The Rogue: A Highland Guard Novella (The Highland Guard) Read online

  Elizabeth looked so worried, Izzie almost felt guilty for misleading her as to the source of her illness. “I do hope you aren’t coming down with something serious. I don’t want you to miss the ceremony tomorrow. I need you there.”

  Izzie’s stomach lurched at the thought; she feared her paleness had turned a little green. “Me, too,” she said with halfheartedness that she hoped her cousin would attribute to her illness.

  An illness that, as it turned out, did last through the betrothal ceremony.

  Elizabeth pretended to understand, but Izzie knew her cousin was hurt by her absence. Izzie wanted to be there for her—truly she did—but she just couldn’t do it. Maybe she was a coward, maybe she was selfish, maybe she wasn’t ready to accept the truth and wanted to delude herself a little longer, she didn’t know. But she couldn’t stand witness to Randolph binding himself to her cousin and pretend it didn’t matter. Pretend it didn’t hurt. Pretend that she didn’t want him for herself.

  So she stayed away, tending her wounds in private, while her cousin tried to convince them that she hadn’t made the biggest mistake of her life. Izzie and Joanna weren’t fooled; the only question was how long Elizabeth could continue to fool herself.

  The day after the betrothal ceremony, Izzie had “recovered” enough to join her cousin and Joanna on a prewedding shopping trip up and down the high street of Edinburgh.

  She even managed to enjoy herself and feel no more than a tiny prick of jealousy when Elizabeth started picking out fabrics for her wedding gown. Izzie was back to her wry, good-natured, lighthearted self and firmly back in her supportive cousin position.

  She’d made too much of it, Izzie told herself. She’d been swept up by passion and confused into thinking it might be something more. Randolph was a real-life hero, for goodness’ sake. What woman wouldn’t be a little overcome by his attentions?

  She was like Annie. He’d made a woman who didn’t think she’d ever have a faerie tale feel like a princess for a few days, but it hadn’t been real. And it certainly wasn’t anything to build a future on. Even if they had more in common than she realized, even if he’d surprised her that day at the pond with his kindness and playfulness, even if he wasn’t as unfeeling as she’d thought, and even if there was more to him than the “perfect” knight, he still wasn’t for her.

  She didn’t want to live her life on stage as the wife of a legend in the making. She didn’t want to always have to dress perfectly, with no hairs out of place, and be worried about what she said. She liked the quiet of the countryside and the calm of hearth and home. She liked to read before the fire and sit by candlelight dreaming up ways of improving the castle. She liked to make wry observations from tables below the salt, not sit at the high table and have to glitter and entertain.

  She had almost succeeded in convincing herself it was for the best. But then, two days after the betrothal and four since Izzie had last seen Randolph (not that she was counting), Elizabeth came bursting into her room in tears and told her what Randolph and Thom MacGowan intended to do.

  It changed everything.

  After the meeting with Douglas on Monday morning, Randolph had kept his word and sent for Elizabeth. When he stumbled awkwardly through the proposal (he was glad he didn’t need to feign romance with Elizabeth because his mind had gone blank with anything lighthearted and charming to say), and managed an only slightly less awkward kiss that evening, which was possibly the most chaste one he’d ever given and felt like he was kissing his sister (thankfully he’d managed not to shudder), he told himself it wasn’t anything to worry about. It was just the lingering irritation toward Izzie.

  Aye, he knew exactly who he had to blame for the way his heart started to race at the oddest times, how his mind felt as if some of Sutherland’s black powder had gone off inside, why he broke out into a cold sweat when he’d said his vows, and the way his stomach seemed to be constantly twisted in knots.

  He was furious with her for putting him in this position. She’d made him feel as if he was doing something wrong—as if he’d made some kind of mistake. But Izzie expected too much, damn it. What else could he have done?

  She would see; it would be better for her this way. It would only hurt her more when he couldn’t give her what she wanted.

  He would tell her exactly that, but… Where the hell was she?

  He finally had asked Elizabeth while they were seated at the dais for the betrothal celebration feast.

  Sick? Was she all right? He hoped Elizabeth hadn’t noticed that he’d nearly jumped up from the bench when she’d told him.

  If she did, she didn’t comment. But she seemed to sense his concern; she put her hand on his arm with a smile. “I do not think it is anything serious. But it is kind of you to ask. I know you and Izzie didn’t get off to the best start, but I hope that you will be friends. She is very dear to me, and I think once you get to know her, you will like her. I’m hoping she will come stay with us for a while after we are married.” Good thing she wasn’t looking at him so she didn’t see him blanch. Good God! Not a chance in Hades. “She is very smart and witty. Even at a very dark time in my life she could always make me laugh and see the ridiculous in things.”

  Randolph didn’t say anything; he didn’t need to. He understood well enough. The lass had managed to make him smile while shoveling shi—dung, hadn’t she? Not to mention pushing him into a damned pond. He forced his mind away before he started remembering what else had happened at that pond.

  Damn. He adjusted his braies. Too late.

  This was crazy, damn it. He shouldn’t be thinking about her. He was going to marry her cousin.

  Randolph tugged at the neck of his surcoat, having that can’t breathe feeling again. A cold sweat broke out across his forehead and his heart started to race. He grabbed his goblet and took a long drink of wine. He hadn’t made a mistake, damn it. And even if he had—which he hadn’t—it was too late to do anything about it.

  Fortunately, Randolph didn’t have long to dwell on it. His attention was diverted elsewhere. On Wednesday, the day after the betrothal ceremony, the king had called him in for a special council meeting. It seemed that MacGowan had figured out a way to implement Randolph’s idea to climb Castle Rock after all. He’d somehow got the idea to modify a few steel spikes that he would hammer into the rock and use to span the twenty-five foot stretch of sheer cliff face that had made climbing the cliff impossible.

  At least it had been impossible—until now. Randolph knew that if MacGowan could pull this off and lead him up the rocky cliff to take the castle, it would be the kind of miraculous feat that would equal, if not surpass, Douglas’s recent taking of Roxburgh and ensure Randolph’s place in history. His name would be uttered in the hallowed echelons of other great military heroes, men renowned as great tacticians. English leaders such as Richard the Lionheart, William Marshal, and their old enemy Edward Longshanks; and Scotsmen like William Wallace, Sir Andrew Murray, James Douglas—blast it—and Robert the Bruce.

  The king agreed to let them try, and the plan was set in motion. On Thursday night (or Friday morning, depending on how you looked at it), Bruce and a group of men would stage a diversionary attack at the south gate of the castle to draw the garrison away from the wall, while Randolph led a small group of climbers up after MacGowan to scale the north face of Castle Rock and surprise the soldiers defending the gate from behind.

  No one overestimated their chances. Even with MacGowan’s spikes, they didn’t have much of one. The climb could fail.

  Or worse.

  That they could die, Randolph understood, but with military immortality on the line (not to mention putting an end to the cursed siege), the risk was worth it.

  At least that’s what he thought until he did nearly die.

  When the night in question came around, miraculously MacGowan’s spikes had held. After hammering them into cracks in the rock at three-foot intervals, the skilled climber had been able to make it past the twenty-five-f