Lyon's Gift Page 18

  And with that challenge, he left her to her curiosity and his manuscripts.

  CHAPTER 19

  “Tell him Leith Mac Brodie says we’re not leavin’ till we see our sister!”

  “Tell him yourself!” Lyon charged as he approached the armed gathering within his courtyard.

  His men parted, giving him room to enter the circle they’d formed about his mounted guests. He had to admire these bloody Scots, riding in as they had, just the three of them against his greater numbers. Christ, but these Highlanders were nothing if not fearless.

  “Damn you all to hell, Lyon Montgomerie!” the stockiest of them proclaimed. He charged his horse at Lyon, but his men moved forward at once, blocking him, and he jerked the reins back, bringing the horse to a protesting halt. “You have no right to take what does not belong to you!”

  “So says the man who now owns five of my goats and a bloody cow, as well!”

  “You started it, mon! You cannot thieve from us and not expect us to retaliate! And you cannot take our only sister in turn for a handful of bluidy goats and a milk cow!”

  “Who started this?” Lyon countered, unable to believe the gall of that single remark. It was his goat that had been discovered in their hands, not the other way around, as he recalled.

  “You did, Sassenach!” said the third Brodie.

  Lyon didn’t even feel the need to reply, ludicrous as it was. Damned Scots. “You’ve bloody short memories,” he said to no one in particular. “And who makes these rules?” he asked of Leith Mac Brodie. “Who dictates what eye is to be plucked for another?”

  “Honor makes them!” Leith Mac Brodie returned.

  “Whose honor?” Lyon contended.

  The two of them faced each other, neither relenting.

  “The fact is I caught your sister in the act of stealing from me,” Lyon told him. “I did no more than to arrest her.”

  “Liar!” shouted the bigger Brodie.

  Lyon turned to face him directly, his jaw taut with restrained anger. “No man has ever called me that and walked away with his bloody balls still attached to his body.”

  The impudent Brodie returned his glare, undaunted, his hand going to his sword. Lyon watched his every move but didn’t respond save to raise his hand when his own men drew their own weapons.

  “Aye?” the other man replied. “Well, Colin Mac Brodie has now! My sister steals from no one—no one, do you hear me!—not to save her own bluidy life! Speak that lie again, Sassenach, and you’ll rue every syllable to come from your mouth!”

  Lyon’s hand went reflexively to the sword at his belt. He flexed his hand upon the hilt, reminding himself that he was speaking to Meghan’s brother—reminding himself, too, that Colin Mac Brodie stood now for his sister’s honor. He’d like to think he’d do the same were the situation reversed.

  “You can call me a bastard,” Lyon told him as calmly as he was able, “because ‘tis the bloody truth. And you can call me a thief if it please you, as I’ll not mince words, but do not ever again call me a liar, Colin, or I’ll slice your goddamned tongue from your mouth and feed it to you with my fist. Do you understand?”

  Colin’s eyes burned with fury. “If that was said to strike terror into my bones, Montgomerie, then you failed! Give us Meghan, or we’ll bluidy well show you the meaning of terror!”

  “I’d have you remember where you are, Colin Mac Brodie,” Lyon apprised him. “Do not try my hospitality.”

  Colin spat viciously upon the ground. “Standin’ before a lyin’, thievin’, bastard Sassenach!” he answered. “That’s where I am!”

  “Colin!” Leith Mac Brodie barked at his brother. “Cease!”

  Lyon nodded at Leith. “Wise man.” He turned to Colin. “You should heed your brother, whelp.”

  Colin launched into an explosion of expletives.

  “Aye, he should,” Leith Mac Brodie interjected. “But dinna mistake me. I will be leaving here with my sister, Montgomerie. You have no bluidy right to keep her.”

  Lyon said naught; he merely removed his hand from his sword and crossed his arms.

  “I will not go without her,” Leith asserted.

  “Aye,” Lyon countered, “you will, as your sister is in my custody by David of Scotia’s command.”

  “To hell with David!” Colin hissed. “That Sassenach-lovin’ bastard holds no sway in these parts!”

  “Aye,” Lyon said, “he does, as he does with me.

  “Return Meghan to us,” Leith Mac Brodie persisted. “And we shall go and the bad blood be ended between us.”

  “Nay,” Lyon said, and uncrossed his arms. “I’ve decided that Meghan is the solution to our little dispute.”

  Leith MacBrodie urged his mount forward suddenly and approached him. Their gazes locked, held. “Solution?” he asked, coming to a halt before Lyon, looking down upon him with narrowed eyes. “What is it you are proposing Sassenach?”

  “I’ve decided to make Meghan my bride.”

  “The bluidy hell you have!” Colin Mac Brodie erupted.

  Lyon ignored him. “That should put an end to our disputes once and for all,” he pointed out, “as what is mine shall in essence be yours and what is yours shall in essence be mine. No more quarreling.”

  Leith Mac Brodie remained silent, scrutinizing him.

  “Meghan wants no husband!” Colin proclaimed, spurring his mount forward as well. “So you can bluidy well forget that, Montgomerie!”

  “I’ll not agree to such a thing,” Leith announced, after a moment’s contemplation. “Not unless I see my sister and she agrees to the same with her own lips. No other way, Montgomerie.”

  “Well,” Lyon said, “then you have wasted your time in coming here today, because Meghan is not seeing guests. She is indisposed, as well you know.”

  “Montgomerie,” Leith warned him, his lips thin with anger now, “I cannot force my way past your guards today, but hear me well... I’ll not rest until I see my sister where she belongs. And if you will not let me see her now as a show of faith, I will not promise to fight fairly. I will leave here, as you leave me little choice, but Meghan is my flesh and my blood and I’llna abandon her to you so easily.”

  Lyon ignored the prick of his own conscience.

  He wanted this too badly, he knew.

  “I am asking for a fortnight,” he said stubbornly. “Give me that time with Meghan, and thereafter I will allow her to decide freely. If she chooses to leave, she may go of her own accord. That is the best I can do.”

  Leith seemed once more to contemplate his request.

  “You expect us to simply abandon her here, Montgomerie?” Colin countered. “Knowing she is wounded and in need of us? I dinna think so, you rotten bastard!”

  “Return her to us, woo her properly,” Leith said.

  It was a reasonable enough request, but Lyon could not agree to it.

  “Nay,” he answered. If he returned her now, he knew, he’d never see her again.

  He needed time.

  And right or wrong, he was willing to wield his sword to keep her.

  “Sassenach bastard!” Colin spat. “Lay a hand upon my sister and I’ll do some slicing of my own!”

  Lyon met Colin’s gaze, assuring him, “I give you my word I’ll do naught to your sister she does not wish me to do.”

  The quietest brother rode forward then and whispered into Leith’s ear. The two spoke an instant, and then Leith nodded, and turned to face Lyon once more. “Your word?” he said. “And what assurances have I that your word is honorable, Montgomerie?”

  Lyon considered his answer carefully, and then spoke truthfully, as there was no other way with him. “None at all,” he replied, “save that I value honesty above all else.”

  Leith contemplated his words, and then announced, “Not good enough!” He motioned for his men to follow. “We’re going, but you’ve not seen the last of us, Montgomerie! My sister is not some beast to be bartered!” He whirled his mount about and spurred it a
way, forcing his way through the circle of Lyon’s men. “I’ll see her a bluidy auld maid before I see her unhappy!” he swore as he thundered away, his brothers at his heels.

  “Sassenach bastard!” Colin said and spat upon the ground as he followed his elder brother.

  Lyon watched them leave, and for the first time in a long time, experienced a twinge of guilt for his actions.

  It confused him.

  He’d done things in his life for which he should have prostrated himself upon the ground, and yet he hadn’t felt guilt then. He’d always done whatever needed to be done, with the least amount of brooding, because to dwell upon them brought madness. But this moment, as he watched Meghan’s brothers ride out from his courtyard, he felt a prick of conscience.

  It was as though Meghan Brodie, somehow, in the space of a single day, had revived him in whole, body and soul.

  It was as though he’d been slumbering and now reawakened—by a smart-arsed, canny-eyed wench who might or might not be mad, as well.

  He shook his head and turned toward the manor with the intention of returning to her, and then stopped and forced himself to turn around and walk away.

  He would go to her soon enough, but just now he needed time to think. Nor could he so easily face her after refusing her brothers so coldly.

  He didn’t particularly like himself at the moment, and he needed to determine why, when he’d felt far less remorse for much worse.

  Meghan completed the second essay, and forced herself to set the manuscript aside and contemplate it, before going on to the next.

  Sometime during the years in which the second essay had been written, Piers Montgomerie had ceased to exist and Lyon had been born. What had begun with noble cause—his pursuit of justice—had ended with a far, far different tone. Meghan had no notion what had happened to him, precisely, as he didn’t elaborate within his texts—perhaps naught at all and it was simply a consequence of the life he’d led—but he’d ceased to claim any noble incentives at all. In fact, he seemed quite resigned to his own avidity, and even irreverent when his pursuits conflicted with those of others. And the detached manner in which he spoke of himself within the text was both unapologetic and yet self-reproachful. In truth, had Meghan not read the previous essay, she might have taken him at his word: she might have believed him no more than an evil greedy knave, concerned only with his own personal gain. It seemed to Meghan, however, that he was not content to be what he was. It seemed to her that he had embarked upon a search and somehow had ended empty-hearted.

  He was testing his limits in an effort to... what?

  Had he lost something of himself along the way and tried to recapture it? Had he found himself numb and yearned to feel again?

  She knit her brows and pondered those questions. She couldn’t quite discern what drove him... couldn’t quite put together the two sides of this man.

  Still, she didn’t view him as wicked precisely, no matter that he thought so of himself.

  But there was still more to read, she knew.

  Perhaps, in truth, she would think so after.

  With her good hand, she lifted up the manuscript once more, set it upon her lap, opened it, and turned another page.

  The next essay was titled simply Plaisir.

  She wasn’t familiar with the word... Plaisir... plesir... plesur...

  Pleasure?

  Something like fluttering wings erupted from her belly and soared into her breast.

  Her heartbeat quickened as she turned the page and read...

  I am my mother’s son. I understand her too well to condemn her for her carnal vices.

  Her heart beat faster as she continued...

  I can deny it if I so choose, but the evidence lies sleeping now within my bed, her body bare and replete by my own body and my hands and mouth…

  Meghan’s heart tripped. How could she continue to read this essay, when it was so obviously a private matter? And yet how could she not?

  He wanted her to read it.

  Had dared her to, even.

  Beauty is my vulnerability, he wrote, and her heart leapt at the words. Curiosity bade her go on...

  ... has always been my weakness. Beauty turned my eyes from the university, my hands from justice, and my heart from piety. And in my covetousness I walked away and never looked back. And where is it I walk to? Where is it that I stand?

  Where is that boy who once yearned for knowledge and virtue?

  I doubt now his existence, as no trace of him seems to remain.

  Meghan paused, inhaling a quivering breath, her heart aching for the man whose words spilled like lifeblood upon these brittle pages. She caressed the bound parchment... feeling it beneath her palm... wishing it were the sweet face of that little boy of whom he spoke so distantly. She heard the confusion in his chosen words, the condemnation, too, and wanted to tell him that no man who agonized so, no matter how wrong his choices, could be so wicked as he believed.

  She took another deep breath, her heart pounding, and continued...

  If one must conclude that happiness is associated with the fulfillment of one’s nature, as Socrates suggests... then I should be well sated... and yet I am driven here once again to pour my words upon these pages in hopes that I should find that part of me which remains absent from my soul.

  While I cannot deny the physical pleasure my body receives in the carnal act, the satisfaction is fleeting. And I sit behind my papers now... knowing only too well that next time it will take so much more to bring back the trice of contentment which Eros brings.

  It makes me weary to think of it only.

  Plato, I think, claims Eros to be passionate rather than calm, and thus demanding, irrational, and even obsessive, and Protagoras observes it as one of the impulses that may overcome one’s knowledge of good. On this I can agree wholeheartedly, as I have experienced the above in full. But Eros defined it as the desire for the beautiful? I’m afraid this I must dispute, though my eyes and actions might call me a liar.

  In truth... I have wallowed in beauty like a swine wallows in cool mud, surfeited my body in ways to be delineated in this very text, shocking though the experiments might be, and it is my contention that Eros is far more than a desire for merely the beautiful.

  It is a desire for something more, as well... something which my soul understands, but my heart has yet to see.

  It is that which drives me from bed to bed, I think... and compels me again to leave.

  The truth is that I have yet to find true contentment in pleasure.

  Does that state of true contentment known as happiness exist beyond the realm of human imagination?

  If so, it is certain that pleasure and happiness are not equal as argued, for the separation is easily measured within the confines of the soul. And knowing as much... I cannot, in good conscience, return to the bed just now... even knowing what pleasures await me there.

  This descent into intemperance has left me deplete of desire.

  Her heart pounding fiercely, Meghan paused once more for breath. In reading, she’d entirely forgotten to breathe, so entranced was she by his heartfelt words.

  This was by far the most personal of his essays. None of the others had been nearly so revealing, nor had he spoken of himself in such a forthright manner.

  Why did he wish her to read this essay?

  Meghan would have buried such a manuscript ten feet under after writing it, in fear that anyone would know her most personal thoughts.

  Why had he simply handed it over to her so easily? Even dared her to read it?

  Was he trying to frighten her away?

  Surely not—not when he’d made so little pretense about wanting her for his own.

  What was it he wanted her to discover in these pages?

  She nibbled her lower lip, contemplating.

  Perhaps if she continued reading, she would learn the answers.

  Below the passage she’d read was a reference to works she had no knowledge of—by men
called Plato and Socrates. Some of their arguments, it appeared, he’d copied into the second notebook, and were therefore impossible for her to read, as she did not understand the Latin text. She turned the page, and gasped at the crude sketches which accompanied the detailed text. She stared wide-eyed at the raw drawings of man and woman in positions and acts that she would never have conceived of. Her breath quickened and her heart tripped.

  God have mercy upon her wicked soul, she could not stop now, no matter that she knew what next she would read...

  CHAPTER 20

  Lyon hadn’t meant to stay away so long.

  But neither had he been able to face her, lest he feel obliged to confess what he’d done. Sending her brothers away when they must have been worried sick after not seeing her for three days and then discovering she was hurt was certainly not the proudest moment of his life.

  Why the hell had he done such a thing?

  Had he fallen so far into iniquity?

  God help him, it was just that... for the first time in his life he wanted something so sorely.

  Meghan Brodie.

  Her name alone made him burn.

  She was becoming an obsession.

  It seemed he could think of naught else but her. In the time he’d known her, he’d abandoned his promises to old man MacLean, disappointed his sovereign, and now turned away worried kinfolk for fear they would seize her from him. What the devil was happening to him?

  He’d spent the morning alone digging a grave for a bloody lamb named Fia! And then had remained by the grave after burying the damned animal, swilling his ale under the high afternoon sun. His skin was blistered now, but the burn upon his flesh was nowhere near that which smoldered through his loins. The mere thought of her there... lying within his bed... reading his manuscripts... made his heart thunder and his blood blaze through his veins.