“And the blessing?” the priest asked.
“He must fulfill the conditions any other suitor would before the blessing,” Dugald Kerr said. “She is determined, and Lord Stewart says he can beat her fairly.”
“You would let her have her way in her foolishness?” David Kerr asked Fingal.
He nodded in the affirmative. “Aye. She needs to feel she has some control over her life even if she doesn’t. Some men might not care, but I want my wife to respect me. She will not if I cannot best her. And yer neighbors will not feel so slighted by this match when I do.”
The priest looked thoughtful, and then replied, “Yer a clever fellow, my lord. And I think ye could be dangerous, given the opportunity. If yer willing to indulge the lass, then so be it. When will yer contest take place?”
“After the gleaning,” Lord Stewart replied.
“Well, ’tis not so long to wait,” the priest said. “I’m pleased to see yer a disciplined man.”
“Remain here tonight, and draw up the contracts,” the laird said. “I want them signed after morning Mass, Brother.”
“Agreed!” David Kerr said. He turned to his assistant. “Tam, go and put my writing box in the laird’s library. Then go home. I’ll not need ye again till the morrow.”
“Aye, Father David,” the boy said, and hurried off to do as he had been bid.
A servant brought the priest a goblet of wine, and the three men sat talking before one of the hall’s two large hearths. Seeing them there as she came in, Maggie slipped up the stairs to her bedchamber where Grizel awaited. The serving woman had had her young mistress’s tub set up, and the steam was rising from the hot water as Maggie entered the room.
“I didn’t ask ye for a bath,” the girl said.
“Yer not going down to the hall for the meal stinking of yer sweat like some man-at-arms,” Grizel said firmly. “What will yer husband think of ye?”
“He’s not my husband yet,” Maggie said, irritated.
“He will be on the morrow,” Grizel snapped back.
“Does everyone in Brae Aisir know my business now?” She pulled off her boots and garments impatiently.
“Fourteen mounted men ride through the village and up the hill to the keep, and ye think it will go unnoticed? Get in the tub before the water cools. A hall full of servants, and ye think no one is listening? This is the most exciting thing that has happened at Brae Aisir in years, lassie.”
Maggie climbed into her tub. Taking up the washing rag, she soaped it and began to scrub herself vigorously. “The contract is to be signed tomorrow, and that’s an end to it,” she said. “I will have obeyed the king’s command. There will be no bedding until he can prove himself worthy of me and earn my respect.”
Grizel shook her head. “Yer the most stubborn lass in the Borders,” she said.
“Aye, I am,” Maggie agreed. “But if after proclaiming I should wed no man who could not outrun, outride, and outfight me, it would be Lord Stewart who would suffer if he did not rise to my challenge. There would be some like that boob Ewan Hay who would challenge his right to the Aisir nam Breug and cause a feud between the Kerrs and half a dozen clan families in the region. Let thishusbandthe king has sent me prove to them all that he is worthy to take on this responsibilityand me.”
“He’s a big bonnie man,” Grizel said. “He’ll beat ye and show the others he can be the true master of Brae Aisir after yer grandfather relinquishes his authority.”
“We’ll see,” Maggie replied to her tiring woman.
“Have ye decided when ye will issue the challenge?” Grizel asked her mistress.
“What? Has that information not been spread from the gossips in the hall yet?” Maggie teased her companion.
Grizel laughed. “Nay,” she said.
“After the gleaning,” Maggie told her, but she was already considering other ways to avoid doing what was really her duty. She would do this in her own time, not another’s. She finished bathing, and after drying herself thoroughly, she dressed in the garments that Grizel had laid out for her—a plain gown of medium blue velvet brocade with a low square neckline, tight-fitting bodice, and tight sleeves. She wore her clan badge as a pendant on a gold chain. It showed the sun in its splendor with the mottoSero sed servio, meaningLate, but in earnest.
Grizel brushed out her mistress’s beautiful warm brown hair. Then she set a French hood with a short trailing veil that fell just as far as Maggie’s shoulders. The hood had a carefully pleated linen edge. “Put on yer slippers and yer ready to go down,” Grizel said. “Ye look respectable and like a young lady should now.”
“He wouldn’t care what I looked like,” Maggie said. “The Stewarts of Torra do their duty by the king, he told me. He’s marrying me because the king said so and for no other reason, Grizel. He was insulting.”
“It’s yer own fault,” Grizel told her bluntly. “Ye refused to get to know any of the marriageable men in the vicinity. Yer heart is nae engaged, lassie, so what does it matter whom ye wed now? Yer grandfather is sixty-three. He could wait no longer for ye to settle on a husband, especially as ye had no intention of doing so.”
“But I can take care of the Aisir nam Breug, Grizel,” Maggie said. “I don’t need a husband to do it for me. Why do ye think I learned to ride, to run, to fight, to do accounts? It was so I could take over for Grandsire one day.”
