Chapter Seventeen
Giselle took the stairs down to the hall with leaden feet. She could scarcely deal with her shame at the events of the night before. There was no excuse for what she had let Lyall do to her. He had not forced her to give him the rights of a husband. All it had taken was a look, from those smouldering green eyes of his, and she had succumbed.
In that dark room, some madness had made her want to reach out and touch the big Scot, for he was so beautiful in his maleness. His skin, tanned by the sun on his face and neck, begged to be stroked and kissed. She had longed to press her lips to the hollow of his throat, to trace her fingertips along Lyall’s hard chest and run her fingers through that thick hair. But she had done none of those things. Instead she had lain there, like a nervous fool, and let him do what he would. When she had asked Lyall if he cared for her, he had muttered the words she wanted to hear. But how could he possibly want her as anything other than a quick tumble for the night? To him, she was a tiresome English woman, his enemy, an unwanted intrusion into his life.
How disgusted Lyall had looked as he stormed off. How low he must think her, allowing a man to take such liberties.
Agnes’ talk of hanging on to a strong man for protection had led her into the trap of having feelings for her captor. Giselle was absolutely certain her captor had only one feeling for her - lust. She was just a distraction, a way for him to take vengeance on the English, by seducing one.
Today, one way or another, Lyall would have to be faced. If that man came near her again, she would just tell him to leave her alone. Keep him at arm’s length - that was what she must do - for her situation was precarious, and no one at Beharra could be trusted. Once the Buchanans relaxed their guard, she could steal a horse and some coin, and maybe get south on her own. Staying meant more humiliation, and the threat of feeling too much for Lyall Buchanan, when instead, she should hate him with every fibre of her being.
Last night had been such an ordeal. These Buchanans were overwhelming, unlike any people she had ever met in her sheltered life. Ravenna was fierce, proud and beautiful, and looked at her with such suspicion. Morna was mischievous, like her brother, and she was softly pretty, with a sweet face and dark, knowing eyes. She was far more bold around men than Giselle could ever imagine being. Cormac was so fearsome that she could barely look at him, and he had such a cold, intimidating voice. None of these people wanted her here, she was sure of that. The only one she could rely on was Lyall, and he made her feel safe one minute, and in jeopardy the next.
In the hall, Giselle found the awful manservant, Ramsay, standing before the fire with a mug of ale in his hand. He gave her a poisonous look, and she backed up and turned to go.
‘Where might you be off to, English?’ he said, coming closer.
‘I am going outside for a walk, or is that not permitted?’
‘Aye, it’s permitted. Walk all you like. Walk south, and keep walking, all the way back to England. That would please me greatly.’
Giselle turned to go, shocked by the sting in his words, but he was not done with his cruelty.
‘Beharra is no place for an English whore,’ he shouted after her.
‘I am not a whore,’ she said.
‘Aren’t you? Lyall has been alone with you long enough to have had his way by now. And, whore or not, you are still English, and to the Buchanans you are dirt.’ He spat at his feet, and Giselle raced away in disgust. What a worm of a man, so bitter. Surely Lyall had not said anything to him?
Ravenna was outside, pacing up and down, with her hand in the small of her back. A little boy clung to her skirts and scrabbled behind them as Giselle approached.
Giselle gave Ravenna a weak smile and was rewarded with a grimace of pain in return.
‘The bairn is lying awkwardly, it gives me no rest, and my back is fit to break with the heaviness of it.’ She eyed Giselle steadily. ‘What’s amiss with you?’
‘That man Ramsay said some things. He was unkind.’
‘That is his way. Ignore him, and don’t bother trying to make friends, it won’t do you any good with him. Ross let go,’ she said to the boy, who was now peeking around at Giselle with grey eyes, wide and curious. He had black hair and a river of snot coming from his nose, which he wiped with the back of his sleeve.
‘This is my son, Ross and, as you see, he does not have the best of manners, like his father. He will not leave me be with his pestering today when he is not off chasing the chickens until they will not lay, or teasing the dogs to distraction. One day he will get bit, and that will teach him.’
Though the child’s eyes were his mother’s, he was otherwise a miniature of his father and had the same way of quietly scrutinising. The boy narrowed his eyes when Giselle smiled at him. Not one to trust easily, by the looks of him.
‘Will your babe come soon?’ asked Giselle.
‘Not nearly soon enough. Where are you going?’
‘I don’t rightly know. I cannot just sit in that chamber being useless all day long. It is setting me to worrying. Perhaps I can be of help. What can I do?
‘I don’t know. What can you do?’ Ravenna softened the comment with a smile.
‘Well, I can embroider and read and write, and I play the lute terribly well. I have the voice of a lark, or so many have told me.’
‘Not much call for that around here,’ said Ravenna.
‘I can pour wine like a lady, and handle a horse very badly.’ Giselle smiled back.
‘Do you have all your wits?’ said Ravenna.