“What is so amusing?” she demanded of Myrna.
“The laird of Duin has had no time for a wife, it is said, because he spends all his time chasing pretty lasses,” Myrna replied. “Blessed Mary, Annabella, he is said to be the handsomest man in the borders, as well as a sorcerer!” She brayed her laughter. “The plainest face in the borders to wed a handsome sorcerer. Maybe his magic can make you fair.” Myrna cackled again at her own wit.
“If sorcery could sweeten your nature, sister, I should be forever grateful,” Annabella returned sharply. “Won’t Ian Melville be surprised to learn what a shrew ye are, Myrna.” She turned back to her father. “Where is Duin, Da?”
“In the western borders on the sea,” Robert Baird answered his daughter.
“I am nae a shrew!” Myrna said angrily.
Sorcha and their youngest sister, Agnes, giggled as Annabella shrugged but did not take back her harsh words.
“Now, now, my lasses, ye’re sisters. Make yer peace wi’ one another,” their mother said. “Very soon Annabella will be gone from us, and who knows when we will see her again.” She smiled warmly at her eldest daughter.
“Probably never,” Myrna said almost smugly. “We shall be much too busy with our own lives to go traveling across Scotland to see Annabella and her sorcerer. I am so glad that Sorcha, Agnes, and I will wed closer to home, so we may be near our mother.”
“Though you three will be near,” the lady Anne said, “’tis Annabella who is making a great marriage and bringing honor to the Bairds of Rath. The distance between us is several days, but we will see one another again,” she reassured her eldest daughter. Then she smiled at them. “Now, because time is short we must begin to prepare your sister for the journey to her new home. In just a few weeks the Fergusons will come to claim her and take her back to Duin.”
“Ohhh,” Myrna said. “Will we get to see the sorcerer?”
“Daughter,” Robert Baird said to Myrna, “Angus Ferguson is no sorcerer. Ye must cease referring to him that way. I now find myself grateful he will not be coming to Rath, but sending his proxy.”
The next few weeks were busy ones, with the ladies of the household packing Annabella’s few possessions into an iron-bound oak trunk. Her dower consisted of linens for both bed and table; two fine goose-down pillows; a down coverlet; a silver spoon and cup; and a fine wooden box filled with ointments, balms, salves, potions, and healing herbs, along with her clothing and small bits of jewelry. A special gown was to be made for the bride to wear on her wedding day. Afterward it would serve as her best garment.
She tried to picture this unknown man she was to wed so soon. He would be tall, of course. Short men were not usually highly praised as handsome. Was he fair or dark? What color were his eyes? Myrna, who always seemed to know everything, could say only that the gossip about the Fergusons of Duin said they were magical folk, and kept much to themselves. It was the earl’s handsome face that caused the telltales to chatter.
“He is said to enchant any woman he wants with a mere look,” Myrna related in hushed tones as she crossed herself.
“It is something to talk about besides the English raids and the destruction they have wrought here in the borders,” Annabella responded. She was a practical young woman. “Babbling about a handsome man is much nicer than wondering how we will feed ourselves in the coming winter.” But for all her brave words, she worried. Still, it was a far better match than she could have ever anticipated.
“They say he has many mistresses, for once he has loved them, they do not—will not—leave him,” Myrna chattered on. “I’m sorry we will not get to see him, but perhaps ’tis better this way. After all, we are so beautiful, and ye’re so plain, Annabella. The earl might regret his decision if he saw us together.”
“What a mean thing to say,” young Agnes spoke up in defense of her eldest sister.
But Annabella, used to Myrna’s thoughtless tongue, just laughed. “Ye’re jealous,” she taunted back. “I am to be the Countess of Duin, and ye naught but Mistress Melville. As for the earl’s many mistresses, they may come in handy if he is not to my taste. I am required to produce an heir for my lord, to keep his house in good order, to stand by his side and chatter pleasantries when he entertains. I can do all of that, Myrna—and a handsome husband is much to be appreciated.”
Myrna shrugged. “Ye’re a strange lass,” she said. “I should be furious if my husband strayed. Indeed, I should scratch his eyes out so he didn’t ever cast them on another woman again. But then I suppose ye’re just grateful to have found a husband at all. I wonder ye did not go to the old church to spend yer days in prayer.”
“I have no wish at all to spend my days in prayer,” Annabella said. “I’m grateful that Da found me a husband, but I can’t help but wonder how he did it. We live in a stone tower that has stood for several hundred years, and housed many generations of Bairds. We cannot be said to be poor, but neither are we rich. How hard our father must scrabble to find dower portions for four daughters. How has he done it? Where is it coming from? And how on earth did he find an earl for me? Why would such a man have the daughter of a simple tower laird of no importance for a wife?”
She looked at Myrna. “Ye’re good at ferreting out information.” Then Annabella added the spur she knew would encourage her sister to go snooping. “I can only hope that Da has not taken from your dowers in order to gain this earl for me.”
Myrna paled as her breath caught in her throat briefly. Recovering, she said, “Ian remarked to me recently that his father was not pleased with the size of my dower. He said his son’s bride should do better. But he also said I am healthy, and he believes I will be a good mother.”
“Ye’re not breeding stock,” Annabella said, irritated.
“Aye, I am, and so are ye,” Myrna replied. “Our dowers and our ability to give our husbands sons are our great value as women.”
“Jesu, Jesu, ye’re listening to those traveling churchmen again. Reformed Church or old Church, they all have the same opinion of women.” Annabella swore.
Myrna’s Cupid’s bow of a mouth pursed itself in disapproval. “I intend to be a good wife to Ian Melville,” she said. “I shall birth a son for his family as quickly as I can. Ye had best do the same for yer earl, sister.”
Annabella sighed. Why couldn’t a woman justbe? she silently asked herself. Why was her only value in her ability to reproduce, and in the coin she would bring her husband? But she was curious to learn what Myrna could find out about Duin and its earl, because the day was drawing nearer and nearer when the Fergusons would come to take her away to the west, and the stranger who would be her husband.
Myrna, however, could learn no more information about the lord of Duin. Nor did she learn how their father had managed to gain the dower to betroth Annabella to an earl. With the Fergusons just a few days from Rath, Annabella went to their mother and asked, “How did Da find a dower large enough to satisfy an earl, Mama? I pray he took nothing from my sisters to do it.”
“Ye should really not ask such questions, Annabella,” her mother said. “It should not matter to ye how the deed was accomplished, and naught was taken from yer sisters.”
“But I have asked, and I want to know,” Annabella persisted.
