Each word her father spoke struck Jenny's heart like a lash, making her cringe with a shame and hurt that was almost past bearing. When he was finished, she stood there while a blessed, cold numbness came over her, until she felt nothing at all. When she finally lifted her head and looked about at the tired, valiant Scots her voice was brittle and hard. "I hope they wagered all their wealth on it!"

Chapter Fifteen

Jenny stood alone on the parapet looking out across the moors, the wind playfully tossing her hair about her shoulders, her hands clutching the stone ledge in front of her. The hope that her "bridegroom" might not arrive for his wedding, which was to take place in two hours, had been snatched from her a few minutes ago when a castle guard had called out that riders were approaching. A hundred and fifty mounted knights were riding toward the drawbridge, the light from the setting sun glinting on their polished shields, turning them to shining gold. The figure of a snarling wolf danced ominously before her eyes, undulating on blue pennants, and waving on the horses' trappings and knights' surcoats.

With the same unemotional detachment she'd felt for five days, she stood where she was, watching as the large group neared the castle gates. Now she could see there were women among them and a few standards bearing markings other than the Wolf. She had been told some English nobles would be present tonight, but she had not expected any women. Her gaze shifted reluctantly to the broad-shouldered man riding at the front of the party, bareheaded and without shield or sword, mounted atop a great black destrier with flowing mane and tail that could have been sired only by Thor. Beside Royce rode Arik, also bareheaded and without armor, which Jenny assumed was their way of illustrating their utter contempt for any puny attempt clan Merrick might make to slay them.

Jenny couldn't see Royce Westmoreland's face at all from this distance, but as he waited for the drawbridge to be lowered, she could almost feel his impatience.

As if he sensed that he was being watched, he lifted his head abruptly, his gaze sweeping over the roofline of the castle, and without meaning to, Jenny pressed back against the wall, hiding herself from view. Fear. The first emotion she'd felt in five days, she realized with disgust, had been fear. Squaring her shoulders, she turned and reentered the castle.

Two hours later, Jenny glanced at herself in the mirror. The feeling of pleasant numbness that had vanished on the parapet had deserted her for good, leaving her a mass of quaking emotion, but the face in the mirror was a pale, emotionless mask.

"It won't be nearly so terrible as you think, Jenny," Brenna said, trying with all her heart to cheer her as she helped two maids straighten the train of Jenny's gown. " 'Twill all be over in less than an hour."

"If only the marriage could be as short as the wedding," Jenny said miserably.

"Sir Stefan is down in the hall. I saw him myself. He'll not let the duke do anything to disgrace you down there. He's an honorable, strong knight."

Jenny turned, the brush in her hand forgotten, studying her sister's face with a wan, puzzled smile. "Brenna, are we discussing the same 'honorable knight' who kidnapped us in the first place?"

"Well," said Brenna defensively, "unlike his wicked brother, at least he didn't attempt to make any immoral bargains with me afterward!"

"That's quite true," Jenny said, completely distracted for the moment from her own woes. "However, I wouldn't count on his good will tonight. I've little doubt he'll be longing to wring your neck when he sets eyes on you, because now he knows you tricked him."

"Oh, but he doesn't feel that way at all!" Brenna burst out. "He told me it was a very daring and brave thing I did." Ruefully, she added. "Then he said he could wring my neck for it. And besides, 'twasn't him I tricked, 'twas his wretched brother!"

"You've already spoken to Sir Stefan?" Jenny said, dumbfounded. Brenna had never shown the slightest interest in any of the young swains who'd been pursuing her for the last three years, yet now she was evidently meeting in secret with the last man in the world her father would permit her to wed.

"I managed to have a few words with him in the hall, when I went to ask William a question," Brenna confessed, her cheeks stained hot pink, then she suddenly became absorbed in straightening the sleeve of her red velvet gown. "Jenny," she said softly, her head bent, "now that there's to be peace between our countries, I was thinking I should be able to send you messages often. And if I included one for Sir Stefan, would you see that he receives it?"

Jenny felt as if the world were turning upside down. "If you're certain you want to do that, I will. And," she continued, hiding a laugh that was part hysteria and part dismay for her sister's hopeless attachment, "will I also be including messages from Sir Stefan with mine to you?"

"Sir Stefan," Brenna replied, lifting her smiling eyes to Jenny's, "suggested just that."

"I-" Jenny began, but she broke off as the door to her chamber was swung open and a tiny, elderly woman rushed forward, then stopped in her tracks. Dressed in an outdated, but lovely gown of dove gray satin lined with rabbit, an old-fashioned, gauzy white wimple completely swathing her neck and part of her chin, and a silvery veil trailing down her shoulders, Aunt Elinor looked from one girl to the other in confusion. "I know you're little Brenna," Aunt Elinor said, beaming at Brenna, and then at Jenny, "but can this beautiful creature be my plain little Jenny?"

She stared in stunned admiration at the bride, who was standing before her clad in a cream velvet and satin gown with a low, square-cut bodice, high waist, and wide full sleeves heavily encrusted in pearls and sprinkled with rubies and diamonds from elbow to wrist. A magnificent satin cape lined in velvet was also bordered in pearls, attached at Jenny's shoulders with a pair of magnificent gold brooches set with pearls, rubies, and diamonds. Her hair spilled over her shoulders and back, glinting like the gold and rubies she wore.

"Cream velvet-" said Aunt Elinor smiling and opening her arms. "So very impractical, my love, but so very beautiful! Almost as beautiful as you-"

Jenny raced into her embrace. "Oh, Aunt Elinor, I'm so very happy to see you. I was afraid you weren't coming-"

Brenna answered a knock on the door, and then she turned to Jenny, her words abruptly choking Jenny's outpouring of delighted greeting: "Jenny, Papa desires you to come downstairs now. The documents are ready to be signed."

A terror that was almost uncontrollable swept over Jenny, twisting her stomach into sick knots and draining the color from her face. Aunt Elinor tucked her arm in Jenny's and, in an obvious effort to distract her from concentrating on what awaited her, she gently drew Jennifer toward the door, while chatting about the scene that awaited her downstairs.

"You shan't believe your eyes when you see how full the hall is," she jabbered in the mistaken belief that a crowd would lessen Jenny's fear of a confrontation with her future husband. "Your papa has one hundred of your men standing at arms at one side of the hall, and he"-the faint sniff of superiority in her voice made it clear "he" was the Black Wolf-"has at least that many of his own knights standing directly across the room, watching your men."

Jenny walked woodenly down the long hall, each slow step feeling like her last one. "It sounds," she said tautly, "like the setting for a battle, not a betrothal."

"Well, yes, but it isn't. Not exactly. There are more nobles than knights down there. King James must have sent half of his court here to witness the ceremony, and the heads of the nearby clans are here, too."