Bride of Lochbarr

by Margaret Moore

  With that, the seanachie hobbled off toward the village.

  Adair headed toward the fortress. He felt like the victim of a vast conspiracy involving everyone he knew and trusted, including his father.

  And all because of Marianne, his proud, aloof Norman bride.

  “IT’S RAINING AGAIN,” Marianne said as she concentrated hard, forming the words in Gaelic while she sat in the teach across from Dearshul. Both of them were sewing, Marianne on a garment of dark blue wool, and Dearshul one of bright scarlet.

  “Yes, it is. Very hard,” Dearshul answered in French, her brow wrinkled as she spoke the unfamiliar language.

  “We’ll get wet if we go out.”

  “Very,” Dearshul agreed, as solemn as a priest giving last rites.

  Dearshul glanced up at Marianne, then frowned. “That wasn’t the right word?”

  “It was,” Marianne hastened to assure her in the combination of both languages that had served them quite well for the past several days. “We both sound so sad, yet we’re only talking about the rain.”

  Dearshul giggled. “Aye,” she agreed, nodding. “It’s the thinking, I’m thinking.”

  Marianne forced herself to smile in return, although she felt anything but happy. She’d cursed herself a hundred times for quarreling with Adair when she’d really been hurt and dismayed by what Nicholas had said.

  Adair had been all but ignoring her ever since, to the curiosity of most and the delight of some.

  “It’s the sewing,” she said as she put her work down on her lap with a rueful grin. “I hate it. But I’ve got nothing else to do.”

  Except wait to see if she was with child. Sadly, she’d felt cramps that morning, which generally heralded her courses. Her first thought had been sorrow, and then she’d wondered what would happen when she told her husband.

  “You could probably take on some of Ceit’s duties,” Dearshul suggested.

  “I suppose I can make myself understood well enough now,” Marianne agreed.

  “Oh, you’ve learned very quickly, my lady!” Dearshul grew more serious. “But I think you were wise to wait. Ceit likes you, and she wouldn’t if you’d gone into her kitchen and tried to tell her what to do.”

  Marianne was pleased to hear that. “She reminds me of Sister Mary Katherine at the convent,” she admitted. “When Sister Sophia arrived and tried to take charge, it was very upsetting for Sister Mary Katherine. We all thought that Sister Sophia should have been nicer about it, and more diplomatic.”

  Dearshul looked confused.

  “Less arrogant,” Marianne offered. She picked up her sewing again. “Una seems a sweet girl.”

  Dearshul nodded. “I like Una. She’s always been kind to me, not like…” The maidservant bent her head over her work.

  “Fionnaghal?” Marianne suggested. She’d quickly noticed that Dearshul and Fionnaghal were not friends.

  Dearshul blushed and didn’t answer.

  “Fionnaghal doesn’t like me, either.”

  Dearshul glanced up and gave Marianne a comforting smile. “She wouldn’t like anybody Adair married.”

  “I thought as much,” Marianne replied, having had plenty of experience with jealousy among the women. Not necessarily over men, although a comely acolyte could make things very tense in the convent. But there was plenty to envy nonetheless—privileges and favors, food and clothes.

  “He never liked Fionnaghal that way,” Dearshul said firmly.

  “So he told me.”

  Dearshul’s eyes widened, and Marianne wished she hadn’t mentioned her husband. “Do you need more thread?”

  Dearshul shook her head. “Adair values loyalty, my lady, and Fionnaghal’s the most faithless woman in Lochbarr. Why, she’s been in the hay with two men on the same night, and everybody knows it. So he’d never go with her.”

  Marianne could guess what Dearshul meant by “in the hay.” And she could also appreciate Dearshul’s scorn.

  Dearshul leaned forward, her gaze intense. “Your husband’s not been in the hay since he married. Well, not that way. He’s been sleeping in the loft over the stables.”

  Marianne jabbed her finger with her needle. “Oh, by the saints,” she muttered, licking away the drop of blood and not looking at Dearshul, in case the young woman saw her relief.

  “I didn’t mean to upset you,” Dearshul said anxiously.

  “I’m just surprised you know that,” Marianne noncommittally replied.

  “Oh, everybody knows. There’re no secrets in Lochbarr.”

  There’d been few secrets in the convent, too. “They blame me, I’m sure,” she murmured, sticking her needle through the fabric with more zeal than required.

  “Well, some do. Fionnaghal, for one. Others think Adair’s angry with his father for making him marry a Norman and that’s why he stays away. But you needn’t worry, my lady,” Dearshul went on comfortingly. “Adair will be chieftain, regardless. He’s got too many friends and folk who think highly of him for the clan to choose another, no matter what Cormag and his ilk might say.”

  “Choose?” Marianne asked, surprised. “Adair is Seamus’s eldest son. There should be no choice in the matter.”

  Dearshul shook her head. “That may be the Norman way, but it’s not ours. The clansmen have to agree on who’ll take the chieftain’s place when he dies. There were some who spoke against Adair, but not many.”

  Marianne wondered what would happen if they were to choose again now, after Adair had married her. “Can they change their minds?”

  “Oh, aye, and there’s been some mutterings, but not enough to matter.”

  Maybe these “mutterings” had made Adair even more sorry he’d married her. That would explain why he found it so easy to ignore her, when she had to struggle not to stare at him in the hall and remember the passion they’d shared.

  “You’ll look like a queen in this,” Dearshul said, holding up the gown she’d been working on. “Did you ever see such a scarlet?”

  “Once, in a market near the docks before my brother and I sailed from France,” Marianne replied, glad of the distraction. “I thought it very pretty and craved a dress in that color.”

  “I can hardly wait to see Fionnaghal’s face when you wear it the first time,” Dearshul said with a smile. “Maybe at the Hairst.”

  Dearshul had never used that word before. “What’s Hairst?”

  “That’s when the…” Dearshul frowned and thought a moment. “The grain. We cut it and…” She acted out pulling something.

  “Oh—harvest!” Marianne cried.

  She’d seen the ripening grain in the far field on the side of the valley. Sometimes, when the wind was rippling the lake, it made the grain move like water.

  “Aye. Lachlann says it’ll be late this year, because it was so wet. I swear to you, my lady, this has been the wettest spring and summer I can ever remember.”

  Perhaps she’d been wrong to think of this country as perpetually damp. “You like Lachlann, don’t you?” Marianne ventured.

  “Everybody likes Lachlann,” the young woman replied in a tone that told Marianne she should ask no more questions about the chieftain’s younger son.

  Despite her reaction, Marianne knew Dearshul liked Adair’s brother, very much. When they were in the hall, she watched him all the time. Still, it was Dearshul’s right to keep her feelings private, and Marianne respected that. But oh, how she missed the whispered conversations in the convent about those mysterious male creatures they would eventually marry!

  Unfortunately, she could also guess why Dearshul was reluctant to talk about the man she admired. Lachlann didn’t seem aware of Dearshul at all.

  Perhaps there was something she could do….

  An idea came to her and she acted upon it at once. “There’s enough fabric left from my gown to make you an overtunic, Dearshul, if not a whole dress. You deserve something for all your hard work teaching me your language. What do you say? Would you like that?”

 
; Dearshul’s eyes sparkled like diamonds, and her smile was just as bright. “Oh, my lady! Truly?”

  “Truly.” Marianne set aside her sewing and went to the chest where she’d put the extra fabric. “If we start on it today, we can have it ready for Hairst, I think.”

  “Oh, my lady!”

  Marianne smiled. Perhaps her marriage was a disaster, but at least she’d found a friend.

  “SO IT SEEMS, FATHER, that the Normans didn’t steal the cattle, after all,” Lachlann finished as he sat with Seamus in the hall several days later. “Otherwise, we would have seen more signs, or there’d have been more thieving since. I think it must have been outlaws who’ve moved on.”

  Seated beside his brother on the bench, Adair shook his head. “Or else they took enough the first time to satisfy them, or they’re scared of getting caught after Father’s warning.”

  “Either way, unless more cattle go missing, there’s nothing more to be done,” the father said decisively. “We can’t accuse Sir Nicholas without strong proof, and that we lack.”

  “You’ll keep up the patrols, though?” Adair asked.

  “Aye, for now. Until harvest.”

  Seamus glanced around the hall, which was empty save for his sons and the hounds lounging by the hearth fire. Everyone else, including Adair’s wife, had eaten the midday meal and drifted off.

  The chieftain fastened his gray-eyed gaze on his eldest son in a way that made Adair want to squirm. “I don’t generally care to interfere in people’s lives, Adair, but you’ve given me no choice. How long do you intend to ignore your wife?”

  Adair had no desire to talk about his marriage with anyone. Not his father, or his brother, or Barra, or Roban, who’d taken to making late-night observations about women and how to win them. “I’m not ignoring her.”

  “’Tis true you talk to her in the hall. But you aren’t sharing your bed with her.”

  He should have known he couldn’t keep that a secret. “My troubles with my wife are my own business.”

  “Your troubles with your wife becomes my business when it leads to strife in the clan and talk of rebellion.”

  Adair’s frustrated annoyance fled, replaced by incredulity. “Rebellion?” he repeated. Lachlann looked just as shocked.

  “Aye. Some folk are saying you pay her no heed, even though she’s a beauty, because I forced you to wed and you’re so angry you might even rebel against me because of it.”

  “I’d never rebel against you, Father,” Adair declared without hesitation. “And not just because you’re my father. You’re my thane and chieftain, and I’ve sworn to obey you. You didn’t threaten me with punishment if I refused to marry, so they can’t say I was—”

  Seamus held up his hand for silence and gave his son a fleeting smile. “I know you’d never betray me, Adair, and I’m glad to hear you don’t hold your marriage against me. But now you know why I must talk to you about this breach with your wife and why it concerns Lachlann, too. I suppose, my hotheaded son, you had an argument.”

  “Aye,” Adair admitted, still reluctant to discuss Marianne.

  “You never could hold your temper,” Lachlann said.

  Adair bristled at the implication that he was solely accountable. “The fault’s not all mine,” he declared, feeling again the sting of Marianne’s words as if she were whispering them in his ear.

  “You’re the one forced her from her home,” Lachlann noted.

  Adair got to his feet. “So she kept reminding me. And if that’s all you have to say—”

  “Sit down, Adair,” his father ordered. “I’m sure there were things said on both sides. She’s a proud, spirited woman.”

  Since his father seemed prepared to be reasonable, Adair sat. “You’ve been talking to Barra, I suppose.”

  His father looked taken aback. “Not about you. But I’ve always found his advice sound.”

  Adair was sorry he’d mentioned the seanachie.

  “Adair, you’re a proud, braw man, and I’m glad you’re my son, but you can be stubborn and hot-tempered. You should try to see her side of things.”

  “Aye, you can’t expect her to just accept what’s happened and be happy,” Lachlann agreed. “It might take years for her to reconcile herself to her marriage.”

  Adair scowled. His little brother couldn’t possibly understand what had happened, or how he felt.

  “You quarreled with her after you told her what her brother said, didn’t you?” his father asked.

  “Aye.”

  Seamus let out his breath in a long sigh. “I thought as much. That had to be hard for her to hear. No wonder she was upset.”

  “She wasn’t angry at her brother. She was angry at me—but I wasn’t the one who abandoned her and declared her dead. And then…”

  He paused, catching himself before he told them everything that had happened that fateful day. “I’m no more to her than a way to get children. She’ll put up with me and live in Lochbarr only for that. Why should I talk to her about anything else?”

  His father stroked his chin and studied his son. “Some men would be glad to have the chance to bed her, and not care about anything else.”

  Adair jumped to his feet. “Other men, aye, like Cormag. But I don’t want to just share my bed with her. I want…”

  He ground his fist in his palm, cursing himself for his weakness. Yet he longed for something beyond acceptance and even affection, something he’d glimpsed in her brilliant blue eyes on their wedding night.

  “She said terrible things to you, I suppose, things that seem unforgivable. I understand that, my son. But as Lachlann says, you must make allowances for her. Think of how she must feel to know her own brother can disown her so easily. She’s a strong, brave woman, and like many a man it’s probably her way to lash out when she’s hurt. Not the water of tears for her, but fire.”

  That could well be true, and yet…“So I’m just to forgive and forget what she said? I’m to humble myself and say I’m sorry, despite all the things she said to me? Maybe she’ll think she can rule me if I beg her forgiveness, that she can twist me round her finger with just the threat of getting cross with me.”

  Seamus regarded him steadily. “Do you really think any woman will believe she could rule my bold, braw son as if he were a bairn? Do you truly believe she could make you do things against your will?”

  “But to debase himself before a woman and a Norman,” Lachlann said, finally siding with his brother.

  His father shot Lachlann a look. “It’s no good for a man to be at war with his wife and Adair’s troubles are starting to cause strife in the clan. I can’t permit that.”

  He addressed his eldest son, his deep voice firm and commanding. “I won’t have this go on another day, so you’ll go to her and make it up, Adair. How or what you say I leave to you.”

  It was a command, not a request, so Adair had no choice but to obey. “Aye, Father, I will.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE DOOR TO THE teach flew open as if a gust of wind had caught it. Startled, Marianne looked up from Dearshul’s tunic, which was nearly finished, to find her husband on the threshold.

  She swallowed hard and commanded herself to be calm.

  He must have heard she’d had her courses, probably from Dearshul or one of the other servants, and now he’d come to try again to get her with child, as he said he would.

  In spite of the tumultuous feelings coursing through her, she tried to betray nothing with her expression, except perhaps mild interest. Yet she couldn’t even pretend to sew. She set her work on the table beside her and folded her hands in her lap, which would help to still their trembling.

  Adair strode into the chamber. He surveyed the dyed woolen cloth hanging from pegs Dearshul had hammered into the wall and the new furnishings: a chair with a thick cushion on its seat, a brazier, a bronze candle stand boasting eight beeswax candles and a second, smaller chest made of plain oak for Marianne’s new clothes.

  He then r
an his measuring gaze over her, making her blush despite her wish to seem impervious to his scrutiny. She was wearing one of the three new gowns she’d made, a simple one of dark-blue wool trimmed with red thread that laced up the front, and with a new shift beneath.

  He walked slowly around the room. Perhaps he’d come for another reason.

  She relaxed. A little.

  “You’ve been busy, I see,” he said at last.

  “Yes. Your father was very generous.”

  Adair glanced at her, his brows raised in silent surprise.

  “He gave me some money for a wedding present.” A disturbing thought occurred to her. “How else did you think I paid for these things, and the clothes I’m wearing?”

  “I assumed the merchants knew they could come to me for payment, and hadn’t yet. I should have told you to get what you wanted and leave the payment of the merchants to me.”

  She refrained from pointing out that would have required him to actually speak to her.

  Adair stopped prowling about the teach. He faced her, hands behind his back, grimly determined. “My father tells me our…difficulties…are causing unrest in the clan, so he’s ordered me to apologize to you.”

  She couldn’t hide her surprise. “He did?”

  His expression softened and his shoulders relaxed. “I want to apologize for losing my temper with you, Marianne. I should have been more sympathetic.” He took a step closer. “This isn’t how either one of us envisioned marriage, I’m sure. Yet we’re wed now, for good or ill—and I’d rather try to make it for the good. I’m willing to declare a truce, and start over, if you will.”

  As he spoke, she felt as though a load had fallen from her shoulders. Ever since he’d marched out that door, she’d been wishing she could call back her harsh words. Her anger and dismay and hurt should have been aimed at her brother, not Adair. She shouldn’t have defended Nicholas and spoken of the girl who had died. But she hadn’t known how to mend the breach between them, and feared his rejection if she tried.

  So she would gladly, and gratefully, accept this olive branch, however it came about. “I’d like that, Adair. I’m sorry, too, for the things I said, and what I implied.”