Page 55 of Highland Sword
“Robert Wemys.” Isabella said the name slowly. She tilted Morrigan’s chin up and looked into her eyes. Her thumb gently wiped away fallen tears. “I saw the way you reacted to him. You’re not the person you were before they brought him to Dalmigavie. Would you like to tell me what he’s done to you?”
She knew. Morrigan felt a sob rise into her chest and expand, filling her with sharp pain. This time she let it go. Her anguished cry had been held in too long. It was a cry silenced for nearly a decade. The tears that followed could not be stopped. She didn’t try to hold them in.
Isabella’s arms encircled her protectively. Her body shook as she wept, but this loving woman didn’t tell herto hush. She didn’t ask any questions or demand the story. She simply held her tight and allowed her to empty out the agony.
When Morrigan tried to speak, to share the horror of her past, it was her decision. Shewantedto speak. Isabella was her mother and sister, protector and friend. Morrigan trusted her. She felt safe with her knowing. In Isabella’s eyes, she’d never be less of a person once the ugly truth was spoken.
“I was twelve years of age,” she began. “My mother had passed, and my father was at a loss as to what to do with me, I think. He took me to Perth and left me with my maternal grandparents. We’d been to their house many times when my mother was alive. He assumed I’d be better off away from the city. I’d grow up near uncles and aunts and cousins. I’d have family around me. He thought I’d be safe.”
Morrigan pulled out of Isabella’s arms and stabbed at the tears on her face.
“Wemys is my mother’s younger brother. I knew him from the time I was very little. I was happy to see him when he came back to Perth to visit his parents.”
She’d been so innocent and trusting. She’d listened to his stories and been entertained by him. Impressed by him. He seemed to have traveled everywhere. He knew important people. He was clever and drew pictures with his words so easily. She never imagined someone could hurt a member of their own family. She never thought he would. She let her memories pour out. There had been no sign, no warning of what was to come.
She tried to continue, but she couldn’t. Her throat had squeezed shut, robbing her of the ability to breathe. Isabella’s eyes shimmered with tears, but she waited.
“I woke up one night and he was there… in mybedroom… on top of me.” Her voice broke, but she forced herself to continue. “Even now I remember the smell of whisky and smoke. I couldn’t move. He held me down. He forced me. I tried to scream for help, but he had his filthy hand over my mouth. And when he was done, he told me I was to say nothing. If I was so stupid as to go crying, he’d deny it.”
Morrigan didn’t know if she was the one who reached for Isabella or if it was the other way around. But she was once again enclosed in her protective embrace.
“His family would never believe me, he told me, if I accused him. They’d throw me out on the street.”
Even now, nine years later, she still lay awake in bed at night, listening. She should have heard him coming. She should have been prepared to do something. How could she have been so naïve? So trusting? So weak?
“I’m so sorry this happened to you, my love.”
The rush of words could not be staunched now. She had to say them all. “I ran away that same night. I took my bag and my coat and left my grandparents’ house with only a few coins in my purse.”
Morrigan knew where she was going. She had to get back to her father. He was the only parent she had left. The only person in the world she could trust. She walked all night and most of the next day. She caught the mail coach at an inn in some village. She sat eyeing every person she saw, fearful they meant her harm. That they knew her secret, and that shame… that guilt… terrified her. She was alone and vulnerable. Before she reached Edinburgh, she swore she’d never be defenseless again.
The two women sat on a bench side by side. Morrigan spoke of her worries and vulnerability, of a child who was lost.
“I was exhausted when I finally arrived at our house inthe city. By then, my father had received a message from my grandfather that I’d gone missing. But he had no idea why.”
“Did you tell him?”
The words hitched in her chest. “I had to. I felt so… so broken. I needed help.”
Isabella leaned her forehead against Morrigan’s. Their tears mingled and landed on their joined hands.
“What did he say? What did he do?”
“He said he was going to fix it. He was going to take away my pain.” As if hecould, she thought bitterly. “He took me to a husband and wife, close friends of his in Edinburgh. People he said he trusted like no one else. I was to stay there until he returned.”
“He went to Perth?”
She nodded. “I never saw him with such rage. When he packed his pistol, I knew what he would do. He intended to go and kill Wemys. Part of me was happy. But I was also afraid. He was so angry. I worried that he’d never come back.”
By the time Archibald Drummond arrived at Perth, Wemys was gone. No one knew where he’d disappeared to or when he’d return. Morrigan never knew if her father told her grandparents what was done to her. Or what had caused their twelve-year-old granddaughter to run away in the middle of night. Or why was it that he was angry enough never to speak to them, or go back there, or say their names ever again.
“He neverfixedit. He couldn’t. How could he take away my pain? My fear? After he came back, his solution was for us to forget it. To pretend it never happened. He thought I’d heal with time. We moved. And we moved again. That’s how we ended up in Wurzburg.”
Isabella caressed her back. She kissed her brow. “Sixyears I was married to your father, and he never told me. But I’m here for you now.”
They stood together, wrapped in silence and each other’s arms, for a long time.
“What do you want to happen now?” Isabella asked finally.
