them to draw notice, as they would with their normal entourages. But Donald will need your safe conduct, since he is not welcome in the western Highlands, where he covets much land. When my lads arrive, I’ll send one to Perth to tell Rothesay you have agreed.”
“Aye, good. Now, just shout up yon service stair for my man, Conal, and ask him to show ye to your chamber. He’ll ken where they’ve put ye, and that way ye’ll not have to talk more with the women but can get right to sleep.”
Fin, feeling his weariness again, was more than willing to obey.
Stirling Castle
Robert Stewart, erstwhile Earl of Fife and now Duke of Albany, looked up from the document he had been reading when, with a single sharp rap, a gillie opened the door to his sanctum and stepped back to admit a visitor.
Still lanky and fit in his sixty-first year, his dark hair streaked white in places, but otherwise showing few signs of age, the duke continued as always to favor all-black clothing and obedient minions. In his usual curt way, when the gillie had shut the door again, Albany said, “What news have you, Redmyre?”
“We ken little of note yet,” Sir Martin Lindsay of Redmyre said. “He is still in Perth, but I have found someone from the area in question to aid us.”
“You may speak freely here,” Albany said, pouring him a goblet of claret.
The two men had known and trusted each other for years, because although the stocky Redmyre was younger by more than a decade, they shared like views on Albany’s right to power. They also shared a loathing for the heir to Scotland’s throne.
Redmyre accepted the wine, saying, “Right, then. I’ve found a man to watch Rothesay if he heads into the Highlands. And my chap, Comyn, has kinsmen who will aid us if it means stirring trouble for the Lord of the North. I ken fine that you have men listening everywhere, but are you sure Rothesay will make for Strathspey?”
“I am, because Davy drinks too much and then talks too much.”
“Aye, and wenches too much, by God,” Redmyre growled.
“Just so, but your sister is safe now, and her husband won’t dare to abandon her. I do not know that Davy will go to Lochindorb, but he does want help from Alex. In any event, Davy is unfit to rule this realm as Governor, and must be unseated.”
“Aye, then, we’re in agreement. I’ll report to you when I learn more.”
Albany knew that he would, and that Redmyre would exert every effort to bring Rothesay to book. There were others like Redmyre, too, who would help.
When Catriona, her mother, and Morag went upstairs to their bedchambers, they went together as far as the landing outside Lady Ealga’s room. Noting that the smaller room across from it showed no candlelight under the door, Catriona hoped that her grandfather had sent Fin to bed. He had looked woefully tired.
When she and Morag had bade Ealga goodnight and continued up the stairs, Morag muttered, “I hope your mam will be safe with that man sleeping there.”
“God-a-mercy, why should she not be?” Catriona said. “He is injured and exhausted, so I warrant he wants only to sleep.”
“Doubtless, James would agree with me,” Morag said stubbornly.
“Then I wish James were here, because if he was, mayhap you would cease to be so glum all the time,” Catriona replied, and was instantly sorry.
Her good-sister was not a close friend, but Catriona knew that Morag was unhappy at Rothiemurchus. Indeed, her unhappiness had long since persuaded Catriona that she never wanted to marry and have to live among strangers.
“I apologize, Morag,” she said sincerely. “I should not have said that.”
“Nay, you should not,” Morag said, passing her to go to her own room.
Letting her go, Catriona went to bed and lay contemplating the man she had met that day, wondering how it was that, having known him such a short time, she could feel as if she knew him well one moment and not at all the next, and how he had so easily stirred a temper that she thought she had learned to keep well banked.
She slept at last, and when she awoke, the sky outside her unshuttered window was gray. From her bed, it was hard to tell the hour, but it seemed earlier than usual, so she got up, wrapped her quilt around her to keep the chill off, and went to the window.