Bride For A Knight Page 0,28

asked, feeling the walls beginning to close in on him.

"Because I have seen them, too."

Chapter 5

It wasn't just his father.

His bride had seen the ghosts, too. And her words kept gnawing at Jamie. Especially when they reached his family's chapel and churchyard and he spied all the richly carved grave slabs, the tall Celtic crosses, and other signs of lives long past. Each ancient, moss-covered stone bearing tales and stories. And some, like the mounded stones covering his brothers' graves, weren't moss-grown at all.

Jamie's breath caught as he drew rein and swung down, reaching out at once to help his bride dismount.

He tried to steel himself, striving to appreciate the beauty and stillness of this sacred place, but it was no use. Telling the sun not to rise in the morning would have been easier.

His brows snapped together in a fierce scowl and his mouth went dry. His heart split.

"We can leave now." A small hand touched his plaid. "It will make no difference to your brothers if you visit them this night or another," she said, the same note of sympathy in her voice that had so touched him earlier, in her father's hall.

"Truth be told, I vow it would please them more if you'd spend the time getting to know your father better. He is not the ogre I know you think he is. He - "

"He ought to have repaired the bridge," Jamie said, still frowning. "Had he not been so tightfisted mayhap my brothers - "

"Do you not think he suffers every night for such a remiss?" Aveline took her hand from his plaid, the warm look of understanding in her eyes cooling. "Can you not think more kindly of him?"

Jamie compressed his lips and ran a hand through his hair. He was trying to mend things with his da. Leastways, he was trying to help the man. But at the moment, the nine burial cairns hit him like a fist in the gut. Nine hard-hitting fists cutting off his air and knifing through him like fire lances. His insides churned and he would've sworn hot, smoldering coals burned in his chest. Now he knew why he'd put off coming here.

The pain was worse than he'd expected. Far worse. Cold rain and blustery winds were sweeping in from the west, but he paid scarce heed to the rough night. Even so, the finality of the combined scent of rich damp earth, leaf mold, and regret, almost knocked him to the ground. As did the unspoken echoes of words he wished he'd said and now would ne'er have the chance.

"Holy saints." He blew out a breath, more aware of his bride's pitying glances than was good for him. "If only I'd told them how much I loved them."

"They knew," she said, her voice revealing the thickness in her own throat. She stepped closer, reaching to touch him again, this time smoothing a fold of his plaid. "Their fondness for you was one of the reasons I knew I needn't fear our betrothal."

She raised her head and looked at him. "Your father loves you, too. He hides it well, but he does."

Jamie shrugged. Were they anywhere else, he might have hooted his disbelief. Or questioned her, for the possibility did give his heart a jolt. But here, in the windy dark of the churchyard, he could see only his brothers'

graves. He stared at them, feeling the weight of his sorrow bearing down on his shoulders.

A fierce, searing pain he'd endure gladly if only such suffering would undo the cause.

Certain his soul was ripping, he stared up at the heavens, seeking answers but finding only a scattering of cold, frosty stars and drifting, wind-torn clouds. The night sky stared back at him with all the chill silence of the hills and the thick-growing whin and broom bushes hemming the churchyard. The dread row of low, piled stones he knew held his brothers' bodies until their fine granite tombs and effigies had been readied for them.

Only he couldn't feel them here.

Not his nine full-of-swagger brothers who should have come strolling forward to welcome him home, their eyes alight and their arms spread wide. Loud, boisterous, and alive as he remembered them.

Jamie's mouth twisted and he clenched his hands, the hot tightness in his chest stopping his breath. He could think on his brothers all he wished, hearing their voices and seeing their smiles. But still they'd be gone. Already were gone - and well beyond where'er he might reach them.