That was true enough, but ’twas due only to the removal of the rushes. There was still a great deal to do. She had to see to finishing the floor, whitewashing the walls, cleaning the wall hangings. By her estimate, ’twould take them at least three days to finish this room alone. Only then would she feel she could turn her attention to the bedchambers. That thought did not please her much. She was not used to living in such squalor and the bedchamber was full of just as much filth as the great hall.

Moving to the nearest of the buckets the women had left behind, Iliana knelt on the floor and retrieved a cloth. She dunked it in the bucket, wrung it out, then began to scrub.

“Nay, my lady!” Ebba gasped, hurrying to her side. “I shall do that. Why do you not take a walk and get a breath of fresh air?”

Iliana shook her head. “There is too much to do. Fetch a cloth and help me.”

Chapter Five

“Gor!”

Quitting her prolonged perusal of the petrified cheese and stale bread that the cook had produced for lunch, Iliana raised her head slowly at that exclamation.

Duncan’s sister, Seonaid, was standing just inside the keep doors, her eyes, and those of her constant companions, Allistair and Aelfread, wide as they gaped at the changes made in the great hall. They were late, the last to enter for the nooning meal, yet oddly, the first to even seem to notice what Iliana and her crew had accomplished over the last three days. At least they were the first to bother to comment on it, aside from Angus.

Iliana had not seen her sister-in-law since she had left the bedchamber with the others on the morning after the wedding. Three days ago. Seonaid and her two cohorts had disappeared the morning after the wedding and not returned since. Off hunting had been Laird Angus’s guess when Iliana had commented on it.

“What goes on here?” Seonaid asked in a hushed murmur as she and her cousins made room for themselves at the table.

“They be acleanin’ the hall.”

Iliana stiffened at the derision her husband put into those words.

“Cleanin’?” Seonaid said the word as if she had never heard it afore. Iliana was not impressed. Neither was Angus, she realized when he turned to scowl at her.

“Aye, acleanin’. Iliana and the women have been workin’ themselves to the bone for nigh on three days now. The same amount o’ time ye’ve been lollygaggin’ about the woods.” He paused to let that sink in, then added, “’Twould not hurt fer ye to stick about to learn a thing or two on the matter. Yer betrothed’ll not be pleased to have a wife so ignorant o’ such an’ the like.”

“Wife!” Seonaid snorted as she reached for some ale. “Ye ken well enough I shall never be that, Da.”