Page 46 of Laird of Flint
They traveled in silence after that, focusing on the dimly lit path.
By the time they descended and emerged upon the field again, the Boyle brothers could be seen snoring away on the hillside, surrounded by the cattle.
By the time they reached the woods at the entrance of Dunlop, Hew figured the visitor had already departed and returned to the monastery.
He nodded toward the castle, whispering, “How will you get back in?”
“I can steal past the guard.”
“He must not be a very good guard.”
“I may have spilled aqua vitae into his beer earlier,” she confessed.
He raised a brow. The lass’s lovely and innocent face clearly concealed a devious mind.
But she instantly turned back into a supplicant angel with guileless eyes, beseeching him, “Pray take good care o’ Hamish.”
He could no more refuse her than he could turn down a challenge to battle. “I will.”
She gave the beast a final squeeze of farewell. Then she glanced at Hew. He wondered if she meant to give him a hug goodbye as well.
But she only nodded. “On the morrow, I’ll send someone to the monastery with coin for his hay.”
Then she whirled away.
“Come along then, Hamish,” Hew said, threading his fingers through the coo’s shaggy hair to guide him down the road.
Each step away from Dunlop was fraught with more misgiving.
As with most of his plans made in the heat of passion, Hew hadn’t thought anything through. He’d only wanted to return the smile to the lass’s face.
Now he was saddled with a huge hulking coo stolen from the local laird. A useless animal he could neither sell nor butcher. A male beast he couldn’t even claim he’d purchased for milk and cheese. Going to a monastery that had no ferme or cattle of its own.
What would he tell the abbot?
Where would he say he got the creature?
Where would he pasture it?
And where would it sleep?
He shivered. As cold as it was, it was tempting to let Hamish curl up with him in his cell.
And not for the first time, he wished he’d taken thecooto Dunlop and brought theladywith him.
Chapter 9
It was still dark when Hew roused to the sound of the normally silent monks gathering to pray at matins. Tonight, however, their soft footfalls were accompanied by a low rumble of murmurs which slowly grew into a rolling thunder of exclamations.
With a sigh, he sat up, scrubbing at his gritty, sleep-deprived eyes. He wrapped the coverlet around himself and prepared to face the mob. He’d hoped to catch a few more hours of sleep before this confrontation. But it was apparently not meant to be. The abbot would want to know immediately why on earth there was a coo in the cloister.
It was tempting to claim it must be a miracle. Clearly, God had seen how the monks suffered from a lack of meat and had gifted them with provender on the hoof.
But he’d promised Lady Carenza he’d keep Hamish safe.
So he had to come up with a different story.
Hew hated lying. It was dishonorable. Cowardly. Sinful. And it felt like a lie told in a monastery was more damning than one told on less holy ground.
