Much Ado In the Moonlight by Lynn Kurland Read Free Book Online

bloody family!” Connor bellowed. He turned his most ferocious scowl on the man before him. “I’ve no liking for these particular tidings. You’re dismissed. Send up the next candidate for captain.”
    Angus bowed, scraped, and backed up. Apparently his sense of direction was as lacking as his good sense, for he fell off the parapet.
    There was soon a quite audible “Ach, that hurt,” floating up from below.
    “Impossible,” Connor muttered. “He must have heard it awrong.”
    “Actually, my dear fellow, I daresay his ears were functioning quite well.”
    Connor spun around to find another shade boldly occupying the same parapet. “Get off my roof, you frilly bugger,” he said.
    “You know,” Roderick St. Claire drawled, “it had so much more, oh, I don’t know, élan , I suppose, when Dun-can MacLeod used to say the same thing to me.”
    Connor scowled as he drew his sword. “Perhaps my delivery is not as good, but I daresay my sword is just as sharp.”
    Roderick only smiled pleasantly. He fussed with his lace-bedecked shirtfront and brushed a speck of nonexistent dirt from his trouser leg. “I say you put your sword back where it was and we call a truce. You might need me on this caper.”
    “Caper?” Connor echoed. “I’ve no intentions of being involved in a caper!” By the saints, he most certainly did not—and especially not with the frilly, long-winded, irritating Victorian fool before him!
    He paused, unwillingly. It was possible, he conceded, that Roderick might know something useful. If so, wisdom dictated that he not do damage to the man before he spat out his tidings. Connor resheathed his sword with a curse, vowing to himself to use it without hesitation if the situation warranted it.
    “Very well,” Connor said gruffly. “What do you know?”
    Roderick examined the volumes of lace dripping from his wrists. “I understand there is a rather large group of mortals intending to descend on our poor home. Angus did rather feebly describe what I have seen for myself to be great activity in the village.”
    “It means nothing,” Connor said, suffering a brief but unsettling moment of unease.
    “Doesn’t it?” Roderick mused. “Well, I suppose we’ll see when they arrive at the keep. Ah, look you there. Here comes someone now.”
    Connor looked down the way and up the road to find a lone man walking toward the castle.
    “Bloody hell,” he said, scratching his head. Then he remembered himself and his position. “Not to worry. ’Tis but a tourist.”
    “Let’s go see, shall we?” Roderick suggested. “We’ll collect the new candidate for your captainship whilst we’re about it. Oh, look at all the men lining up for the pleasure.”
    Connor looked to where Roderick was pointing. Well, men were certainly scurrying about, but it was hard to tell if they were trying to get in line, or out of it.
    He gave Roderick a shove off the parapet, just on principle, then made his way in a more dignified fashion down the stairs to the floor of the bailey. Roderick was cursing him fluently as he dusted himself off, but Connor ignored him. He had more important things to see to.
    Mainly, the man coming inside the gates, gaping like a slack-jawed fool who had never been farther from his cooking fire than his village green.
    “Well, this one looks to be impressed by our idyllic little pile of stones, doesn’t he?” Roderick remarked.
    Connor grunted, then took up a position in the middle of the bailey. He folded his arms over his chest and watched as the man took a lengthy tour of the castle, still wearing that look of amazement.
    Not a tourist, Connor noted without hesitation. No sketchpad, no National Trust Handbook with sights to be seen marked in red, no video camera ready to capture Thorpewold at its best. Who, then, was this simpleton who couldn’t seem to shut his mouth as he stared at everything around him?
    The man looked nothing like Thomas McKinnon, so Connor thought he might be