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Laird of the Land (buttefly0408/kolath)

Oh course he'd come ask her that. She sighed a little and shook her head, "You need not worry, Laird Kael. You cousin hasn't touched what is rightfully yours as the great concurring highland warrior. He offered mind you, but I said no. I got these instead." She raised her wrist to show him how they were bandaged up before placing them in her lap once again. "I'm sure he would have come back to ask again had you not arrived."
 
Kael had started too nod when what she said sunk in. he looked up at her in horror did she really think that little of him? “I’m glad that my cousin didn’t force himself on you, he is just arrogant enough to do it.” he stood and stepped closer to the bed looking down at her. “And you misjudge me as your brother has been all along. I will never force myself on a woman.” He smiled “they always come to me willingly. Now rest you will need your strength. I will send my sister back in to see to your needs.” He turned toward the door to leave.
 
Her brow frowned a little bit, "So sure of yourself?" Pursing her lips a little, she seemed to smirk a little in a challenging way, "It must be due to your position for your kiss was nothing very special. You'll not find me coming to you for more of what was very forgettable in the first place." Yet still she recalled how her lips burned when the made contact with his.
 
He smirked as he could hear the challenge in her voice clearly trying to bait him. he turned back to her his eyes locking with hers and holding them his were so intense. “The very fact you remember it says that it wasn’t forgettable.” Slowly he moved closer leaning down over her his eyes still holding hers. “And that wasn’t a kiss,” he was inches from kissing her, his breath playing over her lips, when he whispered, “Maybe I will show you a real kiss sometime.” Smirking he stood back up and turn to the door opening it and leaving.
 
She leaned back a bit to escape him only to find herself pressed against the pillows with no were to go while he taunted her right back in his own way. Something about what he said, it was not to much a tease but a promise that one day, he would kiss her again. She was frozen as he left the room, leaving her stunned and feeling... like she looked forward to him fulfilling such a promise to her.

---

Blair was abed for a few days, taking all her meals in her room along with Flynn and visits from Angus as well as Evelyn and Linette. Never Kael though. At first she found her self wondering why he did not come to see her again but was soon distracted by all the attention everyone else gave her.

On the third day she was up and around freely in her room. When this news reached outside her room, a summons came in return with a servant, "The Laird Kael says that you and Flynn shall join his family for dinner in the great hall tonight...." she knew it was not a request, but a command.
 
Kael was waiting for them tonight at the head of the large table with his sister on one side of him and his aunt next to her. there was one chair between his sister and him that was empty and one on the other side between him and another man that they had not met. The next down the line was Angus who was already enjoying the pleasures of the Sutherland ale. He was nowhere near drunk but clearly had finished off more than one tankard already.

As she and Flynn entered Kael stood and motioned to the two chairs next to him. “Thank you both for joining us. Please come sit.” There was already food laid out on the table steam raising from it clearly having just come out of the oven. This table was laid far finer than any that her father had laid before with a abundance of food and all of it the finest choices. Roast chicken, suckling pig, mutton, beef, and vegetables that defied belief in there number. All laid out expertly and prepared by the castle cook and the women of the clan.
 
As they entered into the dining hall, Blair felt the strangest conflicting feelings that she ever had in her entire life. Half the room looked upon them as welcomed guests. The other half looked at them like they were out of place enemies in the room. Thankfully, the seats open for them at the laird table were amongst mostly those that seemed welcoming to them. As they approached the table, Linette motioned her to the seat next to her. She was a little reluctant to take a seat so dominate that the head of the table near Kael, but deciding this had to be just a one time thing since it was their first time at the table.

Taking their seats, she nodded her head in a reply to him, both siblings staying quiet as the dinner became. The family all talked joyfully around them while the feeling of being and outsider seeped into her more and more.
 
Kael watched them come in, or rather watched her. She looked beautiful even in a simple dress she could turn heads. And did so every male head that wasn’t married was watching her and even a few that were married. After they were seated the dinner started more plates of food being brought out and drinks began to flow many of the men at the tables quickly becoming boisterous. Kael leaned over smiling. “I’m glad you both were able to join us.” He looked at Blair, “How are you feeling after your days of rest?”
 
She had been a little surprised that it was he that spoke to her first out of everyone at the table. The last time that has seen one another, there was much tension left floating between them. "I fair as well as one can I suppose." She rested her still bandaged but they were not as sore any longer to show him, "Your aunt says these should come off in a few days and there shouldn't be any real signs left of the ordeal." Thinking he was done with her, she seemed to turn her attention away.
 
He smiled nodding, “Good I would hate to think that Malise had scarred your wrists for life.” he started to dig into his food a little his eating style half way between the barbarous way of other lairds and the fine style of the French Lords.

The man sitting across from Linette leaned over the table resting his elbows against the hard wood looking from Flynn to Blair. “So pray tell us a little about yourselves. You are going to be staying here with us and so it is only fair that we get to know each other some.”
 
The man that spoke was not one that she had ever met before in this place but the way that Linette smiled, she assumed it had to be her husband. Linette had spoken of him a few times, manly of his looks and his strength. He fit pretty well. "There is not much to tell real. What do you wish to know? I am Blair Ross, daughter of the late Fergus Ross, sister of Flynn and the late Shawe Ross."

Her reply made Linette look at her odd, "Well what do you like to do? You won't want to sit in your room the whole time you are here."

Blair respond in equal oddity upon her face as if she didn't know exactly how to answer the question. "The usual..." she replied and turned back to her food. She was not use to being the center of attention and it made her a little uncomfortable now. Her own family had not really cared much about her so why did these strangers.
 
There was silence at the table for a long moment after Blair’s simple dismissive response no one knew how to reply to her reaction. Finally Kael cleared his throat drawing attention back to him. “Well I’m sure that my Aunt and Linette will be glad to provide you with what ever you need to keep yourself busy.” He turned to Flynn smiling, “How about you lad? I bet you are already deadly with a blade in your hand, would you like to join the guards in their drills?” it wasn’t that odd to suggest since that was what men learned from a young age, and even when captured they would still be allowed to practice just in very controlled situations.
 
The siblings shared a momentary glance between the two of them. Flynn was soon donning a look of embarrassment upon his face that Blair instinctively flew it to try and help, "I don't think it would be wise. One of your warriors could overpower him. He's still just a lad after all and-"

"And I don't know how to use a sword," Flynn's voice suddenly cut in, taking the explanation upon himself. "Our father was never one to look beyond what was right in front of him. Shawe was much older and father focused all his attentions upon making him the best warrior and leader that he could. There was no time to train me. The little I know was taught to me only out of necessity. Blair knows more then I do."

"I don't know more then a little. It's not proper for a woman to know much more then how to defend her..." she trailed of, meaning to say one thing then clearly changed her word last moment, "self."
 
Kael was in shock at what had been said about not training Flynn at all in what was a basic skill in this world. “That is just…shocking lad.” He shook his head and sighed softly. “Well the offer still stands lad, my captain of the guard is very skilled at training even those that had never handled a sword in their lives. If you would like to learn I’m sure he would be glad to teach you.” It was unthinkable to Kael that Fergus had left his son, even his second son, so unprepared for life, it just felt so foreign to him to think that the lad had no training at all. It almost felt dishonorable to have taken the land when its Laird had been so ill trained, but still a captured land was a captured land.

Linette smirked at Blair’s statement looking across at her husband. “Oh I don’t know about that my dear, sometimes knowing too much about sword play can put your…self in just as much peril. Some men like a girl that can handle a blade.” She never took her eyes off her husband.
 
"Like I said, I don't know much. A little with a dagger for fighting off an attacker," her eyes trailed to Kael a moment, remembering how they had scuffled. "Though my skills are not as fine as I once thought they might be. And besides, my father said the man he would eventually find me to marry would be one that wanted a wife, not a..." once more she meant to repeat her fathers words but cushioned them with a kinder word, "warrior. So it was not necessary I learn more then the bits of the basics I did."
 
Linette laughed softly gently reaching across the table to hold her husband’s hand. “Oh I know my father said the same thing. But I wouldn’t have anything to do with the men that he brought. I could beat everyone of them at dueling.” She smiled sighing softly. “It wasn’t till I finally met a man that knew more about swords then I did that I finally gave in.”

Driscol her husband sighed shaking his head slowly. “Her father wasn’t happy about it though, he didn’t think that was a good reason to marry.”
 
Linette and Driscol looked into one another eyes and even Blair could see the love there. It was something that lacked in her father's eyes back when he looked at his mother and the same in return. But she had seen it before in some of the guards and their servant wives. Then it dawned upon her that Linette had been a lairds daughter yet remained in her own home with her husband, "Why exactly... why do you both reside her and not with your own clan?" The question was directed towards Driscol.
 
Driscol finally pulled his eyes from his wife’s looking at Blair and smiling. “Her father wasn’t just upset because of the reason she fell in love with me Blair.” He held up one hand showing the burn marks and calluses on it, nothing at all like the normal sword calluses that a Laird had on his hands. “My family is not high enough in our clan to be any kind of a Laird. I am a freeman, I was traveling looking for a place to ply my trade when I stopped here, and well I fell in love and so I stayed.”
 
Flynn's reaction was far more noticeable then Blair's. He had been in the middle of a drink when he chocked a little on the liquid that had been in his mouth. But even with that, it was Blair's words that cut through the air first, "Your father... let you marry... a...a..." she didn't want to say what her father would call Driscol for it would be very rude of her and her mother taught her better then that.

Apparently though, Flynn had a bit of their father in him for he said it instead. "A working class no one with no honorable alliance?!"
"Flynn!" she scolded him.
 
There was silence around the table again for a long moment no one saying anything as Driscol looked at Flynn something of a dark look on his face. it was finally Kael that broke the moment bursting out laughing almost falling backward out of his chair. “Driscol you keep that up people are actually going to think you are mean.”

Linette and Driscol were the next to start laughing the look on Driscol’s face disappearing instantly and replaced by the laughter. “Yes lad, I’m not ashamed of what I am so don’t think you offended me. I tried to tell Linette the same thing when she informed me that we were getting married, not that she listened.”
 
Flynn and Blair still looked dumbfounded as they learned a little more every moment about the people that now found themselves living among. "You... picked him?" Blair sounded just as shocked by that has she had been about her marrying someone of a much lower station. "And your father allowed it?"

Linette smiled, "He realized after awhile there was not much of a choice. I was in love and Driscol was the only one that would ever make me happy so he finally relented and let me have his way. I was his little girl after all and he just knew that I'd never speak to him again until I got my way."

All she was saying was so foreign to Blair that her expression never softened. She was suddenly very embarrassed about herself and her father. He'd never let her have a say in the man she married. She would have been lucky if she knew his name before she found herself wed to him. He had cared nothing for her happiness. In fact, sometimes she thought he actually enjoyed moments he caught her unhappy. He seemed to feed of her sad emotions and fear just like he did everyone else around him.
 
The Sutherland dinner continued for a while into the night. Everyone was enjoying themselves and did their best to include Flynn and Blair in their conversations when they could. All the women seemed to love Blair and wanted to do nothing but talk to her about her life. it was just that they loved to hear about different people since even in this clearly open minded clan women didn’t travel much and just wanted to hear about everything.

The next few days passed quickly. Food and supplies were sent to the newly conquered land to help it keep passed the hurdle that it was going to be facing. Winter was coming soon and even though Allister had already been very effective at organizing the people into harvesting the crops and the natural food sources there was still going to be a lack.

Something had been bothering Kael for the days since that first dinner, and even though they all dined together nearly every night he had never found the time to ask her the questions he had wanted too. He finally went to her rooms knocking lightly and opening the door to step inside. “Lady Blair?”
 
Blair sat at her window, looking out is as she sat herself upon the seat in the window. At first she didn't seem to notice him, lost in thought as she stared out it. Often times when she found herself here in her room she was lost in thought like this. This clan was so very different then her own. It delighted her yet troubled her at the same time. This was the kind of family a young woman wished to have. Loving, caring people all around them that supported them no matter what. It was something her mother always wanted but never got. Now, it seemed like she had somehow been throw into it and all she needed to do was open her arms and embrace it. But hesitation still filled her. A hesitation placed there by her father she could never seem to shake no matter what she did.

When Blair finally realized she was not along, she turn, anticipating seeing her brother of perhaps Linette. When she saw it was Kael, more conflicting feelings added to the ones she already had. "Laird Kael, to what do I owe the visit?"
 
He waited while she seemed lost in thought watching her just sitting there and finding it surprisingly enjoyable. As she responded to him he smiled and stepped closer. “I would like for you to join me on a ride seeing as you don’t seem busy.” There were many things that he wanted to ask her about her father and the life that she had lived before he came along because it just seemed like something didn’t fit with the life he knew nearly all the Sutherland Lairds and their families enjoyed.
 
It had been days since she had gone for a ride and her face lit a little with the idea of it, "If you like Laird Kael." She rose and came to him, ready for riding just as she was since she wore pretty simple clothing already there was no need to change for a ride now. As they walked towards the stables where they would mount, she had to ask, "What has made you want my company? You have not sought me out the entire time I have been here besides to dine with your family."
 
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