Read Bold (The Handfasting) for Free Online Page B

it.”
    “Aye,
well and good.”  Feargus nodded.  "But you know, if she doesn't come
around, if she keeps her distance, we expect her back in the same pure state
she'll have left us.  I'll not see her returning with a kerchief on her head
for the whole world to know she's not a maiden anymore."
    "Aye." 
Talorc agreed.  "I'd want no different for my own daughter, if I'm ever
blessed to have one."
    “You
will also vow," Fiona continued, "never to hurt my daughter, to
strike her or beat her or punish her in any physical manner.”
    “I
vow to you she shall never be harmed by me or mine, in any manner.  If I fail
in that, I will return her to you.”
    “So
be it.  If you can convince her to say yea, you may have my daughter.”
    “Oh,
for a certainty, she will say yea.  She’ll have no other choice or she’s not
the woman I think her to be.”
     
     
     

CHAPTER 5 - BETRAYAL
     
              It was a clear
night with a full moon, eerie shadows and the shimmer of silver light that
teased of spirits lurking.  It was the season for Lughnassadh, the time for the
summer sun to loosen her hold to Tannist, the stingy winter's day.  It was a
season of the festivals of old. 
    Talorc
the Bold, The Laird MacKay, would be leaving soon for the Samhain.  At least he
should be, for no Laird of any worth would be away from home when the spirits
of the ancients walked freely upon the earth; when the clan would celebrate
those newly deceased as well as those to be born.
    Maggie
hurried past the gardens, grateful that the souls were not yet free to roam in
the fey light of a full moon.  The only ghosts here were the shadowed furrows
of the vegetable beds, empty of all but the withered rubble of a harvest now
past.  Today's bitter northern wind brought frost, prelude to a carpet of snow.
    Snow.
Maggie looked toward her destination, the small area surrounded by a low stone
fence, peppered with Celtic crosses.  It was the home to her ancestors, home to
all the family who had passed beyond this life.  Home to her brother, Young
Ian.  Her twin.
    This
Samhain they would celebrate Ian’s glorious death in battle.  He would be
honored, praised for going as he had gone.  It was selfish of Maggie to wish it
any other way, but wish it she did.  She wanted to unwrap her plaid, lay it
upon his frozen bed, to warm him until the snow could play the part of
blanket.  But to do so would ignore the chance of his soul rising free of the
earth’s embrace.  She could not risk the insult.
    It
didn’t take her long to reach his grave, to see the covering of heather she had
planted, gray in the moon's light, sparkling with the frost.  A part of her had
died with him.  Praise God that it wouldn’t resurrect, that her ability to love
so deeply would never claim her again.
    She
thought of the MacKay, and his peculiar hold on her.  “I’ll not leave you,
Ian.”  She promised.  “Whatever The MacKay wants, it can’t take me away from
here.”  She fell to her knees, leaned to the side and supported her weight on
one arm.  “This is my home.” She picked at the heather. “This is where I
belong.  These are my people, our people.”
    There
were no tears this time.  Normally, when she visited Ian’s grave, emotions
brimmed and spilled.  Perhaps she was getting used to his absence.
    “Do
you know what it is he thinks?  Can you watch, from wherever you are?  Can you
see what’s happening?”  Maggie looked up at the sky, before studying the sway
of trees that surrounded the graveyard.  She’d often wondered if Ian watched.
     When
he was alive, she would have known what he was thinking without saying a word. 
The loss, an emptiness that could not be filled.
    “You
would laugh, you know.”  Could hear her even if she couldn’t hear him.  “Our
warriors told tales and the Bold was daft enough to listen.  They turned-around
all I ever did to grieve them, until you would think I was the bravest and
wisest of