Untamed by Elizabeth Lowell

his knights,” Meg said. “The great barons will also—”
    â€œThey are busy with the Celts in the south,” Duncan interrupted curtly, “when they aren’t fighting among themselves or plotting against the king. They have tried to take the northern marches. They failed.”
    â€œThey had no reason to succeed. There is easier land to the south.”
    â€œExactly. They won’t—”
    â€œThey will !” she interrupted passionately. “You will give them the reason!”
    â€œNo more than they had before. It wasn’t enough then.”
    â€œTell me, Duncan,” Meg said in a scathing tone, “if your right arm were cut off by a bandit, would you notice its loss and seek vengeance?”
    â€œAye, but I’m not the English king.”
    â€œAh, you’ve noticed that, have you? ’Tis a thing to keep in mind whilst planning the death of Norman nobles.”
    â€œMeggie—”
    â€œNorman barons quarrel among themselves because there is no better game to play,” Meg continued without pausing. “Slay Dominic le Sabre and you will provide the barons with the best game of all. War .”
    Duncan shrugged. “It is a game we shall win.”
    â€œYou will not win! If I can see that, why can’t you?”
    â€œYou are a girl with a tender heart and no understanding of war.” Duncan smiled. “’Tis another of your graces, Meggie.”
    â€œSave the oil for the serving wenches,” she said acidly. “I’m not so easily tricked. Neither is the king of England. When word of the slaughter reaches London, the king and his barons will unite and deliver such a harrowing to the marches as will still be whispered of a thousand years hence! You have but twelve knights—”
    â€œSixteen.”
    â€œâ€”and a rabble of brutes good for little more than butchering women and children.”
    â€œEnough!” Duncan demanded.
    â€œNay! ’Tis not enough until you understand that you can’t win!”
    Duncan’s hands wrapped around Meg’s shoulders, holding her still while his words hammered at her like stone.
    â€œUnderstand this,” he said flatly. “If you marry that Norman bastard, I will have to watch my birthright—”
    â€œNay!” she raged. “Bastards have no birthright!”
    â€œâ€”pass into the hands of another man,” Duncan continued relentlessly, “and with it the green-eyed Glendruid witch whom the vassals of Blackthorne Keep love more than they love anything but God. That, as much as the English king, is why John hasn’t disinherited you. The vassals would have set aside their plows and walked from the land as from a cursed place.”
    Pale, trembling invisibly, Meg tried to get free of Duncan’s grip. He barely noticed her struggles.
    â€œKnow this, Lady Margaret. I will have land and a noble wife to bear my children. If I must kill ten Norman nights or ten thousand, I will have land .”
    Shaken, Meg wrenched free of Duncan’s grip. Torn between understanding of her childhood friend’s need for a place in a society that made no place for bastards, and her certainty that his plan would be the ruin of the land and the vassals she loved, Meg watched Duncan with tears overflowing her eyes.
    â€œYou’re asking me to throw Blackthorne Keep into war,” she whispered.
    â€œI’m asking you not to marry a brutal Norman lord. Is that such a grand favor to seek from you?”
    Meg’s only answer was her tears.
    â€œAsk not for favors of a Glendruid witch,” John rasped fiercely. “I’m commanding you, Margaret. I am lord of this keep and you are as much my chattel as a pig rooting in my forest. You will obey me or you will rue the day of your birth as often and as deeply as I do!”
    â€œDinna worry, Meggie,” Duncan said softly, tugging on one of her long braids. “I’ll see