A Dangerous Love (42 page)

You, my lord, also descend from King Edward the Third through his sixth-born child, his fourth son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. It was Gaunt’s granddaughter, Lady Joan Beaufort, who married King James Stewart the First, your great-grandfather. Therefore you and Adair Radcliffe are related by blood. Her natural father 
is dead. Richard of Gloucester is dead. She had no other male relations. If you would become Adair’s legal guardian and formally agree to a match between us, she would be forced to accept it.”

The Hepburn of Hailes whistled slowly. “I would have never considered you capable of such deviousness, Conal Bruce,” he said admiringly.

“It is worthy of a Florentine,” the prince agreed.

“Actually I cannot take credit for the thought, Your Highness. It was my brother Duncan Armstrong who brought it to me.”

“It matters not,” the prince responded. “While the connection between your lady and me is tenuous at best, it nonetheless exists. I know a priest in Jedburgh who is conversant with the law. Let us see what he has to say about the matter. We’ll ride out tomorrow morning.” He turned to Patrick Hepburn. “What say you, my lord?”

The Hepburn nodded. “There is a lass in Jedburgh I would be delighted to visit once again,” he said with a wicked grin. “My wife need not know.”

The following day the four men, in the company of twenty of the Hepburn’s clansmen, rode into Jedburgh.

While Patrick Hepburn’s men drank in a nearby tavern, and the Hepburn himself was entertained by an old friend, the laird, Duncan, and the prince sought out the priest, whom they found in a small religious house on the town’s edge. Seeing the young man, the brown-robed priest’s eyes lit up with pleasure. He knelt and, taking the royal hand, kissed it in a gesture of respect.

“How may I serve you, Your Highness?” he asked as he rose back to his feet. He invited them to sit, and offered them small cups of wine.

“This is Conal Bruce, the laird of Cleit, who is my friend, Father Walter. He has come to me to help him solve a difficult situation which may require your knowledge of the law.” The prince explained how Adair had come into Conal Bruce’s possession, and that now
 
that she was with child he wanted to wed her. “But the lass is recalcitrant, good Father. She will not accept the laird’s offer, but she must for the bairn’s sake. Her close male relations are dead; however, the lady and I are related by blood. A feeble thread binds us, but nonetheless it does exist. Could I be made this lady’s legal guardian so that I might arrange the match between this relation and the laird, if for no other reason than the sake of the bairn’s immortal soul?”

Father Walter thought for several long and silent minutes. Then he said, “Explain to me the line of descent for you both, Your Highness.”

The prince did, and when he had finished the priest said, “It is a thin connection indeed, Your Highness, but it is my learned opinion that the lady, like all of her sex, needs to be protected from her own foolish and headstrong passions. Aye, she must have a guardian who will make a sensible decision for her. If she will not accept it for her own sake, surely her maternal feelings will make her do so for her child. Especially given the stain of bastardy that she herself carries.” He turned to the laird.

“And while you must certainly atone for your lusts, my lord of Cleit, I commend you for accepting the responsibility of your unborn child and the weak woman who is its mother. Do not hesitate to beat her regularly once you are wed. The Bible recommends it. It is for her own good, and she will be a better and more obedient wife to you for it. I will draw up the papers, Your Highness.

If you will come back in a few hours it shall be done.”

Outside in the street the prince burst into merry laughter. “I suspect if you ever beat her she would kill you the first chance she got.” He chuckled.

The laird nodded. “Aye, she probably would,” he agreed.

“I am always astounded that men of the cloth who have no association with women seem to know how they should be treated,” Duncan Armstrong said.

“Aye, they forget that they came into this world from 
a woman’s body,” the prince said. “Still, if Father Walter says the agreement he is drawing up is legal, then it is.”

The three men joined the Hepburn clansmen at the tavern, where they ate and drank until it was time to return to Father Walter. He had two documents spread out upon a table. The first gave the prince charge over his blood relation, Adair Radcliffe of Stanton, to do with her as he would. The line of descent between the two was carefully illustrated. It was signed by Father Walter, and then the prince, and sealed with the priest’s official ring. The second parchment was a marriage contract between Conal Bruce and Adair Radcliffe, as sanc-tioned by her guardian, Prince James.

Several days later the laird of Cleit returned home in the company of the prince, the Hepburn of Hailes, and his oldest brother. He was greeted by Murdoc.

“All has been quiet,” Murdoc told him. “And Adair is not angry with me. I much enjoyed her company,” he told his brother.

“She will continue to be angry with me,” Conal told his youngest brother. “Especially when she learns what I have done.” And then he explained to Murdoc how he had gotten around Adair’s resistance to marrying him.

Murdoc’s blue eyes grew troubled. “If you force her she will never forgive you.”

“What choice have I? Would you let my son be born a bastard?” the laird asked.

“Nay, but can you not wait a bit? Perhaps you can bring her around. All you need do is tell her the truth.

That you love her.”

“And do you believe she would accept my word 
now?” Conal Bruce replied.

Murdoc looked crestfallen. “I don’t want Adair to be angry with you anymore, Conal. It cannot be good for the child she carries.”

And then the subject of their conversation came into
 
the hall. The young prince thought that Adair was probably one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen.

He envied Conal Bruce, but the truth was, had she not been with child he might have considered making an attempt to steal her from the laird.
I would not have hesitated to tell her that I loved her,
James Stewart decided.

And eventually it might have even been the truth.
He smiled winningly at her as she came forward to greet him.

“Welcome to Cleit, Your Highness,” she said, and she curtsied.

“Thank you, madam. I have brought you news of an interesting sort, which I hope may please you,” James Stewart said. He was going to tell her. He was not going to let Conal Bruce’s youngest brother talk the laird out of doing what he must do. The prince knew enough about women to know that Adair would be far angrier two months from now than she would be learning the truth today.

“The day has been gray, and your ride a chill one.

Come and sit by the fire. I will bring you wine myself,”

Adair replied. She made him comfortable and fetched a goblet of wine for the prince, noting that Conal stood by his side. “Will you have wine, my lord?” she asked him coldly and, not waiting for his answer, brought it to him.

Then she smiled at the prince and asked him, “What news do you bring?”

“I have learned, madam, that you and I are related by blood. We both descend from King Edward the Third through his three of his sons. That being so, I shall call you cousin.”

“I am honored that you do, Your Highness,” Adair answered him, smiling, but there was something more.

She sensed it.

“Your father and he you called father are both dead, cousin. You have no brothers living, or any other male relations in England. It would seem your only male relatives are here in Scotland now.”

“My lord!”

The prince held up a hand, warning her to silence.

Adair, having been raised in a royal court, responded as she had been taught in the face of authority.
Jesu,
she thought,
I am little better than Bessie.

“As your male relation I have moved to become your guardian,” the prince continued. “The legalities were approved in Jedburgh several days ago.”

“I am too old to have a guardian,” Adair protested, 
“and you too young to be he.”

“No woman is too old to have a guardian,” the prince chided her, “especially when she is given to stubborn-ness, cousin. The laird of Cleit has made you an honorable offer of marriage, which you refuse to entertain even though now you carry his bairn. I cannot allow you in a fit of female pique to deliberately smear this infant with the stain of bastardy. You will marry Conal Bruce.

The contract is drawn and signed. There but remains a visit to the priest, which we will make tomorrow. I will remain to witness these nuptials, as will my lord Hepburn.”

Adair was speechless with both surprise and shock.

She had never considered that her life could be turned upside down in such a fashion with no care to her feelings. But then, from the moment she had been carried over the border more than a year ago, nothing had gone as she had anticipated. “I cannot wed a man who doesn’t love me,” she protested weakly.

“He does love you, but he is, it seems, incapable of saying the words aloud,” the prince responded gently.

He might be young, but James Stewart knew a woman’s heart much better than men twice his age, like Conal Bruce.

Adair looked up at Conal Bruce. “You would do this?

You would force me?”

“You leave me no choice, my honey love,” he replied.

Adair shook her head wearily. “Three words, my lord, and I would have wed you willingly. Gladly! But now
 
should you say them I could never be certain that you really meant them. You no longer need my consent, and I will never forgive you for that.”

“You accuse me of being coldhearted, Adair, and yet while I have never said those words to you, neither have you said them to me,” the laird answered her. “Do you love me, my honey love? Do you?”

She looked into his eyes. Her own were filled with tears. “Aye,” she said to him. “I love you, Conal. For the first time in my life I love a man wholeheartedly and without reservation. It is to my sorrow that you cannot love me in return.” Then she turned, and, her head held high, Adair left the five very surprised men standing in the hall.

Finally the laird swore softly. “Jesu, I cannot force her to this,” he said.

“If you do not take her to the priest tomorrow it will but convince her that you really do not love her,” Duncan said, and the others nodded in agreement. “It will take time and a great deal of patience on your part, but she will forgive you this.”

“I hope so,” Conal Bruce, the laird of Cleit, said, “because I do love the difficult wench with every bit of my own heart.”

“You’re a damned fool, brother,” Duncan Armstrong said, and his companions nodded in agreement.

S
he couldn’t stop crying despite Elsbeth’s soothing voice, which pleaded with her.

“You will harm the child if you do not cease your greeting,” Elsbeth said. “Your bairn will have a name.

Be glad, my chick.”

“He does not love me,” Adair sobbed, pummeling the pillows of her bed.

Elsbeth gritted her teeth. “Of course he loves you, and you know it to be so!” she snapped at the young woman. “It is regrettable that that big border brute cannot manage to look you in the eye and then get those three tiny words out. But he cannot, it appears. Men can make a great to-do over nothing, it would seem. Still, it does not change how he feels about you, my chick. Why else would he have gone to such trouble to wed you?”

“What trouble?” Adair sniveled.

“Going to Prince Jamie and patching together a blood tie.” She chortled. “I see the fine hand of Duncan Armstrong in that. Your man has not the wisdom to have figured that connection out, but his elder brother does. Yet once he had a bit of hope in his hand the laird hotfooted it to find the prince and make that hope a reality. If that isn’t love, I don’t know what is,” Elsbeth said.

“He just wants his child born legitimate,” Adair said, sniffing.

“He could as easily legitimize the bairn after its birth,” Elsbeth said. “ ’Tis the mam he wants first and before all, my child. He loves you.”

“I cannot believe it unless he says it to me,” Adair replied. She was so tired, and she felt horribly weak. All the fight had suddenly left her. She turned onto her back and closed her eyes. “I need to sleep, Nursie.” Her eyes closed of their own volition.

Elsbeth sat by Adair’s bedside until she was certain that her mistress was sleeping soundly. Then she arose and returned to the hall, where the five men were now having their meal. The table was a bit subdued. “Is it not enough?” she asked the laird. “Is something wrong with the food, my lord?”

“Everything is excellent, Elsbeth. How is Adair?” he answered her.

“Sleeping, my lord, and I believe she will sleep through the night. I would make preparations for a wedding feast.

When will you go to the church tomorrow, my lord?”

“I am sending for the priest to come to the hall so it may be easier for Adair,” he told Elsbeth.

But Elsbeth shook her head and clucked disapprov-ingly. “Nay, my lord. You must take her up on your horse and ride to the church with her for all to see, else she will believe you are ashamed that you are making her your wife. And you must wed her before the altar and all who would enter the church to see. Then you will set her upon your horse and ride back with her to the keep to celebrate.”

The prince nodded his agreement. “Aye, Conal.

Women put much store in public displays like that. She may not say anything, but she will notice that you have publicly put her forth as your bride and wife.”

Patrick Hepburn chuckled. “The lad is barely out of leading strings, but his knowledge of women is phe-nomenal.”

The men about the table laughed.

“I’ll go and plan the wedding feast then, my lord,”

Elsbeth said with a curtsy.

“Are there any flowers left in Adair’s garden?” the laird asked.