Page 23 of Rebellion's Fire

He remembered the flashing images, the dreams which had assailed him through Cairistiona’s touch and later in the fire while she slept. He closed his eyes against the burning temptation, the pain of longing, and turned away from the comfort.

Chapter Seven

The rain ofthe early morning had dried up and left an unexpectedly warm, pleasant spring day. Enjoying the sun on her skin, the gentle bobbing of the ship, and the rhythmic splash of oars, Christian felt an urge to remove her mask for the first time since she’d donned it at court last year. It was an easy temptation to resist. For some reason, she felt stronger with the mask on. And people seemed to regard her differently, too. It was as if, being unsure what lay beneath the mask, they were prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt and accord her respect. Which amused Christian in a detached, dispassionate kind of way.

She smiled at the white, wispy clouds drifting across the blue sky and inhaled the fresh, salt scent of the sea, which seemed more intense after the rain. With an escort of Henry and five men-at-arms, she was traveling to the cathedral church of Rosemarkie at the invitation of the Bishop of Ross himself, who had also offered to accommodate her party for the night.

Christian was excited by the expedition. As well as confessing and hearing mass—William kept no chaplain, and there was no church in Tirebeck. She looked forward to discussing with the bishop the spiritual needs of her people. And the possibility of some kind of detente between Tirebeck and the rest of Ross. The bishop would be a powerful ally.

Attending Christian were Felicia and Eua. She hoped in this way to discourage the ill-feeling between her native and foreign women. She’d wanted to travel merely with a couple of Tirebeck men as escort, but William had insisted she take six of his own soldiers instead. He didn’t trust the men of Ross after the recent brush with the MacHeths. Christian herself didn’t fear any attack. Adam MacHeth had called her the Lady of Tirebeck.

So, they’d begun their journey before it was light, with a wizened old fisherman called Kertill supplying the ship and guidance, and William’s soldiers rowing them across the Cromarty Firth to the Black Isle, which you could see from Tirebeck on a clear day.

“Why do they call it the Black Isle?” Christian wondered aloud. “It looks very green to me.”

Eua smiled faintly, turning her face into the sun as though she’d missed it. “It looks black in winter when the snow covers everywhere else. Snow never lies on the isle.”

They were hugging the coast around the isle, just past the village of Cromarty, when the old fisherman, Kertill, shouted in Gaelic, pointing outward toward the deeper water.

“Dolphins,” Eua said with pleasure, and Christian found herself on her feet between Felicia and Henry, watching the amazing creatures jump in and out of the water in perfect arches.

“How beautiful,” Christian said in awe. “I’ve never seen them before.”

“They might come right up to us,” Kertill said. “They’re curious creatures, but they’ll not harm us. They seem to like people.”

Christian, desperate to see them up close, was disappointed when, although they followed their ship for a little, they didn’t come any closer. It might have been too noisy for them, for several ships and smaller boats seemed to be heading toward Rosemarkie for the market. Henry watched very carefully any vessel that came close to them.

A few children, taking advantage of the warmer weather, played along the shore, splashing and laughing. They called and waved to the ship, staring wide-eyed at the men-at-arms.

Christian enjoyed watching the boats in the firth, no doubt bringing supplies to the small communities scattered along the coast. It came to her that this was not unprosperous country. When gaps between wars allowed.

While Henry and the men scowled repellingly toward a curious and rather leaky-looking boat approaching from the Moray side of the firth, Christian turned her head back to the shore. There were no villages that she could make out just here, and she almost missed the unobtrusive little cove, until the sound of splashing and laughter drew her closer attention.

In fact, several grown men appeared to be frolicking in the sea around a large vessel that resembled a galley. Christian paused, gazing at the ship. Galleys could be used for trading as well as for war. William had found no trace of warships, not even tracks in the sand, in Tirebeck. She knew because she’d asked discreetly about the large huts along the shore.

In any case, the raucous, good-natured calls of these seamen were not so different from those of the children they’d just passed. But the children had splashed about in the shallows. The galley men were swimming like fish in much deeper water, over and under the oars in some kind of race. They took it in turns while the others chanted a beat, perhaps timing the swimmers.

A cheer went up, making Christian smile. Then one of the swimmers hauled himself out of the water and up the side of the boat, stark naked. Stretched and honed with muscle, water streaming off him like rain, his body looked golden, almost godlike.

After years of occasionally amusing and comforting herself by imagining people without their clothes on, Christian discovered there wasn’t necessarily anything silly or laughable about a naked man. Instead, even over this distance, the sight of this one brought warmth tingling through her, taking her by surprise, reminding her of her youthful reactions to handsome—if fully clothed—young men, in the days before her marriage. Marriage was a great cure for lusts of the flesh.

The naked swimmer hauled himself to a sitting position on the side of the boat, from where he called something down to those still in the river. As they laughed and called back, he turned his dark head and looked toward Christian’s party. For an instant, he stilled, shocked, perhaps, to be discovered naked by passing strangers, several of whom were obviously women. Then he swung his legs inside the ship, and Eua moved alongside Christian, blocking her view.

“Men,” she said tolerantly.

“Men,” Christian agreed, walking forward. The pit of her stomach still churned and tingled, because just for a moment, she’d imagined the dark, naked young god to be Adam MacHeth.

*

“That,” Findlaech said,balancing on an oar as he gazed after the vanishing vessel top-heavy with men-at-arms, “had to be the Lady of Tirebeck. I thought she’d have been too frightened to leave without Lanson’s whole army.”

Not she… Adam shrugged. “They’ll be going to Rosemarkie—church and market, no doubt, catering for both spiritual and material needs. Eua is with her.” A creature of instinct, he had to force himself to weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of the plan forming in his head.

“They didn’t turn Loegaire out?” Findlaech asked, surprised.

Adam shook his head. “The lady kept Eua to look after the house, and Loegaire is still running the estate. According to Cailean.” He’d left Cailean in hiding at Tirebeck to observe and report on any threats. But beyond cutting down trees and building a mound for a castle behind the main house, and suspiciously patrolling the immediate environs, Lanson didn’t appear to have made many changes.

Adam began pulling on his clothes. “They’ve seen this galley. Keep the others well out of sight.” And with luck, Eua would lead them well away from the boat-building camps now set up in the deep inlet on the isle’s coast beyond Fortrose.

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