Page 2 of Lyon’s Gift (The Highland Brides #2)

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER ONE

“ T wenty-seven,” Baldwin announced, marching into the room where Piers sat poring over his new survey.

It was a lesson Piers had taken from old King William: one could hardly rule a land unless one knew precisely what one held to rule. Following William the Conqueror’s example, the first thing he’d done upon receiving this fief was to survey his holdings, meager though they might be. And it was a good thing, as it seemed his stock was dwindling quickly. He might never have known until they’d been seriously depleted.

Thieving, conniving Scots.

“Twenty-seven,” he exclaimed. Christ, but he didn’t know whether to be angry or amused. At last count—only yesterday evening—the sheep had numbered thirty-four. “When did those whoresons have the occasion to rob me again? I thought I told you to set a man to guard those mangy beasts?”

“The Scots?”

“Them, too, cunning bastards. But I meant the bloody sheep, Baldwin. The bloody rotten mangy sheep! I thought I told you to set a guard for them?”

Baldwin’s ears reddened. “Well...” His face twisted into an abashed grimace. “I did set a man to guard them, you see… but it seems I set a wolf to guard the sheep’s pen.”

“Wolf?” Piers lifted both brows. He couldn’t wait to hear this one.

Baldwin winced. “I appointed Cameron,” he said, looking shamefaced. “He was already keeping watch over his own sheep, you see, and I—”

“Cameron!” Piers exploded. “The arse who refused to leave his parcel and hut?” He tossed down his quill in disgust. “Damn it, Baldwin! Whatever were you thinking to put a thieving Scot to guard against his thieving kinsmen?”

“Well, I thought—”

“That he would give his loyalty to an Englishman over his own countrymen?”

Baldwin frowned. “Well, he did stay when the rest of them abandoned us,” he pointed out.

“Only because he’s a stubborn old coot who refused to leave his land to a bloody Sassenach. His own words, do you not recall? His behavior was certainly not born out of any sense of loyalty.”

“Aye, but it’s not what you think,” Baldwin said. “He merely fell asleep, is all. ”

Piers sighed and slumped within his chair, smacking his head in exasperation against the high back of his seat. He rolled his eyes, then stared up at the ceiling, noting its rotten condition for the first time.

He frowned.

How had he missed that before now? His chamber was directly above. He was going to have to fix that bloody ceiling soon, lest he plummet through the floor onto the table in front of him and find himself fare for the band of misfit Scots who had remained with this ruined demesne.

“My lord?”

Piers turned his attention from the rotting floorboards and eyed his longtime friend with a mixture of bemusement and displeasure. It seemed to him that Baldwin had taken to behaving less like a friend and more like an underling, and though this new manner wasn’t entirely without its merits, he was nevertheless uncomfortable with Baldwin’s unexpected attention to the proprieties. He much preferred the drunken companionability he and his men had shared in the years before his enfeoffment.

Christ, but he’d never expected to find himself lord—or laird, for that matter—and he’d certainly never aspired to it. It seemed wholly unnatural to him now to be fussed over as though he were some grease-lipped lord casting dinner bones to his dogs. He was a commander first and foremost. It had been his skill at arms that had won him this little piece of Highland hell, and he didn’t see the bloody need to change what had served him so well for so long. His men worked well beside him because they were foremost his fellows. He didn’t want, or need, a bunch of knock-kneed lackeys running about according him undue honors.

“Sire?” Baldwin’s tone clearly revealed uncertainty over Piers’ mood. “What is it you’d have me do?”

“You might first cease to call me my lord ,” Piers suggested, his tone unmistakably provoked. “And sire , as well, as I am not your bloody father either.”

Baldwin lifted his head in surprise. “Then what is it you’d have me call you... if not ‘my lord’?”

Piers thought the answer rather obvious. “What is it you called me before?”

Baldwin cocked his head a little uncertainly. “Lyon?”

Piers responded with a droll grin. He’d been given the name by his men after a particularly bloody battle; they’d said he’d appeared to them coming off the battlefield, with his long, gilt mane of hair and bloodied face, like a lion fresh after its kill. It wasn’t an honor he was particularly proud of, but he’d gotten used to the name after all.

Baldwin’s brows lifted. “But you don’t like that name?”

“I certainly prefer it to my lord .”

Baldwin’s lips curved into a companionable smile. “If that is your wish...”

“It is,” Piers assured him. “I’m no different now merely because I have a parcel of land to piss on. Why should we resort to ceremony after all these years? I didn’t like the damned name before and you hounded me with it anyway. Why not still?”

Baldwin nodded, his grin spreading from ear to ear. “I am relieved to hear you say so.”

“Are you now?” Piers was relieved as well at having settled the matter once and for all. Now wasn’t the time for maudlin expressions, as he still had these annoying, bare-arsed Scots to deal with.

And yet... strangely enough, though the Brodies had all but robbed him blind, it was a simple enough task to temper his anger against the thieving curs.

Why was that? he wondered.

Truth to tell, accustomed as he had become to the intrigues of court and the stealth of warfare, this matter of feuding seemed more like sport.

In fact, Piers could scarcely help but admire these Scots. They fought their battles fiercely, and by some strange code of honor that somehow appealed to him. They spat upon your boot; you drew your sword; they stole your goat; you stole their sheep; and so on and so on—though bloodshed seemed proscribed—and all of it done openly, as though thieving your good neighbor were the most natural and honorable thing to do. Thus far, not so much as a single beast had been harmed, though Piers had not enjoyed a moment’s peace since first he’d stepped foot upon these Highlands.

It was more than apparent that a bond of blood was as binding as a Scotsman’s honor would allow—that they defended kith and kin unto their dying breath.

It was also apparent that an outlander would always be just that... an outlander.

Well, Piers was perfectly accustomed to that. He didn’t need their bloody approval. David of Scotia might, but he sure as hell didn’t. He had grown up an outlander, didn’t they know it; his father was a king and his mother a whore.

And while his mother had slept in a different bed many a night, Piers had slipped away and curled beneath a pew in the chapel to close his eyes and dream of all the things he wanted in life. And he had wanted so much.

He had wanted to go away and study in one of those places he’d only heard speak of... He’d wanted to read until his eyes went blind... He’d wanted to learn things, and do things, and see things.

He’d wanted to know why the sky was so blue and the grass so green. He’d wanted to know what stars were made of, and why they burned so brightly. He’d wanted to know why his veins were blue while his blood was red. He’d wanted so much more than a bed on a cold, hard floor and to stand alone behind invisible doors... watching other children at play.

Though, in truth, why should he have cared if the other children were outside playing and laughing? Thanks to his mother, he’d been able to study with the Archbishop of Canterbury and that had been no trifling thing. He’d had every reason to be grateful and no reason at all to yearn for something so negligible as dirty knees or silly games.

“Damn it all,” he exclaimed, lifting up his pen and rapping the quill’s end upon the wooden table. “We’re going to show these bloody Scots that we can feud with the best of them.”

And enjoy it every bit as much.

That’s what it was going to take to win their alliance, he surmised.

Or not.

Either way, he would relish the sport.

Though at first he’d been taken unawares by their unanticipated raids, some part of him reveled in this honest form of warfare, where one’s enemy stood up to be counted, and one’s friends openly declared they’d as soon pluck out your eyes if they could profit from them. There was something particularly heartening in that unrelenting honesty.

Aye, he was perfectly pleased to play their games.

“These savages will not run us off this land,” he vowed. “Damn you for a witless arse,” he reprimanded Baldwin, though he knew his eyes didn’t quite conceal the smile he hid. “I should take the price of those beasts out of your hide, you realize?”

Color returned to the tips of Baldwin’s ears. “I wouldn’t fault you for it, Lyon,” he said, but neither did his smile vanish either. “So what would you have me do?”

“What else?” Piers grinned. “We steal the buggers back—and a few more for good measure.”

Baldwin smirked. “If I didn’t know better,” he said, “I’d think you were enjoying this.”

Lyon lifted a brow. “And you would probably be right,” he returned, rising from his seat and taking his sword from where he’d placed it upon the table before him. He slid it into his scabbard and winked good-naturedly at Baldwin. “Now, let’s go teach these Scots how to commit a proper thieving.”