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at first sight. That same something bids me stay with you for now. There will come a time when I will seek to return to Friarsgate. Or perhaps you will need to return to Glenkirk. And when that time comes, we will know it, and we will part again as we obviously did at some other time and in some other place. My poor cousin Tom will be most shocked, for this behavior is very unlike me. And there is something you should know. I have a suitor—Logan Hepburn, the laird of Claven’s Carn. He expected to wed with me on St. Stephen’s Day, though I told him nay. He will come to court seeking me and attempting to foist his will upon me. But I do not wish to remarry.”
    “Do you become my mistress to thwart him, Rosamund?” he wondered aloud.
    She propped herself upon an elbow and looked down into his face. “I become your mistress because I choose to be and because there is something obviously unfinished between us from that other time and place. You know it, Patrick!”
    “Aye, lass, I know it,” he said. “I am a Scot, and I understand these things.” He reached up and pulled her down into his embrace once more, kissing her. “I loved you once, Rosamund.”
    “I know,” she replied softly. “And I loved you.”
    “I will love you again,” he told her.
    “I know,” she said with a little smile. “I already love you, though it be madness to say it, Patrick.”
    He laughed softly. “The king has the lang eey , or long eye as you English would say. I shall ask him about this wonderful insanity that has afflicted us, my love.” He drew her even closer and pulled the coverlet about them. “Will you remain with me?”
    “For a little while, my love,” she responded. “My poor Annie will wonder where I have gotten to, and fret. She is one of my own Friarsgate folk. And I would prefer that what we have be between us alone for now. Soon enough there will be talk and speculation about the Earl of Glenkirk and the queen’s English friend.”
    “You are very discreet,” he teased.
    “I don’t want to be discreet,” Rosamund told him. “I want to shout from all the rooftops of Stirling that I am in love and am loved in return.” She chuckled. “People would think me mad, especially if they knew the circumstances of our love, my lord.”
    He nodded. “I can hear the gossips now. There is old Glenkirk, come down from his Highland eyrie, and carrying on wi a lass young enough to be his daughter.”
    “But there will be others who say old Glenkirk is a lucky devil to have such a lusty young mistress and keep her satisfied, too,” Rosamund teased him back.
    He laughed. “I suspect you care no more than I do what people say, Rosamund.”
    “I don’t care,” she admitted. “Once I might have cared, but no more. I have outlived three husbands. I have spent my entire life doing what was expected of me, doing what I was told, for I am naught but a mere woman. But I have given Friarsgate three little heiresses, and I have kept the land well and will continue to do so with the help of my uncle Edmund. Now I wish to live for myself, if only for a little while.”
    “Tell me about Friarsgate,” he said.
    “It is beautiful and fertile. The house sits above a lake. I raise sheep. We prepare our own wool and weave our own cloth, which is highly sought after by the mercers in Carlisle and the low countries. I have cattle and horses, as well. We are safe from our border neighbors because the land about my valley is ringed with steep hills. No one can steal our livestock because they cannot escape with it without being caught. I love it there! It is the best place in all the world, Patrick. Now, you tell me of Glenkirk.”
    “It sits in the eastern Highlands between two rivers. My castle is small. Until I was sent to San Lorenzo by our Jamie, I was naught but the laird of Glenkirk. The king wished to honor the Duke of San Lorenzo by sending a nobleman, and so I was created the Earl of Glenkirk. We raise sheep and