Edana was supposed to meet him here. She’d promised him right before the wedding ceremony that she would, but as the sun dropped lower and lower over the horizon, he began to question her loyalty to him.
While she’d spoken venomous words about Arran and his family, Tormod had seen Edana be quite friendly with Arran on more than one occasion. As the sun made its final bow against the horizon and night spread itself over the sky above him, Tormod stood to leave. Just as he stood, he heard Edana’s voice behind him.
“I’m sorry. I was delayed. What are we to do,Tormod? It will be difficult for us to meet now that I am married to him.”
He couldn’t have cared less about the tears she shed as she sat down next to him, burying her head in her hands as she wept. If he was to keep Edana’s interest and loyalty, he knew he must show her sympathy.
“Come here, lass. I doona wish to see ye cry. Yer marriage changes nothing. We shall be together as often as we can, and soon enough I will be laird.”
Edana lifted her head. With great difficulty, Tormod kept his face from showing his displeasure at her red, tear-stained face.
“How can that be? The men love Arran. They are glad to have him as laird and they willna take well to someone trying to take away his position.”
“Nay, they willna just now,” Tormod assured her. “In time we shall find a way to change their opinion of him.”
“How?” Edana collapsed into a fit of sobs once more.
Tormod stood, incapable of soothing the lass any further. “I doona know yet, but ye shall be spending much time with Arran from now on. Watch him, find something in his behavior that we can twist into an untruth, some way in which we can claim he did something he did not and make others believe that it is so. It may take some time.”
Edana sniffled, looking up and breathing deeply as if trying to stop her tears. “Aye, I shall do me best. Tell me, Tormod, I need to know, I fear ’tis the only thing that shall get me through every horrible moment I must spend with Arran. Do ye love me? Would ye wish to be with me even if it would no make ye laird?”
She stood and moved next to him. He pulled her in close, wrapping his arms around her as he kissed her on the top of her head. “Aye, o’course I do. I love ye as much as I’ve ever loved anyone.”
The second part of what he’d said was true, not that he’d ever loved anyone, save himself and perhaps his sister. The first, his declaration of love, was the lie, but it had slipped out easily. And perhaps he did love the lass a bit. At least, he loved what she would do for him and the power that would be delivered into his hands with her assistance.
Squeezing her once more in farewell, he pushed her away and waved her off to the castle.
“’Tis best that ye go. Yer new husband will be searching for ye, and we doona need to give him reason to be suspicious. I shall seek ye out after we have all arrived back home in a few weeks, after ye are both settled into yer castle.”
“I shall miss ye every moment that I am no with ye, Tormod.”
After she left him, he sat down on the rocks laughing quietly to himself. The lass was a fool to believe that he would care for her. He needed to find a way to destroy Arran soon. He didn’t know how much more of the pathetic lass he could take.
*
Early the next morning before the sun had risen, Arran snuck out of his room to retrieve his new bride from his late-mother’s bedchamber. All castle workers and wedding guests, Mary being the one exception, assumed the newly married bride and groom had spent their first night of marriage together, and that was just the way he wanted to keep it. It wouldn’t do if it was found out that neither of them had wanted to consummate their marriage.
After their wedding, Edana had briefly disappeared. When Arran finally found her, the marks of freshly run tears stained her face. He’d rushed her away to his bedchamber to comfort her, but she’d pulled away claiming her tears were caused by her fears of their wedding night.
While he suspected all new brides approached their wedding night with some anxiety, Edana’s reaction seemed to be caused by more than just nerves. Arran had already suspected that Edana’s father had harmed the lass in some way, but her apprehension for their wedding night only solidified his suspicions of just how monstrous Ramsay Kinnaird had been.
The lass’ fears aside, Arran was not eager to consummate the marriage either, his feelings for her being only of a platonic nature. Instead, he’d not questioned her, not pushed the ritual they were both expected to complete, but ushered her quietly down the hall to the safety of her own room.
Arran knew the consummation would have to be completed, but that could come in time, when the bonds of friendship were a little stronger between the two of them. For now, he would simply collect her from her room, and together they would make their way to the stables where they would meet with his new clansmen so they could begin their journey to the new Conall Castle.
*