The Sixth Labyrinth (The Child of the Erinyes Book 4) (7 page)

In her imagination he dropped to his knees, overcome with emotion. Kissing her palms, he expressed undying love. She must leave with him this very day and become his wife and ally, his partner in the trials of living. Like Theseus and Antiope, the great Amazon queen, they would remain loyal, passionate until death forever separated them….

Depending, of course, on which version of the myth one learned. The one where Antiope died defending Theseus and Athens against an Amazon army, or the version where Antiope survived, only to be betrayed and murdered by Theseus after he decided he wanted to marry the daughter of the Cretan King Minos.

Morrigan and the dominie had spent much time discussing the myths and tales from ancient Greece. He’d told her she knew more about those old stories than most anyone else in Southwest Scotland, including Carlisle. She was his prize student, and she reveled at the gleam of pride in his regard. She was careful to never breathe a word of how often she was skelped for getting home late, or how she had to hide the books he gave her then sneak them into her bedroom after her papa fell asleep. When Douglas put an end to her schooling she had wept bitterly for weeks. The dominie even came to the inn to personally try and reverse Douglas’s decision, but his efforts had failed.

She saw her father exit the barn and gesture to her brother. They spoke, and then disappeared within. When Nicky reemerged, he waved at her.

“Help Da, will you?” he said. “The foal’s coming. I’m away to fetch the veterinary.”

At last! Leo’s foal out of Cloud, their finest mare. Morrigan ran to the barn, leaving the sheet she’d been washing half in and half out of the tub. She couldn’t wait to see it. Sometimes when she sneaked away and everyone thought her traipsing the moors she was actually in Leo’s warm stall, tucked in the hay near his enormous front hooves. She liked to read to him while he crunched his oats. He’d nod his massive head, nickering like he understood. Now his first foal was coming. It would be so fine if Papa would let her halter-break it.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Douglas left the stall, latching the door behind him.

“Nicky told me to help you.”

“You’ll try any excuse, won’t you? Prancing about like a bloody princess.” His fingertips ground flesh against bone as he grabbed her arm and bent, his stale breath laden with the aroma of boiled turnips. “God, what will it take to break you of that?”

She stared into his unblinking eyes, longing to scream at him. But she kept her mouth closed, forcing down her resentment. Long ago she’d learned that defiance made matters much worse with Douglas Lawton.

Something changed in those grey depths. There was an odd intensity she didn’t understand. His gaze dropped. His hand tightened, pulled her closer, too close, before he drew in a breath and shoved her away.

“Get back to your washing. This be men’s work.”

She ran from the barn, rubbing her arm. Fury and hate coiled in the pit of her stomach.
Damn him
. She was so tired of his contempt, the way he always looked at her like he wished she were dead.

She scrubbed the bedclothes as if the Devil himself writhed under her fingers. Dizzy breathlessness brought an explosion of starbursts through her eyes, and an uncomfortable stuttering of her heartbeat. No, she would not swoon. No, by
God
, she would not.

It was that crazed bitch hiding inside her making all this trouble. Morrigan always had to choke down her rage for fear of repercussions. The wild inner girl, though, never suppressed anything. Morrigan felt her seething, cursing, throwing things.

The old delusion spewed… crystallizing into images of worldwide carnage and a suffocating drench of blood.
No
, she thought.
Push it away. Drive it out. Don’t see it. Refuse to hear it. It’s merely a picture, not real
.

The eagle brought her back. Lodged in the silver birch at the edge of the close, its yipping cries penetrated the screams and moans of her hallucination. It fluffed its magnificent wings and hopped about in anxious fashion.

Next was the vicious stinging. She stared, breathing hard, for a moment not comprehending how she’d come to be crouched on the dirt, her trembling hands immersed in warm water. The sheet lay mangled, a great tear across the middle. She’d ripped two of her nails on the washboard clear into the quick. Blood mingled with the soapy water, turning the froth of bubbles pink.

CHAPTER FOUR

MORRIGAN ROSE FROM
her laundry when she spotted the vet and his son, Kit. Kit and Nicky had met long ago at the school on High Street, before Douglas insisted Nicky needed no more education. An impatient scholar at best and tired of the dominie’s eternal haranguing, Kit had stopped going as well. He’d skipped classes more often than not in order to paint his pictures, and blamed the dominie for being too pinheaded to teach him what he needed to learn.

The vet and Nicky disappeared into the barn, but Kit paused to wave when he saw Morrigan, and veered towards her.

She took a few deep breaths and labored to present a calm demeanor as she dabbed at her torn fingernails with a cloth from the laundry basket.

“What’ve you done, lassikie?” With a snort of laughter, he held up her wounded hand, glancing from it to the torn, blood-spattered sheet still draped across the washboard. “You’re a hopeless excuse of a woman. It’ll be a miracle from God himself if you ever find a husband.”

Snatching her hand from his grasp, she said, “Papa won’t let me help with the foal,” and tried to swallow a cloying suffocation in her throat.

He bent and kissed her cheek. “Wee simplehead, to him you’re a scullery wench, and Nick his ploughman. Don’t you understand he’d rather shove bamboo in his eyeballs than allow you a moment’s pleasure?”

Euphoria swelled through her chest, submerging the rage and dread.

From the moment Nick first brought his new mate home, thirteen years past, to sample Beatrice’s girdle scones, Morrigan had fallen hard. Ever since that day, Kit of the gangly arms and bold brown eyes teased her mercilessly, but some instinct she didn’t quite trust had marked changes in his behavior over the last year or so— the same sort of change she’d seen in almost every other male, young and old. His teasing had acquired an edge; she’d caught him eyeing her in a way that made her nervously aware of odd things always taken for granted… the way inhaling lifted her breasts… how breezes caused her skirts to frolic at her ankles. Somehow his furtive observations kindled a desire to preen and parade, though she never did, not having a clue how to do it and too afraid of being laughed at.

She was sure they belonged together, though he hated Scotland.
What can a body do with himself in this damned country?
he often complained.

Her cheek burned where he’d kissed her. She longed to return the kiss, forget tiresome manners and self-restraint. They must marry and run so far away she’d never again see her father’s scowl. Somehow Kit would make his fortune. They’d live like kings, sleep till gloaming, and dance through the night.

She swayed closer. He put a steadying arm around her shoulders and laughed into her upraised face, but the moment was ruined by Beatrice’s voice, echoing from the kitchen door like a thunderclap. “Stop bothering that silly besom. It’s plenty of trouble she’s found herself in this day without you to make it worse.”

Kit would never risk vexing one of Stranraer’s finest cooks. “I’ll away to this birth, then. Don’t let him spoil your day, you daft nuisance.” With a meaningful backward glance and cocked brow, he whistled, “My Love She’s But A Lassie Yet” as he sauntered off.

Ibby returned soon after, red-faced and breathless with her recent triumph. She seized Morrigan’s wrist and pulled her into a hug. “Mr. Ramsay sends his best wishes. He said you’ve too much work to do, and should have some help. I knew it would happen. What a fine catch, Morrigan. He’s aye rich, and you’ve seen with your own eyes how handsome he is, and kind. I didn’t want to embarrass him so I said nothing before, but he’s commonly known in the north as ‘Laird of Eilginn.’ It’s not a formal title— nevertheless, when he marries, his wife will locally be called
Lady
Eilginn.”

“Oh, Auntie.” Morrigan blushed, wondering if she’d ever felt as mortified. Thank God she would never see him again. It would be too, too awful.

* * * *

The night beckoned with lingering warmth and soft breezes. A fine colt had been born, long-legged, according to Nicky, blood-bay like his sire. Since she’d first heard Cloud was expecting, Morrigan had eagerly awaited the arrival of Leo’s offspring, and she would see him, with Papa never the wiser.

An hour passed. Morrigan paced to her bedroom door and edged it open. Grating snores echoed through the corridor.

Holding her breath, she crept down the stairs and let herself out. Above her, a milk-white crescent moon rested on a vast bed of diamonds. Warm dirt muffled her footsteps as she ran across the close. Victory infused her, made her feet as light as elf-wisp. She’d fooled the old man, and could spend the whole night with the foal if she wanted, while Papa snored— but the sight of the open barn door stopped her cold. Yellow lamplight flickered within and she heard quiet voices.

Poised to flee if she recognized her father’s gravely rumble, she inched forward. But it was Nicky. A laugh followed.
Kit
. Kit, of course. One of them idly plucked the strings of some instrument, creating a harmonious sound.

She stepped through the gap.

“You’re daft, you know,” her brother was saying.

“No, you are,” Kit replied, “to think you could ever be anything but half-starved and penniless if you stay here.”

“I’ll not starve, and I won’t be penniless. I’ll have respectable work with
The Scotsman
, while you’ll be freezing in the wynds of Paris. You couldn’t choose a more miserable profession if you tried.”

“Tell me again what you’ll be doing? Writing about rich old women and giggling debutantes?”

“Shut your bloody gob.”

“I can see you covering the Winter Ball to Benefit Our Puir Masses.”

Morrigan stepped into the circle of light, startling Kit, who leaped from his bale of hay; his father’s prized mandolin slipped from his lap and struck the floor with a raucous jangle, prompting a horrified gasp from Morrigan. She could only hope the fact that it fell on straw saved it from damage.

Though his father would have his head if the mandolin came to harm, he barely glanced at it. “Hist,” he cried, his eyes traveling over her. “I thought you were a ghost.” Coming closer, he bowed and offered his hand like a gentleman, then ruined it with, “You’re no’ dressed properly, you floozy.”

He’d be right about that, since she wore nothing but her nightgown. “It’s the dead of night. You’re the one who shouldn’t be here. I want to see the foal, and I won’t be put off.”

They obediently led her to Cloud’s stall. Morrigan fed the mother lumps of sugar she’d filched and stroked the colt’s velvety black nose. He stood on spindly legs, eyes bright, droplets of milk clinging to the baby whiskers about his mouth.

“You smell so new,” she said, kissing him.

The lads said
Och
, and
Females
, and returned to their whisky.

“Sing to us, Morrigan,” Kit called, his words half-slurred.

“Whisht… you’ll wake Da,” Nicky said. “Do you want a dishing?”

“Bollocks! I’m sick of your da. You treat him like he’s God in Heaven, and he’d never lay a finger on me. He can’t afford to lose the good will of the only veterinary in Stranraer.” Kit wandered back to the stall. “Morrigan, come away.”

“I don’t want to sing.” She stepped out of the stall, now self-conscious. “I’ll go.”

“Aye, well. I’ll sing to you then.” Kit placed the whisky bottle on the bale of hay with great care, picked up the mandolin and gazed into the rafters, weaving like a ship’s captain caught in rough seas.

“
Bonny wee thing, canny wee thing,

Lovely wee thing, wert thou mine
….”

A thrill fluttered through Morrigan’s breast. The way he lowered his gaze from the roof to her eyes, the way his brows lifted, made it clear he was singing to
her
, sending yearning and wishes from his soul to hers. His mouth moved softly over each word as though caressing a lover’s face.

“
Wishfully I look and languish

In that bonny face o’ thine
…”

She opened her mouth, wanting to say something… but she didn’t know what.

“
… And my heart it stounds wi’ anguish
,” he finished, “
Lest my wee thing be na mine
.”

He strummed a few more chords. Their eyes locked. Then he leered, and the spell was shattered.

“What you’ll never do, Christian Lindsay,” she said, “is sing on key.” Yet her taunt sounded weak and shaky.

Man’s love for woman. It stirred anticipation… for caresses. For ardent promises.

She pictured the warrior. He could throw a spear straight and strong— decapitate an enemy without care or emotion. Yet he could also kiss a woman’s lips with unparalleled tenderness in the dark green of a summer night.

How she wished the fantasy could be real.

“I asked you to do it, didn’t I?” Kit said. “Would you care to dance instead?”

In truth she was a simplehead. Where was the sense in languishing over an imaginary lover when right before her stood this fair fellow with warm hands and canted smile? She could see and touch Kit. He’d be here tomorrow, the next day, and the next, waking and sleeping. He was
real
.

“Let me do the singing,” Nicky said, “else the dogs’ll howl and poor Burns’ll rise from his grave and curse us.” He cleared his throat and strummed the mandolin. When had he learned to do that?

“
Wit and grace and love and beauty
…”

Kit caught Morrigan’s hands and pulled her into the yellow wash of lantern light. He watched her, eyes half-closed, the hint of an indecipherable smile on his lips.

“
In ae constellation shine
…”

Holding up the hem of her nightgown, Morrigan followed his lead though he stumbled twice and trod on her foot.