A Dangerous Love (54 page)

The winter passed slowly, finally melting into spring.

The hills began to color green again. Adair’s belly had begun to show, and she was well pleased and happier
than she could ever remember being in all her life.

In late April word came that Janet Douglas Hepburn had given birth to a daughter, baptized Janet, in mid-January. The baby was strong and healthy, but her mother had died at the beginning of April. Patrick Hepburn, grieving for his wife, had brought a wet nurse into Hailes, and then departed to join the king. Their friendship was a strong one, and the king had rewarded that friendship by making the earl master of the king’s household, custodian of Edinburgh Castle, and sheriff principal of Edinburgh and Haddington. His brother, Adam, had been made master of the royal stables.

Adair was saddened to learn of Janet Douglas Hepburn’s death, but then she remembered that the young Countess of Bothwell had practically foretold her own end when they had spoken at Hailes during the New Year’s celebration. Still, she had thought that the Hepburn’s wife was simply being affected by the child she carried. Obviously she had not been. Adair shivered with the memory of their conversation as the child within her moved strongly.

Then one night the watch reported signal fires sprout-ing upon the hills. The English had come raiding. Cleit lit its own fire to warn those beyond them. The courtyard gates were closed, locked, and barred. Cleit had the advantage of its location upon a small hill. The hillside was kept clear of trees and bushes behind which an enemy might take shelter or hide. Cleit would not be an easy keep to take, and raiders usually passed it by for just that reason. The village over the hill, however, was vulnerable, and the laird invited its inhabitants to shelter in the keep. The laird had his men drive Cleit’s cattle off on the principle that it would be easier to steal the herd if it were all together than to go chasing after the individual beasts. They would lose some, but not all.

This time the raiders came to the keep and attempted to storm it. The gates, however, held, and Cleit’s archers had deadly accuracy. After two days the
English borderers moved on in search of easier pick-ings. When they had gone the laird and his brother had taken a party of their own clansmen and gone after the English, managing to save the village over the hill from too much pillaging and damage. They drove the raiders back over the borders, and then returned home. But the entire spring and summer the border roiled with unrest.

They learned the reason for the unusual activity from Hercules Hepburn, who had come to Cleit to see if they were all right.

“It’s the English king,” he told them wearily, for he had been involved in several skirmishes over the last few weeks.

“What has happened?” Adair asked him. “We had an uneasy truce, but we had one nonetheless.”

“King Henry is unhappy that the old king was over-thrown and killed,” Hercules answered her query.

“Why should he care?” Conal Bruce wanted to know.

“The old king was easier to manage,” Hercules replied.

“Of course he was,” Adair said. “He preferred what he thought was diplomacy to war. But this young king is not so amenable, and cannot be managed by England.”

“Aye!” Hercules said, nodding vigorously. “ ’Tis said Ramsay of Balmain fled to him, and now the English king is encouraging him to mischief. He has based himself in a village called Stanton, and from there controls the raiding parties that come over the border to pillage and rape. He is in league with a man, Sir Jasper Keane, a nasty devil.”

Adair grew very pale. “
Stanton
? You are certain it is Stanton?”

“Aye,” he responded. “The place was deserted, they say, but the cottages still sound and livable.”

Adair felt her anger rising. “How could he?” she fumed. “How could he do such a thing to me? Was it not enough that he took everything I had? Must he now
make Stanton a means for his perfidy?” Her face was high with color.

“Adair, do not distress yourself,” Conal Bruce begged his wife.

“What is the matter?” Hercules said, confused.

“I was born the Countess of Stanton,” Adair told him.

“When Henry Tudor of Lancaster took England’s throne he took my title and my lands from me, because I would not permit lies to be disseminated about King Richard, who was my uncle. My own half sister sat by his side, now England’s queen, and would not defend me or my rights. I returned to Stanton to find my home destroyed, but my village was left. It was from there I was stolen by Willie Douglas and brought into Scotland.

Some months ago my late husband’s brother came looking for me. The king had restored my lands to me, but I sent Robert back to England with a letter for Henry Tudor renouncing my claim on Stanton, telling him that I was now wed to the laird of Cleit, and content. I asked that he give my lands to my former brother-in-law, Robert Lynbridge. This is the English king’s answer.”

“But why?” the laird asked his wife.

“Why? Because I did not wait for his mercy and largesse, which I am certain had already been trum-peted about his court. I made a new and happy life for myself. And I made it with a Scot! In King Henry’s eyes I am a traitor to England. So he would besmirch Stanton’s good name by making it a refuge for a Scots traitor.” And then Adair burst into tears. “I will never forgive that Welsh usurper,” she sobbed. “Never!”

Conal put a comforting arm about his wife. “There, there, lass, don’t greet,” he said, and he kissed the top of her dark head.

Adair pulled away from him. There was suddenly a hard line to the mouth he so enjoyed kissing. There was fire in her eye. “I will not tolerate what that Welsh king of England has done,” she said. “Does he believe that
because I am now in Scotland I cannot strike out at him?”

“Adair,” her husband said, “he is a king. You cannot strike out at a king.”

“And I am the lady of Stanton, or was,” she said. Then Adair looked up at her husband. “I was not responsible for who sired me, Conal, and John Radcliffe knew I was not his blood. But he treated me as if I were. Before I was born he made certain that I would inherit Stanton and its title in my own right. That Edward of York would take care of me should it become necessary. The man I will always remember as my father gave me his name. I am proud of the Radcliffe name, as was my father, which is why any man who wed the lady of Stanton had to eschew his own family and take the Radcliffe name for his own. Radcliffes ruled over Stanton for over six hundred years. The name is an old one. It is an honorable one. I will not allow this Welsh upstart who now sits on England’s throne to besmirch my father’s name. I will strike out at him.”

Hercules Hepburn listened to Adair and nodded with his understanding of her words, but then, he was not wed to the lady; nor was she carrying his bairn. He could understand the worry and the concern he saw on Conal Bruce’s face.

“How can you strike out at a king of England?” the laird asked his wife.

“I will destroy what little is left of Stanton,” she said.

“I will eradicate it from the earth. There will be nothing left but the land. No village, no hall, nothing by which it or the Radcliffes can be identified or shamed.”

“You are having a bairn any day now,” Conal reminded her.

“Our son is more important to me now than ever before,” Adair said. “I will do nothing to endanger him.

That I promise you. But when the autumn comes, Conal Bruce, and a fine border moon rides high above the Cheviots, we will go to Stanton and do what must be
done. I swear it by almighty God, my lord! I will do what needs be done!” Her eyes were blazing now with her determination.

“And the Hepburns will ride with you, madam,” Hercules said admiringly. Then he turned to Conal Bruce.

“With your permission, of course, my lord.”

“Since I am a wise enough man to know I cannot keep my wife from what she must do,” the laird said wryly, “I will welcome the company of the Hepburns of Hailes.” Then he took Adair into his arms again, saying,

“I can only hope that the son you will soon bear me will have your ferocity, my honey love.”

“He will, my lord,” she promised him. “He will!”

J
ames Robert Bruce was born on a rainy July morning. He was a large infant who entered the world red-faced, howling loudly, and with his small clenched fists waving. Elsbeth cleaned him with warm olive oil, commenting as she did so on the particularly fine attributes he possessed. Then, swaddling the baby tightly, she laid him in his cradle so they might attend to his mother. Conal Bruce stood over the cradle admiring his firstborn son, who looked back up at his father with deep blue eyes.

Adair was both exhausted and elated. She had insisted upon seeing her son immediately upon his birth, and kissed his wet dark head joyfully. This was so different from when their wee Jane had been born. This child was strong. He would live. After passing the afterbirth she allowed Elsbeth and Flora to bathe and refresh her.

Then she lay back in a freshly made bed that Grizel had prepared for her.

“Give me the bairn,” she said, and when Conal had lifted their son from the cradle and put him into his mother’s arms, Adair put the boy to her breast. Immediately the little mouth opened and then clamped down firmly upon her nipple. He sucked noisily, and his mother smiled, well pleased. “I told you I would give
 
you a son,” she said to Conal Bruce. “When he has satisfied himself you will take him into the hall to show Murdoc, Duncan, and your clansmen.” Adair was extremely pleased.

“He’s a braw laddie,” the laird remarked, grinning.

“You’ve done well, lass.”

Adair laughed. “I have indeed,” she agreed.

“You need your rest,” Elsbeth scolded her gently.

“Let the bairn take his nourishment, Nursie,” Adair said, and Elsbeth smiled at her mistress’s use of her old designation.

“You’ll need a nurse for the bairn,” she said.

“Let Flora help me,” Adair replied.

“Leaving Grizel and me with all the heavy work,”

Elsbeth grumbled. “I should bring another woman in from the village.”

“Nay,” Adair said. She turned to her husband. “If you are truly pleased with this son I have given you then you will give me something in return.”

“What do you want?” he asked her, surprised by the request. He had not thought Adair an acquisitive woman.

“I want you to go to Willie Douglas and get Elsbeth’s sister, Margery, for us. Her term of servitude is long finished, but if she is not dead she has remained with him, for she has nowhere else to go. Before I bring another woman from the village I would like to see if you can fetch Margery. She is not a woman the men would seek to futter.”

“I’ll go tomorrow,” the laird said, and Elsbeth burst into tears.

“Thank you,” Adair said. “Cease your howling, Nursie; you will frighten my bairn,” she told the older woman. She detached her infant son from her breast and handed him up to his father. “Take James Robert to the hall and present him to his uncles and his clansmen,” she said. “I must sleep.”

“Bless you, my chick.” Elsbeth sniffled as she exited the bedchamber.

Adair lay quietly after they had all left her. She was still a little bit too excited to sleep. She had done her duty to Cleit. Conal had an heir. Now she would recover her strength and do what needed to be done by Stanton.

She had learned that Ramsey of Balmain had settled himself into Stanton village, and all summer long he had raided across the border from his sanctuary. Every time she thought about it Adair was filled with cold anger.

She would bide her time for a little while longer, but then she was going back to Stanton. And when she left it would all be gone forever. No one would ever again besmirch the Radcliffe name or Stanton, because neither would exist any longer.

In the hall below she heard a shout go up, and knew that the Bruce clansmen were giving their approval of the newest member of the family. The infant would be passed about to be admired, and then she knew that either Elsbeth or Flora would bring the child back upstairs, settle him in his cradle, and then sit by it while she slept. Adair’s eyes grew heavy as she slipped into sleep.

She did not awaken when her husband slipped into their bed later that evening.

In the night Flora brought the baby to his mother so that he might nurse. Awakened, the laird lay on his side watching as his son vigorously suckled upon his mother’s breasts. It was, he thought, the most beautiful sight he had ever seen. He slept again, awakening just before the dawn. Rising from their bed, he quickly dressed and left the bedchamber. Shortly afterward he rode out from the keep with his older brother. To his surprise he found Willie Douglas in his own house. He wasted no time in coming to the point of his visit.

“Is Margery still with you?” he asked.

“Aye,” Willie Douglas replied. “I kept the old bitch on even after my wife died.”

“I’d like to speak with her,” the laird said.

“Why?” Willie Douglas demanded to know.

“Her term of servitude with you is past,” the laird said. “Her sister wants them to spend their final days together. Elsbeth has become an important member of my household. I am happy to comply.”

“If she’ll go with you then take her,” Willie Douglas said. “She’s a sour bitch, and I’m of a mind to take a new young wife. I would have sent her packing sooner than later, for my bride-to-be is healthy, unlike my last wife.

She will cook and care for my house. I have no more use for Margery, and do not wish to feed a useless mouth.

The kitchens are below. I hear you took the wench I sold you as a mistress. I hope she gave you more satisfaction than she gave me.”

“How long did it take you to heal?” the laird asked.

Then, as he turned, he said, “The lady is my wife now, Douglas. Speak of her with respect.” He left the trader openmouthed and descended into the kitchens.

“Margery, sister of Elsbeth, show yourself to me,” he called out into the darkened room. “I am the laird of Cleit, and I have come to take you home.”