But he had his clan and this village. Judging from some of the glances traded among the unattached lasses, he’d have more help, and more consoling, than any one man could possibly need.
Those lasses glanced her way with speculation in their eyes. Did they think if one brother failed to claim her, the other would do? The elder? The future laird? She pursed her lips, hating how the notion raised a flare of hope in her chest. Hope and something more—ambition? With time, could Keenan come to see her as something other than Gavan’s intended?
The idea saddened Fenella even further. She didn’t know if the man she’d promised to wait for, Keenan’s younger brother, was still alive, or how he would come to know of his brother’s loss. Or if he would ever return to claim her.
Nay. She couldn’t dwell on such an idea. She’d be no better than these grasping lasses, eyeing Keenan before his dead wife was covered up in the cold, muddy ground.
But her daughter?—
As the infant wailed in protest of the cold and wet, Fenella saw an honorable way to support Keenan and keep herself allied with his family until Gavan returned—which he would do. She could not let herself imagine anything else. Gavan would come home. Eventually. Hopefully before he forgot her, and before she wasted her youth, or her life, waiting for him. She would ensure a place for herself with his family, so that when he did return, she would have their support while the promise Gavan and she had made to each other sustained them until they became reacquainted.
Keenan dropped a handful of earth onto the casket, then turned away. His shoulders rounded as though he fought the need to bend double with grief and pain. Then he straightened and trudged toward the wee bridge over the burn and the path that led to the gates of the MacNabb keep, his sister Groa keeping pace silently at his side, his brothers following and their parents walking slowly a few steps behind their children. He never looked back.
His daughter’s cries didn’t stop him or change the path he walked. The nameless lass. Keenan was too grief stricken to name her and others would not do so until she reached several months of age. Any child might die all too easily, but a motherless child was more at risk. Better to let her go, if that was to be her fate, without a name to keep in the hearts of those who wanted to love her. Or hate her for the death of her mother. Would Keenan hate his daughter? The thought soured in her belly. How could he? The bairn was all that was left of his wife.
Fenella did not hold with the superstition that denied this bairn a name. Yet it was not her place to name Keenan’s daughter, or even to encourage him to do so. Perhaps if she could care for her well enough, if he saw her thrive, he would claim her and bestow whatever name he or her mother haddecided to give her. Fenella swore to do what little she could to ensure that happened.
She fought back the tears that had mixed with raindrops on her face, and resolved, strode to the wet nurse, who was frantically trying to soothe her charge and silence her. Fenella took the infant from Kyla’s arms, and rocked her. Her cries calmed and her eyes closed, leaving tears to dry on her tiny face.
Fenella walked through the keep’s gates with the bairn on her shoulder, the wet nurse trudging behind her through the muddy ground. She nodded to the bairn’s grandmother, the clan’s lady, who gave her a sad smile and permitted her to continue without questioning why she had the bairn and not the woman following her. Her approval gave Fenella hope that when Gavan returned, they could start where they left off, and not as the strangers they might have become. His family, accustomed to her presence with the wee lass, would accept her as his.
She stayed in the nursery and warmed herself at its hearth fire while the wet nurse fed the wee lass. The midday meal would be a solemn affair at best. She’d rather remain with the infant than endure the gloom that would inhabit the great hall. Here, at least, was new life, and hope for a future, even if it was different than the future anyone in the clan, especially Keenan, had envisioned.
But she couldn’t hide, any more than he could. His family would see him through the meal, and so must she, if she was to retain the ground she’d gained with his mother. She nodded to Kyla, then stood and left her suckling the bairn.
The great hall was as silent and still as Fenella had expected. She took a seat within view of the upper table, but not so close as to appear presumptuous or, like some of the other lasses, determined to be noticed by Keenan. Rather, she found a place below the side where his mother sat, solemn and picking at the food on her trencher.
It hurt Fenella to watch her. As soon as Keenan left, his parents stood to go. Fenella took that as permission for everyone else to do the same. Groa stood at the same time and raised a hand to halt her, then came down from the dais to meet her.
“Thank ye for taking care of the wee bairn,” Groa told her. “I saw how she responded to ye. Ye are good for her and I hope ye will find it within ye to spend more time with her.”
“Of course,” Fenella promised, shocked at the notice Groa gave her during such a grievous time.
“My brother is too wounded right now to give his daughter the care she needs, and frankly, a woman’s touch is better for her, I think.”
“But Keenan needs his daughter, too.”
“He will, but not today. Perhaps not this sennight. He must come to terms with what has happened and what is left to him. An infant daughter isna something he ever thought to be responsible for on his own.”
“He willna be alone in this.”
“Ye?” The look Groa gave her was speculative rather than censoring.
Fenella shook her head. “Nay, ’tis no’ what I meant. He has ye. His family. People who love him and care for him.”
Groa nodded. “Ye are right. ’Tis too soon by far for another lass to enter his heart. It still bleeds. I ken ye and Gavan cared for each other—and may still do so despite his long absence. But I thank ye for anything ye are willing to do to help us ease Keenan’s burden, and to keep his daughter well until he can accept her.”
Fenella nodded, throat so tight, she found herself unable to speak.
Groa took her hand and squeezed it, then left her standing in the middle of the hall fighting for calm, overwhelmed bythe responsibility Keenan’s sister had laid upon her, despite her earlier resolve to do just what Groa had suggested.
As the months went by,the wee lass, still nameless, grew strong and thrived. Her father did not fare as well. The grief that consumed him at his wife’s sudden death had not eased its grip. He continued with his responsibilities as his father’s heir, and in the company of other men seemed to come back to himself, though he remained mostly silent and closed off, avoiding many of the women of the clan, especially if they resembled his dead wife.
With regret and no small measure of reluctance, Fenella had given up on Gavan ever returning. She spent as much time with Keenan’s daughter as she could, and even brought the wee lass to her father. He would hold her, but seemed lost in thought, not really present with her, even when she cried. Fenella would take her from him when that happened, fearing her cries would upset him, but in asking silent permission to do so, would touch Keenan’s shoulder and place a sympathetic hand there. Only then did he seem to come back to the present, look up and actually see her. Lately, he placed his hand over hers on his shoulder, making Fenella’s heart race with surprise and pleasure that he’d acknowledged her touch.
Groa, present during several of these instances, watched closely. Once they were away from Keenan, she said, “ye are the only lass he seems to respond to, save me and mother. Have ye noticed?”
“Nay. Ye are mistaken. He’s finally responding to the bairn.”
