“She does look like our former sister,” the priest said in a flat tone.
“Ye are my uncle?” Glynis asked.
After growing up in a family in which she looked like no one else, Glynis had been disappointed to see no resemblance between herself and her aunt. She could see herself in this tall, gaunt priest—but she did not like what she saw.
“Yes, I am Father Thomas,” he said, as if being himself was a great responsibility. “You may sit.”
Glynis’s backside was barely on the bench before her uncle started the prayer. He recited it rapidly with no inflection, giving Glynis the impression that his mind was elsewhere. When he finished the prayer, he helped himself to the choicest piece of meat on the tray and began eating before the rest of them had any.
“I hope you have a more obedient nature than your mother did,” he said, looking at her with a grim expression. “I pray you will not bring more shame upon our family.”
He did not expect an answer, and Glynis had to bite her tongue to prevent herself from giving him one he was sure not to like.
Glynis’s lively aunt Peg and Henry seemed to wilt in the priest’s presence, and the supper conversation was stilted. Midway through the meal, the priest put away his eating knife.
“Gavin Douglas has been imprisoned,” he announced.
Aunt Peg gasped, and Henry went pale.
“How can that be?” Henry asked. “He was supposed to become the Archbishop of St. Andrews.”
“The queen nominated him, and she is no longer regent,” Father Thomas hissed. “Now the Douglases are out of favor.”
“What does this mean?” Peg asked in a hesitant voice.
“It means, dear sister,” Father Thomas said, turning his venomous eyes on her, “that I will not be going to St. Andrews with Gavin Douglas.”
Glynis was tempted to suggest that Father Thomas should be grateful he was not following this Gavin Douglas to prison.
“What in the name of God possessed Gavin to advise his nephew to marry the queen?” Father Thomas raised his hands as he spoke, as if beseeching Heaven. “As her lover, Archibald Douglas had the queen in his pocket. And the council could do nothing because the king’s will provided that the queen should be regent
Glynis dropped her gaze to the food growing cold in front of her.
“Damn him to hell,” Father Thomas said. “Gavin should have stuck to his poetry.”
“He is a poet?” Glynis asked, hoping to divert Father Thomas to a topic less upsetting to him.
“Gavin Douglas is famous for his own poetry as well as for his translations of ancient poems,” Father Thomas said. “A useless activity, of course, but one that would not have cost him a bishopric.”
“Useless?” Glynis said. “We Highlanders hold our poets in high esteem.”
From the way Father Thomas’s eyebrows shot up, he was not accustomed to disagreement.
“Why has the poor man been imprisoned?” Glynis asked, her curiosity overtaking her caution, as it often did.
“He is accused of attempting to buy the bishopric from the Pope.” Father Thomas shrugged one bony shoulder. “If Albany’s faction did not suspect Gavin had also advised the queen to flee to England with the Scottish heir, no one would care if he bought it.”
Glynis cleared her throat. “Are ye aware, Uncle, of what this new regent’s attitude is toward the Highland clans?”
“Of course I am,” he snapped. “’Tis fortunate that you escaped that God-forsaken place, for Albany has given the Campbells the crown’s blessing to destroy this Highland rebellion ‘by sword and by fire.’”
Glynis put her hand to her throat, fearing for her family back home. “What does that mean?”
“It means they have a free hand to lay waste to the rebels’ lands and murder anyone who stands in their way, including women and children,” Father Thomas said, “When the rebels submit, as they will, the Campbells are to collect the rebel chieftains’ eldest sons as hostages to assure their father’s good behavior.”
“My brother is only four years old.” Glynis felt sick to her stomach.
“Then it may just be possible to teach him civilized ways.”
If her father knew of this plan, surely he would see sense and leave the rebellion. Before Glynis could question Father Thomas further, he got to his feet.
“I must pursue my advancement independent of Gavin Douglas now,” he said, fixing his hard gaze on Henry. “It will be costly.”
Father Thomas did not wait for a response. Without so much as a fare-thee-well, he left the room with long- legged strides.
“Thomas is an important man in the church,” Peg said when he had gone, as if that should excuse his rudeness.
“Eat up,” Henry said to Glynis, as he stuffed an apple tart in his mouth. “A man likes a woman with some flesh on her bones.”
Glynis could not recover her good humor as quickly as her Aunt Peg and Henry, but she managed a weak smile and took a bite. The apples were not as tart as at home. Nothing tasted good here.
