#nwilt

[lady-o-ren]

NEVER WILL I LOVE THEE

CHAPTER ONE // CHAPTER TWO // 

CHAPTER THREE 

(AO3 link HERE)

The King's council room is unexpectedly small and simply furnished, solely meant for conversation and truly nothing more. Yet the crackling fire and floor to ceiling windows brings a warmth to the room, casting a burnished sheen to the gold and silvery embossed armor of the two guardsmen flanking the chamber's door.

At the heart of the room, beneath a large tapestry that hangs on the wall, is where the King of Albion sits.  He's a short and stout fellow with closely cropped hair, gray as the thin smoke that spouts from the fireplace. His face is lined from the years of having to bear the weight of his title alone, with eyes the dusky color of a sable's pelt that peek from beneath his furrowed brow, searching the younger King's own for deceit just as his niece had done.

“Whyever would you come all this way just to break an engagement?” The elder man asks Jamie.

“For one, Your Grace, I think the princess would've thrown any letter from me to the fire before ever reading it, considering it an insult. And two, I didna break the engagement. I simply gave her a choice where there had been none before,” Jamie replies, his voice spiking ever so slightly with hostility that ripples down to his fingertips, tapping against the polished arm of his chair. 

For he too knows what it's like to be betrayed by one's own kin.

But not all of them. . .

He glances over at his captain of the guard standing off by the high windows that overlook the water, reflecting the last glimmering brilliance of the setting sun. He catches the older man's disapproving eye narrowed at his hand. Jamie clenches it to a fist, remembering the feel of a belt against his knuckles that strapped him just hard enough to leave a red sting.\

“I'll break them bones too if I a’ve tae, laddie. All that fidgetin’ let's the other man ken all yer thinkin’. The same as screamin’. And what good will that do ye?” 

And though he hasn't been punished like that since he was a lad, Jamie wouldn't put it past his guardsman to whack him with his leather scabbard right now. No matter that he's inherited a throne and can see far above that dark head of his. He'd always see him as the child he was.

Alone. 

Without a mother and father. 

Ripped from his sister's arms.

But Jamie knows he does so out of love sacred as the vow he'd sworn on his head as a wee babe. For the captain of his guard was also his godfather.

“Till my last breath, when my heart no longer beats, I swear tae God Almighty and yer mother above, tae keep ye from harm. Always, a bhalaich mo ghràidh.”

And Murtagh Fitzgibbons Fraser was a man of his word.

“But there is another matter I'm most concerned with,” Jamie continues, flicking his gaze back to King Quentin.

“Go on,” he says warily.

“Part of the agreement between you and my uncle was that your kingdom would be joined with ours in peace. It's something I'm still verra much interested in upholding and think it would be to both our benefit. "

“Our benefit.” The elder man snorts humorlessly and leans forward against the table, inlaid with florals and fish hiding between reeds.

“Your uncle said the same when he threatened to invade my land and savage my people unless I gave him my niece's hand. And I did so, not having much choice myself,” he says roughly, giving Jamie a cutting look. “It was either my people's lives or the last piece of my heart and I've paid dearly for it.”

Jamie holds his glare, unflinching. Firelight flickering across his features and thick waves of unbound hair.

“I'm not my uncle. I'm not here for yer land and I've proven I'm not here to force marriage on yer niece, even though I've been advised a union between us would've helped me a great deal better than pleading wi’ ye to take me at my word." Jamie gives a quick glance to his godfather and cocks a half grin at his barbarous scowl. He'd been very vocal when told of the broken engagement and would likely be foul tempered for their entire stay. “ I'm here to amend the reputation of my kingdom that's been tarnished by her fallen King and clear my sullied name.”

A gray feathered brow is raised in challenge.

“Your name, Red King, is spoken in the same breath as the devils. It's said you take great delight in torturing your enemies, even more so when it's the blood of innocents.”

“All lies,” Jamie says resolutely, eyes gleaming bright and true, that doesn't go unnoticed. “I've never tortured my enemies nor have I murdered an innocent. The only blood that stains my hands and soul has been spilt on the battlefield. Nothing more. And done so not out of some misguided loyalty to a King but for the sake of my sister, taken by Dúghall when she was a child barely older than I.”

The King of Albion regards him with a curious gaze that deepens the wrinkles around his eyes.

“I've heard something of that sort too. That Dúghall held your sister captive for years and it was she who poisoned him in the end. ”

“That's gossip fit for chambermaids who've no doubt fancied doing the same to many a man and worse,” Jamie retorts through a tight jaw, and is surprised when the elder man huffs a laugh from deep within his belly.

“And no one would blame them, nor your sister if true. But I do wonder,” he says, serious once more. “If one tyrant was disposed of to make way for an even crueler one.”

“If ye believe me to be as vile as others say, and I dinna think ye do, then let me prove my worth to ye as an ally, one ye sorely need, Your Grace. For I know trouble brews with your borders to the east, with the Wolverton King.”

A fraught quiet fills the air before King Quentin heaves a weighty sigh and rubs the space between his eyes straining without his spectacles.

“I think a drink is needed before we continue. What say you, King of Scotia?”

His tone is almost cordial but only faintly so, just enough for Jamie to crook a grin.

“I'd like it fine. Any whiskey perchance?”

//

They continue to talk for an hour more until Jamie and Murtagh are dismissed by King Quentin, needing to ponder their possible alliance and rest his tipsy mind and even more so tired eyes. 

Out in the grand windowed hallway the torches have been lit along the walls that arch up into a high domed ceiling, it's intricate carvings lost in the flickering shadows. A young faced guardsman, introduced simply as Sir Jeremy, has been waiting to escort them to their private chambers for the night and ends up becoming witness to a verbal brawl.

“So what d’ye think, Ghoistidh?” Jamie asks in the gàidhlig as they walk. “Will the King join wi’ us or has our journey been for naught?”

Murtagh doesn't spare a glance nor a word, but his nostrils flare like a bee-stung bull in response.

Jamie sighs, glancing down  at the white marbled floor and runs a finger down his nose. “Ah, still mad at me then. Would it make ye feel better to bash my face in wi’ yer fists?”

That gets his godfather's attention and he halts his step.

“Nothing would please me more if it meant knocking some sense intae that reckless, empty heid of yers, ye wee shite,” he growls from his scruffy black whiskers, gnarled hands gesturing his thoughts.

“Ye ken ye could'a been thrown intae the dungeon fer approaching the princess wi’out her guard or chaperone beside her. And me being yer sword and shield, I would'a been heaved in right after ye, amongst the fekkin rats and piss, begging yer mam above fer forgiveness fer strangling the bloody life outta ye.”

Jamie, used to being berated by now, simply quirks an auburn brow, mouth twitching.

“Isn't it treasonous to both threaten and insult yer King?” 

Murtagh leans in, breath laced with the king's whiskey and the spiced jerky he keeps in his leather sporran.

“Hang me from the gallows then when we're back in Scotia, my King of fools,” he hawks.

But before anymore is said (before Murtagh is forced to do penance for the murder of his godson who's shoulders are shaking from stifling his laughter), the sound of a door opening has the two men turning back down the hallway where two guards have now appeared along with the princess.

“Seems we had a wee mouse listening in on us. What must she think of ye now?”

“I wonder,” says Jamie softly, switching back to the Albion tongue, and watches as the lass turns a corner, a heartbeat too far. “I think I'll ask her.” 

Murtaugh stares at him as if he's lost all sense. “Ye’re naught tae speak tae her.”

“Is that an order from my guardsman to his king?” Jamie asks, knowing his godfather would be powerless to challenge his title, especially in the presence of a foreigner in their native tongue.

And he's right. 

Murtaugh flicks his gaze to young Sir Jeremy, who's eyes dart nervously between the two men, and sighs. “Pardon me, my King, but it is getting late and I'd rather be sleeping in a bed t’night, no’ shackled tae a dungeon wall beside ye.”

Jamie grasps his shoulder, the whipcord muscles beneath his palm taut as a bowstring. Always primed for a fight. “I'll be only a moment, Ghoistidh.” Then says no more, his feet already propelling him forward, as Murtagh can only look on, muttering incoherently -

"Tha e na iongnadh nach deach mi liath."

//

The princess is still within sight when Jamie calls out to her in the quiet hallway that has her pausing to look over her shoulder, gilded in the moonlight. Still dressed for a tumble through the thistle and grass, she raises a hand for her guards to move aside as he approaches her with a hurried step, loud and eager as his heartbeat.

It had been racing since he first caught glimpse of her running between the green bracken and trees, curls whirling about her like a gale over a stormy sea. Jamie had thought her a nimble, wild thing of enchantment. The kind of tameless creature that lived only in tales of times long gone his mother and father had told him about when he was a child. And for a breath of a moment, he had wondered if this maiden had unwittingly stumbled from her own realm of faerie to his.

But then she had tripped and fallen, graceless as a newborn fawn. 

Had spat out the most wicked obscenities that would've made even his godfather blush. 

Yet when he held her hand in his, small and wounded like an injured dove, Jamie felt something startling, warming him like a golden ember from the breath of a firedrake down to the marrow of his bones.

And his heart . . .

"What is it King of Scotia that couldn't wait for the morrow?" 

Claire asks, voice no longer bristling with the bite of a crocodile but still thickly laced with trepidation, as her guardsmen wait behind her with their halberds raised.

It's enough to make Jamie's gut plummet to his boots.

“I saw ye leave the king's chambers and came to ask if yer opinion of me has changed but I see that even from what ye heard and what we spoke about beneath the trees that ye still doubt the man I am, that I ask ye to trust.”

Her eyes fall down to her hands clasped together, the right still bound with his handkerchief, and gingerly she brushes her delicate fingertips over the fabric. 

"You have given me my freedom, King of Scotia, and for that you have more heart than my former betrothed. But I still have known you far less than a day and now you're willing to pledge your loyalty to my people and king just like that, without a price."

Jamie shakes his head, eyes intent on hers. “I don't make my decisions on a whim, Your Highness. All I want is a chance to hold me heid up high and bring honor to my family name that right now only brings fear to all who hear it, as ye've proven t’day when first we spoke. And I think I can do that by shielding Albion from an enemy like yers . . . And mine."

"Yours?" Claire's eyes search his, a fearful shadow tainting their amber-gold luminescence. "You said no such thing to my uncle, that you know The Wolverton King."

Jamie draws in a hard breath, looking down at his right hand flexed between them, the skin scarred and burning with the crushing echoes from his past. 

 You beauty, let me hear you scream . . .

He clenches his palm shut, before saying roughly. "I've never met the King, but I've had the cruel misfortune of falling prey to his brother years ago. A man I pray ye never meet and would lay my life to keep that so. This ye must believe of me, Your Highness."

His voice whispers off at the end, feeling his heart gallop just as it did in the midst of battle, waiting for her to speak. And she does. A tentative question, hand outstretched to his.

"May I?" 

Claire asks, though Jamie can't fathom why. Not after she recoiled from him earlier. But he nods, heart fluttering, as he opens his palm for her to take. For who could ever deny a princess?

He watches as her fingertips feather across his battered hand, gently tracing the jagged scars gone white as the years of violence dragged on. She grimaces at the once broken bones protruding awkwardly beneath, as if she could truly see how each crooked finger had met the brutal blow of the malicious prince.

And maybe she did.

"You were just a boy when you met him, weren't you?" She lifts her gaze, dark with shock.

"Aye," rasps Jamie, glancing down at his hand clasped between her own. "I was barely fifteen when I was ambushed by a gang of soldiers along the Wolverton borderlands. They tied me up and brought me to their Lord Commander, their prince, for interrogation and I was fool enough to think he'd simply slit my throat. Instead he crushed my hand wi' his boot and carved my back to the bloody bone like he was gutting a fish . . ." 

And for all his days, Jamie would remember the pink flick of the wicked devil's tongue tasting his blood, smeared like rouge across his harsh thin mouth, parted in a lover's blissful sigh.

Jamie grits his jaw, swallowing the bitter bile rising up the straining cords of his throat, and continues.

". . . He would've done far worse to me too if not for my godfather risking his neck to save mine."

Claire tightens her grasp, instilling a steadying warmth into his palm and fingers he badly needed. "Not your uncle? Surely he must've tried to rescue you

He snorts ruefully at the princesses' appalled expression. 

"He's the one that sent me to scout the border, Your Highness. Wi' no sons of his own, he thought my very existence was a threat to his and wanted me dead. Tis why he forced me to soldier for him when I was a child. The bastard couldn'a kill me himself and waited for someone else to." He then shrugs, grinning wryly. "Didn'a work like he planned though. Nor was it the first or last time he ever tried."

There was a thick curved scar along the back of his skull that could attest to that too.

"So do ye see why I'd give my right hand and more to defend ye from men like my uncle and the prince they call Black Jack? Why being compared to them, to ken ye see me in such a way, is a blight on my soul."

He sees her chest heave with unspoken breath as she circles her thumb around a knot of tissue, so very softly, as if his skin would bruise from such attentiveness.

Was it just hours before she threatened to tear him apart? 

"King of Scotia . . ." 

He shakes his head, voice low and heady from her ministrations.

"Jamie, Your Highness. Tis my boyhood name and ye're welcome to call me so, as the last of my kin does, please."

For the first time, Jamie sees a smile bloom on her wine kissed mouth that only adds to her loveliness that glows in the mystic light of the moon and stars, the vibrant flames of the torchlights.

"I suppose if you're to stand between me and all things grisly, a single name would be easier to call upon."

 "Do ye mean that? Truly?" Jamie asks, unaware he's tugged her hand up to his chest, sparking a sudden shyness in the princess.

"There's still much to talk about between us, and with my uncle too," she hastily adds.

"Of course," he grins.

"So until the morrow then . . . Jamie." 

"Until the morrow, Your Highness," he echoes back, reluctantly letting her hand fall from his.

Jamie then achingly watches her walk away, a heartbeat too far again, and slumps his shoulder against the wall. Runs a hand through his curls, down the back of his neck.

"You are a fool." 

Jamie doesn't bother to turn around, merely sighs in answer to his godfather.

"Ye've fallen for a princess. Could've had that princess. But ye've gone and thrown it all away." Murtagh shakes his head, coming up beside him. “Ye're the same heartsick fool yer father was.”

Jamie huffs a laugh and glances to his side. "Do I have nothing of my mother?" 

Arms across his chest, the older man looks thoughtfully at the once wee lad, his grizzled features softening as he does so.

“Tae much heart. Tae much spirit. Tae many good things that will make ye tae good of a king." He then smacks the back of the young King's head, who bunches over and lets out a yelp. "And  a pain in the arse tae serve and protect. Now if yer done fawning over the lass I'd like tae get tae bed.”

But as they walk, and as Jamie rubs the bump on his head . . .

“Ye dinna think she noticed the fawning, d’ye?”

"Ye wee. . . " Murtagh reaches for the hilt of his sword just as Jamie cracks into raucous laughter, running down the hallway for dear life.

A/N:

So the first two parts have been ready since the summer. The third part has been a beast to write.

 I couldn't put Claire in the beginning because she just took over the conversation and distracted Jamie way too much and I needed that place to flesh out Murtagh a bit. I also can't write more than two people in a scene so I had to push her down. But then I had a hard time writing her there. She's listened to Jamie and Lambs conversation and has definitely mellowed out off page but is still cautious towards Jamie. But I didn't know how the fuck to write that tone into her speech. I tried having Jamie joke around with her to flesh her out but after three rewrites it just didn't work. Also it's all written in Jamie's pov cause I felt overwhelmed by all the juggling I had to do and by being so deep into Jamie's thoughts and backstory. I tried mixing in Claire's pov but it was just too much and I ended up with a very stilted Claire at the end which sucks.

Anyways this is the best I could muster and I'm not happy at all about it. Mostly because I did rush through what was left to be written. My grandma is not doing well (I wrote about that in another chapter of another series) and she won't be getting better. I feel like I'm being ripped apart and a thousand other emotions that are driving me mad. But I'm trying to write to keep some semblance of sanity (it's not working). I just don't know how long I can keep doing that.

Thank you to all you readers who gave me some kind words and prayers ♥️🙏♥️

Random Info:

*So Uncle Lamb is very different in this fic compared to how he is in my head (he's like Jane's dad from the animated Tarzan which is very different from how I think of him in canon). And since I don't think he'll pop up again, his back story is that he married. His wife died in childbirth, along with the child, never remarried and is very protective of Claire.

*Murtagh is Jamie's bodyguard. And looking up some official titles the only one I liked was Captain of the Guard. He's also been at Jamie's side since Dougal forced him to be a soldier.

*Claire definitely has thoughts on the Wolvertons that I couldn't flesh out here but it's why she's warmed to Jamie a great deal more than last chapter.

*It's been so long since I've written parts of this fic. If there's anything that sounds like it's from the books I got it from there.