Despite the fires burning brightly in the great hall and the tapestries hung on the walls and doorways, the keep was drafty. Megan felt cold as death. In but a few weeks the Christmas revels would be upon them and she, God help her, would be Sir Holt’s wife.
Not for the first time, she considered defying her father and fleeing. Once upon Shalimar’s broad back, she could ride swiftly through the gatehouse before the portcullis could be lowered! She would race the mare deep into the forest, where she knew of hiding places where no one, not any of her father’s soldiers or even the band of outlaws that resided in the wooded hills surrounding the castle, would find her. Yes, she could ride to freedom … ahh, would it were so!
She nearly bumped into one of the seamstresses, who was hastening down the hall with another young woman, but Megan ducked into an alcove before being seen.
“… doesn’t know how lucky she is to be marrying the most handsome man in all of Dwyrain. I would gladly lift my skirts for that one and, oh, to be his wife …”
Megan’s stomach clenched and she slid deeper into the shadows while the seamstress, a silly, freckled-skinned girl named Nell, paused to lean against the wall. Nell was carrying a white silk tunic with gold brocade and rabbit trim. Megan’s heart dropped to the floor, for this was her best tunic, the one in which she was to be married.
“… if I were Lady Megan, I would lick my fingers to be Holt’s bride.”
“And what else would ye lick?” Grace, one of the cook’s daughters who often worked in the kitchen, asked with a suggestive giggle.
Megan’s stomach turned over, and she realized she should step forward and scold the girl for gossiping idly, but she wanted to overhear what the maid would say next.
“Shh, Grace—such a tart ye be!”
A big girl with ample breasts and a gap between her front teeth, Grace flirted often with the soldiers.
Nell rambled on, “ ’Tis true, the lady loves him not, and all the pain she’s brought to this castle is but proof she has not a pure heart. Did ye not hear about the curse that prophet, the lame one Lady Megan met in the forest, laid on this castle?”
“Aye. Everyone in the castle and the villages heard, but I don’t believe in prophets or curses of the pagan ones,” Grace said, crossing her chest hastily, as if in fear that the very Devil himself might swoop down upon her.
“Well, ye’d better change yer way of thinkin’, because since that time there have been strange deaths and evil within the walls of Dwyrain.” Her voice dropped and Megan strained to hear. “ ’Tis all because of her. Had Lady Megan not been out riding that day against the baron’s wishes, she’d not have met the sorcerer and he’d not have laid the curse on this castle.”
“ ’Tis not true,” Grace said, though there was little conviction in her words.
“Aye, ye can say as much because ye did not lose a brother to the sickness that crept through Dwyrain like a thief and took the lives of many, including the baron’s wife, his wee babe, and his only son. Ye remember Sir Bevan, Grace, and don’t be lyin’ to me and sayin’ ye dinna. If ever there was one who could turn a lass’s head, he was one.” She sighed dreamily, clutching the tunic to her.
“Another one ye would lift yer soiled skirts for?” Grace asked, raising her eyebrow.
“Aye, quick as a cat jumping for spilt cream,” Nell said with a laugh as they continued, making their way past the smoldering rush lights.
Megan didn’t move. Her eyes were moist, her stomach tied in painful knots when she thought of her mother, tall, stately, prideful but loving, a woman whom everyone in the castle trusted. Violet of Dwyrain. Dead. “God be with you, Mama,” Megan said with a sniff, then thought of her brother Bevan, one year older than she and a devil of a boy who loved mischief. He had not been felled by the sickness that claimed so many but had drowned in the creek near Hag’s End Lake.
Bevan and Megan had been fast friends, always getting into trouble, forever telling secrets. As he’d grown, he’d been groomed to become baron. “ ’Tis silly, really,” Bevan had told her when they were riding far from the castle one day and they paused to let their mounts sip from a stream. Over the tops of the trees, the towering walls of Dwyrain were visible and Bevan squinted as he stared at them. “Ye’d be a much better lord than I. Too bad ye be younger and a girl.”
“You’ll be a great baron,” she’d predicted and he’d grinned.
“Ye’re right, sister. I’ll be the best!” Then, yanking on the reins, he’d given a loud hoot, kicked his gray palfrey in the flanks, and raced off across the creek, splashing noisily through the water.
Aye, she missed her brother and tiny, giggling Rosalind as well. Not even two years old, with only a few teeth and a silly, bright smile, the baby had succumbed to the dark death that had stolen through the corridors of Dwyrain.
Losing his wife and Baby Roz had been the start of Ewan’s ruin, Megan thought sadly, squeezing her eyes shut, remembering her father, strong then, kneeling in the mud and laying roses on the grave of his beloved Violet. He’d wept openly, and Holt had been with him, helping him up, whispering condolences, his hands steady.
Then, only weeks later, the tragedy of Bevan’s drowning. Megan had heard her father’s hoarse wails when he’d been told the news, then watched his stoic decline as his son had never again opened his eyes.
Before the deaths of family, friends, and servants, Ewan of Dwyrain had been a powerful ruler, one of the most envied of King Edward’s barons, a fair man known for his good sense and coarse humor. Now, he was but a shell of the man he’d once been, a husk of that courageous soldier who had ridden into battle against the Scots.
There was a time when no one in the castle had dared defy him, no one questioned his judgment, no one considered going against him. At present, there was malcontent, and the soldiers guarding the gates of the tower were new men, unfamiliar faces who looked to Holt for leadership, or old, tired friends who whispered between themselves that Ewan was addled and ill fit to rule.
Megan leaned the back of her head against the cool stone walls of the alcove and remembered the prophet’s words. You will marry in the next few years at the bidding of your father, but the marriage will be cursed—
“Dear God, no.”
Sickness. Deceit. Betrayal.
The sorcerer’s words rang in her head as they had been whispered through the keep. True, they’d all come to pass. The blame will be placed on you.