Free To Kiss A Kilted Warrior by Rowan Keats Page B

confines that drew her dismay—it was the stained, threadbare mattress hanging on drooping bed ropes, and the rank reeds upon the floor.
    “’Tis only for a few nights,” he said encouragingly.
    “A few nights passed in this room, and we’ll spend a fortnight itching and scratching,” she responded.
    “Can you not set it right?”
    She spun to face him. “I suppose I should be grateful that your faith in me is so great.”
    Wulf lowered his bundles to the floor in the passageway. “Tell me what you need, and I’ll fetch it.”
    “A broom,” she said. “And some dried feverfew to tuck inside that pallet. I’ll not sleep with vermin, even for you.”
    He gathered her to his chest, relishing the soft warmth of her body against the uncompromising firmness of his. He planted a kiss on the top of her head, inhaling her sweet scent. “You are a fine woman, Morag Cameron.”
    She allowed herself to be held for a brief moment, then pushed at his chest with both hands. “Off you go, then. Tide and time tarry for no man.”
    Releasing her, he stepped back.
    “And fetch the tarp from the cart.” She rolled up the sleeves of her sark and lifted one corner of the mattress, her nose wrinkled in disgust.
    Wulf set off in search of her demands. This was the Morag he knew and loved. Since the attack in her bothy, she’d been a wee subdued, a little less assured. But Morag with purpose was a force to be reckoned with.
    He grinned.
    God help the town of Edinburgh.
    *   *   *
    They set out for the High Street just before dawn, when the dark of night still held sway and the moon shone bright as a silver denier in the sky. The market was quiet but industrious—vendors of all sorts were laying out their wares by torchlight. Fishmongers from Leith with their baskets of conger and garvie, bakers with steaming bread rounds and buttery pastries, shoemakers with footwear of every size, and farmers with sheaves of grass and the bruised remains of last season’s neeps, leeks, and apples.
    Morag spied samplings of almost every good she could imagine—and some she didn’t recognize. Had she not her own goods to trade, it would have been tempting to investigate.
    “There,” Wulf said, pointing to a group of men arranging bolts of cloth on the flat displays of several booths.
    Dodging a lad wheeling a barrel of pickled beets, they approached the cloth vendors. One of them, a reed-thin man with curved shoulders, paused as they neared. Eyeing Wulf’s armload of colorful twills, he said, “Tuppence to display, and a tariff of one-third on all goods you sell.”
    “That’s robbery!” snapped Morag, shocked.
    “Take it or leave it.” He addressed the comment to Wulf, ignoring Morag completely.
    Morag opened her mouth to give the man a taste of her opinion, but Wulf grabbed her arm and tugged a warning.
    “We’ll take it,” he said quickly. “Pay the man his tuppence, lass.”
    Her chest tight with bitterness, Morag dug into her purse for the coins and dropped them into the weaver’s outstretched palm.
    He marked off a narrow section of his stall with a sooty stick and went back to arranging his goods for sale. Morag peered at his woolens with a critical eye as she and Wulf placed her twills on the table. The man’s were well made, with tight, even threads and a smooth brushed finish, but the colors were dull and lifeless. And the patterns lacked imagination.
    But she said none of what she thought.
    Best she learn to bite her tongue now. Later, when she watched him pocket twice the profit forgoods of lesser quality than hers, she’d find it much more difficult to hold her wheesht.
    “I must see to repairs on the pony’s harness,” Wulf said. “Will you fare well on your own?”
    “Aye,” she said. “There’s little room for the both of us here. Go.”
    Morag used her small section of the display to best advantage, unraveling a portion of each of her ten bolts and spreading the patterns wide. Dawn broke as she set