Page 74 of Wild Wicked Scot
Margot made a sound of indignation—even though it was true.
“Bring your horse to a canter, aye? It’s a smoother gait for riding. Watch me.”
She spurred her horse to canter across the meadow, looking quite comfortable on the bay’s back as she moved up and down in rhythm with the horse’s gait. She circled back around and trotted back to where Margot sat woodenly on the back of the pony.
“Now you.”
Margot spurred the pony, but he wouldn’t budge. All of Scotland was against her, including this beast.
“Use your crop!” Griselda said impatiently.
“I haven’t got a crop!” Margot said just as impatiently.
“For God’s sake.” Griselda moved closer, reached across the space between them and handed Margot her crop. “Spur and crop, all at once, then lower yourself over his neck so he knows you donna mean to amble along.”
There were a million things Margot wanted to shout at Griselda in that moment, but, in the interest of ending this wretched lesson, she did as Griselda instructed. The pony lurched forward a step or two.
“Do it again! Donna tap him,crophim!”
This time, Margot did what Griselda suggested with vigor, and the pony took off in a gallop so unexpectedly that Margot was almost unseated by it. With a shriek, she clung to the horse and lowered herself over its neck, gripping with her legs as hard as she possibly could...until the pony realized she didn’t mean to run at all and slowed its gait to a trot, turning back without her prompt.
When she arrived back to a very smug Griselda, Margot was breathless. “As I said, you’ve no notion how to ride,” Griselda said with great eminence.
“All right, all right, you win, Zelda! I am a poor rider, a worse dancer, a wretched wife! Let’s go again.”
The two women spent the afternoon practicing the art of riding astride. Griselda taught Margot how to slow a horse, how to accelerate its speed. She learned how to signal the pony to walk, to trot, to canter, to gallop and then do it all again. Margot was exhausted, her legs and abdomen ached with the exertion of it, and at long last, Griselda took pity on her. They came down off their mounts—Griselda with ease, naturally, and Margot practically falling—to eat some bread and cheese Griselda had brought.
They sat with their backs against a rock, their legs stretched in front of them, eating in silence. Until Griselda giggled.
Margot glared at her. “What is so amusing?”
“You,”Griselda said. “You look as if you’ve been tossed and turned upside down.” She lifted a tress of Margot’s hair that Margot hadn’t realized had come undone. “You must learn to pin it up without the help of aladies’ maid,” she said with a prim English accent.
“I know how to pin my hair,” Margot said, frowning at her.
Griselda snorted.
“For the love of—All right, Zelda, you can stop. I know you don’t care for me and wish I’d never come to Balhaire. You needn’t press the point home at every opportunity. But I’m here! I was bartered off to Arran like a hold of fish. I was meant for London ballrooms, not old castles in Scotland.”
Griselda clucked her tongue at Margot. “I liked you well enough until you wounded Arran.”
“Well,thatis hardly true. Need I remind you of the time you put pepper in my bowl of soup? It’s a wonder I’ve stopped sneezing yet.”
Griselda’s face broke into a wreath of a smile. “No need to remind me—I recall it with fondness.” She laughed.
Margot couldn’t help it—the memory of her fleeing the great hall, sneezing over and over again, made her laugh, too. The two of them looked at each other and giggled like girls over it.
“All right,” Margot said, wheezing between laughs, “We are two grown women. We’ll likely never be close friends, but surely we can agree to coexist at Balhaire when Arran and I return?”
Griselda’s smile faded. “When you return?” She suddenly tossed the rest of her bread into a bag. “You’re a fool yet, Margot Mackenzie. You’ll no’ come back.”
“I will,” Margot said. It was the first time she’d said it; the first time she’d allowed herself to think that far ahead. It surprised her how easily the words came. Was it her true desire? In the maelstrom of the last few days, she hadn’t thought of the future.
“You honestly think that either of you will come back to Balhaire?” Griselda thundered. She suddenly scrambled to her feet and strode away.
Margot groaned. “What have I said now?” she shouted after Griselda.
Griselda stopped and whirled about. “Are you really so daft?” she asked, jabbing at her own head.
