Medieval 01 - Untamed

was going hunting.
    â€œAye, m’lady.”
    Meg watched the gamekeeper trot across the bailey to the gatehouse with gratifying speed. But the gratification, like the man’s speed, was short-lived.
    This fighting must end , Meg told herself silently. There will be no one left to bury the dead, nor any food for the living. One more year of meager crops will be the end of Blackthorne Keep .
    A sliding, changing pressure at Meg’s ankles distracted her. When she glanced down, Black Tom looked back up at her with feline intensity.
    â€œNot yet, cat. First I must see Duncan.”
    Black Tom stropped himself once more and walked off in the direction of the granary. Megwished him luck. She doubted there was enough grain inside the structure to lure a mouse from the meadow stubble’s skimpy food.
    Holding her simple head cloth and leather circlet against the searching wind, Meg started for the keep.
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    â€œT HE church will agree to your marriage,” Lord John said hoarsely. “All you have to do is take the Norman’s gold. And his life with it!”
    A savage smile transformed Duncan’s face, revealing the Viking ancestry that ran through Scots blood like lightning through a storm.
    â€œDone,” he said.
    And then Duncan laughed.
    John’s pale lips shifted in a smile that was colder than the stones of the keep. His bastard son was much like him in ways that went beyond hazel eyes and hair the color of freshly turned loam; both men were warriors who gave no quarter and asked for none.
    â€œSend word to the Reevers,” John said. “Have them blend with the wedding guests in the chapel. Then—”
    Abruptly words became a fit of coughing that wracked John’s frail body.
    Duncan went to the bed and slipped his arm around his father, helping him upright until the coughing passed. He held a cup of ale against the old man’s dry lips until most of the ale had been drunk.
    â€œYou should rest,” Duncan said.
    â€œ Nay . Listen to me. Whether I live or die, you must let the wedding go forward before more Normans come! You must! Only then will—”
    Coughing took away words and the will to say them. When John was once again quiet, Duncan gavehim more ale to drink; but this time he added two drops of the medicine Meg had made to alleviate John’s pain.
    â€œEase yourself,” Duncan said. “I’m listening. What have you planned?”
    With a surprisingly gentle hand, Duncan brushed back the forelock that had gone gray between one winter and the next as disease ate John’s strength.
    â€œGet Meg,” John said hoarsely. “I can say it only once.”
    â€œI’ll send for—” Duncan began.
    â€œThere is no need,” Meg said from the doorway. “I am here.”
    No longer was she dressed in the clothes of a cotter’s child. She wore a long inner tunic of soft rose wool and an outer tunic of forest green that was trimmed with a heavily embroidered strip of cloth. Unlike the tunics many women wore, Meg’s were closely fitted, for she had no patience with flapping cloth. Her narrow waist was wrapped about with a sash that crossed in back around her hips as well before being tied in front, further keeping folds of cloth from getting in her way when she worked in the herbal. The sleeves of the outer tunic were long and narrow, hemmed with more embroidery.
    â€œWhat did you want of me?” Meg asked.
    Her intense green eyes looked from Duncan’s muscular good health to the withered shadow that was her father. She noted the stopper out of the small medicine bottle and looked quickly at Duncan.
    â€œTwo drops only,” he said, knowing her concern.
    Her mouth flattened. “He had that much before mass.”
    Everyone in the room knew that the potion was very strong. Six drops sent a patient into dreamless sleep. Three times that could kill the average man.A person as frail as her father had to be given the medicine with great care.
    â€œNo matter,” John rasped. “If I die sooner, so be it. Listen well, daughter of Anna of Glendruid. You will be wed on the morrow, before the feast.”
    â€œWhat feast?” Meg said tightly. “Duncan forbade the gamekeeper to—”
    â€œSilence!” John coughed, but only weakly. “When the priest asks if you agree to the marriage, you will say no.”
    â€œBut—”
    John talked right over Meg, his voice as