Page 92 of The Scottish Bride
Flexing his shoulder against the pain, he went to find his horse.
She was temptedto take the dappled gray and ride out to search for Liam. Listening anxiously for his step, she peered through the little window again, but the stables behind the inn were quiet. With every moment, she grew more anxious.
Earlier she had enjoyed a bath, and thinking he would return soon, ordered food too. Servants brought a tray with a hot meat pie large enough for two, along with cheese, bannocks, apples,ale, even a jug of wine. She nibbled at some of it and covered it. Two servants had carried in a wooden hip bath and toted buckets of steaming water back and forth from the kitchen, and then the innkeeper’s wife had appeared to hand Tamsin a sticky ball of soap and some linen toweling. When the woman began to take the supper tray, Tamsin shook her head.
“My husband will return any moment,” she said.
Now she sat, still hoping to hear his step, his voice. Unwrapping the book again, she paged through, reading, trying to savor its simple beauty, knowing how much her siblings would enjoy it. Yet the quiet, the worry, were too distracting.
As the room darkened, she was grateful for three bright candles. A glance told her the stable yard was still empty. Her stomach was in knots now. Liam would not leave her alone this long unless something dreadful had happened.
Testing the bath water, finding it still quite warm, she stripped down and slipped into the water, hoping that might ease her nervousness. The pine-scented soap ball was gooey but lathered well as she bathed, washed and rinsed her hair. She stood to towel off. Still the yard was empty. The candles, slender tallow sticks, were burning down.
She was glad to have brought the leather satchel, which held a clean shift, her dark blue gown, and a comb. She was even more glad for something to do as she sat to comb out her hair. Its curl resisted the ivory comb, and its length, nearly to her hips, could be a challenge. But it took up the time.
She prayed softly as she worked through her hair. In the silence, her whispers seemed loud, her heartbeat louder, thumping out the worry she tried to keep at bay. Turning to the brazier to coax her hair dry, she loosely braided its golden gleam.
Then she heard sounds in the yard, but when she went to the window, she saw only shadows. Moments later, she heard a soft rapping on the door.
“Tamsin,” he murmured. “Tamsin, love, let me in.”
She flew across the room, turned the latch, opened the door. He stood in the dark corridor, face pale, and she grabbed his leather hauberk to pull him into the room. Sobbing, she threw herself into his arms.
Chapter Twenty-Five
His deep wince,as she tugged on his hauberk, startled her. “Liam, what is it? What happened?” She touched his face, ran her hands over his shoulders.
“It is naught. I am just glad to be here.” He shut the door and bolted it.
“Jesu,” she whispered, seeing the broken stump of the shaft jutting out below his shoulder, nearly under his arm. “You were arrowshot!”
“It will be fine. I will need some help to tend it, though. Ah, a bath. Good.” His voice was graveled, weary.
“Come here.” She took his other arm. “First we will get your things off.” She pulled at his wide leather belt as he worked at the fastening, then let it fall to the floor. She pulled at the sleeveless leather hauberk and the tunic sleeve beneath.
“Careful,” he said, sounding wooden and exhausted. Reaching up, he pushed back the chain mail hood, wincing.
“Sit, you are so tall. Let me help,” she insisted. Piece by piece, his things came away in her hands, though he protested at first. “You do not like being weak, do you? But let me do this.”
He allowed her to lift away the chain mail hood and capelet, then the quilted cap beneath, freeing his hair, damp and tousled. The heavy iron-studded leather hauberk came next, nearly tipping her balance as she set that aside with the other things. Then she helped him tug off his brown woolen tunic. When he sat in his long linen shirt and trews, the candlelight illuminatedthe blood, the torn fabric, the clump of leaves around the base of the ugly broken bolt.
“Is that yarrow? Good, it will help. Who shot at you? Tell me. Please.”
“Knights went after me over the moor, eastward. My fault—I stayed too long on open ground. One had a bow, thankfully not a crossbow, or I might not be here. But I made it to a patch of forest and lost them there. I waited until they were gone. I am sorry to have left you so long.”
“Hush, I was fine.” How simple an untruth could become truth. She had been worried, but she endured, she had been fine. And now he was here. “Awful men! Did Malise send them?”
“Likely so. But they were after me, Tamsin. Not you.”
“Why do you think so?”
“An old matter, I believe. Malise still burns over it. We do as well, my kin and I, but we left it behind. No wonder Edward favors him, seeing fury that matches his own.”
“Will you tell me what it was?”
“Someday, aye. Ow,” he said, as she leaned to examine his wound. She winced as he did, but summoned her courage and wished her sister Rowena was there, calm and knowledgeable, her very spirit soothing. Tamsin did not have that knack. But when she felt sure the bolt could be removed, she stood back.
“Boots,” she said. He bent to undo the lacings and the lower legs of his trews, then slid off the boots. His bare feet were long, knobby, strong, beautiful. “Stand,” she directed, and he obeyed. “Into the bath with you.”
