Page 44 of The Handfasting

As Ysenda stared in wonder, Caimbeul shook his bruised knuckles. Then he grinned in satisfaction. “That’s for a lifetime o’ sufferin’…Da.”

Those had been Caimbeul’s last words to the laird, who’d shuffled off to have someone tend to his bloodied nose. Ysenda had never been prouder of her brother. And she thought their mother would agree that he’d chosen his battle wisely.

Now they were headed to France—to freedom and to family. As impossible as it seemed, Ysenda thought Caimbeul looked taller as he traveled beside his new companions-in-arms. Perhaps he no longer felt crushed by the weight of his infirmity.

As for her husband, though his men laughingly insisted No?l was the ugliest of the de Ware brothers, Ysenda could not have been happier to be wed to such a handsome, kind, noble, brilliant, and honorable man. No?l had promised that when her father died, he and his men would return with Caimbeul to help him claim the Highland holding without shedding a drop of blood.

Their path from the keep took them past the Viking well. Ysenda requested a private moment before they continued on their journey to visit one last time. Gathering her cloak about her, she clambered across the snowdrifts until she reached the silvery stream and the crumbling stones of the ruin.

There, she ran her fingers over the ancient runes carved into the lid of the well. She whispered thanks to the lost lovers for granting her wish. Then she sent up a silent prayer of her own—that somehow, some way, no matter how long it took, the doomed couple might eventually have their own curse lifted.

By the time she returned to the company, the knights were speaking with a dozen strangers—travelers headed in the opposite direction. The band of ragged Highlanders said they were on their way to the keep of Laird Gille.

The wee lad at the fore licked his chapped lips and raised his beardless chin, boasting in his high, sweet voice that he was going to marry the bonniest lass in all of Scotland.

Ysenda’s brows lifted. But she wisely held her laughter. She wished she could see her sister’s face when Cathalin beheld the bridegroom she’d wanted so badly—all four feet of him.

Instead, she smiled up at No?l, whose lips were twitching with amusement. He gave her a wink, and she sighed with pleasure.

This was going to be, without a doubt, the best Yuletide ever.

THE END