As for explaining the contraption she wore, that was a nightmare he wished not even to consider. Besides, his father seemed quite taken with the wench. He certainly seemed pleased that she was setting her hand to running the keep. That outcome was bewildering to Duncan, who had been a mere five years old when his mother had died. Too young to recall what Dunbar had been like in her day. All he knew was that the way it had been the day his bride had arrived was the way it had been for as long as he could recall. It had been good enough for everyone else but was not good enough for his wife, and quite suddenly appeared not good enough for his father either. It was as if his wife had bewitched the man. She had made him smile. And somehow, her very presence had made him decide that Seonaid should marry her Englishman, the same man he had spent both of their lives villifying and calling “Sassenach scum!”

“Husband?”

Duncan grimaced. She should not be allowed to call him that. The marriage was not consummated. But he could hardly take her to task for it in front of the stablemaster. “Nay, he went to talk to a crofter. What be ye wantin’?”

Duncan heard Iliana sigh unhappily. What was she so put out about? He was the one being denied his rights.

“I don’t have all day, wench,” he snapped, then paused and forced a smile for the stablemaster’s benefit. “What be ye needin’?”

“I was told that the spice merchant crossed our land this morn?”

“Aye.”

“Well, we have no spices and I wondered if ’twould be possible to send a messenger after the merchant, requesting that he stop here ere he moves on,” Iliana blurted.

Duncan shook his head. So, here was another change she wished to instigate. A fine and expensive change that would be. He had not known the spice man to stop here in all his memory. Now she thought he should. He would not have it. “We need no spices. And I’ll not be wastin’ a man on sendin’ him on such a fool errand.”

Iliana opened her mouth on a protest, but he turned abruptly and headed away.

An hour later, Duncan was crossing the bailey toward the keep when the stablemaster came charging up, calling after him urgently. “Me laird! Thank the saints! I been lookin’ fer ye all this past hour and could find ye nowhere.”

“What is it, Rabbie?” Duncan frowned at the man’s obvious distress.

“Yer wife, me laird. She rode out right after ye left us.”

“Rode out? What mean ye, she rode out? Rode out where?”

“After the spice merchant. Alone.”

Cursing, Duncan turned toward the stables. “Fool woman. She kens nothing about this land or its dangers. I doubt she even kens in which direction McInnes land is.”