Taken by Angeline Fortin (great books of all time TXT) 📗

he were to have one, of course.  Who was his favorite then?” she asked simply to perpetuate the conversation.  “Laird’s mother?”

“His favorite daughter perhaps but nay, ‘tis well known that the auld King favored his second son above all his children.  Perhaps that is why Laird served as his squire, at the King’s bidding,” Rhys shrugged and swallowed more wine, tipping up his cup to get the last drop before holding it out to be refilled once more.

“Thank ye, Willem.”

The young man beamed, his eyes filled with adoration for his master.

“Top me off, too, Willem.”  Scarlett pressed her fingers to her lips as a hiccup escaped her.  “I heard about him.  The Duke of something?”

“Ross.”

“Yes, that’s it.”

“Perhaps it was the duke who taught Laird to be the way he is.  He inspires such love from his people yet he cares naught for any of us.”

Scarlett thought Rhys was wrong about that.  Laird did care, thought he hid it well.  Perhaps he even cared about her as well.

Ha, she must be tipsier than she thought.

“He might have made a fine King,” he went on.  “He is the only child of the auld King’s oldest child.  In another world, in another time, he might have been King.”

“Naw,” she scoffed, waving off the notion with a flick of her fingers.  Laird might have been legitimate but his mother was not.  Scarlett bit her tongue from blurting out Laird’s secret and said instead, “That would never happen.  The laws of primogeniture will never change that much.  A daughter, sure, but not an illegitimate child.”

“And how can ye ken such a thing, my dear?” he asked, slurring his words a little.  “Are ye a mystic seer?”

“Nope,” Scarlett brought her goblet down on the table with a punctuated thunk. “I’m from the future.”

Rhys blinked at her in a moment of silence and then burst out laughing, slapping his knee and almost spilling his wine.  “The future! Ha!  Ha!”

“No, it’s true,” she insisted, ignoring the little voice in the back of her mind that was telling her to shut her mouth.  “I can prove it.  Go ahead.  Ask me anything.”

He laughed some more but interest flared in his eyes as he leveled her a serious look.  Or as serious a look as he was capable of producing in his inebriated state. “Verra well.  Tell me, Scarlett my dear lass, who will be the next King of Scotland?”

Scarlett rolled her eyes.  “That depends, which number on you on now?  I never thought to ask.”

“James is the fourth of his name.”

“Oh, well, then that’s easy.  The next one will be James the Fifth.”

They shared a look and then they both fell into a bout of laughter.  Even Willem was grinning from ear to ear.

“Well played, Scarlett.  Well played!”  Rhys leaned across the table and lifted his cup.  Scarlett tapped hers against it before they both drank deeply again.

“No, really,” she said, twitching her fingers in invitation. “Give me another one.”

“I dinnae know.  If I ask ye who will follow King Henry, ye will probably only say Henry the Ninth.” Rhys waved a finger at her.

“Henry the Eighth?” she said, her jaw sagging in amazement. Tucking one leg beneath her, she hooked her other heel on the seat of the chair and rested her chin on her knee as she stared at him with fascination.  “The King of England right now is Henry the Eighth?  Holy shit.  Imagine that.  Meeting Henry the Eighth.”

“He is in France right now,” he pointed out.  “Ye cannae meet him.”

“That’s too bad,” Scarlett said with honest disappointment.  “Which wife is he on right now?”

“Which wife?” He raised a brow in bewilderment.  “You mean Catherine?”

“Catherine?  Which one?”

“What do ye mean?”

“Aragon, Howard or Parr?”

“Aragon.”  Rhys drank deeply once more, eyeing her over the rim of his cup.

“Ha!  There you are, then.  I can prove it to y’all.”  Scarlett waved her goblet at him triumphantly, the wine sloshing over the sides.  “Henry the Eighth will have six wives.  Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Ann of Cleves, Catherine Howard and Catherine Parr.”

“Six?” He jeered dismissively.  “Nae man is widowed six times.”

“No, he was never widowed at all.” Scarlett counted them off on her fingers.  “It goes divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived.”

Rhys spat out his wine and howled with uncontrollable laughter, rocking back in his chair until he almost tipped over before Willem caught him.  Still he didn’t stop, laughing so uproariously that he couldn’t catch his breath and was holding his sides as Laird walked into their circle of light.

“What’s all this?”

Scarlett offered up a lopsided grin.  “I think I broke him.”

30

 

“Yer blootered again, are ye?”  James looked between them, at the empty bottles on the table and at Willem, who hastily shoved the third bottle behind his back.  Rhys hollered hysterically once more.

“Hey, don’t judge me.”  Scarlett waved a finger at him.

James snorted.  “To bed wi’ ye, lass.”

Rhys looked set to argue but Scarlett only shook her head, leaning across the table to kiss his cheek and wish him good night before James led her off.

“Willem, be sure Rhys reaches his tent.  We’ve an early day before us.”

“Aye, my lord.”

Willem took Rhys away, wrapping an arm around his waist as he stumbled away.

“Spoil sport,” Scarlett mumbled as James propelled her into the tent.

“Ye’ve become a veritable maltworm, lass,” he said, clarifying when she frowned, “A drunkard.”

“Yeah?  Well, I didn’t grow up drinking with every meal like you did.  You’re going to make a drunk out me before I make it home.   Then I’ll have to go into rehab.  The press would get a cheap thrill out of that.”

Ignoring Scarlett’s drunken rambling, James ignored her and looked around the tent.  “Where is Maris?  I hired the bluidy wench to see to yer needs no’ her own.”

“She’s been gone since we got here.  Again.” Scarlett sniffed dismissively but turned to face him.  “Hey, this is my tent.  Mine.  Remember?  Propriety and all?”

“I kent whose tent it is verra well, lass,” he ground out.

“You’re not supposed