Fallen: A Medieval Scottish Romance (The Sisters of Kilbride Book 3) Page 7

  Coira frowned. “It depends on how yer wound is faring.”

  “Take a look at it then.” Craeg sank back against the pillows and pushed down the coverlet covering his bare torso.

  After a moment’s hesitation, Coira moved close to him. Even injured and weakened, this man had a strong physical presence. His chest was broad and heavily muscled, with a light dusting of dark hair across it that narrowed to a thin strip at his belly. And that strip then disappeared under the waist band of his breeches.

  Coira hurriedly averted her gaze. It wouldn’t do for a nun to stare at a man’s groin, even if it was clothed.

  Stepping forward, she removed Craeg’s bandage with deft, practiced ease. Observing the wound to his flank, Coira relaxed a little. She had packed the arrow hole with a poultice of woundwort, and it had done its work beautifully, withdrawing the evil humors from the flesh. The wound no longer festered, and it was beginning to heal.

  Coira glanced up, catching Craeg’s eye once more. “It looks like it is mending well.”

  Craeg’s mouth lifted at the corners. “Thanks to ye.”

  Coira smiled. This man had a warmth and charisma that was hard to resist. No wonder he had inspired a band of loyal followers—men and women who lived as fugitives simply because they believed in him.

  I’d believe in him too.

  Catching herself, Coira straightened up.

  Mother Mary, what a foolish thought.

  Coira set her jaw and began to clean the wound. Fatigue had clearly turned her witless this morning. She then reached for her basket and extracted a small wooden pestle and mortar. “I need to mix up some more woundwort,” she murmured. “Just to make sure the injury doesn’t sour again.”

  “I should leave,” Craeg said after a pause. “My band is waiting for me … if I don’t reappear soon, they will think I have died here.”

  Coira glanced up to find him watching her, his expression shuttered. “Ye are gaining strength,” she replied, holding his gaze, “but ideally ye should rest for another day or two before moving on.”

  A muscle bunched in his jaw. “I don’t have a day or two. My brother still hunts me … I can’t stay here.”

  “I’m aware of that … but if ye leave before ye are ready, all my work will be undone.”

  Silence fell between them for a long moment, before Coira moved to the small table next to the bed and lowered herself onto a stool; it was hard not to groan as she did so. Her knees felt as if they belonged to a crone this morning. Trying to ignore her aching back and legs, she transferred a handful of fresh herbs to her mortar. She then began to mash them.

  “The hatred between ye and MacKinnon,” she said finally, as the hush drew out between them. “It runs deep?”

  He huffed a bitter laugh. “Aye … deeper than most realize.”

  “Clan-chiefs sire bastard bairns all the time,” Coira pointed out as she continued to mash the woundwort into a paste.

  “Aye, but few threaten the order of things,” Craeg replied, his voice lowering. Coira could tell from his tone that he didn’t want to continue this conversation. But, glancing up at him, Coira’s interest blossomed further.

  “How so?” she asked.

  Craeg’s face tensed, and Coira instantly regretted the question. What was she doing interrogating the man anyway? It was best she knew as little about him as possible, best that she healed him and then got rid of him.

  “I see ye know of my origins,” he said, a wry tone creeping into his voice.

  Coira nodded. These days, there were few folk in this territory who didn’t know that Craeg was the result of Jock MacKinnon plowing a whore. The story had often been told at The Goat and Goose during Coira’s time in the brothel. Years earlier, Craeg’s mother was said to have worked there before succumbing to consumption.

  “I grew up in a brothel,” he said, glancing away. Did she imagine it, or did he seem embarrassed by this admission. “While Ma worked, it was my job to clear tables, empty hearths, and run errands for the woman who ran the place.”

  Coira tensed. Maude. “Were ye ill-treated there?” she asked softly.

  Craeg’s mouth twisted, although he shook his head. “Not particularly … I was seen more like an annoying hound that gets under everyone’s feet. Although as I grew into a strapping lad, I had my uses. It became my role to throw out any patrons who became violent or mouthy. Maude—the woman in charge—kept me on, even after Ma died … and that’s how I met my brother.”

  Coira stopped mashing the woundwort, her breathing slowing. She hadn’t heard this part of the story.

  “Our father continued to visit The Goat and Goose, even after Ma died,” Craeg continued. His gaze looked past her now, as if he was no longer seeing his surroundings, but his old life. “And one day he brought Duncan along … so that his son might bed his first woman.” Craeg paused there, his gaze snapping back to the present. He favored Coira with a harsh smile. “It was hate at first sight.”

  “He knew who ye were?”

  “Aye … everyone in Dunan did.”

  Coira swallowed hard before picking up the mortar and carrying it over to Craeg. Perched on the edge of the straw-stuffed mattress, she began packing his cleaned wound with the paste. She wished now that she hadn’t been so curious about Craeg’s past. Even the mention of Duncan MacKinnon made a chill shiver down her spine.

  “Our father didn’t help matters,” Craeg continued, a bitter note in his voice. “He acknowledged who I was … in front of Duncan … deliberately provoking him.”

  Coira’s chin raised, her gaze narrowing. “Why would he do that?”

  “He wanted his son—his legitimate son—to prove himself, I guess. He wished to see if Duncan would be threatened by me … and he was.” Craeg paused there, his eyelids fluttering closed, his face going into spasm. Coira knew that although she was trying to be gentle, she was hurting him as she applied the salve.

  “It’s alright, I’m almost done here,” she murmured.

  Craeg nodded, and she saw that sweat had beaded upon his forehead. She didn’t know how the man thought he was going to get up and walk out of here today. His injury, and the sickness that had followed, had seriously weakened him.

  “We fought once, in the brothel,” Craeg said finally, his voice rough with pain. He continued to keep his eyes shut, his big body tense while Coira completed her ministrations. “He was rough with one of the lasses, and she was in tears. I confronted him downstairs, and he attacked me.” A smile curved Craeg’s mouth then, unexpectedly. “I split his lip, blackened his eye, and sent him away.” The mirth faded as quickly as it had appeared. “And that was when the tide turned against me.

  “Until then, I’d been liked in Dunan … but as the months passed, the mood changed. Vendors refused to serve me at market, women spat at me when I passed them on the street, and when business slowed at The Goat and Goose, I was blamed. I’d just passed my sixteenth winter when I found myself living rough, sleeping in alleyways and begging for crumbs. No one in Dunan would give me a job.”

  Coira sucked in a breath. She knew what hardship was, what it was like to look hunger in the eye. The outlaw didn’t realize how much she understood what he’d gone through. “Why didn’t ye leave?” she asked finally.

  Craeg’s eyes opened, and for a moment their gazes fused. “I eventually decided that I would,” he replied softly, “on the day my father died, I realized that there was no future for me in Dunan. Duncan, who was eighteen at the time, would become clan-chief, and what little protection I’d had from him would be gone. But that last night, as I scrabbled for scraps of bread to feed me on the journey I planned to take north into MacLeod lands, Duncan and a group of his friends found me.”

  Craeg paused there, scrubbing his face with his fist. Coira realized then that this was a tale he rarely shared with anyone. Even though it had happened a long time ago, it clearly still pained him to dredge up the memories.

  “One against six isn’t good odds,” Cr
aeg said, his tone wry now. “They beat me bloody, and then Duncan drew his dirk and slashed me across the face with it.” Craeg reached up, a fingertip tracing the fine white scar that ran from his temple to his cheek, skirting his left eye. “They then dumped me in the river outside Dunan and left me for dead.”

  “But ye didn’t die,” Coira finished the story for him. “And ye have plagued Duncan MacKinnon ever since.”

  Craeg flashed her a hard smile, his gaze gleaming. “Aye … and I will continue to do so until I draw my last breath.”

  Craeg watched the nun pack up her supplies. Her movements were deft and purposeful, matching the resolute expression upon her face.

  He drank her in.

  He’d missed her last night. When one of the other nuns had tended to him, he’d been disappointed. As much as he hated to admit it, Sister Coira had gotten under his skin.

  Why else would he have been so candid with her?

  He rarely spoke of his past. Telling the tale of how his half-brother had nearly killed him still left a sting of humiliation in its wake. That humiliation had fueled his need for vengeance, and he felt it again now.

  He liked the way Sister Coira listened to him, the understanding and compassion in those lovely eyes. She lived a sheltered existence here behind the walls of Kilbride, yet he’d sensed that she grasped exactly how difficult his upbringing had been. There had been no shock in her eyes when he’d spoken of his quest for revenge.

  Somehow, she understood.

  Ye shouldn’t be lusting after a nun, his conscience needled him as he continued to observe Sister Coira. She had almost finished tidying up and would soon leave him alone. Ye shall go straight to hell.

  A grim smile stretched Craeg’s lips then. Luckily for him, he wasn’t a pious man. As a lad, he’d regularly gone to the kirk to pray. Father Athol had been good to him, had given him soup and bread when his mother was too busy to feed him. Yet despite the priest’s best efforts, Craeg had never embraced God. Maybe he’d seen too much ugliness already, even as a lad.

  “Sister Coira,” he said finally when she picked up her basket and moved toward the hanging that separated his dark space from the rest of the infirmary. “Would ye stay with me a while longer?”

  She halted and turned to him, her eyes widening. “I shouldn’t really,” she murmured, favoring him with a half-smile. “I have chores to do.”

  “Just for a wee while?” he replied, returning her smile. He knew he could be charming when he wanted, although Sister Coira seemed immune. “I’ve spent too much time alone of late … it sends my thoughts to dark places.”

  Her expression softened at this, and her gaze shadowed. Once again, he got the feeling that she understood him better than anyone ever had. How was that possible?

  “Very well,” Sister Coira said softly, setting the basket down on the end of the bed and moving toward the stool. “I suppose I can spare a little time.”

  9

  Ships in the Fog

  “CRAEG CAN’T REMAIN here.”

  The tension in Mother Shona’s voice made Coira glance up from the psalm she’d been reading. The abbess closed the leather-bound history volume perched upon her knee. She then fixed Coira with a level look.

  “It’s been over a week … he has to go.”

  Coira let out a soft sigh. “He’s still weak, Mother.”

  “That may be, but the abbot is showing no signs of leaving. Just this morning he informed me that he wishes to inspect all the buildings within the abbey to ensure ‘good practices’ are being upheld.

  Coira’s belly tightened at this news. “How long before he or his monks venture into the infirmary?”

  “Exactly.” The abbess’s small frame bristled with indignation, her brown eyes hard, and her jaw tight. Her outrage at Father Camron’s interference was palpable. The two women sat in the abbess’s hall. It was a cool, grey afternoon, and Vespers was approaching. Often, Mother Shona spent this time alone, but over the past few days, she’d asked Coira to join her.

  Coira wondered if it was to keep her out of trouble, and out of the abbot’s way.

  “I’m sorry about that incident … with the quarter-staff,” Coira said after a pause. She hadn’t properly apologized to the abbess about that, although she’d meant to. “It was a foolish thing to do. I wasn’t thinking.”

  The abbess sighed, leaning back in her chair. Her gaze shifted to where a single lump of peat glowed in the hearth. It was proving to be a cool summer, and without a fire burning, the air inside the hall would have been unpleasantly chill and damp. “I don’t blame ye, Sister … it’s hard to break a routine ye are used to. But unfortunately, Camron is sniffing around like a hound on the scent, looking for anything that will damn me.” Her gaze shadowed. “And sooner or later, he shall find it.”

  Alarm fluttered up under Coira’s ribcage. It was unlike the abbess to sound so defeated. “No, he won’t,” she said firmly. “He will stay on a few months, like he did last time, and leave Kilbride empty-handed.” She shut the book of psalms with a ‘snap’. “Ye are right … even if he still has some healing to do, the outlaw has to leave. I will see to it this evening.”

  Mother Shona fixed her with a wary look. “Be careful, Sister. The abbot’s monks hide in shadows and listen at open windows and doorways. If ye will take Craeg out of here tonight, ye must wait until well after the witching hour.”

  “Make sure to leave the gates ajar,” Coira replied with a nod, her pulse accelerating as she contemplated just how careful they’d have to be. There was only one way in or out of the abbey. “We will have to leave quickly.”

  “I will ask Sisters Mina and Firtha to keep watch on the gates tonight,” the abbess replied, her brown eyes narrowing. “They will let ye know when it is safe.”

  The two women watched each other for a long moment, and Coira noted the lines of strain on the abbess’s face—lines that hadn’t been there a year earlier. The troubles with Ella and Leanna had taken their toll upon her.

  A chill settled in the pit of Coira’s belly then, a foreboding. For years, Mother Shona had managed to keep the rest of the world at bay. Kilbride had grown strong and prosperous under her guidance, and they’d been able to help the folk of this corner of the isle as a result.

  But now, the defenses that the abbess had built were starting to crumble. Mother Shona knew it, and Coira felt it too—the sensation that control was slowly slipping through their fingers.

  The future of this abbey now teetered upon the edge of a blade, and it would take very little to topple them all off it.

  The wind moaned and sighed against the stone walls of the infirmary, and made the roof creak. The noise was reassuring, for Coira had worried that it would be a still evening, one of those nights when the slightest noise traveled. Even so, the waiting was stretching her nerves to breaking point.

  Restless, Coira shifted upon the uncomfortable stool and spared a glance at the man who sat upon the edge of the sleeping pallet.

  Clad in the cleaned vest and braies he’d arrived in, but with a new woolen cloak about his broad shoulders, Craeg was dressed and ready to go.

  He looked as on edge as Coira felt, his hands clenching and unclenching, his jaw tense.

  “How much longer?” he asked finally, his voice a harsh whisper.

  “Sister Mina will arrive soon,” she replied, hoping that would be the case. “We wanted to wait until we were sure everyone was abed.”

  “But surely no one is awake at this hour?”

  Coira huffed. “Ye would be surprised … the abbot and his monks like to keep us all on our toes.”

  Craeg frowned at this news. “He’s determined to find something to discredit the abbess, I take it?”

  “Aye … and that’s why ye must go tonight.”

  They fell silent again while the wind continued to whine and rattle. Over the past days, the silences between Coira and Craeg had often been companionable. After he’d told her the brutal story of exactly why he h
ated his half-brother, Coira had felt an odd kinship toward the outlaw.

  He had no idea of her own history with MacKinnon, or of her past at all, but knowing that they’d once lived under the same roof—albeit during different timeframes—made her feel as if this man understood her a little.

  His mother had been a whore, after all.

  A lump rose in Coira’s throat, her body flushing hot and then cold. Even after a decade away from the brothel, a sickly sensation still swept over her whenever she thought about her previous life.

  Will I ever outrun the memories?

  Coira’s breathing started to come in short, fast breaths as her chest tightened. She wanted to run right now. It was torture to sit and wait like this. Time inched forward, and just when Coira decided she would have to get up and start pacing the cramped space of the alcove, she heard a gentle thud of the door.

  “Sister Coira?” Sister Mina’s voice reached them, low and urgent. “It is time.”

  Wordlessly, Coira rose to her feet, took the quarter-staff that she’d rested against the wall, and motioned to Craeg. He stood up, his attention shifting to the weapon she held loosely at her side. His gaze widened questioningly, for he hadn’t noticed it till now, but Coira ignored him.

  It was best he didn’t know Kilbride’s secrets.

  Pushing aside the hanging, Coira led the way into the main space of the infirmary. Sister Mina awaited them by the door, a small figure outlined against the shadows. They followed her outside into a blustery night, shutting the door quietly behind them.

  The wind had a bite to it, cold for mid-summer, and clouds raced across a mottled sky. A waxing half-moon hung above, casting the world below in a silvery light.