The Raven's Wish Read Online Free Page A

"Stop!"
    She glanced back. "They would not dare cross the stream to our side," she hissed. "Ruari MacDonald is a bully and a coward. One curse from me would send him home to his màthair ."
    "His bràithrean are with him," Kenneth said. "They will not hold back from a fight. And marriage plans will not stop them."
    "Elspeth Fraser, hold your temper," Magnus said.
    Elspeth paused, the water cooling around her ankles. Magnus was right. She must behave herself. Standing with her cousins, she stared at the three MacDonalds, who glared back in turn.
    * * *
    "When you sent word of your visit, I knew you might need a comrade to go with you to Castle Glenran," Alasdair said as he and Duncan rode among the birches. "You wear neither plaid nor plant badge. You look like a Lowlander, even a Sasunnach. Though your Gaelic, when you choose to speak it, is pure as any Highlander's."
    "I still remember," Duncan said quietly. "So the Fraser chief will meet me at Castle Glenran, where he said in his message he will be fishing for the week on a holiday."
    Alasdair chuckled. "Holiday? The MacShimi does little else but fish, hunt and raid."
    "MacShimi—so that is what you call your chief."
    "Aye, an auld title, after the first Fraser chief, Simon." Alasdair looked sideways at Duncan. "Does the MacShimi ken the why of your visit?"
    "Surely he knows that Queen Mary and her Privy Council desire peace throughout Scotland. They wish an end to the feud between the Frasers and the MacDonalds."
    "Such a request, even from the queen, may fall on deaf ears among these Highland men."
    "The bloodshed and cattle thieving between the Frasers and MacDonalds must cease. I simply act as the royal lieutenant in delivering this ultimatum."
    Alasdair let out a loud sigh. "So they sent you in George Gordon's place?"
    "The Gordon clan is in disgrace now, their titles and lands forfeit to the crown. Nor can they continue to serve as the royal lieutenants in the northeast."
    "The cocks o' the north, the Gordons are called, but they have been brought low."
    "Gordon's plan to abduct Queen Mary and marry her to one of his sons was an embarrassment to the whole of Scotland."
    "A beastly affair with a gruesome end, that."
    Clenching the reins, Duncan recalled the Edinburgh trial months earlier, when a grotesque tradition had been obeyed. George Gordon, earl of Huntly, had died of an apoplectic fit months before the trial. Nevertheless, his corpse, hideously sagged and discolored from salting and embalming, had been propped up in the courtroom for the trial. Sitting as one of the lawyers on the Gordon case, Duncan had watched in sympathy as the beautiful young queen, obliged to be present, had struggled to overcome illness at the horrible sight.
    "A cruel thing indeed," he said.
    "So you are the queen's lieutenant, sent to talk peace with the Frasers," Alasdair said. "What document did you bring?"
    "I am sent to make a bond of caution with the MacShimi and his kinsmen."
    "A letter o' caution! The feud's not twenty years old yet. And who is named as the cautioner? Yourself? Och, you may regret that obligation, man."
    "I anticipate no problem. I will witness the signing and return the document to the Privy Council. The friendship between Frasers and Macraes will make the cautioning period of one year easy enough."
    Alasdair cast him a wry look. "Luck go with you. A Highlander cherishes a good feud."
    "I know that better than most," Duncan said.
    "Come ahead, Cautioner, if you dare. There's some Frasers below, on the bank of the stream." He pointed down the slope.
    Squinting in the sunlight, Duncan peered down the grassy slope to see a group of Highland men, wearing plaids of the blue and green favored by Frasers. They stood beside a wide stream. A lad with hair bright as flame stood ankle-deep in the water.
    A sudden chill crept up Duncan's spine. He felt uneasy, unsettled. His black cloak floated out on a quick breeze. A disturbance of the wind, he thought; he had forgotten