The Perfect Ten Boxed Set

by Dianna Love

  Flora, obviously horrified, shook her head.

  “Mayhap I do,” Rachael whispered, “but if we canna help, then our presence will, at least, be some comfort.” She lowered her voice even farther. “Such a wee thing is Mary. She’s had trouble from the verra first. This be her third babe.”

  As soon as the boat hit the beach everyone tumbled out. With their skirts soaked to the knees, the women raced after Alex.

  Beth’s fear that they’d lose sight of him evaporated as a blood-curdling screech rent the air. It came from the second stone cottage before her.

  Rachael entered the small two-room home ahead of her and settled on her knees before a pale, sweat soaked woman on the pallet. “Shh, Mary, ‘twill all be well, dearest.”

  The midwife, though probably only forty, looked a hundred as she whispered in Gael and Rachael translated, “She said ‘tis the shoulders. The head is out but she canna bring forth the rest.”

  Beth, easing to the far side of the cot, felt the blood leave her head as she looked between the laboring woman’s shaking legs. The child’s cone shaped head was indeed out, dark and swathed in blood.

  Feeling light-headed, she mentally chided, Get your shit together. This woman needs what little comfort you can offer. Beth knelt, brushed the woman’s russet curls from her face and placed a cool compress on her brow.

  Rachael whispered to the midwife, “Ye have nay choice, mistress. Ye must break the babe’s shoulder or we lose mother and child both.”

  “But I had hoped...”

  Rachael shook her head and reached for Mary’s hand and right leg. “My lady, take Mary’s other hand and leg as I.” When Beth had imitated Rachael’s hold, Rachael murmured to the midwife, “Do it, now.”

  Tears sprang into Beth eyes as the walls echoed with Wee Mary’s stomach-churning agony.

  Before Beth could think to pray, all went deathly quiet. Beth looked to the midwife. The woman held a stout but silent babe on her forearm. With a well-practiced hand, the midwife swabbed the babe’s face and mouth and then slapped the baby’s feet. Beth’s heart gave a mighty thump when the child, a boy, finally bellowed for all he was worth. The new mother, her arms reaching for the infant, laughed and praised God while Beth silently slid to the floor.

  Excited by the simple prospect of having a child, she’d given no thought to the dangers of birthing in this primitive world. Her fingers instinctively sought her wedding band.

  Chapter 26

  Duncan frowned studying his wife as she sat huddled at the far end of their wee isle with her arms clutched around her bent legs. They’d not tupped in days.

  Wishing Beth hadna witnessed Mary’s birthing was of little use now. More worrisome was her endlessly twisting of her wedding band.

  In a flood of tears, she had told him her people would have sliced wee Mary’s womb and taken the babe, so the babe wouldna have had a damaged arm as he did now. Though he had heard it done when a woman was lost, he had difficulty believing both mother and child could survive such barbaric treatment. But she swore it was true, and he worried even more.

  He knelt behind her and wrapped his arms around her shoulders. Believing he already kenned the answer, he still asked, “Lass, what are ye fashin’ on now?”

  Staring at the sea, she leaned back against his chest. “Whisky.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Do you know how to make it?”

  “I dinna ken the art myself, but Ol’ John does. Why?” If he lived to be one hundred, he wouldna ever understand this woman.

  “Whisky will make you rich.”

  He chuckled. “Ladywife, ‘tis nay a way in hell John’s wee still will make me a wealthy man.”

  “Exactly. You need bigger stills to make more. And some of the whisky needs to be put up in oak barrels and stored for five years, some even twenty.”

  Ack! The poor wee thing had gone totally daft from fashing, just as he feared. He stood, lifting her as he did so. “Come, lass, ye need rest.”

  She spun in his arms. “Listen to me. The longer whisky ages, the better it gets. Where I come from and in England, a rich man thinks nothing of paying fifty dollars—-pounds—for a bottle of aged whisky this big.”

  His jaw dropped as he studied the small space between her hands. “Ye canna be serious?”

  “Aye, Duncan, I am. As serious as your priest is about his sacraments.”

  He expelled a great whoosh of air contemplating the possibilities. He had heard rumors some English were quite fond of the water of life. Of course, he’d not tasted aged whisky because they drank John’s brew as fast as he made it, but...

  Then there was the problem with the land. His wouldna support large crops, but he could negotiate for grain or finished whisky from the lowlanders. He could sell a bit and put away the rest. Too, he’d have to engage in a bit more smuggling, something he’d been reluctant to do of late, but better that then going to France. Hmm.

  “Lass,” he kissed her soundly, “we need go speak with Isaac.”

  ~#~

  Flora grinned as Beth settled in the boat. “My lady, we’re finally off to Drasmoor.”

  Beth nodded. With her husband sequestered with Isaac, Rachael engrossed in mending—-Beth’s idea of purgatory—and the keep in good order, she’d been in sore need of a distraction. “Thank you for suggesting this outing.”

  “My pleasure. We shall visit the babe and Wee Mary first, then go to Kari’s cottage and watch her work the Eire loom.”

  As they drew closer to Drasmoor Beth asked, “Do you look forward to having children?”

  “Nay.” Flora’s gaze shifted out to sea. “I watched my sister die trying to birth and heard too many tales to want such.”

  “I’m sorry.” She placed a hand of Flora’s arm. “I hadn’t meant to open wounds.” After a long pause she garnered enough courage to ask, “Is that why you refused the men who have asked for your hand?”

  Flora’s brow furrowed. “In part.”

  Lost in their own thoughts, they didn’t speak again until the boat beached.

  At her cottage door, Wee Mary wobbled a curtsey. “Good day, my lady. And to ye, Mistress Flora.” She ran a worried hand over her plain and spot-stained kirtle. “I hadna expected visitors. Please come in.”

  Beth smiled and handed Mary a basket laden with a beef stew, bread and jam. “I just came by to see how ye fared.”

  “Well, thank ye.” With her free hand, Mary waved to the cottage’s one chair. “Set ye and I will fetch ye a drink.”

  “Thank ye, but nay. I just wanted to see your beautiful son again.”

  The worry in Mary’s face dissolved at the mention of her babe. “Come then.”

  Beth’s gaze drifted over the soot-covered rafters, the unadorned whitewashed walls and settled on the wooden cradle in the corner.

  The child was wrapped snugly in a woolen blanket so Beth could only make out his face. But such a pretty face he had now, all the swelling and redness had vanished. “Is his shoulder healing?”

  She nodded. “We keep him bound but he can now move his hand.”

  Beth sent a prayer of thanks heavenward.

  “Would ye like to hold him, my lady?”

  “Umm...” Her fear of possibly hurting the child must have been apparent for Mary chuckled.

  “He willna mind, my lady.”

  When the child had been placed in her arms, Beth marveled at how light he felt and how good the infant smelled. “What did you name him?”

  “Clyde, after his father’s father.”

  The babe chose that moment to open his deep cobalt eyes. When a bubble made him grin, Beth chuckled, “And it’s a pleasure to see you again, too, Master Clyde.”

  She rocked him as they chatted about the upcoming tournament. When the child became restless, anxiously alternating between fist chewing and trying to rout at her breast, Beth murmured, “It must be dinner time.”

  She handed the baby back to his mother and she and Flora readied to take their leave.
At the door Beth said, “Thank you for letting me hold him.”

  “Ye are most welcome and come again.”

  As they approached the weaver’s cottage, Flora, who’d been silent during most of their visit with Wee Mary, became animated again. “It takes Kari nigh on a year to make enough cloth for one cotehardie, but ‘tis worth the wait.”

  “A year?”

  Beth soon found out why.

  Kari’s cottage was much like Mary’s, only in this home a tall, narrow loom that produced eighteen-inch wide cloth occupied the corner by the window.

  Kari, a small, middle-aged redhead with a wide grin, told her, “’Twill take twenty-five yards of my wool to make a gown such as ye wear now, my lady.”

  “My word.” Beth ran her fingers through the fine warp threads. “Will you show me how you do it?”

  Kari sat on a backless stool before the loom. Beth—knowing she barely had the talent to walk and speak at the same time—gaped as Kari made the shuttle fly across the weave while her foot controlled the vertical threads. Kari then demonstrated how she created patterns.

  “This is amazing.”

  “Nay, my lady. ’Tis only a matter of havin’ practice, good eyesight, and a strong back.”

  “Do others in the village work a loom?” The beautiful fabric would be highly sought in major cities.

  “Nay, some ken how, but this be the only loom.”

  “Hmm. Are looms expensive—-dear?”

  “Aye, my lady, but another could be crafted by a skilled carpenter.”

  “Wonderful.” She might have found yet another way to garner income for the clan.

  Seeing Flora becoming impatient, she thanked Kari again and said good day.

  Outside, Flora asked, “My lady, while we are here, would ye mind if we went to Bryce Burn in yon glen?” She pointed between two nearby hills. “‘Tis only a short walk where I found kale and fern fiddles peeking up last week. They most surely are ready to harvest now. If we hurry, we may even have time to hunt mushrooms.”

  “Wonderful.”

  An hour later Beth began to wonder if Flora had lost her way. She could no longer see the smoke from the village chimneys or the harbor thanks to the dense, head-high foliage and young pine.

  “Flora,” Beth puffed, “how much further?”

  “’Tis just around these boulders, my lady.”

  Stumbling over her skirt, Beth muttered, “Thank God,” and continued on, climbing over the myriad of tree roots clinging tenaciously to the steep hillside.

  “’Tis here,” Flora said as she came up beside her.

  Thirsty, Beth looked about the small, sun-dappled clearing for a brook. “Where’s the burn?” Her gaze shifted from the hard ground to Flora’s stony expression. Inexplicable fear made the fine hair on the back of her neck and arms stand up.

  Instinct made her turn to run, only to slam face first into a massive leather chest shield. “Whoa, Lady MacDougall!” Heavily callused hands slapped around each of her wrists like manacles. Mouth agape, Beth stared at the man’s familiar face. She didn’t know his name but did recognize him. The night of the banquet, he’d arrived with the Bruce.

  “FLORA?”

  Flora calmly stared at her as a second and then a third man came into the clearing, and Beth’s fear solidified into fury. She kicked the shins of the man holding her. “Let go of me!”

  Her kicking only resulted in bruising her feet, and she sought Flora’s help again. Seeing her new friend backing down the path, realization dawned. Incensed, Beth screeched, “YOU BITCH!”

  A gag was forced between her teeth before she could hurl another expletive. Her fury turn to liquid fear when Flora only waved and the two men holding her arms dragged her backward, kicking and crying into the foliage.

  Chapter 27

  “What in bloody hell do ye mean ‘YE LOST HER’?!”

  Flora didn’t have to fabricate her fear or her tears. She’d never beheld such fury in her life. The Laird of Blackstone was beside himself, ready to tear her throat out and only Angus’s sturdy arm kept him at bay.

  Good.

  Her brother-by-marriage would now lose everything he held dear just as she had. To keep steady before his wrath, she held tight to the knowledge that he would now feel all the pain and humiliation she lived with every day since realizing he would never take her to wife.

  Oh, aye, she knew that her father had offered her hand to Duncan. She’d witnessed her father and Duncan slipping away and had followed. She’d listened from a darkened alcove, curious and hopeful, to their whispered conversation in the library. When Duncan had refused her father’s offer saying he could not marry for grieving, she’d wanted to believe him, though she suspected it was more for the lost child than for Mary, but then she had loved her sister and him. Not a season later, however, she’d been forced to face the humiliating truth—he did not want her—when he married that pathetic nun creature, and then another and another without giving her, a well-connected and rare beauty, so much as a backward glance. That all the marriages had been ordered by Albany mattered not. Duncan had no need for more land, and he knew, had he wanted her, that her father would have done all in his power to see them wed.

  That he had convinced her father she should remain trapped within Blackstone, where she’d been forced to face her humiliation daily, only added to her pain and fury. But Duncan sealed his fate the day he further debased her by trying to foist the first of several suitors on her. That he didn’t care if another held her, tupped her, had been the most hurtful insult of all.

  Her heart held no pity for him.

  “Answer me, woman!”

  “’Twas I said, my lord. She trailed behind me one moment and...was gone the next.” She dropped to her knees, sobbing. “I swear...I dinna ken where she is. I sought her for hours to nay avail.”

  Flora could read the disgust and disbelief on his face and did not care. She had accomplished what she’d set out to do six years ago, and had succeeded beyond her wildest dreams. He had lost his heart and his holdings, all in one blessed moment.

  “Throw her in the dungeon.”

  Two men grabbed Flora’s arms, much as the Bruce’s men had grabbed Beth, and yanked her to her feet.

  “And she’s not to be given food nor water until Lady Beth is found!”

  As the men hauled Flora away, Duncan muttered, “She lies. God damn her soul into perpetuity, she lies.”

  To the men before him he ordered, “You two, take ten men apiece and scour the ridges and crags. Report back immediately if you see tracks or find someone who has knowledge of Lady Beth’s whereabouts.” To Jacob he said, “Ready the war horses and armor.”

  Rachael appeared at his elbow with a goblet. “Drink this, my liege.”

  He took the wine from her hand and tried to swallow, but his throat had closed completely. Tears blurred his vision and he put the goblet down. “I canna lose her, I canna.”

  Isaac patted his back. “We will find her.”

  “Ye ken this stinks of the Bruce.”

  “Aye.”

  ~#~

  Beth awoke in a dank, black-as-pitch place. She blinked as she tried to see, and her eyelashes caught on something close to her face. She gasped and something collapsed against her teeth. She cried out. Instinctively she tried to brush it away and realized to her horror she was trussed like a turkey, with her hands and feet bound behind her back. She writhed and screamed, praying all the while that she was having a nightmare. Nothing changed.

  After minutes of struggling, her heart thudded so painfully, she feared she might die. She forced herself to calm. She held her breath, refusing her lung’s demand that she continue to pant. Slowly she exhaled and then eased a lungful of the fetid air back in. Her eyelashes again caught on something, and—now calmer—she realized she wore a hood. A second later, her memory came back to life...Flora leading her into the glen, the Bruce’s men grabbing her, and then one of them slamming a fist into her cheek, rendering her unconscio
us. Against her will, she started to pant again.

  Oh, God. Please, God help me.

  She opened her mouth to scream. Before it could rip from her parched throat, she heard heavy footsteps. She snapped her jaw shut and listened. The footsteps—out of synchronization, telling her two people approached—grew louder, and then silence.

  She nearly jerked when a man’s mirthless chuckle echoed directly above her.

  “Should the lady wake, give her naught.” She recognized the deep voice. It belonged to John the Bruce, who apparently studied her from above.

  A different voice, this one gravelly, “Aye, my liege.”

  The footsteps, again out of sync, sounded and then grew faint.

  She took a deep breath, jerked at her bonds. A second later, fresh air seeped into her mask. Her heart lept with the realization that the hook wasn’t secured around her neck. She shook her head repeatedly, dipping her chin, and was relieved to find she was able to see a glimmer of light.

  Her tears flowed as she twisted and squirmed on hard packed dirt, aggravating an already miserable headache, until the mask finally slipped off.

  She took a deep lungful of air, craned her neck and saw damp stonewalls in every direction. She looked toward the light, up through a narrow tube, and saw a metal grate. She was in a bottle necked dungeon. But why?

  This cell was larger than Blackstone’s dungeon, could easily have held four big men. The only keep of any size within two days ride of Blackstone was the Bruce’s. It made sense, but she couldn’t be sure. She could have been out cold for an hour or for a day—perhaps two, from the feel of her head—but then she couldn’t be sure. Without windows she couldn’t tell if it was day or night.

  She took a second, deep shuttering breath. “Damn Flora.”

  Her thoughts flew to Duncan. He had to be frantic by now. She hoped he would see through Flora’s duplicity, but there was every possibility he wouldn’t. She hadn’t. Like a naïve fool, she’d blindly followed Flora, thinking her a friend, while picturing sautéed fiddle ferns in a garlic butter sauce.