men sent word that a messenger was being dispatched to Stirling,” the cloaked man added. “We managed to capture him before he could make it to the castle.”
“Where is he now?”
The man looked at Angus Beag cautiously. “Yer Da’s got him.” To the others, he said, “He’s bound and gagged at Angus Mhor’s smithery in ceannaiche-cruadhach.”
Angus Beag swore long and eloquently.
“Bound and gagged?” Dougall balked. “What—here, in the middle of a crowded city? What if he escapes? What if the gag slips and he hollers bloody murder? Ye’ll all be found out.”
“What choice did we have?” The man threw his arms in the air.
“Ye should have killed him outright,” Angus Beag shouted. When the handful of patrons in the tavern glanced up, startled by his outburst, he lowered his voice. “Dinna give him the chance to tell what he kens.”
“Nay,” Eleanor interrupted, summoning immense composure given the circumstances. “My father wouldna want any more to die for him. Wi’out cause, at least,” she added, when she caught Dougall’s eye. After all, weren’t they prepared to die for him, if that’s what it came to?
“He canna stay there for very long,” Thomas observed.
“He willna,” Angus Beag stated. “We canna afford to drag this out any longer. If we’re going to rescue the earl and what remains of our kinsmen in that tower, it has to be tonight.”
A grim silence fell over the group. He was right. This had gone on long enough. Now was the last opportunity they were going to get.
“What of the final guardsman to be replaced?” Thomas asked.
The face of the man in question surfaced in Dougall’s mind. An ordinary man, with an ordinary face. He could be anyone on the streets of Stirling that Dougall might pass in a day. He could have a family. A wife and children.
Dread settled over him when he heard Angus Beag answer, “He’ll have to be dealt wi’.” Dread, because Dougall knew it was true.
“Nolie, have Gabhan and Manus send word to the others,” Angus instructed. “Tell them there is to be a meeting.”
“Where? Here?”
“Nay, ’tis too dangerous here.”
“Cnò-Daraich?” Eleanor suggested.
“’Tis too far,” Dougall put in. “There’s no time to get there and back if this thing is going to happen tonight.”
“What about Callanach’s barn?” Thomas suggested instead.
“Who is Callanach?” Dougall asked.
They looked grudgingly to one another before Eleanor answered.
“A dead man, that’s who. His wife isna part of our plot. But she has distant Douglas kin, and has been supporting us from the off.”
Thomas continued, “Apparently, just after Arkinholm, when MacRae and some of the first men came to Stirling, Mistress Callanach offered her support wi’out her husband’s knowledge. Well didna he find out? Threatened to tell the king. So…”
“So MacRae killed him,” Dougall surmised.
Angus Beag snorted. “It were his own wife that killed him, man. And if she hadna done it then, she would have done it sooner or later. I kent Callanach. A drunk. A small man wi’ a violent temper. Used to beat his wife raw for the fun of it. I tell ye, I think she was glad of the excuse to off him, and for the help in disposing the body.”
Dougall grimaced, picturing the scene.
“Thomas, ye’ll ride for Dunmore, and ride hard. Have Kemp ready the boat for tonight.”
“Boat?” Dougall questioned.
“We have a boat standing by over at Dunmore harbor, to take the prisoners straight to England once they’re freed,” Thomas explained. “And we’ll have horses at the ready to take them to the boat. There will be no hiding in Scotland for days or weeks or months after. We’ll be riding hard for freedom only once.” He looked to Angus Beag. “Ye think ye can make it to Dunmore wi’ the earl and the men tonight?”
“Nay. At best we’ll be there by dawn. But he’s to have that bloody boat ready, and ye make sure he doesna talk ye into giving him the final payment until we’re bloody ready to leave the shore. That’s what he and I agreed, so dinna let him argue otherwise.”
***
Two hours later, Dougall was seated on a stale bundle of hay that looked—and smelled—as though it had been harvested a decade ago. The whole of Callanach’s barn, like the hay bale, was in a bad state of decay. The stone walls were crumbling, the roof was caved in at the back, and a disconcertingly large colony of feral cats peered down at them from the many nooks and crannies with their luminous yellow eyes.
The farm sat on the western edge of the burgh of Stirling, on a quiet outcrop of inhabited land that was officially part of the city, but in reality was remote and on its own. It was a good place to have a secret meeting, should an emergency render Cnò-Daraich too far.
Almost all the Douglases who had been at the last secret meeting in the acorn vale were again in attendance. Those who could not get away on such short notice would be informed of the plan—whatever it turned out to be.
Mistress Callanach was not what Dougall was expecting. He’d imagined, from the way Angus Beag told the story, that she might be a meek, frightened slip of a woman. Instead she was robust and ruddy-cheeked, with a shock of frizzy, gray-and-white streaked hair. She was also older than he’d imagined, well into the twilight of her life. He didn’t know why he supposed she’d be younger. Perhaps it was because any man who was as mean as Callanach sounded would likely have put his wife in a grave long ago.
Mistress Callanach bustled about the barn, offering home-brewed barley ale (that tasted a little too much like warm pish for Dougall’s liking) and fussing over the men like a mother hen.
The Douglases were in a loose circle, with MacRae in the center, the voice of authority. MacLellan, too, was there. His shift at the castle did not begin until evening.
“Aye, ’tis true,” MacRae was telling them. “We have the Red Douglas’s man. Annie Fitz couldna be here for obvious reasons—the duties of a lady-in-waiting being what they are—but she’s sent word that to the best of her knowledge, the message hasna reached the king in any other way.”
Dougall did not want to imagine how Anne Fitzgibbons had come across her information…given the one thing ladies in waiting were known for at court.
“But we canna sit back and wait for the Red Douglas to send another,” MacRae concluded. “It must be tonight.”
“Do we have a plan?” Gabhan asked. He stood at the back of the barn, leaning against the door with his arms crossed at the chest.
MacLellan answered on behalf of MacRae. “We do. As ye ken from our previous discussion, there is a window that overlooks the east bank of the motte. At the bottom, there are a number of young pines hidden by bracken, growth that hasna been cleared away for a while. We’ve been down there, MacAlpine and I, and we think one’s rooted deep enough.”
“Deep enough for what?”
“For stringing a rope from the window to the bottom.”
“And what of patrols? Did ye no’ say that window overlooks the wall walk?”
“It will work tonight. We have Fionn and Stuart on the walk. They’re wi’ two of the castle guards, but they’ll be on alert. If any of theirs come near enough to see, ours will be ready to slit their throats before they send up a cry.”
“What of those below?” someone enquired.
“Nay. From there, the lower walk doesna wrap around the tower. ’Tis a steep but clear drop to the other side.”
“And Frazer? He’ll be in the tower as he is every night. How d’ye plan on slipping the earl past the likes of him?”
“Ye leave that bastard to me,” MacLellan spat. “He’ll be alerted to our men’s arrival and will be distracted. I’ll take him down from behind, when he’s no’ expecting it, and good riddance to him.”
There was silence for a moment as the men absorbed this information. Then someone scoffed, “Is that really the best plan we’ve got? From the sounds of it, His Lordship is too weak to let himself down on a rope that steep, let alone the other prisoners. Who kens what state they’re in?”
At this, MacRae spoke. “It is the only plan we have, the only one that spares as many lives as possible. Wi’ this plan, we’ll no’ need as much force to get inside the tower, other than our own men who are already there.”
“How many men will we need?”
“No more than ten.”
“What of the prisoners no’ being strong enough?”
“They’re strong enough to hold on to the rope, at least. Even Lord Albermarle,” MacLellan confirmed. “Eight men will be needed, one to go wi’ each prisoner to support their weight, so they’ll need to be strong.”
“And Lady Eleanor? Where will she be in all of this?”
“She’ll go tonight to Dunmore to await His Lordship’s arrival. Aye, My Lady?”
Eleanor nodded, and looked to Dougall. “Aye.”
MacRae searched the faces of the men looking back at him, waiting for volunteers to come forward. After a short pause, one man stood. “I’ll go.” Then another, “I’ll go, too.” Then another, and another, until there were nine men standing.
Dougall watched the scene unfold. Nine had stood; one more was needed.
He took a breath, running over in his head the choice that had, in truth, been made long ago. He was a warrior, sworn to protect the innocent from injustice. His loyalty was to his clan, not his king. Lord Albermarle was one of his clan, and what was being done to him was an injustice. If Dougall were to die, his conscience would be clear that he’d done right by the Lord’s reckoning. He stood.
“I’ll go.”
Eleanor stared at him, her eyes wide with horror. “Dougall, no,” she gasped.
MacLellan nodded his thanks, but Dougall was not finished. He glanced reassuringly to Eleanor, before continuing.
“I’ll go, but on one condition. I get His Lordship. I’ll be the one to carry him down.”
There was a slight murmur amongst the men, though none objected.
“Ye shall have him, Dougall MacFadyen,” answered MacRae. “We are indebted to ye.”
Everyone murmured their agreement with MacRae, even as Eleanor was shaking her head vehemently.
“Nay,” she insisted. “Nay, I’ll no’ go to Dunmore, then.”
“My Lady, with all due respect, dinna be daft,” MacRae countered. “Ye must be at the boat, ready to depart when the prisoners are brought.”
“Nay! If Dougall isna coming wi’ me, then I mean to stay wi’ him. I’ll no’ be leaving him behind, uncertain about his fate in all that time. I will wait wi’ the horses, and ride for Dunmore wi’ the men.”
This did not please anyone, least of all Dougall, whose eyes Eleanor could not bring herself to meet. But he did not protest. Despite his gut instinct that she should be as far away from danger as possible, he could not make himself force it on her.
He did not want her far away, when it might be the last chance in this life that he would see her face.
MacRae, too, did not protest. By the look on his face, he seemed resigned to the fact that objecting to the strong-willed Lady Eleanor Douglas would prove fruitless.
“So be it, lass,” he said. “Ye’ve risked yer own neck this long. Far be it for any one of us to take yer fate out of yer own hands at this point. Ye’ll wait on the east bank of the motte for the prisoners to come down. Then ye’ll all ride together for Dunmore.”
The rest of the time at Callanach’s barn was spent finalizing the details of the plot. Then, one by one, the Douglases left to live what might be the last of their hours as they would.
Until the anointed hour was upon them, there was nothing to do but wait.