At once, the younger woman burst into tears, and pointed her finger at the other nursemaid. “She said everything would be all right, we just needed tae give it more time…and the healer said as much, too—”
“More time when my son is wasting away?” Roger demanded, his face darkened with fury. “Get out of here, both of you!”
The two women didn’t hesitate, the older one throwing an imploring look at Julianna as they both rushed from the small bedchamber.
“Mayhap they just didn’t know…” Julianna offered, laying her hand upon his arm. “I will stay with him, but now you must go. Surely there is another young woman here who can help—or in that village we passed a short way from the castle.”
“I will find someone.”
Julianna had dropped her hand from his arm to lean again over the cradle, Roger missing her unexpected touch more than he could say as he strode from the room.
His chest tight. Remorse nearly choking him.
His son’s life-threatening condition was his fault! If he hadn’t ignored his children and all else around him, he would have judged better the servants tasked to care for them.
His thoughts flew at once to his young daughters, their shared bedchamber across the hall, yet he didn’t have time to tarry—
“Papa?”
Roger’s heart thudded to see little Elspeth, only four, peering out the doorway at him, though a longtime maidservant he had always trusted, Myra, came to guide her with a soft word back inside.
“No, give me a moment,” he murmured, Elspeth staring up at him with big blue eyes so much like her mother’s as he drew closer.
Moisture clouded his vision as fresh remorse gripped him, and he went down on one knee to draw his daughter into his arms.
Elspeth hugged him back, giggling as if she was delighted to see him, which only made the cutting pain in Roger’s heart worse. He stroked her silken auburn hair, but she began to squirm and pulled away to stare at him with a sudden pouting look on her face.
“I havna seen you for so long, Papa…months and months and months! Will you stay with us now? Me and Breda and Aran?”
“Aye, child…aye,” was all Roger could muster, his throat had grown so tight, and he rose to steer her gently toward Myra.
“Take her. I’ll return later tae see Breda.”
Myra had time only to nod before Roger turned away, a last glance into Aran’s room making his heart thud harder to see Julianna cradling him tenderly in her arms.
“Dinna live without love, Roger. Find a kindhearted lass tae help you raise our bairns and be happy…”
Sylvia’s last words like a blessing to him, he knew then as surely as he breathed that he loved Julianna…but would she ever love him?
As if sensing someone watching her, Julianna glanced up with tears in her eyes and mouthed, “Please hurry.”
Her silent plea made Roger lunge down the hall, fear for his son spurring him to break into a run.
* * *
Julianna sighedwith exhaustion and sank onto the cot she had asked to be placed near Aran’s cradle, and where she had allowed herself only a few hours’ rest in between his frequent feedings over the last four days.
Early evening now, the babe was sleeping peacefully or she wouldn’t have considered taking a nap, no matter two maidservants—different ones than those nursemaids Roger had dismissed—seemed always to be near to relieve her if she asked them.
Julianna hadn’t done so yet, preferring to watch over the child’s progress herself as each passing day brought greater reassurance that he would survive.
Aran’s cheeks were no longer sunken, but plumper and tinged pink, and his belly was gently rounded as should be a babe’s receiving good nourishment, rather than tightly swollen.
The wet nurse Roger had brought back with him from the village, a cheerful young woman with a wee daughter the same age as Aran, had moved with her babe into Douglas Castle. An arrangement that had greatly pleased her since her husband was one of the guards manning the fortress walls.
Julianna had even allowed herself to envision the two children playing together one day—a thought that made her sigh again as she lay down and covered herself with a blanket.
She wouldn’t have dared to imagine such a thing when she first saw Roger’s son, the couple hours she had spent waiting for a wet nurse’s arrival some of the worst she had known.
