Blue Bells of Scotland: Book One of the Blue Bells Trilogy (25 page)

"You said you didn't want Amy hurt. I understand." She thrust herself forward, bosom first. "But Amy's not here, and you're hurt." Her hand shot up to his temple, pushing the hair aside and touching the deep purple bruise. Another tingle shot through him. He pushed her hand away. "Let me take your mind off it." Her eyes slid coyly in the direction of the bedroom, her lips curved in a bewitching smile.

Niall took a deep, steadying breath. Could a woman really be so blatantly offering things any man dreamed of? She was. And she was beautiful.

Beautiful like the Barns of Ayr. The English had promised a council of peace there, and instead threw a rope around each Scotsman's neck, as he entered, till three hundred of Scotland's finest twisted, like ribbons dangling in a tree, from the rafters. He rubbed his throat. He couldn't look Allene in the eye again if he betrayed her trust. "I'm sorry," he said, turning her toward the door. "I don't remember you." He twisted the gold door knob.

"I could help you remember." Her voice caressed him like a summer breeze. The Barns of Ayr, he warned himself, swallowing.

"No, thank you," he said. He pushed her out the door, closing it firmly behind her.

* * *

Back on his knees, beside Shawn's bed, Niall forced his mind from the encounter with Caroline, to his prayers. "I lean on Thee, Lord God, for the wisdom I lack. I pray Thee provide for my people, now I've failed them. Guide me in all I do today, help me to do Your will, and get back to Hugh."

He sighed. Only God could possibly know what he needed, or how to get back where he belonged. Rising, he crossed to the window in the sitting room, pulling back the lace. Outside, morning sun skimmed across the manicured lawn, stretching away to a grove of trees, and a brick wall with a wrought iron gate surrounding the gardens. He reviewed the possibilities once more, but there was no escaping the awful truth. He was seven hundred years outside his own time. He dropped onto the periwinkle cushion in the window seat; his forehead fallen on clenched hands, incapable of even forming a prayer. "Thy will be done," he whispered. "Though I confess I do not like Thy will over much right now." He crossed himself, and lapsed into silence, listening for God's voice.

After a half hour, he rose, more unsure than he'd ever been in his life, of what the day would bring. He went back to the wardrobe in the bedroom. He'd barely finished dressing, struggling with the tiny buttons, when a knock sounded on his door. He fastened the last button and called, "Enter," hoping it would not be Caroline again.

Amy came in, her heavy, black hair falling free to her waist today. She wore a more modest shirt, and a swirling skirt, below her knees, although still showing far more, even, than her ankles. "How are you feeling?" She looked his clothes up and down. He wondered what he'd done wrong.

He bowed to her, relieved she had stopped blushing at proper courtesy. Obviously, Shawn had not been genteel. He rather thought Shawn a fool, as well, failing to appreciate what he had in Amy. "I am well," he told her. "Your doctors have wonderful medicines." The festering of the MacDougall's arrow was healing much more quickly than such a wound normally would.

She nodded, pausing as if framing words, and then said, "You might want to put on something more casual."

"Casual?" He did not understand the word

"You don't need to wear a dress shirt to breakfast or rehearsals. Especially with jeans." Her mouth twitched. He suspected she was laughing at him. "Here, try this." She led him across the sitting room to his bedroom, opened a drawer in the chest, pulled out a black woven shirt, and tossed it to him. The gesture reminded him of something Allene would do. "Why don't you change?"

He did so as quickly as he could, trying to hide his discomfort with working the small, unfamiliar buttons. He glanced up guiltily, and saw, though she said nothing, that he hadn't fooled her. He turned his back to peel off the dress shirt.

"Got shy all of a sudden?" Amy asked.

He didn't answer. The shirt fell away, and she gasped. He spun back quickly, startled.

"What happened to your back?" Her hand covered her mouth.

"My back?" The scars from the whipping were a distant memory to him.

"You didn't have scars on your back."

"No, I didn't," he agreed. "It was.…" His choices flashed through his mind like lightning. How important was it for these people to believe he was Shawn? He had Shawn's life and power at his disposal to cope in this world and get back to his own. Would he be locked away as a fraud, or mad, if he now claimed not to be Shawn? "It was running through the trees. They scratched my back...they...I was in the woods."

"What were you doing in the woods?"

He spoke as the future laird he was. "Whatever happened in the castle, I dinna ken."

"You dinna ken? You mean you don't know?"

"Aye." He chastised himself for forgetting the proper words. "
Yes.
I was in the woods seeking help." He stared her in the eye firmly before yanking the new shirt over his head. "Now, I need to see Conrad."

"But those scars are...." Amy started.

"It's fine. Do you ken...do you
know
...where Conrad is?"

"But how could trees...?"

"I'm fine," Niall snapped. "I do not wish to discuss it. Do you know where Conrad is?"

Amy rolled her eyes. "Same old Shawn. You'll have a hard time finding him this morning. He might be with Peter doing arrangements for those new pieces you offered to do. Maybe down at breakfast, but not for long. Anyway...it's good to see you feeling better. I guess. People are really worried about you. Rehearsal starts right after breakfast."

Niall studied her. She was bonnie, with her long black hair, fine creamy skin, and large eyes of midnight blue fringed with heavy, dark lashes. Clearly, she and Shawn had been close. And yet, not betrothed. This Caroline, now, with her obvious expectation of a hasty roll in the hay: he wondered that a woman apparently of good breeding by her looks, dress, and speech, should exhibit such common, scaffy behavior. The castle's blind beggar could see what relationship she had had with Shawn.

But Amy seemed to actually care for him, whoever he might have been. Goodness knows why. It was obvious Shawn had been involved with others. And it could be seen from Amy's own behavior that she was unused to proper treatment from Shawn. A real lout, he must be. A churlish oaf who unwittingly charmed a few, earned money for the rest, and thus mistakenly thought himself a man of stature. Yet here was Amy by his side, asking nothing of him.

"You ready?" she asked. "I guess you don't need your trombone if you're playing harp."

"I guess not." He pulled the door shut behind him, barely thinking of the coming rehearsal, and hopeful of finding Conrad soon.

* * *

Conrad was, in fact, everywhere and nowhere, impossible to pin down.

Niall found himself pulled along to breakfast by Rob and a shorter man, who came down the gilded hall as he and Amy left the room. "Forget Conrad. He's busy!" said Rob. He turned to Amy, taking her elbow. "What were you doing in his room, Amy?"

"He needed help," she said.

"Not from you."

"Nothing you need from Conrad right now, is there?" asked the shorter man. "You'll see him at rehearsal."

"He's got a lot of adjusting to do to the program for you." Rob's voice was as chilly as the loch in spring.

Niall's effort to turn and follow a glimpse of Conrad down a hall was thwarted, as Conrad disappeared around a corner, and Rob yanked him on. "Plenty of time later! Let's eat!"

Niall found himself swept down the wide red-carpeted stairs and back to the huge dining room, dragged into the growing line at a table flowing in white cloths and laden with food. Someone pushed a plate into his hand. He was so surprised at the expectation that he serve himself, that he didn't see Conrad at first. When he did, he started toward him. Rob yanked him back. "Utensils, Shawn!" he barked. Niall stared blankly at him.

"Unless your new persona includes eating with fingers," said the other man, dumping a pile of metal objects on his plate. Niall jumped at the clatter. Several others laughed. He swung his head to where Conrad had been. Conrad was gone.

"Come on, Shawn, you're holding up the line! We know you move faster than that!" someone yelled from behind. A group of men laughed. Across the buffet, Caroline grinned at them. Niall looked fruitlessly around the room again, before giving up and moving forward. He heaped his plate with the table's abundance, not recognizing half of it, and moved with the flow toward a white-clothed table full of men, all jostling and laughing and asking questions at once as he seated himself.

"They say you got yourself shot with an arrow!" one said.

"A little chilly in that castle overnight?"

"A little chilly between him and Amy, more to the point." They laughed and nudged each other.

"When did you learn to play the harp? That's not what you were really doing with Celine last month."

"And when," interrupted Rob loudly, "did you start eating garnishes?" He poked his fork at something green and leafy on Niall's plate.

Conrad appeared suddenly at Niall's elbow. "
Blue Bells
as the finale. The solo in the middle...."

"Conrad, I must...."

"Megan will sing with you on Sheebeg Sheemore and the other one, the one about the traitor."

"I need to...."

"Got all that? We'll talk at rehearsal." And Conrad plowed away through the tables. Niall jumped up to follow him, his eyes chasing him frantically through the crowded room. His chance to reach Hugh was slipping away. He took a step, and came up short, Caroline blocking his way with a red-nailed hand on his chest.

"You never mentioned the harp," she purred. Niall stepped to the left. Caroline stepped with him. Niall stepped to the right. "When you were showing me all the other things you can do," she said, and stepped with him.

The men hooted.

Niall looked across the room. Conrad had disappeared again. Amy, at the buffet, was watching. He sank back in his chair, Caroline's hand still on his chest. "Not now," he snapped.

She pulled her hand away. "Later," she whispered, and blew him a kiss. "When you're feeling more yourself."

* * *

Tension crackled over the table through the meal. Dana threw morose looks at him and whispered occasionally to Amy, who whispered back and cast him furtive worried glances. Rob spoke stiffly to Niall only when necessary, and continually tried to catch Amy's eye. Niall did not understand Rob's antagonism. He had seemed, at first, to be Shawn's friend.

Niall crossed himself and bowed his head over folded hands, giving thanks. He heard a whisper or two. Finishing, he looked up to see people staring. Caroline, at the next table, frowned, feathery eyebrows dipping close over cornflower eyes.

"When did you start praying?" Dana asked.

"Nice touch," Rob muttered. "Saint Shawn. He's playing you, Amy. I told you he would. Don't believe him till you get that ring back."

Niall turned to Amy for some understanding of the hostility. Amy stared back with something less than kindness, and said nothing. The silence grew awkward, as the four of them glanced at each other uncomfortably over their meals.

Rob followed Amy to the buffet when she rose for seconds, and Niall noted the way he leaned in close, his hand on her back, whispering intently, and throwing hard stares back at Niall. She shook her head vehemently, and moved away from him, her lips clamped, her eyes dark.

* * *

After breakfast, Niall followed her out of the dining hall, torn between relief at the meal being over and annoyance over the time the rehearsal would consume. The musicians trailed out to a gigantic silver beast, and climbed, laughing and talking, into the maw on the side of its head. "Go on, Shawn," said the man behind him, when he stopped. "Never seen a bus before?"

"Leave him alone. It's the head injury," said Dana.

The others seemed unconcerned about diving inside the beast. So Niall followed, forcing down the quivering of his stomach. The inside of the giant was lined with cushioned benches. Niall took the first one he came to, and sat, planning his day. He'd talk with Conrad. Amy seemed distressed at the thought of skipping centuries. But maybe, being a leader, Conrad knew things she didn't. Maybe, when he explained, Conrad would have a quick and easy answer, maybe even a tool or weapon to help him save the Scots at Stirling.

Amy and Rob squeezed through the narrow aisle. She met his eyes only briefly, and followed Rob.

As the bus rumbled to life, Niall closed his eyes against the ill feeling in his stomach. It was just a giant car, he realized. Nothing to worry about. He opened his eyes to see his own face grinning at him, from one of the paintings that festooned half the buildings of Inverness.
Shawn Kleiner,
he read;
The Best of Scotland!
Shawn gamboled in a meadow of heather, wearing his tartan. He held the sackbut to his mouth. His eyebrows lifted high; his eyes opened wide in delight and angled toward a buxom auburn beauty dressed in a similar tartan and playing bagpipes. She appeared to have something quite different from music on her mind, Niall thought. He lifted his eyes to heaven and closed them again. He didn't want to see any more of this ridiculous bampot of a man.

* * *

In the great hall, Amy pulled an instrument from a black case. It must be this century's version of a lute, Niall thought, noting the strings running up the long neck. But she tucked it under her chin, rather than holding it before her, and drew sound from it with a bow, rather than by plucking. She seated herself just back of Celine's great harp.

Conrad proved equally difficult to pin down at the rehearsal. He was, Niall thought, the king of his castle, in command, and everywhere at once, issuing orders, making adjustments and giving snap decisions like Wallace in his glory at the Battle of Stirling Bridge. Niall was rebuffed with, "In a minute, Shawn," and, "Not now," and, "Go warm up."