3
“Curse ye, Alexander!” roared Barra as the victorious MacDubh raiding party entered Rathmor’s great hall. “Why did ye leave me behind?”
“Ye would have been more of a danger to us than a help, for ye suffer the ills of too much drink,” Alexander explained, then frowned as he realized that Barra was no longer listening. His gaze was fixed on the other side of the great hall.
It was not the three children Barra stared at as if the Devil himself had suddenly reared up out of Hell. The three children were still difficult to espy amongst the crowd of men. Barra’s wide gaze was fixed upon Ailis, who was gently urging Jaime to sit down as she attempted to tend the man’s facial abrasions and bruised knuckles.
Barra rose from his seat at the head table and took a few unsteady steps toward Ailis with one of his shaking hands outstretched toward her. With each step Barra took, Alexander saw the shock upon his brother’s lean face lighten just a little bit.
“Mairi,” Barra whispered, but then he shook his head and rubbed at his temples with trembling fingers. “Nay, how foolish of me. Mairi is dead. I but let wishes and dreams cloud my sight for a moment. Ye must be her sister, Ailis.”
Ailis gave a small involuntary cry. Her time had abruptly run out. Her shock increased as, in Barra’s handsome face, she saw the blue eyes of the twins as well as their narrow faces. So, too, did she see thick strawberry-blond curls identical to those that crowned Sibeal’s small head. There was no denying the devastating revelation that flooded her mind. The way Barra’s gaze settled upon the children, his look filled with love and a hunger born of long denial, Ailis was left with no doubts. Her sister’s lover had been Barra MacDubh. Now she understood Mairi’s reason for such intense secrecy concerning the identity of her lover.
“Sister?” Alexander hissed, and he gave Barra a slight shake to gain his attention. “Did ye saysister?”
“Aye,” Barra briefly forced his gaze back to Alex. “Ailis.” He looked at Ailis. “Ye do look much like my Mairi, but now that the first shock of it all has left me, I can see the differences. I am so very sorry, Ailis,” he said, his voice muted and sincere. “I brought your poor sister naught but misery.”
There was such melancholy in his voice that Ailis’s heart was touched. “Nay. Mairi was happy, very happy, with ye and with the bairns.”
“Ye said you were their nurse,” Alexander hissed, glaring at Ailis and fighting to ignore the way she spoke to Barra, for it created a dangerous, unwanted softening inside of him. “Ye lied.” He decided to center his attention upon this sin. “Ye are Ailis MacFarlane—niece and heir to that murdering bastard Colin MacFarlane.”
“I ken well enough who I am.” Ailis was determined not to quail before the man even though she only reached his collarbone. “I didna lie. Ye didna askwhoI was, onlywhatI was, and I answered that truthfully. I do act as their nurse. I just didna mention a detail or two.” A page brought her a cloth and some water to clean Jaime’s wounds, and Ailis took swift advantage of them even as she glanced toward the children. “Didna I care for ye and I alone?” she asked them, and the children nodded. “Didna I help your mama before God took her into His arms; didna I help her and care for ye when she couldna?” Again the children nodded, and Ailis sent Alexander a brief sharp glare. “That sounds much akin to a nurse to me. So how did I lie?” She shook her head as she rinsed out the rag she had used to bathe Jaime’s wounds. “I now ken why ye were after the children.”
She tried to keep her attention fixed upon Jaime. Alexander MacDubh was far too unsettling. None of the stories of his beauty had been exaggerated, she decided. He was tall, lean, and exquisitely formed. His hair was thick, had an attractive wave to it, and hung a little past his broad shoulders. There was that taint of a cynical twist to his expression, but that face was still breathtakingly lovely. Ailis did not think she had ever seen a man’s features cut so perfectly. And his eyes, she mused with a silent curse. Those startlingly blue eyes stole her thoughts even though they glinted with fury and mistrust. And his temper had not been exaggerated, either, she thought. Ignoring the man was her best defense. If his beauty did not leave her witless, then seeing that anger would surely have her trembling. She had no wish to appear either way in front of the man. When Alex spoke, she fiercely resisted the urge to turn toward that deep voice.
“Aye, I was after the children,” Alexander said, his voice hard and cold. “I wasna about to leave anyone with a drop of MacDubh blood in the murderous hands of a MacFarlane. The children are still young. We should be able to scrub them clean of the taint.”
Despite what Ailis thought of the method her uncle had used to obtain Leargan, she was a MacFarlane. Alexander’s insult stung. Since she, and before her, Mairi, had had the sole care of the children, she saw his remarks as a personal affront. The soft voice of common sense told her that MacDubh could have no knowledge of who raised the children or how, but she paid it no heed. She curtly tossed aside the rag she held, forcefully placed her small fists on her slim hips, and glared at the man.
“Oh, aye, the raising of the bairns is so clearly a concern for ye.” She gave a soft, sarcastic laugh. “ ‘Tis so much better if the bairns learn to be the bloodthirsty, cold-hearted bastard that ye are.”
Alexander backhanded Ailis across the face. His action stunned him and—he could tell by their faces—astonished and shocked his men. Despite the depths to which his opinion of women had sunk, he had never before struck one. He had always seen such an action as dishonorable, even cowardly, for a woman could not match a man blow for blow.
A low growl escaped Jaime as Ailis tumbled to the floor. Four men rushed to hold the brute down, but tiny Sibeal reached Alex first, and she demonstrated that she carried an ample load of the now legendary MacDubh temper. Alexander grunted in pain as the little girl delivered a punch to the part of his anatomy most within her reach. He clutched his groin and doubled over slightly, needing a moment to catch his breath. When he looked at his tiny niece, she faced him squarely with her small fists set firmly on her hips in imitation of her aunt. Through his discomfort, Alex briefly noted that he was not the only one staring at the child in openmouthed silence.
“I hope I crippled ye!” Sibeal said, fury adding strength to her childish voice. “Ye hit my aunt Ailis ever again, and I will cut your pintle off and stuff it in your ear, ye rammish whoreson.”
Even the pain in her jaw could not extinguish the laughter rising up in Ailis. Neither could swallowing hard, coughing, or any of the other tricks she sometimes used to stifle a laugh. The gaping looks upon everyone’s face and the sheer astonishment on Lord Alexander’s overwhelmed her. She released a peal of laughter. The twins were the first ones to join her, then Jaime and Barra, as well as many of the MacDubh men. As she fought to control her mirth, Ailis noted that Alexander himself was very close to outright laughter.
“Och, lassie,” she finally said, grinning at Sibeal. “Ah, my sweet Sibeal, ye shouldna have done that. ‘Tisna proper for a lady to act or speak so.”
A frown creased the child’s angelic face. “But ye did the same to Sir Donald MacCordy. I was peeking, ye ken. Ye said just those things and more, too.”
Ailis could feel the color rush into her face, and she groaned softly, then attempted to look stern as Barra helped her to her feet. “I am sure ye are mistaken, child.” She tried to speak with calm assurance, but it was not easy. She knew shehadsaid such things. She silently vowed that, if there was a next time, she would be certain to ascertain that no small but keen ears were close at hand.
“Nay, she isna mistaken,” said Rath, a glint of mischief in his eyes, and his upset over the treatment of his aunt briefly pushed aside by a highly amusing memory. “Donald was screaming like a stuck pig. I ken it well. He was saying that he burned for ye, and ye said that ye would snuff out his flame for all time.” Ailis softly yet vehemently urged him to hush, but he was spurred on by the obvious enjoyment of the MacDubh men. “Donald said that he would warm ye up until ye begged for him, and ye said that if he put one filthy hand on ye, ye would knock his cullions back so far that he would never be able to swallow again. Then he touched ye and ye did it.”
“Nasty little piece,” Alexander murmured and grinned at Ailis’s embarrassment. His amusement faded as he studied her, fighting to ignore the bite of guilt he suffered over the mark of his blow upon her small, oval face. “And just why does Sir Donald MacCordy feel he can take such liberties with Laird Colin MacFarlane’s niece?” When she started to turn away from him, he caught her by the arm.
“Mayhaps he is just a lecherous dog.” Ailis knew it would be a mistake to let him know that she was betrothed to a man the MacDubhs hated almost as much as they did her uncle.
“Aye, he is that, well enough, but I think there is more.” He grasped the hand she was trying to keep hidden in the folds of her skirt and stared at the ring she wore before looking directly at her. “I think the man merely tries to gain what will soon be his anyway. Ye are betrothed to Sir Donald MacCordy.”
Ailis frantically searched her mind for some name to give him, any name that would not add to her usefulness as a tool of revenge.
“Ye dinna like him, either, do ye, sir?” Sibeal said to Alexander in all innocence. “I can tell it. He doesna like me and my brothers, ye ken, but it doesna matter. We shall still have Ailis. We will live with her. She has promised us. I am going to help her care for her bairns.”
Although it was faint and quickly disguised, Alexander felt the tremor that ripped through Ailis. He also saw the fleeting look of revulsion that clouded her beautiful dark brown eyes. Alexander wondered if it was only Donald MacCordy who repulsed her or if it was all men, then wondered why he even cared. When he bedded the girl—and he would—it would not be for pleasure, his or hers, so her warmth or lack thereof should be of no concern to him.
