Bertrice Small - Betrayed

"Aye," Aulay responded calmly.

"Don't try to get the upper hand with Aulay," the laird warned Fiona. "He's been at Brae since the day of its creation, I think, and is the real power here, are ye not, old friend?"

"If my lord says so," the steward said with a small smile and a bow.

"Are ye hungry, lassie?" the laird asked, and Fiona nodded. "Come," he said, leading her to the high board and seating her.

Almost at once their goblets were filled with a fine red wine such as Fiona had never tasted. It had a fragrant bouquet to it, and she drank half her portion before she even realized it. Platters were set before them. One held thinly sliced salmon on a bed of greens. Another contained a fat duck, and the third a haunch of venison. A loaf of hot bread was brought, along with a small tub of sweet butter and a half wheel of hard cheese. There was a bowl of small green peas. Fiona's eyes widened. She had never seen so much food and so much variety on a table in her life. Meals at Hay Tower had always been simple. One dish, bread, a vegetable if she could find one. She ate heartily and unabashedly, taking from each platter and dish, devouring half the loaf herself, and almost half of the sweet apple tartlet that was brought to conclude the meal. She downed two cups of wine without so much as a blink.

The laird watched her with a mixture of awe and amusement. He had never seen a woman of such good appetite. "Ye enjoyed yer meal?" he asked her with droll understatement.

Fiona smiled blissfully, her green eyes narrowing, catlike. "Aye! I've never had such a feast. Do ye eat this way every day, my lord?"

He nodded, and then said, laughing, "But ye canna, sweetheart, or ye'll grow as plump as the cattle ye stole from me."

She laughed with him. "No," she promised him. "The women in my family don't run to fat, my lord."

"I'll be watching ye closely, Fiona Hay," he teased her.

"How many servants do ye have?" she asked him.

"Ye met Aulay," he began. "His wife, Una, is my housekeeper. Beathag is the cook, and she has a helper, Alice. There are four maidservants, and when we need them several of my clansmen help within the castle. There are stableboys, a gamekeeper, several herdsmen, and some others I canna remember, lassie."

"With all those mouths to feed," she wondered, "will there really be room for Flora and Tam, my lord?"

"Aye," he reassured her. "Aulay will be happy to have Tam to help him, and Flora must look after yer sisters as she has always done. I will give her Giorsal to help her, for I can see the old woman is a wee bit frail now, but I will not relinquish her duties out of loyalty to yer late mother, may God assoil the sweet soul of Muire Hay."

"Thank ye, Angus Gordon. Yer a good man," Fiona said quietly.

He flushed at her words. She almost made him feel in her debt instead of the other way around. "Ye will want to go to yer chamber now, lassie," he told her. He looked about for someone to show Fiona the way, and Una seemed to materialize out of a dark corner of the hall.

"I will show Mistress Hay, my lord," Una said. Like her husband, she was tall and spare. "Come, lassie. Ye’ll want a bath, I've no doubt, to rid yerself of the stink of the horses and yer journey."

Fiona followed her obediently, asking, "Are my sisters settled, please? I don't want them to be afeared. They have never been away from home overnight before, and they will miss our Flora."

"They are fine, lassie," Una reassured Fiona. "The wee one has been fed and put to bed already. The other is eating down in the kitchen. I have never seen a child tuck away so much food as that bright-eyed girlie is now doing."

"Ye didn't leave Morag alone, did ye? She is fearful of the dark when there is no one with her," Fiona said worriedly.

"No, lassie. Giorsal is sitting by her cot, and there is a light burning as well. Don't fret. The bairn will outgrow her fear eventually. Yer mam was like that when she was a wee one, and she outgrew her fears by the time she was six."

Fiona was amazed. "Ye knew my mother?"

"Aye," Una said calmly. "I was born a Hay, lassie. I only became a Gordon when I wed with my Aulay." She led Fiona down a corridor and up a flight of stone stairs into another hallway. “Did ye really steal the laird's cattle?" she slyly asked the girl as she opened the door to a large chamber and ushered her inside.

"He believes I did," Fiona said, refusing to admit her guilt to anyone, even now.

"Yer grandfather, God assoil his good soul, would not approve the arrangement ye have made with the laird," Una said frankly.

"Then he should have made provision to dower his granddaughters," Fiona snapped. “Instead, he and my father continued their feud to their graves, leaving me with five little sisters to provide for, and not so much as a merk to my name to do it with, may God help me! Well, I have married off Annie, Elsbeth, and Margery to their sweethearts, and my arrangement with the laird will assure that Jeannie and Morag will have fine husbands. I do what I must, and I'll hear no more about it, Una Gordon!"

Una nodded, not in the least offended by the girl's outburst. She had learned what she wanted to learn. The lass was no adventuress out to take advantage of her master. She was her mother's daughter, for certain, accepting her fate for the sake of those she loved. "Ye’ll be verra comfortable in this chamber," she told Fiona calmly. "The fireplace draws well and is large enough to heat water for yer bath, as ye can tell by the cauldron hanging there now. I see Nelly is already attending to her duties. She is my niece, and a good lass. I canna imagine where she has gotten to, however."

Her words had scarcely died when the door opened and a young girl hurried into the room, carrying a silver tray upon which was a carafe of red wine. Sticking out from the pockets of her apron were two silver goblets. She was a pretty creature with bright blue eyes and carrot-red braids. Placing her burden upon the table, she then curtsied to the two other women. "I have already begun warming the bath water, Mistress Una," she said politely.

"Aye," Una answered approvingly, "and ye have fetched wine. Good. Well, I can see ye have yer duties well in hand, Nelly. Greet yer new mistress, Fiona Hay, and I'll be on my way."

"God's greetings to ye, lady," Nelly said, curtsying prettily.

"God's greetings to ye, Nelly," Fiona returned. The girl looked to be about her own age.

"I'll bid ye good night then, Mistress Hay," the housekeeper said, and she departed the room.

"I'll get the tub," Nelly said briskly. "Whew! I can smell the horses on ye. Did ye ride far today, lady?"

"From the bottom of Ben Hay," Fiona replied, then looked about the chamber.

This was to be her new home, and it was far grander than anything she had ever had. She wondered if her sisters were as finely ensconced. It was, to her eye, a very elegant chamber. There were heavy draperies of crimson velvet drawn over the shutters that covered the windows. There was a fine big bed with curtains of scarlet and cream-colored brocatelle hanging from polished brass rings. But the ultimate luxury was indeed the fireplace. There had been but one at Hay Tower, in the hall, but their bedchamber above the hall had been so cold on many a winter's morning that the contents of the nightjar had frozen.

"Can I help ye?" she asked Nelly as the girl struggled to wrestle a round oaken tub from its storage space behind a small door.

"No, thank ye," Nelly said, rolling the tub before the fireplace. " 'Tis just getting it out 'tis tricky." She began emptying a line of buckets set up by the fireplace into the oaken tub. "The lads will be up with more hot water any minute now. It cools on the way from the kitchens, but that is why I have this big kettle over yer fire." No sooner had she spoken than there was a knock upon the door. At Nelly's bidding the door opened to admit a line of young clansmen bearing two buckets apiece, which each dutifully dumped into the tub.