Epilogue

OCTOBER

Josselin popped a chunk of one of Kate Campbell’s famous apple coffyns into Drew’s mouth. His expression was a predictable mixture of wonder and delight.

“See?” she said while everyone at The Sheep Heid Inn cheered.

All the parents had come together for the wedding, despite their differences, which so far had amounted to little more than mild disgruntlement. Crowded into the cozy tavern were Kate, Jossy’s three fathers, and Drew’s uncles, who, for their own protection but much to their chagrin, were forced to attend in the guise of plaid-wearing Highlanders from Tintclachan.

Even the Four Maries, enchanted by Drew’s romantic proposal on the links, had sent along a gift. At their command, Tristan MacKenzie, the dashing and talented half-Scottish, half-French apprentice to Queen Mary’s own cook, had arrived early in the morn to prepare a sumptuous wedding feast.

And now the guests gorged on the young lad’s delicious and inspired dishes of smoky salmon and mussel brose, steaming seaweed soup and fresh-baked barley bread, Scottish carrageen pudding made with rose water, and flaky French mille-feuille glazed wth honey.

But despite his far superior cooking skills, Tristan, with both French charm and Scottish hospitality, had graciously made room on the table for Kate Campbell’s renowned apple coffyns.

Beer flowed like a storm-swollen stream, which was fortunate, for most of the inn’s patrons were too drunk to notice that some of the Highlanders had a distinct English drawl to their speech.

“I’ll make ye a bargain, lad,” Kate promised Drew with a pointed glare. “If ye vow to stay in Selkirk, I’ll give Jossy my recipe.”

“Selkirk?” Robert barked at Kate. “Pah! Nay, they’ll be coming to Andrew’s home.”

“O’er my dead body,” Angus growled.

“Da!” Josselin scolded.

“That can be arranged,” Simon muttered.

“Uncle!” Drew snapped.

Will folded his hands patiently around his tankard. “Where do ye intend to go, lass?”

Everyone looked at them expectantly. They definitely weren’t staying in Edinburgh. After their confrontation with Philipe on the golf course, Josselin had promised the apoplectic secretary that they’d keep well away from the queen.

“Well,” Drew said, “we haven’t quite decided, but…”

Josselin continued for him. “We’re stayin’ in Scotland.”

Drew’s uncles groaned.

“You’d let a maid tell you where to live?” Simon spat in disgust.

“She isn’t tellin’ me—” Drew began.

“Why would you want to stay,” Robert growled, “in such an uncivilized—”

There was a loud scrape of chairs as the Scots in the room rose to their feet.

Josselin sighed and shook her head as vile oaths and threats began to fill the inn.

“Listen to me!” she bellowed, silencing them all. “There will be no malignin’ of anyone’s place o’ birth at my weddin’, do ye understand? The next person who utters one more word of it, I swear Drew and I will both disown ye.” She gave them all a withering glare. “Now sit down.”

Once they were seated, she resumed. “I’m not tellin’ Drew where to live. ’Twas his choice. He makes his livin’ at golf, and he—”

“Can’t you bat your ballocks around some sheep field in your own country?” Robert asked.

Drew suppressed a laugh. “’Tis balls, Uncle, not ballocks.”

“Well, can’t you?”

Thomas answered his brother. “Golf’s been banned for years now in favor of archery.”

“The lad should go where he can make the best livin’,” Alasdair added, “and the best home for Josselin and their bairns.”

“Bairns!” Kate cried with, in Josselin’s opinion, far too much enthusiasm. “Ach, lass, are ye already with child?”

Simon protested. “Surely, Andrew, you won’t let your son be born on Scots soil!”

Angus narrowed his eyes. “And what’s wrong with our soil…aside from the fact it’s stained with English blood?”

“Out!” Josselin cried, pointing toward the door. “Both o’ ye! Out! And leave your weapons here.”

Simon and Angus scowled, but they did as they were told. They stood, slammed their daggers flat on the table, and shoved their chairs back, then began lumbering reluctantly toward the door.

But just as they were about to exit, the door opened, and Davey the beer wagon driver sauntered in. He had a missive for Josselin.

Josselin took the letter from him, gasping when she saw the seal. ’Twas stamped with the royal insignia of Queen Mary. With quivering fingers, she broke the seal and, standing beside Drew, read the contents aloud.

“My faithful and good subjects, as you may find it a difficult, indeed impossible, undertaking to return to your ancestral abode at Tintclachan in the Highlands, I am determined to grant to you, by God’s grace, at the suggestion of my secretary, Philipe de la Fontaine, and as a condition of your marriage, 200 roods at the southeastern limit of Scotland, including a links bordering on the North Sea. It is my dearest wish that you will endeavor to establish a course there for the pleasure of any who may come, and that you will erect a tavern nearby for the comfort of all. Furthermore, I trust that you will understand always the responsibility that accompanies the holding of a property so positioned. I pray God to give you a very happy and long life. From Edinburgh, this 11th of October, 1561. The Queen of Scotland, Marie.”

While the parents blinked in confusion, Josselin grinned, and Drew swept her up in his arms, twirling her around till she grew giddy with laughter.

“‘So positioned’,” Drew repeated in wonder. “’Tis at the border. Everyone will be able to play there—Scots, English, Catholic, Protestant.”

Josselin nodded, pleased. Apparently, Philipe had found a way to grant them the next best thing to exile.

“We’ll have tournaments,” he continued. “And I could start a school—a school o’ golf.”

“I can run the tavern,” Josselin gushed. “And we’ll be ideally situated to guard the border for Mary, to defend Scotland against ruffians.”

While they celebrated their great fortune, Drew’s uncles watched uncertainly.

Finally Simon grumbled, “I suppose, lass, you’d consider us ruffians?”

There was a pregnant pause.

Finally Josselin smiled at him. “O’ course not…Uncle.”

He scowled, but she could see the endearment pleased him.

Drew raised his tankard from the table. “A toast to kith and kin livin’ in peace and harmony!”

“Aye,” Josselin added, eyeing Simon and Angus, “and if ye ever dispute that, ye’ll have to fight it out with clubs and balls on our links.”

Everyone raised a cup in accord. By the wee hours of the night, the sworn enemies—their tongues and hostilities mellowed by an excess of beer and merrymaking—were toasting one another’s health and swapping tales of the married couple’s childhoods. When Will began gleefully relating the story of how Jossy, at four years of age, offered to defend her first love—Rane MacFarland, the lord sheriff’s huntsman—with a wooden sword, she decided ’twas time to retire.

She stole up the stairs with Drew, closing the door on the festivities below. The two of them had their own celebrating to do.

The morn was halfway gone when the happy bride collapsed back onto the pillow, spent. Her chemise was halfway down her arms. Her skirts were bunched around her waist. One of her stockings had gone missing. But somehow she couldn’t summon the energy to care.

Beside her, the bridegroom, too, lounged in apathetic splendor. He wore a self-satisfied smile and little else. His shirt was torn, revealing his still heaving chest. His legs were splayed casually across the bed, with his trews slung around one ankle.

If they continued much longer like this—dozing blissfully off, only to awaken again for another round—they might remain at The Sheep Heid forever and never make it to their new home.

Josselin sighed. She supposed she should drag herself out of bed. Change was in the wind, and they had a future to plan. Drew would want to inspect every inch of their seaside property to determine how to arrange the course. And Josselin had ideas for the magnificent tavern she’d build.

“The Silver Thimble,” she mused, gazing at the wedding ring on her finger, which had been fashioned out of the thimble Drew had given her.

“Hm?”

“Our tavern.” She turned on her side and idly ran her knuckles down Drew’s arm. “We have to have a name for it.”

“How about The Blue Cods?” he replied, too exhausted to open his eyes.

She gave him a light punch on the shoulder. “Ye’re a filthy lad.” With the attention she’d lavished on them all night, his cods were anything but blue.

He grinned with his eyes still closed.

Josselin frowned up at the heavy-beamed ceiling. ’Twould be clever, she thought, since she and Drew had overcome the differences of their birth, to unite the symbols of their two countries. “The Cross and Lion,” she tried.

He snorted, countering with, “The Fig and Prick.”

“Drew!” she scolded, dropping her jaw. “I’m serious. ’Tis an important consideration.”

He opened one lusty blue eye to gaze at her. “Darlin’, how can I consider anythin’ but swivin’ when ye’re lyin’ there, all naked and lovely and temptin’?”

She might be flushing with pleasure at his smoldering glance, but she wasn’t going to fall for his flattery again. They’d been swiving all night. Enough was enough.

She gave him a chiding smirk, tugging the bed linens up over her breasts, and he sighed in exaggerated disappointment, closing his eyes again.

Maybe the name of the tavern should reflect something of the legacy of warfare they were leaving behind and the new journey of peace upon which they were embarking. “The Rusty Dagger,” she suggested.

One corner of Drew’s mouth curved into a smile. “The Frisky Yard,” he insisted.

She had to bite back a laugh at that one, then shook her head. Drew MacAdam was incorrigible. But she supposed that was one thing she loved about him. After all, if he was a man to give up easily, he would never have pursued the cursing, trews-wearing, brawling lass with whom he’d crossed paths on the Royal Mile. He would never have chased halfway across the countryside to keep her safe. And he would never have risked the wrath of his uncles and her fathers to marry her.

She smiled. Their parcel of land wasn’t going anywhere. The day was still young. And they had years ahead of them.

“I know,” she said with a wicked glint in her eyes, walking her fingers down his chest. “The Withered Cock.”

Drew opened his eyes and lowered a disapproving brow at her. Then he clasped his hands behind his head and gave her a slow grin as his body responded boldly to her rousing touch.

With a smug growl, he tore off her coverlet, rolled atop her, and sank into her welcoming warmth. “The Longnose Club,” he told her in no uncertain terms.

’Twas a long while before Drew and Josselin left their room at The Sheep Heid Inn to venture to their new home, but when they did, two pieces of their destiny had been determined. One was that their tavern would be called The Rose and Thorn. The other was that their first son would be born exactly nine months hence.

THE END