“He’s dying!” Isabel cried. “My son is dying!”
For one terrible moment Margaret thought she meant Finn, and her heart stopped in her chest. But it could not be Finn. He was outside questioning the guards. And his mother would never weep like this for him.
When Margaret stepped closer, she saw that the man on the cot was Bearach. His limbs were tangled in the bedsheet from tossing and turning, and his chest glistened with sweat, but his eyes were alert.
“For God’s sake, shut her up!” Bearach said.
“Let me help,” Margaret said, resting her hand on Isabel’s shoulder. “What can I do?”
“My darling son is dying!” Isabel wailed. “He’s dying!”
“I’m ill, not dying,” Bearach growled. “Now get out, before Curstag hears your yowling. If she finds me here, she’ll know I was with one of the maids again.”
“You’re supposed to be at Girnigoe Castle,” his mother said. “Why did ye come back?”
“When the weather turned nasty, I decided the visit could wait another day and turned around,” he said. “I slipped into the kitchen while everyone else was at supper and persuaded that bonny lass with the fiery hair to spend the night with me.”
“Have ye had any food or drink since ye returned?” Margaret asked.
“Why?” Bearach asked in surly tone.
“Your aunt and uncle are gravely ill,” Margaret said. “We suspect they were poisoned at supper.”
“Tell me ye touched nothing,” his mother pleaded.
“I stole the earl’s best wine that he saves for himself, the selfish bastard,” he said, and pointed at an ornate silver flagon on the floor.
Margaret recognized it as the one that was always placed at the earl’s end of the table.
“Nay! Nay!” Isabel wailed, tearing at her hair. “Why did ye drink it? Why did ye come back?”
From the look of panic on Bearach’s face, he finally understood why his mother was wailing. Neither panic nor wailing, however, would help the situation.
“We don’t know that the poison was in the wine,” Margaret said, attempting to calm them.
“He’s dying!” Isabel cried, louder than before. “My son is dying!”
“Listen to me.” Margaret pulled Isabel to her feet and gave her shoulders a shake. “Even if there was poison in the wine, that doesn’t mean Bearach will die.”
“You’re lying,” Bearach said. “My aunt and uncle are already dying from the poison, aren’t they?”
“You’re not as ill as they are, which probably means ye consumed far less of the poison,” Margaret said in a firm voice. “Besides that, you’re young and strong, so you’ve a good chance of surviving this.”
She prayed it was true. Though she could find nothing to like about either Bearach or Isabel, they did not deserve this.
“Aye, ye will recover,” Isabel said, finally gaining her composure. “Being half Sinclair, you’ve stronger blood than the earl and Helen.”
“We need to move ye up to your bedchamber.” Margaret signaled to the two men who had followed her and were waiting just outside the room. “You’ll be more comfortable there.” And easier to care for.
“Don’t tell Curstag…where ye found me,”Bearach said between gritted teeth as the men helped him to his feet and slung his arms around their shoulders.
“Everyone will say,” Isabel ordered, glaring at the men and Margaret, “that Bearach returned during the night and slept in the hall so as not to disturb his wife.”
How Bearach and Isabel could connive to deceive Curstag in the midst of this was beyond her. In any case, the lie proved unnecessary.
Curstag had slept through all the commotion. When the men banged open the door as they hefted Bearach inside, Curstag leaped out of bed in her night shift.
“God help me, he’s wounded!” she shrieked, and covered her face with her hands. “I can’t bear to see his blood! I can’t, I can’t!”