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they’d tried to protect her? When her only surviving brother was imprisoned?
    “You have lovely hair, milady,” Trilby said.
    Bethia tried to smile. The girl had tried to be kind, had tempted her last night with sweets, but hopelessness reached so far down into her soul, she felt her whole being dragged into a huge dark abyss. Then she looked at herself again. Where was the spirit that her brothers teased her about? Where was the courage they bragged about when she raced bareback across the moors?
    No bloody Englishman or Scots traitor was going to defeat her . They would not see her bowed.
    She stiffened her back as the girl finished her hair. “Thank you, Trilby.”
    “Do you wish me to help you dress?”
    Bethia was wearing a linen tunic. She needed only to drape the overskirt and buckle the belt that held it in place. “No,” she said. “You can tell… the marquis I will meet with him as soon as I have finished.”
    Trilby curtsied.
    “You need not do that with me,” Bethia said. “I’m naught but a prisoner in this place.”
    “But milady, ye are the new marchioness.”
    Such an exalted title . Bethia choked down a bitter laugh. Marchioness, indeed!
    Instead, she asked the question that had been haunting her. “Can you tell me something about the marquis?”
    The girl’s face stilled. “What would ye be wanting to know?” she asked after a moment’s pause.
    “Is he … an older man?”
    “Nay, he has but thirty years.”
    Bethia was not sure whether this was good or ill news. Part of her had hoped for an elderly man who was beyond the physical lust of marriage.
    “Can you tell me something of… his character?” He betrayed his own countrymen. What kind of character could he have ? Still…
    The girl’s face locked in indecision.
    “I will tell no one what you say,” she promised.
    “In truth, milady, I do not know. He was fostered on the border and he rarely returned here until the… uprising. I heard …”
    “You heard what?” Bethia prompted.
    The young girl’s eyes pleaded with her not to ask more questions.
    “Trilby … I will know soon enough. Please.”
    “I do not know, milady. Truly I do not,” Trilby said. “He has been gone frequently, even since he became the marquis. They say he is a gaming man and…” Her voice died away. ” ‘Tis all I can say, milady. I should not have said that.”
    Bethia’s throat grew dry. There was more. Much more, or the girl wouldn’t look so miserable. What kind of man had Cumberland condemned her to?
    Well, she would know soon enough. She turned away. “I will be down shortly. Tell me where to go.”
    “I will wait outside for ye,” Trilby insisted, seeming to understand that she wanted several moments to herself.
    Bethia swallowed. In truth, she did not want to go wandering about this huge pile of stones. “Thank you,” she said. “I will not be long.”
    The girl disappeared out the door, closing it quietly behind her.
    Bethia pulled on the overskirt, then defiantly positioned her tartan around over her shoulder, fastening it with a plain broach. She gathered it with her lightly jeweled belt, the one possession of value left her. She had pride enough to wear the tartan, even though she knew it shouted her rebellion. She did not care. Let him know he was getting no meek maiden.
    She pinched her cheeks, bringing some color into them. She did not want to look fearful or pale. Then she went to the door.
    Think about Dougal.
    With him, and only him in mind, she opened the door, tilted her head up proudly, and silently followed Trilby down the steps to meet her betrothed.

Chapter 3
    Rory couldn’t contain a certain uneasiness, even tension, as he awaited the MacDonell lass.
    He would rather face a hangman, he thought, than a bride. Any bride. But especially a hostile one.
    But mayhap she would be pliable, happy to have a title, even one granted by a Hanover.
    A knock came at the door. What would the fop, Rory Forbes, do? Certainly