Page 47 of Highlanders for the Holidays
Epilogue
Leavingher Highland home to travel south with the Knights of de Ware, Ysenda had never felt so well protected. Of course, that hadn’t kept her from packing her own chain mail and weapons. Old habits were hard to break. It would be a long while before she’d grow to accept that she had an army of knights at her command and that her brother could take care of himself.
Caimbeul had certainly proved that upon their return to the castle.
Ysenda had had a lot of time to think on the way home from the well. Now that she was no longer beholden to her father, years of anger over Caimbeul’s mistreatment began to fester within her. All the laird’s past abuses—his mocking, violence, and cruelty—congealed into a single, hard knot of rage and injustice that stuck in her craw. With each step she took toward the castle, fury flowed hotter in her veins.
When they finally arrived at the keep to face her father, he was alone in the great hall and deep in his cups. His drunken sneer as the three of them approached only added fuel to the almost irresistible desire Ysenda had to pay him back for all the pain he’d caused.
But she’d held her tongue as Sir No?l explained that they wished to take Caimbeul with them to France.
Her father’s eyes lit up. “Ach, aye!” he crowed. “I’ve heard the French courts like to use dwarves and such for entertainment.”
Ysenda longed to curse her father for his brutal words.
But then she heard the echo of her mother’s voice. Above all, the warrior maid had taught Ysenda to maintain control of her emotions. Losing one’s temper was never wise. Besides, she and Caimbeul would leave soon and likely never see the laird again. There was no point in stirring up trouble. So she tensed her jaw against the urge to fire off a biting retort.
The laird eyed Caimbeul speculatively over the top of his cup. “Or maybe ye’re plannin’ to sell him along the way? The lad has a decent voice. No doubt a singin’ cripple could bring ye a good price.”
Ysenda clenched her teeth until they hurt. But she kept mentally repeating her mother’s advice. One must take a deep breath, harness all the anger, and choose one’s battles wisely.
The laird took a drink and then smacked his lips. “He’s probably got another five or six years o’ life at most. Still, ye’ll get your coin’s worth.”
That made Ysenda’s blood boil. But no matter how much she yearned to claw that smug smirk off of the laird’s face, no matter how gratifying it would be to tear the beard from his chin, no matter how her fist ached to…
Crack!
Ysenda lifted a brow as her father’s head snapped back under Caimbeul’s solid punch. The laird staggered backward, dropping his cup and clutching his nose.
As Ysenda stared in wonder, Caimbeul shook his bruised knuckles. Then he grinned in satisfaction. “That’s for a lifetime o’ sufferin’…Da.”
Those had been Caimbeul’s last words to the laird, who’d shuffled off to have someone tend to his bloodied nose. Ysenda had never been prouder of her brother. And she thought their mother would agree that he’d chosen his battle wisely.
Now they were headed to France—to freedom and to family. As impossible as it seemed, Ysenda thought Caimbeul looked taller as he traveled beside his new companions-in-arms. Perhaps he no longer felt crushed by the weight of his infirmity.
As for her husband, though his men laughingly insisted No?l was the ugliest of the de Ware brothers, Ysenda could not have been happier to be wed to such a handsome, kind, noble, brilliant, and honorable man. No?l had promised that when her father died, he and his men would return with Caimbeul to help him claim the Highland holding without shedding a drop of blood.
Their path from the keep took them past the Viking well. Ysenda requested a private moment before they continued on their journey to visit one last time. Gathering her cloak about her, she clambered across the snowdrifts until she reached the silvery stream and the crumbling stones of the ruin.
There, she ran her fingers over the ancient runes carved into the lid of the well. She whispered thanks to the lost lovers for granting her wish. Then she sent up a silent prayer of her own—that somehow, some way, no matter how long it took, the doomed couple might eventually have their own curse lifted.
By the time she returned to the company, the knights were speaking with a dozen strangers—travelers headed in the opposite direction. The band of ragged Highlanders said they were on their way to the keep of Laird Gille.
The wee lad at the fore licked his chapped lips and raised his beardless chin, boasting in his high, sweet voice that he was going to marry the bonniest lass in all of Scotland.
Ysenda’s brows lifted. But she wisely held her laughter. She wished she could see her sister’s face when Cathalin beheld the bridegroom she’d wanted so badly—all four feet of him.
Instead, she smiled up at No?l, whose lips were twitching with amusement. He gave her a wink, and she sighed with pleasure.
This was going to be, without a doubt, the best Yuletide ever.
