Highland Promise by Amanda Anderson

ONE
     
     
     
    Anne could barely get her breath.
    “How is this happening?  I can’t do this Margret.  Please, just slow down.  I cannot leave London.  This makes no sense.  Stop it, just stop.  I can’t just leave.  This is my home!”
    “Miss Anne.  I know you don’t understand this right now, but I can’t explain.  There is no time for this.  You need to trust me lovey.  You know you can trust me.  You need to hurry now sweetheart.”
    Anne watched the woman who had practically raised her throw things around her room and she couldn’t even move.  She just stood there and watched as everything in her life changed.
    “It is too late to be thinking about this.”  Anne pulled her dressing gown around her tighter.  “We can talk about it in the morning.  I want to go to sleep!  This doesn’t make any sense!  Just let me go back to bed.”
    Margret took her by the arms and shook her once hard. 
    “Child there is more to all this than I am able to say right now.  You must listen to me.  This is not something we can just go to bed and forget.  We have to go tonight and we have to pack light and you have to snap out of this.”
    “No.”  Anne was tired of this.  She wanted to sleep and she wanted to know what was happening.  “No.  I am tired of this.  I want to see mother.  I want to sleep.  Everything will make more sense in the morning.”
    “No.  No dear, it will not.”
    Anne rushed from the room in search of her mother, but the house was in disarray.  Servants rushed about as if it were midday instead of the middle of the night.  Two of the house maids stopped to gawk at her before they rushed away hiding whispers behind their hands.
    Anne rushed to her mother’s rooms, but they were empty except for a few servants who were wide eyed with fear.  The furniture had been covered and the servants were working to pack everything up and close down the rooms.
    In confusion Anne rushed to the rooms of her sisters only to find them in the same state as that of her mother.
    She turned in the hall as if lost in the forest in the darkness.  Margret stood with tears in her eyes and opened her arms.
    “You must go as well Love.  It is no longer safe here.  I thought there would be more time, but we must go.  Your safety is all that matters to me, it’s all that has ever mattered.”
    Anne felt tears fall down her face.  “Father?”
    “Has gone as well.  Please Anne.  This is for your safety and theirs.  They have gone to safety and entrusted your safety to me.  They have done all they can, they must see to their own safety now as we must see to yours.  They risked everything to keep you safe for all these years.”
    Anne was rushed back to her rooms where she was dressed by one of the servants, she couldn’t even recall the girl’s name.  The dress that was pulled over her head didn’t fit her as well as her own things and the fabric was scratchy.
    “Why must I wear this?  Isn’t everything bad enough?  Why must I look like and urchin as well?”
    Margret sighed and walked to her.  “Anne, I love you.  I know you have grown accustomed to a certain way of life.  I fear I did you a disservice by allowing it, but you must adapt.  Your life may be difficult for a while, but you will be what you were raised to be as soon as I can arrange everything.  Please trust me my dear girl.”
    Anne couldn’t think.  She couldn’t think of her family that she may never see again.  She couldn’t think about the uncertainty of her life now or why things had changed so dramatically in such a short time.
    Everything had been fine at dinner.  How had everything changed?
    Anne didn’t protest when a pair of ill-fitting boots were tied on her feet. She felt nothing.  How could she feel nothing when everything that mattered to her was being ripped away?  She was being sent to a friend of Margret’s in the godforsaken highlands.  Her brain was outraged, screaming arguments