Free Once Upon a Plaid by Mia Marlowe Page B

away.
    Dorcas tucked her knees up and leaned her arms across them. “So what do ye do when ye’re here by yerself, Nab?”
    Did he dare tell her? She might laugh and he didn’t think he could bear more laughter this night. Still, she had brought him a Clootie Dumpling, so he decided to risk it. After all, when someone has licked a body’s fingers, a body ought to be able to trust them.
    “I read.”
    Dorcas snorted. “Ye never do.”
    At least she didn’t laugh.
    “’Tis true. I’ll show ye.” Nab pulled the book out from under his plaid and handed it to her. The maid’s eyes grew round as she opened the pages and looked at the ornate script.
    “What does it say?”
    “ ’Tis the story of Arthur and his knights.” But Le Morte d’Arthur by Sir Thomas Mallory was far more than that to Nab. It was a whole world where the good fought to protect the weak and might didn’t always equal right.
    It was a world he dearly wanted to visit, and if he ever reached it, he’d never willingly return.
    There was enough action and adventure in the tome to please him and enough courtly love nonsense to have Dorcas sighing in short order. Girls liked that sort of thing, he’d heard. Maybe he could read it to her if she ever—
    “Read it to me.” Somehow, even the middle of his thoughts managed to interrupt the beginning of her words. She handed the book back to him.
    He turned to the story about the Lady of the Lake. Sometimes when he gazed out on the loch, he wished the Lady would rise up for him, sword in hand, her eyes blazing with destiny. He glanced down at Dorcas. She was peering intently at the ornate script, but from this angle her eyes were downcast, their pale blue irises obscured by the fringe of blond lashes. She looked as demur and fragile as any lady needing rescue he’d ever imagined.
    Nab began to read.
    “What’s this?” she interrupted yet again, sounding anything but demur or fragile. “It may as well be a mass.”
    “I suppose it does seem like that to ye. ’Tis in Latin.”
    Dorcas crossed her arms. “Makes no more sense to me than a mass either. I think ye’re making all this up.”
    “Nay, I’m reading. Truly.” Nab removed his fool’s cap and scratched his head. “Suppose I read a bit to myself and then tell ye what it says in words ye will understand.”
    Nab thought he’d never seen anything finer than the way sunlight danced on the water of the loch as the sun came up. It never failed to make his chest swell with the joy of simply being alive. Nothing could be better.
    But that was before he saw Dorcas really smile.
    She lifted a corner of his blanket, draped it over herself, and laid her head on his shoulder. “Tell me the story, Nab.”
    Something new stirred in his chest. He felt bigger. Stronger. As if he were all the Knights of the Round Table rolled into one.
    “One day,” Nab began, “King Arthur decided to seek an adventure, so he . . .”

Make we merry in hall and bower
And this glorious lady we honor
That to us hath borne our Savior
Homo sine femine
To increase our joy and bliss,
Christus natus est nobis.
    —From “Make We Merry”
     
     
    “This is a song about the deep magic of how women make things new . . . er, I mean make new things. That sort of power should cause men to have a bit of a rethink about how they treat them.”
    —An observation from Nab,
fool to the Earl of Glengarry
    Chapter Seven
    “We’ll need another leech under that eye if we dinna want it to swell shut for days,” a calm feminine voice said from somewhere above.
    “If we must. I can barely abide the nasty things,” said another with a sigh. “Have ye any fresh ones?”
    “Aye, I think so. Let me check in the . . .”
    The voices faded and William sank back into the black pool of forgetfulness, hovering in the deep. It was peaceful and dark and undemanding. There was no pain. Well, not much. The eye the voices had mentioned did ache a wee bit and his back throbbed.
    Cool