Boundless (Age of Conquest #6) - Tamara Leigh Page 0,1
took a Norman bride, but here was hatred. For this, which she had not fully understood when last she was here, her mother had been nearly cruel in ordering her to stay on her side of the border.
Had Marguerite known her namesake was dead, she would not have come. However, privy to Edgar the Aetheling’s plans to lead an army out of Scotland to reclaim the English throne that was more his right than William the Conqueror’s, she had feared for her mother. And King Malcolm, given to indulging the daughter of the man he had loved as a brother, had provided an escort who could not have known how emboldened her Norman kin by their countrymen’s grip on England.
“Fear not, Gerald. We have only to keep her hidden until Patrick comes for her.”
Here another reason her mother had not wished her to return. Her grandfather liked the Irish little more than the Scots, but his dealings with the man who had looked uncomfortably close upon his granddaughter were lucrative. And slavery was among the things in which the Irishman dealt.
Dear Lord, he intends to sell me to him, she sent heavenward.
“It could take weeks for the missive to find him and weeks longer before he arrives,” her uncle said.
“Hence, we take her west on the morrow.”
“What if one of our men talks?”
“Some are greedy enough to betray me for coin, but brave enough to venture forth if Malcolm comes? Brave enough to journey to Scotland and stand before that savage who might believe they were among those who put arrows in his men?”
“Still—”
“You worry like a woman!”
Scornful laughter ending on a cough alerted Marguerite another was here, and it was not her cousin, Pepin. “Heh, Gerald, our father regards you little better than he does me,” creaked her younger uncle who was afflicted with a wasting sickness. More for him than their aging father, her mother had returned to her Norman family when her own mother passed. Marguerite liked Claude better than Gerald, but he was too sullen and demanding for her to feel kindly toward him beyond comparison to ones whom she now had cause to hate.
Almighty, forgive me, she sent heavenward, but eleven are dead only for having served as my escort.
“You are untouchable, wee brother,” Gerald scorned. “That is nothing to be proud. Were you not—”
“Were I not infirm, we would resolve this with fists,” Claude snarled. “And as I would be stronger of body than one who eats more than he moves, you would fall more heavily than I, big brother.”
Boots pounded the floorboards, but her grandfather’s shout halted his eldest son, then he barked, “Seek your brother’s forgiveness, Claude!”
“You first told he behaved a woman, Father. Do you apologize, I will think on it.”
“Claude!”
“I will not apologize!”
The silence of disbelief descended. Marguerite had not passed much time here while her mother tended her kin, but most of Claude’s unpleasantness had been reserved for his sister and servants. When it spilled over, it had splashed the younger Marguerite, sprayed his brother, and misted his sire.
“Go, Gerald,” her grandfather commanded. “Aid Pepin in concealing the bodies.”
Her uncle cursed and slammed the door behind him.
“What is this, Claude? With what tongue do you speak?”
“An angry one.”
“Why angry?”
“When last was I well-tended? While my sister lived. Though now my niece is here and can do for me what her mother did, you would give her to Patrick!”
“She would not stay!”
“She might.”
“Non, and did we force her, the heathens would take her back.”
“Possibly, but since you have slain Malcolm’s men, we cannot test that, can we?”
“Their deaths were warranted. Diarmad the Mad abducted my daughter—twice!”
“Once!”
Marguerite’s grandfather stepped nearer his son. “He took her and put babes in her belly. Now I have taken the one babe the Lord allowed to survive and the lives of her escort as payment. And they are not enough!”
“Then you can collect further payment when Malcolm sends his forces. If you and my brother survive.”
“Silence!” Boots sounded again.
“Where do you go?” Claude called.
“I have a missive to write. Shout when she rouses.”
His footsteps echoed down the passage, then the door of his private chamber closed.
Marguerite opened her eyes. Past a curtain of dark hair, she saw she was against the wall opposite the doors leading to the bailey and no servants were present. If she could silence Claude before he—
“There is not much time, Marguerite,” he rasped. “Go out the rear window and stay low. When you are distant, run as never you have.”