Aimil decided that it was a very good time to practice a little wifely obedience.
Chapter Nineteen
“Must I go?”
Parlan looked at Aimil who wore only a shift and was sprawled upon her stomach on their bed. “Ye would send me off alone?”
Looking at the crestfallen face he made, she giggled. “Poor, wee laddie.” She grimaced and sat up as her child moved within her, making lying upon her stomach very uncomfortable. “Ye truly wish me to come along?” Placing a hand over her rounding stomach, she delighted in the feel of her child’s life and idly wondered how unattractively noticeable the changes in her shape were.
“I wouldnae ask ye otherwise. Why are ye reluctant to go?” He moved to stand by the bed as he finished donning his doublet.
“Weel, I would prefer to be looking my best when I meet your closest allies.”
Biting back a smile, he bent down and kissed her then started out of the room. “Ye look bonnie enough to turn any man’s head. Get your clothes on, lass, and I will send Maggie to help ye with the packing. We must leave Dubhglenn before the noon of the day arrives.”
Sighing, she got off the bed. He did not understand and she doubted that she could make him. While she was delighted to be carrying his child, the way it was swiftly changing the shape of her body did not please her at all. She often felt awkward, even misshapen and knew that the feeling would only grow stronger as she grew rounder. Although he showed no lessening of his passion for her, she was not feeling her prettiest nor too capable of inspiring and holding onto his passion.
That, she mused, was not the feeling she wished to hold when she came face to face with his past. She knew there would be women at the Dunmore keep who had shared Parlan’s bed in the past. There was also a good chance that at least one of those women would be sure to remind her of that fact and even intend to repeat it despite the presence of a wife. Even at her most confident, Aimil knew she would find that difficult to deal with. She did not want to face it when her waistline was little more than a memory.
Giving a soft, self-derisive laugh, she admitted that, waist or no waist, a part of her also wished to go. Worse, it was for the same reason she did not want to go. His former lovers were there, and she did not want him to go without her. The presence of his wife, rounding with child or not, would help push aside most temptation. And that, she decided wryly as Maggie entered, was why she would be riding at Parlan’s side when he left Dubhglenn.
“Do ye need a rest, sweeting?” Parlan asked when they had been riding for an hour.
“Nay, I am fine. ’Tis a good brisk day for riding, and I feel little discomfort when on Elfking’s back.” She patted her mount’s neck. “I thought, mayhaps, that ye would be riding him.”
“Nay, not this time. Ye look grand on the beast. When I rode into the Dunmores that last time, I thought on how it would look if ye rode in on Elfking and I upon Raven. T’will be a fine show.”
Although she laughed, she saw the truth of his words when they rode into the Dunmore bailey a few hours later. The admiration on so many faces was embarrassing to endure. Aimil noticed that Parlan had little trouble with it, and had to smile. He did like to put on a fine show as he called it.
After being led to their chambers, she joined Parlan in washing away some of the dust of the journey. The way the maids who brought them their heated water ignored her and greedily eyed a half-naked Parlan annoyed her. Parlan seemed oblivious to it and she tried very hard to follow his example. It was not easy, however, and she found it even less so as the evening wore on. Even Lord Dunmore’s fulsome daughter, Janet, seemed more flirtatious and inviting than was appropriate.
When they retired for the night, she held Parlan close and knew there was a hint of desperation in her lovemaking. That he sensed it as well was proven by his quizzical glances but he asked nothing and she offered no hints. She did not want him to know that she battled with a gut-twisting jealousy for he had done nothing to deserve the poison such emotion could arouse. She held him tightly and prayed that she could continue to control her jealousy.
By the next afternoon she was beginning to think that an impossible task. Needing some time alone, she wandered out to the stables. As she brushed down Elfking, she began to calm the emotions that knotted her stomach only to glance up and see Janet sauntering toward her. Aimil mused ruefully that peace would clearly not be something she could enjoy until they were back at Dubhglenn. Wherever she turned at the Dunmores, there seemed to be someone only too eager to remind her that her husband was once a man of healthy appetites who had never hesitated to satisfy them.
“I cannae believe that the Black Parlan would wed some Lowland wench.”
And there, Aimil thought crossly,is another source of annoyance, something else that gnaws at my temper threatening to break my weak control over it. There were several of the Dunmore clan who held only contempt for anyone not of the Highlands and they made little or no attempt to hide it. Janet added to that with her constant throwing of lures at Parlan. She was twice the annoyance, Aimil mused, as she got ready to answer the woman’s slurs yet try to prevent any trouble.
“Ah, weel, life has always been strewn with surprises.” Judging by the look upon Janet’s face, Aimil decided that she had kept her voice as calm and amiable as she had hoped to, that she had succeeded in keeping her seething anger out of her voice.
“How verra amusing.” Janet moved closer to Elfking’s stall. “I would never have thought Parlan a man to be caught by a bairn.”
“The bairn didnae catch him.”
“Nay? ’Tis why he wed ye. Ye somehow tricked him into letting his seed take root. I never would have thought some Lowland slut to be that canny as to get Parlan to err as he never has before.”
“That, of course, is assuming that it was an error.”
“Of course it was. A MacGuin would never taint his line with the blood of some Lowlander.”
It was very hard but Aimil continued to try to control her temper over Janet’s continuous slurs. Her pride was rebelling against taking such blows. She knew many an insult about Highlanders with which to battle Janet’s cuts but she refused to use them. Not only did she find that sort of thing distasteful but she could not bring herself to insult what was also Parlan’s heritage. She certainly did not want him to hear that she had and she knew that Janet would not hesitate to tell him. She also wished that she would not be pushed to trading insults with the woman. It lacked a certain amount of dignity and maturity—both of which she wanted to maintain in this confrontation with one of Parlan’s past lovers.
“Taint? Nay, rather strengthen. It can never hurt to bring in fresh blood.”
“If ye hadnae come along, it would have been Dunmore blood, my blood, that would have run in his heir’s veins.”
“Ye are certain of that, are ye?”
