Brenda Joyce by A Rose in the Storm

Author:A Rose in the Storm
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

BALVENIE SPRAWLED ABOVE them atop the hill, a massive red stone fortress.

Margaret halted her small mount. Peg and Eilidh had their own horses as well, and they also stopped, as did the three knights escorting them. She stared up at the welcome sight of Balvenie’s curtain walls crossing the hillside, its towers jutting into the bright blue sky.

“Balvenie,” she whispered, disbelieving. Three days ago she had awoken in Alexander’s bed, and now, she was home.

The River Spey was below them, churning rapidly through the forested hillside. Its frigid waters still rushed over frozen rocks. But snow was melting everywhere. Patches of new grass and thistle with small, tight, unopened blooms were emerging across the hillside and just beneath the thick castle walls.

“I will tell the watch that we have arrived,” one of their knights said. He spurred his mount forward and up the hill at a canter.

“We are home,” Peg cried, smiling. “I never thought to see the day!”

Margaret did not quite smile back at her. She was pleased to have reached Balvenie safely—she was relieved to have reached her uncle’s largest, most defensible home. But her happiness was somehow spoiled—and partly it was because Castle Fyne remained lost to the enemy, and William remained a prisoner there. But she knew that secretly, there was even more.

Secretly, she thought her homecoming spoiled by the night she had spent in Alexander’s arms.

For, at random moments in the day, and then, in her dreams at night, she recalled not just the passion they had shared, but other moments, too, moments in which he seemed like a powerful champion. Yet she did not want to think of him at all! And she especially did not want to recall how she had betrayed her uncle and her betrothed.

“It’s so grand,” Eilidh whispered, wide-eyed with awe.

“It is very grand,” Margaret agreed, and she started her mare up the hill, on the muddy road they traveled upon. Her two maids fell into line behind her, while the remaining two Highland soldiers rode abreast of her, having cast their furs aside.

They had stayed hidden in Alexander’s army for two entire days, but when it had made camp not far from Dumbarton, they had stolen away. Peg had managed to get them inside the royal fortress there, where Margaret had been warmly received by its governor, John of Menteith. Already aware of the attack about to take place the next day, he had wasted no time in sending her on, with three of his men as an armed escort. They had arrived at Dumbarton in the fading light of the late afternoon, and they left just a few hours later, as twilight stole upon the land.

Margaret saw the gates of the barbican being opened, and now, she could hear surprised cries coming from the ramparts, as the news of her arrival spread. She looked up as men, women and children appeared on the walls above her, waving eagerly, clearly jubilant over her return. She smiled and waved back, but inwardly, she was grim.

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