by Aileen Adams
Yet there was no ignoring the way his throat tightened when he imagined their discomfort; to say nothing of how he’d already come to rely on their happy, laughing voices when he entered the house every evening.
They would be well soon enough, or so he told himself. Anne was correct. They were healthy children, not sickly or weak. They would be well.
Even so, he made haste to return to the house with the water, for there was no telling when they would need it.
“They shall remain home, with Anne, until they’re well enough to visit ye,” Drew explained. “I would not have them coughing and disturbing ye now.”
“Poor lambs.” Davina was out of bed, the first time he’d seen her up and about in many weeks. She fussed over a pot of soup, its aroma enough to make his mouth water.
Shana sliced potatoes at the long kitchen table. “How is Anne? Worn out, I would imagine.”
“Aye, that she is, but there is no convincing her to rest. I wish she would, and that is a fact, but she insists she can care for them both. She was hard at work when I left, preparing a new poultice, with bedding hanging over the line to dry. She’d just scrubbed it in the tub behind the house.”
“I shall send ye back with soup tonight,” Davina promised. “The poor thing ought to at least have supper prepared for her.”
“And by yourself, no less.” He grinned. Seeing her on her feet, bustling about the kitchen as if she’d never taken ill, was a true relief. “I’m sure Rufus was relieved to find ye well enough to get up from bed.”
The women exchanged a look. “I would not say he was relieved,” Davina murmured, eyes downcast. The flare of her nostrils, the set of her jaw reminded him of the fiery lass he’d met on the road to the farm. How she had tormented his cousin with her stubborn ways. She was not to be trifled with.
He could only imagine the thrashing she’d delivered when his cousin had balked at the notion of her being on her feet.
“He shall come to his senses,” Drew predicted. “He merely wishes to keep ye safe and well—yourself and the bairn, as well. He has good intentions.”
“Those good intentions shall be the death of him,” she muttered, her hand tightening around the handle of the kettle. “Or I shall be if he does not learn to give me space.”
Shana offered a reassuring smile before glancing toward Drew and grimacing. So the fight had been a woeful one. He was nearly sorry he’d missed it, though Anne had needed his assistance to fetch more water, hang the sodden bedding and more before he left to begin his work.
“Remind Anne that she ought to take care with herself,” Shana suggested. “It would be a pity if she wore herself out while tending the twins.”
“I shall do just that,” he promised, backing from the room. “And Davina.”
She looked up, frowning—likely with the memory of the fight with Rufus, or at least he hoped. Woe to he upon whom she looked with those angry, sullen eyes and that defiant jaw. Would that she never looked upon him that way. He was uncertain he’d live through the ordeal.
“I shall speak to Rufus,” he promised, “and when I visit the village on the morrow, I shall pay another visit to the healer.”
The anger in her eyes cleared. Her jaw released. “Ye need not bother. I can do it.”
“Nonsense. I already plan to take the cart in. And dinna even think of handing me a shilling,” he added. “Think of it as a gift.”
“I was correct about you,” Shana smirked.
“What’s that?”
She shrugged as if it meant little. “I told Anne ye were a good man. I suspect she did not believe me, but perhaps she will with time.”
He wished fervently that she had not spoken a word, and felt it best to leave the matter alone.
20
Anne had never been so tired in her life.
She had never known such deep, aching weariness existed. Not during her night-long raids of nearby farms. Not while cleaning up after the Stuart men. Not during the times when Liam had taken ill. Not even during her own rare illnesses. She had never once been near the point of falling asleep while standing upright.
Until now.
They were sleeping, and thank heaven for that. In the three days since they’d first become feverish, it had seemed more often than not that one of them was almost always awake. They seemed to take turns sleeping, rather than sleeping at the same time.
Which meant she’d almost always had to be on alert, mopping sweat-slick brows and catching phlegm in rags held to their mouths and preparing poultice to apply to their chests. It seemed to be helping, at long last. Their fevers had broken. They slept peacefully, silently on clean linens, wearing clean shifts.
They no longer needed her as they had.
She could leave now.
Her heart caught in her throat as she gazed down upon their sleeping forms. They were so dear, even while ill. Moira had apologized nearly every time she’d called out for water or broth or anything she’d found herself needing. Poor, wee Owen had coughed until tears rolled down his cheeks, yet had managed to make her laugh more than once. Even in the midst of the grippe, he was able to keep his good humor.
She would miss them, there was no doubt. But they were not Liam. He needed her more.
Did he not?
She took a step away from them, then another. Her straw tick sat on the floor at the foot of the bed, and she longed to crawl into it and bury her head beneath a fur, but there was no time for that. If she slept through the night and woke in the morning in this house, she might never find the strength to leave. Not when the pair of them had worked their way into her heart, like a seed on the verge of growing into something much larger.
Something with roots. Something impossible to pull up and out.
She pressed her lips together as tight as she could to hold back the faint whimpers which threatened to escape. What would they think when they woke to find her gone? Poor dears. They loved her. It was not fair. Nothing was fair.
Perhaps it was best for them to find out now just how deeply unfair life could be. They would forget her in time, and likely not much time at all. They were young. She would not even be a memory within a year or two.
So she told herself. So she needed to believe.
She tied the cloak about her neck, tears now blurring her vision. Why was it so difficult? Why could she not simply leave and never look back? Liam needed her! Liam loved her, and he would certainly not forget her as the bairns would!
“I am sorry,” she whispered to the sleeping children. “Forgive me, dears. Forgive me. I had no choice. I had to find my brother and take care of him. He needs me, too. Your uncle loves ye and will care for ye as he did before. Never fear.”
She turned away then, before sobs could overtake her and hold her fast. Her feet seemed stuck to the floor as it was. No sense in making the inevitable more difficult.
Her hand was on the metal knob when a faint whimper sounded from the bed.
She froze, her eyes sliding shut. If only Moira did not wake—she knew the sound of her whimpering by now, having heard both it and that of her brother many times over three long days. If only this was an unhappy dream that she would not wake from.
If the lass opened her eyes and knew Anne was about to leave, there would be no going through with it. She knew this. She could not disappoint the child so.
“Mam… Mam!” Moira’s wracking sobs caused Anne to whirl around, stunned. “Mam!”
“Moira, dear!” She sat at the edge of the bed, where she’d spent so much of her time during the illness, taking the child by the shoulders and shaking as gently as she could. “Moira! ‘Tis only a dream!”
Moira’s eyes fluttered open, then darted back and forth as she accustomed herself to her surroundings. Anne understood this feeling well, naturally, as a truly dreadful dream was never an easy thing to wake from. Often there was a period of breathless moments when a body froze in shock, still caught between the dream and reality.
When she re
cognized Anne, she burst into tears and buried her face in Anne’s shoulder. Owen woke, of course, and was quick to fly to his sister’s side. “What is it, Moira?” he asked in a sleepy voice.
“Mam…” It was the only clear word the bairn sobbed. “Mam…”
“Mam?” Owen’s chin quivered.
Och, nay, Anne lamented. Two crying bairns.
“It was nothing but a dream,” Anne whispered, rocking Moira while stroking Owen’s hair. “Nothing more.”
“I dinna wish it to be a dream,” Owen whimpered just before two fat tears rolled down his cheeks. “I wish for Mam to be here. And Da. I want them back.”
Soon, there were three weeping, orphaned children in that room. Anne may no longer have been a child, but she felt the loss of her parents as acutely as she had when the loss occurred. She had spent many a night weeping in her bed, longing for them, wondering what she’d done to cause their loss.
She understood, years later, that their death had not been her doing. As a lass of only thirteen, with a brother not much younger than Owen and Moira, she’d been far too overwhelmed and overwrought to do anything but cry herself to sleep.
“Come,” she murmured, easing both of them back until their heads touched their pillows. “Rest, now. Ye must sleep if ye wish to feel well.”
“Why will they never come back to us?” Owen asked, his voice thick and a cough threatening to make itself known. He was still in no condition to upset himself so—neither of them were.
Anne kissed his forehead. “Because that is the way of it, my dear. My da and mam went away as well, to God. Is that what ye learned of it? That they went to be with God?”
Moira nodded. Her sobs had quieted to soft whimpering and the occasional hitching breath. “Aye. People told us so.”
“They were correct.” Anne settled in beside her, on the edge of the bed, the two of them small enough that she could extend her arm about them both at once. “Your mother and father will wait for ye. They watch over ye, as well, and it pleases them that ye are such a good lass and laddie, and that ye give your Uncle Drew little trouble and make him very happy.”
“We do?” Moira asked. This seemed more important to her then than any talk of her parents.
“Aye, dear. Of course. Ye make him happier than he was before ye came, I am certain. He loves ye very much. But I am afraid your mam and da will not come back. I was so sad when I learned my parents could never come back. I know how it feels.”
“Do ye still miss them?” Owen whispered, his eyelids heavy.
“Och, I do,” she whispered in reply, stroking his smooth cheek. “Every day.”
“I dreamed she was with us,” Moira smiled, her voice turning soft and drowsy. “It was lovely. But she had to go, and I wanted her to stay, and I asked her to stay and cried and pulled on her hand…”
“Shh…” Anne kissed her forehead, crooning softly. “Rest now. It was only a dream, and she loves ye and is watching over ye. I promise.”
She rested her head on her folded arm, still holding the pair of them with the other. She watched as they fell asleep again, their furrowed brows smoothing, the uneasy lines of their pursed mouths easing.
Owen stirred one last time, struggling his way out of the sleep which pulled him under the surface just long enough to whisper one last thing. “I love ye, Anne.”
She smiled, even as her eyes filled with tears of regret, shame, guilt. “And I love ye, Owen.”
And she did. She loved them both so dearly, the wee things. She knew what it meant to be in the world with no mother, no father. Nothing but memories and dreams which would never come to be because once a person was dead and gone there was no bringing them back.
No matter how many tears were shed over them.
For children so young, they had already lost so much. And they loved her. They trusted her. They fell asleep in her arms, both of them, knowing she would not bring them harm. They could rest easy with her beside them, warding off further nightmares. Loving them.
And if they woke again, they trusted she would be there to dry their tears.
While she had been mere moments from leaving them forever. What was she thinking? What was any of it about?
They needed her, and, God help her, she needed them. They would haunt her forever if she left now, knowing as she did how fresh the pain of losing one’s parents and security and everything they had ever known. Coming to a new home, with strangers and new rules and the struggle to learn how to please.
There had been no pleasing Malcolm. There had never been any pleasing him. These two were fortunate that they’d come to a happy home, with friends who cared for them and an uncle who had been beside himself during their illness. The man had been nearly inconsolable at times, try as he had to pretend otherwise.
She could not bring to mind the image of Malcolm ever caring so much.
Even with so much love and affection around her, however, there would be no making up for a long time the loss of yet another person they’d come to love.
She had waited far longer than she ought to. It was too late now. For all of them
A single tear leaked out from beneath her lowered lashes when she closed her eyes.
Sleep was not far behind.
21
Sweet silence filled the house upon Drew’s awakening, and he smiled to himself at the lack of coughing or wheezing or calls for Anne.
He suspected Anne would feel the same, as she had barely slept in days. She had given the twins every last ounce of strength in her possession and had proven herself to him as she did so.
He suspected she could not have cared less whether he was impressed with her, however. Even that made him like her more, in spite of the reservations he’d held toward her in the beginning.
It seemed years had passed since then, though it had been less than a fortnight since they’d met. Never would he have imagined her caring for the twins. Loving them, even.
He might have been wrong about that. He might have been imagining what he wished to imagine. He did not believe so, however, for no one would devote themselves wholeheartedly to the state of another if it was not love that made it so.
The fact that she loved them as he did served to soften his feelings for her even further.
It was not until he sat up in bed and touched bare feet to cold floor that he came fully to his senses and recalled how daft it was to think of her as anything other than who and what she was.
She was a thief. She had stolen from them, no matter why she’d done it.
Rufus would not forgive this, and neither could he. To do so would only lead to greater complication.
He got up and went about splashing water from the bedside basin on his cheeks, which further roused him and guided his thoughts on a more natural course. It was possible for two people to love the same thing and still remain two separate people. Loving the twins did not make him and Anne anything other than strangers who happened to have something in common.
He had all but set his mind to this as he shrugged into his tunic and stepped into his trews. The lass was a fine caregiver, and he was grateful for what she had done, but there was nothing more between them. There could never be.
Dawn had broken by the time he stepped from his bedchamber into the main room, where the hearth was dark and cold. He supposed there could be nothing lost by allowing Anne time to sleep a bit longer. He lit the fire, building it up with wood from the pile beside, then started a pot of porridge and filled the kettle for tea.
As he performed these small tasks, he reminded himself that it was not for her sake. He cared nothing for whether this would please her. The fact that her smiling face came to mind time and again meant nothing.
What did it matter that he wished to return the favor she’d paid him by nursing his niece and nephew? He was not a cold-hearted brute. He understood what it meant to owe a body for what they’d done, and he had never been above granting credit when and where it was due.
With
the porridge simmering and the tea steeping, he decided it was time to wake her, if not the bairns. She would need food as much as she needed rest, for she had not eaten as she should have, either.
Neither had he, for that matter. He had been too concerned over the twins.
Not a sound came from the closed-off bedchamber, and he took his time of opening the door lest he wake all three inside.
At first, when he spied the empty tick at the foot of the bed, his heart leapt into his throat and threatened to escape through his mouth when it fell open. Of course, she had left during the night. She had run when all of them were at their most vulnerable and least suspicious.
She’d taken advantage of him. He might have known she would. In fact, he had known! He’d known all along, had he not? He’d managed to make himself forget. Nothing more.
What a fool she’d made out of him. He would have her hide for this.
Only then, after already imagining every terrible thing he wished to bring down upon her head, did his gaze rise to the bed. Where she slept with her arm about the twins, who were also sleeping soundly.
Only then did his heart settle into its accustomed place.
Only then did he release the breath he’d been holding.
What had taken place to lead her there? It seemed almost cruel to wake her, seeing as how she had spent part of the night sharing a bed with two kicking bairns. Perhaps they had both felt poorly and asked her to join them, that she might sing them to sleep.
As Bridget had for him.
She was not Bridget. Whatever it took, he had to remind himself and make it stick. She was not Bridget. She would never be their mam, either, no matter how fond of her they had become.
Anne’s eyes opened. Then, she blinked slowly as she woke. He couldn’t help but smile a bit as she returned to herself.
She looked at the twins, and a faint smile crossed her lips. She then raised her arm, moving slowly so as not to wake them. She had yet to take notice of him, and he remained as still as possible to keep it that way for a while.
