"Perhaps, sweeting," he told her, "it might be a good thing if ye and the children hid at Hay Tower if war comes. The troubles will not be anywhere near yer home. It will be fought in the north and in the west predominantly. No one would think to seek ye on yer ben."
Fiona sighed. She had thought to coerce him into renouncing his foolish course, but instead she had given him a means to salve his conscience. "I canna change ye, can I, Colin MacDonald?"
He shook his head, a small smile upon his lips. "No, sweeting, ye canna change me. I love ye with all my heart, Fiona mine, but not even for ye will I betray Alexander MacDonald, Lord of the Isles."
"I can but pray we all survive yer misguided loyalties," she answered him, but then she kissed his lips.
The snows were on the bens and the trees showed no sign of budding when the call to arms came. One icy twilight when a new sliver of moon hung in the western skies, first one, and then another, and yet another signal fire sprang up on the hills. Before dark a messenger arrived at Nairns Craig from the Lord of the Isles. James Stewart and a vast army had crossed the Tay River, bound for the north. The king had struck earlier than any of them had anticipated. It was to be a battle to the death.
They had lost not a man at Inverness, but now, as the two hundred assembled in the castle courtyard, Fiona looked upon them with sad eyes, wondering how many, if any, would return unscathed. As Nairn was preparing to make his departure, his mother, frail with the hard winter they had endured and the loss of her old servant, Beathag, spoke earnestly to her only child.
"I sense what ye are doing is not right, Colin," she told him. "Don't follow the MacDonalds this time. If not for our sake, then for yer own. No good can come of this fighting." Her eyes were filled with tears that began to flow down her weathered, yet beautiful, aged face. "If ye go, I will not see ye again in this life," she told him.
He tried to comfort her, for he had never in all his life seen her so concerned over him. Putting an arm about her, he said, "I am my father's son, mam, and must do my duty by my family."
Moire Rose looked up at him bleakly as he kissed her cheek.
"God bless ye, Colin, my son," she said. Then, pulling from his embrace, she hobbled back into the castle, leaning heavily upon the cane she now used. She would have no servant helping her since Beathag's death in the winter from old age.
"I'll look after her," Fiona said to her husband, "but there is little I can do to calm her fears. We are right, Colly. Ye should not go with the lord. March for the king's camp and align yerself with him. Ye will not suffer for it, and, believe me, ye will not be the only highland chief who arrays himself with James Stewart. I don't approve the burning of Inverness, but I understand now why ye felt ye must join yer brother in razing the town. This is different. That was to avenge an insult, but this is treason, plain and simple, Colly. Will ye mark yer bairns with a traitor's mark? So will they be if the king wins."
"If," The MacDonald of Nairn said with a jaunty smile.
Fiona wanted to shriek at him. Didn't he understand? The Lord of the Isles believed he had ten thousand men beneath his banner, but human nature being what it was, Fiona was certain that a number of the clansmen, seeing the king's might, would switch sides. The messenger last night had stated that the king's troops were equal in size to Alexander MacDonald's. Looking into her husband's eyes, she saw that there was nothing she might say or do that would turn him from the path of his own destruction. It was madness, but she had to admire his sense of loyalty and determination. He was not a complicated man, just a good one. Pulling his head down to hers, she kissed him passionately until both their heads began to spin with the pleasure. He broke the embrace, smiling down at her.
"Farewell, my love," Fiona said. "May God guard you and bring you home safe to us."
"So," he said, his blue eyes suddenly alight, "you do love me, Fiona mine." His big hand caressed her rosy cheek.
A quick sally sprang to her lips, but she swallowed it back, saying, "Aye, I love ye, Nairn." Then, before he might see her tears, she turned away from him, walking back into the castle as his voice called after her, "I always knew ye would love me one day, Fiona mine!"
The days took on a sameness. While not isolated, Nairns Craig was off the beaten track. As the ground grew soft again, Fiona oversaw the planting in their few fields that were tillable. Mayhap they would get to harvest them. She carefully rationed every particle of grain in her storage bins, set extra watches on their cattle and sheep. She sent a lad, too young for battle and disappointed that he wasn't allowed to go off with the men, to sit down by the roadside and question any travelers so they might learn what news they could. Fiona knew she should leave, but she could not seem to do so. During the day the yett was drawn down over the entry to Nairns Craig; each night the heavy iron-bound oak doors were shut behind it.
Beathag, whose frail old body had been stored in the cold cellars during the winter months, was now laid to rest in a newly dug grave. This event seemed to make Moire Rose sink even lower. She barely ate anymore, and each day she grew weaker and weaker. One afternoon when the sun shone brightly from a clear blue sky, Fiona had her mother-in-law carried to the roof of one of the towers so she might enjoy the soft air and see the countryside about her. Below, the hills were lush with fresh new greenery, and the lochs about them sparkled, reflecting back the sky's fine color. Together the two women sat for several hours, Fiona sewing a garment for Alastair, who was growing quickly. Finally, as the afternoon waned, Fiona suggested it was time to go inside.
"Let me see the sunset," Moire Rose said in quavery tones.
"If it pleases ye, lady. Ye are not cold, are ye? We have been out here for some time."
"I am all right."
Together they watched as the sun sank below the western hills. The sky was a panorama of blazing colors. Orange melted into a slender length of pale green, which oozed into lavender. Rose-pink clouds edged in violet and gold hung in an aquamarine sky. The horizon was a rich royal purple beneath which the molten red sun slowly sank, while above the castle swallows darted like dark shadows amid the twilight.
Finally Fiona arose and called down to her servants to come and carry Moire Rose back to her bedchamber. The litter was carefully lowered through the trapdoor and carried through the corridor to the old woman's chamber. Once inside, however, as they made to lift Moire Rose back to her bed, Fiona noted how still she was.
"Wait," she said, and fetched the little silver hand mirror Donald MacDonald had once given her mother-in-law. Holding the mirror to Moire Rose's nostrils, she immediately saw that there was no breath of life reflected upon the glass. Her mother-in-law's blue eyes were but half-open. Fiona closed them gently. "The lady is dead," she told the servants. "Put her gently upon the bed. She must be prepared for burial tomorrow." Then she hurried out to find Nelly.
At the gravesite the following morning Fiona wished that Father Ninian had been with them. They had not seen him in well over a year. Moire Rose's delicate body had been washed and dressed in her finest gown. She was then sewn into a cloth sack, for there was no one to fashion a proper wooden coffin. The young boy who watched the road had dug the grave for her, then filled it in.