Page 5 of Scottish Rose: Coira

“She might not be able to leave, but I can come with you, Coira,” suggested Zara.

“Would ye?” Coira looked up excitedly. “Zara, if ye were there with me, I am sure I would feel better about this whole situation.”

“Let’s go, Wife,” said Lance, putting his arm around Coira. If she wasn’t mistaken, it felt like he was using her to help him stand.

“I have a room here at the Horn and Hoof for ye and Coira to stay on yer weddin’ night,” offered Storm.

“Nay, but thank you just the same, Torm – Sorm – Storm!”

“Storm, I will be leaving with them, going along to serve as Coira’s handmaid if you don’t mind,” said Zara.

“I dinna mind if Sir de Selby doesna,” Storm answered.

“Fine, come along then,” he said, his eyes closing slightly. “Squire, where the hell are you?”

“I’m here my lord.” A young man about the same age as Coira ran up and stopped at Lance’s side.

“This is my quire, Jack,” said Lance.

“Squire. He meant to say squire,” said Jack, looking at his lord from the side of his eyes.

“So, Bride. Are you ready to head out to your new castle? I think you are going to like it. And the best part is that it’s on the border and you’ll still be living in Scotland after all.”

“Oh, I’d like that,” said Coira, feeling relieved to hear this.

“Where is the castle?” asked Effie. “What is it called?”

“I get a bad feeling about this,” mumbled Zara, shoving her deck of cards into her oversized travel bag that she slung over her shoulder.

“Oh, didn’t I tell you?” said Lance, smiling like a fool. “It is a castle that you are never going to forget. It’s called Liddel Castle. Have you heard of it before?”

Coira’s heart about stopped and a shiver ran up her spine. “L-Liddel Castle?” she asked, hoping she had misheard her new husband. After all, it couldn’t be the same castle where she was kept prisoner and almost died hanging in a cage.

“She’s heard of it, and she’s no’ goin’,” spat Effie, coming to her rescue.

“Effie,” warned Aidan. “Ye canna say that. Coira is the man’s wife now, and she has to go.”

“That’s right,” added Storm. “We made an alliance.”

“But no one told me where I’d be livin’.” Coira wished this was all naught but a dream.

“We didna ken about this,” Storm told her.

“No one did,” Lance added. “I just found out myself how lucky I was to have inherited it from my late Uncle Ralston.”

“Lord Ralston?” Coira’s blood froze in her veins remembering the man who had been her captor.

“Aye, did you know him?” asked Lance. “Lord Ralston the Bold, he was called.”

“Aye, we kent him though I wish we could say we didna.” Effie glared at him through narrowed eyes.

“Oh, I think I am feeling a bit ill.” Lance pounded his fist against his chest. “Perhaps, it was too much whisky on an empty stomach. Squire, load my wife’s things as well as her dowry into the back of the wagon.”

“Aye, milord,” said Jack.

“I think I will ride in the wagon so that I can hold my wife in my arms.”

“More like so ye dinna pass out,” Effie mumbled under her breath.