A Promise of Love (40 page)
Authors: Karen Ranney
Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Romance, #Historical, #scottish romance, #Historical Romance, #ranney romance
Why was it possible to feel his exhilaration as she felt her own, a thrumming that began in her core and sparked outward into a dozen small fires? Judith gasped, crying out his name as she sank into oblivion for moments, unafraid, even now aware that he held her and protected her. Aware, too, that he followed her into bliss, his own cry muted by their kiss.
His smile melted into hers.
"Alisdair," she whispered.
"Yes, my love?"
"Although I admire most of Scotland's customs, and not that I doubt the finality of this sort of wedding, I'd just as soon settle for a parson."
He chuckled, thinking she would be surprised at the arrival of the visitor from Inverness. The minister would be here in a few days, to celebrate their fourth, and final, bonding. No couple would be more wed than he and Judith.
She sighed finally, holding him close when he would have pulled away.
"Do not leave me, Alisdair," she murmured when he moved. Since he was intimately joined to her, he only smiled, and held her close. She raised her face and drank in the sight of him with misty eyes.
"Never, my love," he said gently, and she smiled at the way he framed that word, a tender and gentle endearment.
EPILOGUE
"You look like a young girl readied for bed," Alisdair said, smoothing his hand over the silky length of her hair, newly brushed. She was dressed in a clean gown and the sheets had recently been changed. He smiled at the sight of her, propped up in the bed like a little girl, instead of a lovely, but tired woman who had just given birth.
He had not wanted Judith to see the depth of his anxiety, but she'd discerned it anyway, which is probably why she'd not told him she was in labor until their son was nearly born. He'd no time, towards the end, to recall either Anne or Janet, or any other birthing tragedies. He'd been too busy asserting his rights as laird, physician and husband - although not necessarily in that order - in order to remain in the room with his wife. He should not have worried - Judith excelled in childbirth.
"It's being a Scot," she said, smiling at him when he said as much.
Judith leaned back against the pillows and sighed. She was exhausted, and it would be only moments until she succumbed to the deep sleep which beckoned.
She knew that her presence as mother of the heir was superfluous at this particular moment. Over the last two years, Judith had discovered that the industry of the Scots was expended in merrymaking as much as it was backbreaking labor. Right now, they were doubtless waiting for Alisdair's presence in the great hall for the celebration to begin. Elizabeth was there, excited beyond measure by the smiles and laughter. She was performing those chores given to her by the women of the clan, looked after and coddled, and forever loved.
Gerald Malcolm MacLeod had been born during the wee sma' oors, which meant, according to Grizzelle who seemed to be an authority on the subject, that the MacLeod's son was expected to be as intelligent and stubborn as his father.
His first journey must not be down towards the warmer rooms, Judith had been told, and since the lord's room was the top most habitable room, Alisdair proudly took his son on his first journey up the steps of the wheel staircase, to where boards prevented further passage. Only then was he taken to the warm kitchen, where he was washed, and readied for his first suckle. His right hand was left untouched, so that he would never know poverty, and each visitor was required to place a coin in his hand for good luck. Her son gripped the coins tightly, and the women laughed, saying that he was to be a tightfisted, wild, intelligent man.
Judith only sighed and hoped she was up to the challenge.
Gerald was returned to the cradle beside her bed, where she turned and watched him with such love that it shined in her eyes. It was Janet’s cradle he rested in, because on no account, must his first sleep be in any but a borrowed bed. Alisdair had, during her labor, walked seven times around the perimeter of Tynan, or as much as was possible due to the presence of the cove, to safeguard the child and protect him from being stolen by fairies. A knife was placed at her son's feet, for the same purpose, and each of the women who attended her knew not to carry fire out of the house until her son was at least a week old. She, herself, must never leave the house after sunset for at least a month lest she be stolen to nurse an ailing fairie child who could not return to health unless suckled on human milk.
Judith thought that the superstitions surrounding the birth of her child much more difficult than the actuality.
She had felt little real pain at first, which had changed drastically towards the end of her labor. She had felt constrained by the interested faces of the women of her clan, who had watched to see if she was a soft English woman at this critical juncture, or a stoic Scot. She had been a stoic Scot, and she wasn't going to let them forget it.
Their son was worth all of the discomfort and pain.
While Alisdair held her tenderly within his arms, they both kept vigil over the newest MacLeod.
"I did not realize I could bear a child, Alisdair," she admitted, "until I came to Scotland. I did not know a great many things about myself."
"Like what?" he smiled tenderly at her.
"For example, I seem to have a bit of a temper."
"Aye, Judith, that you do." He didn't care if she saw his smile. She had the devil's own temper when she was riled.
"Yet, you've always let me speak freely."
"We Scots are like that," he said, brushing back the tendrils of hair from her face. "We appreciate independent thinking." Aye, and courage, and pride. She had all these qualities and more, his wife.
"Shall I ever be a Scot, Alisdair?" she wondered, her cheek against his chest, feeling in that one perfect moment all the joy she’d never expected to feel.
Alisdair closed his eyes against the power of the emotion which swept through him then.
"I think you've always been one, love," he said softly, and held her gently within his arms.
A few minutes later, he sighed and kissed the top of her head. "I wish to build you a home, my Scots lass," he said tenderly. "A small home with two floors and a neat, thatched roof."
"We would leave Tynan?" She raised herself up and looked at him in the light of the candle. He had scandalized the women by refusing to sleep apart from her, even in the last stages of her pregnancy, and was planning to sleep next to her tonight. It was spring in the Highlands, he had complained, and he needed her warmth. None of the women were taken in by such a flimsy story.
Judith would always remember the sight of him, then, his face softened into tender lines, the somber gleam of his amber eyes overlaid with one of mischief.
"I seek a home without the scent of burned wood, Judith. A place to begin again." He looked at her seriously. "Will you miss being the mistress of a castle?"
"The incessant scrubbing, and the sounds of mice? I think not."
"We do not have mice at Tynan," he grumbled.
"Of course not, Alisdair," she said, smiling gently, and curled up in his arms, feeling as if she had always belonged here.
****
Judith would sometimes come to Tynan in search of her children, a wild Scots-English hoard led into mischief by their elder brother. Gerald loved playing Robert the Bruce, using the castle as a place of made up stories, while his sisters and younger brothers were relegated to minor English parts.
She would stop sometimes and glance into the empty cavern which used to be their kitchen. Stone dust lay inch thick upon the floor, undisturbed except for tiny mouse footprints. She would smile and wander into the room Sophie had called hers, now stripped of its heavy French furniture and delicate lace. No ghosts lingered here, even though the silence sometimes echoed with the click, click of an ivory handled cane.
The steps were still uneven and steeply canted, but Judith took them slowly, passing Ian’s room, and up one landing to the laird’s chamber. It was empty, now, and dusty, filled with long-ago memories that seemed to whisper in the swirling light from the open windows.
In the silence and perfect peace, Judith would feel the greatest serenity and comfort, as if a golden blanket of warmth had been placed around her shoulders. The air itself was rife with solemnity and a curious benediction, almost tasting of forgiveness. In those moments, she felt touched by tenderness, humbled by the sensation of it. It was as if Heaven answered her many prayers, promising a future filled with joy, laughter, and love.
About the Author
New York Times bestselling author Karen Ranney was first published in 1995. Since then, she’s gone on to write dozens of historical romances, most of them set in Scotland.
Her books have been described as evocative, intensely romantic stories featuring characters who leap off the page.
She currently lives in San Antonio with her antique collection of dust bunnies.
Visit her at:
Twitter:
http://twitter.com/KarenRanney
Blog:
www.karenranney.wordpress.com
Website:
www.karenranney.com
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