The Border Lord and the Lady (35 page)

“We should be back by afternoon,” Ian told his wife, giving her a quick kiss. “I’ve told the men to keep a sharp watch, but ’tis unlikely you’ll be bothered. Still, keep the doors barred, ladyfaire.”

Cicely went back to bed, for it was nowhere near dawn. She arose at her usual time and went about her day as she always did, telling Mab to prepare a hot meal for when the men returned. Cicely began to worry as the afternoon wore on, but then one of her husband’s men rode in to tell her that when they had reached Greyhome the sheep and cattle were not there. Storming the house, they found it virtually empty but for two terrified old women who told them the Grahames had gone to the Michaelmas fair in a nearby village.

“The two lairds decided to travel on to the fair because they realized the English borderers had probably taken their livestock there to
sell,” the young messenger said. “My lord bid you not to fret. They will be back tomorrow.”

“Are you returning to join the laird?” Cicely asked.

“Nay, mistress. The laird told me to remain here,” came the answer.

“He’s totally reckless!” Cicely said to Orva. “He and Ben Duff both. They plan to ride into an English village and take back their livestock? They’ll be killed!”

“Nay, lassie,” Mab, who had come up from her kitchen, said. “They’ll lay waste to the village first to secure a safe retreat before they take the beasties back.”

“What? There are innocent women and children in that village!” Cicely exclaimed. “What is going to happen to them?”

“What always happens in these raids,” Mab said with a shrug.

“Blessed Mother!” Cicely swore softly.

“And there is certain to be more raiding now,” Mab predicted. “Ah, well, these months of peace have been enjoyable, my lady.”

“Will we be safe?” Cicely wanted to know.

“Safe as some, but not as safe as others,” Mab said.

Cicely grew pale suddenly, swaying slightly. “Nay! Not now!
Not now!
” She gripped the back of a chair to keep from falling.

“My lady, what is it? What do you mean, not now?” Mab asked nervously.

“She’s with child,” Orva said bluntly.

“Bless us,” Mab said, smiling her toothless grin, “Glengorm is to have an heir!” Then she patted Cicely’s small hand. “Don’t fret, my lady,” she said. “Glengorm is one of the safest houses in the border. This bit of thieving by the Grahames is nothing, and the two lairds will stop it. Nothing more will come of it.”

“I hope not,” Cicely replied. “The English king is an infant yet, and those ruling for him have enough on their hands with the French. Scotland’s English queen was meant to give England peace in the north.”

“I had heard that our King Jamie loves his queen,” Mab said.

“Oh, he does! Very much!” Cicely told her. “But that was God’s blessing on them both, Mab. For if they hadn’t fallen in love the marriage still would have been celebrated for the very reason I have previously said. England needs peace with Scotland, and nothing seals a peace between nations like a marriage between its king and the other king’s kin. Queen Joan and the king are well matched.”

“She had better cease having daughters,” Mab said darkly, “and give Scotland a fair prince. Two princesses in two years! We need a strong lad.”

“I know she’s doing her best,” Cicely replied with a smile.

“Does our laird know he’s to be a father?” Mab asked.

Cicely shook her head. “Not yet. I was planning to tell him, but then our sheep were stolen, and Ben Duff came, and off the two of them went. If he comes back I will tell him,” she said with a sigh.

“Not
if,
my lady, but
when
he returns,” Mab said. “When our men go raiding here in the borders we always say
when
they return.”

“Now don’t you go upsetting her any more than you have,” Orva scolded. “Sit down, my lady, and rest yourself. You have a ways to go till your child is born.”

“When?” Mab asked, curious.

“Spring,” Orva said. “My lady will have her babe in the spring.”

“I’ll pray for a son for Glengorm,” Mab said.

“It will be what it will be,” Orva said sharply, “and the laird will be happy as long as the child is strong, and its mother safe.”

“Yes, yes,” Mab agreed impatiently, “but first we need an heir for Glengorm. I hope my lady isn’t going to be like her friend the queen. A lad or two, and then there is time for the lasses.”

The raiding party returned by midafternoon of the following day. They had brought back Glengorm’s flock of sheep, and Ben Duff’s dozen head of cattle. They had killed several Grahames, but they had spared the English village hosting the Michaelmas fair, for they had arrived before their livestock was to be sold off. And the villagers
had very wisely sided with Ian Douglas and Andrew Grey when they learned from where the cattle and sheep had come.

“Mind you,” Andrew Grey said, “had the creatures already been sold they would have sided with the buyers. But there we were, and they knew they could save themselves if they were quick. The Grahames were very surprised.” He chuckled.

“Were you hurt?” Cicely said anxiously, running her hands over Ian’s arms and shoulders, seeking wounds.

“Hurt?” Ian looked surprised. “Nay, ladyfaire, I wasn’t harmed at all. This was simply a wee raid. There was no danger.”

“No danger?”
Cicely looked outraged. “You dare to tell me there was no danger. You ride off with a troop of armed men to accost a group of bandits, and you tell me there was no danger? You send a messenger to say you will be traveling deeper into the English border to retrieve your sheep. Mab tells me you’ll burn the village sheltering the Grahames, and you say there was no danger?”

Andrew Grey’s face, surprised at first, suddenly took on a knowing look.

“You could have been killed!” Cicely shouted, and then she burst into tears, flinging herself against her husband’s broad chest, sobbing piteously.

The laird was astounded. “Ladyfaire, I have been on many such ventures.”

Andrew Grey snickered, close to open laughter.

“What if you had been killed?” Cicely wailed. “Who would take care of us?”

“Ladyfaire, I wasn’t killed or injured, and I am here to take care of you,” the laird comforted his wife. “You have never shown me weakness before. Why are you showing it to me now?” He stroked her hair.

Andrew Grey began to howl with his laughter.

“What the hell is so funny, Ben Duff?” Ian Douglas snarled.

“Don’t you know?” Andrew said, doubled over with laughter.
“Cicely, you must tell him,” he said to her. “It is not my place to tell him.”

“Tell me what?” the laird demanded.

“I am going to have a baby!” Cicely sobbed. “And I don’t want its da killed.”

“A bairn? I’m going to be a father?” Ian Douglas’s face lit up with pure joy, and he looked down into her tearstained face. “Ladyfaire, I thank you! And I promise not to get killed, for if I were who would teach my son all he needs to know?”

“It could be a daughter,” Cicely said softly.

“Nay, ’twill be a lad, I’m certain,” the laird of Glengorm answered her, grinning.

“No more raiding,” Cicely told him.

He shook his head. “Nay, I will not promise you that, for if I did not redress any attacks on my lands, my livestock, my people, I would not be a fit laird. And I would be open to attack from all and sundry who believed me a weakling. Raids are a part of life on the border, ladyfaire, but Glengorm has been more fortunate than most. The sheep stolen by the Grahames were still in their summer meadow, which is across the loch. It is the most distant of my lands. There was but a single shepherd and dog, and if he hadn’t jumped into the loch and swum across to sound the alarm we probably wouldn’t have known who took the sheep. I shall keep that meadow better guarded in the future, and I will build a small stone redoubt on the hill above, to be manned so that we will be able to see who is coming from that direction. But I will never permit an outrage against me to go unpunished, ladyfaire. Weakness leads to far worse things than small wounds.”

“Then I will pray the Grahames have learned their lesson, my lord,” Cicely told her husband. “May they keep to their own side of the border.”

“When is the bairn due to be born?” he asked her.

“Late March or early April,” she told him. “ ’Twill be a spring child.”

He put an arm about her, giving her a small hug. “I shall take him raiding with me as soon as our son can sit a horse,” he teased her, and Ben Duff laughed aloud again.

“You will do no such thing!” Cicely said indignantly.

“Ah, Ian, my friend, you are about to see the love of your life change into a mother before your very eyes. It has already begun, as you see, for she is protective of her child against all comers, even its father,” Andrew Grey said. “I can’t wait to tell my Maggie of this happy event.” And on the following morning he departed with his men and his cattle for his home.

Several days later Fergus came to tell his brother that a party of Grahames was on the other side of the loch calling for a parley.

“We’ve got to get that redoubt built before winter,” the laird said. “I don’t like it that the Grahames are suddenly coming and going as they please on my lands.”

“Don’t go!” Cicely begged him.

“Ladyfaire, ’tis a parley, not a battle to the death,” he told her gently. “ ’Tis better we talk than fight, isn’t it?” Giving her a quick kiss, he left the hall with Fergus.

The two brothers walked down the hill through Glengorm village and onto the shore that edged the water. The Douglas clansmen had come out to stand behind their laird in a show of strength. Across the loch upon the other shore was a small party of men. The loch was not particularly wide and so they were able to shout across it.

“What do you want?” Ian Douglas called across the water. “You are trespassing.”

“Are you the laird?” a stocky man demanded to know.

“I am,” Ian said.

“ ’Twas your band of clansmen who killed three of our kin?”

“Your kin stole from me, and when I reclaimed my livestock they attacked me,” Ian said. “I was within my rights.”

“You owe us a forfeit for those murders,” the stocky man retorted.

“You owe me for the three lambs that were missing from my flock,
and undoubtedly slaughtered to fill your fat belly,” Ian told him. “Consider us even.”

“If you will not pay then we shall take our revenge,” the stocky man said, and as the words left his mouth a hail of arrows were shot by the mounted men across the narrow loch at the laird and his people.

Fergus Douglas flung himself in front of his brother, taking the arrow meant for the laird directly into his own heart. As Ian bent to catch his sibling he felt himself pierced sharply. Kneeling, his dead brother cradled in his arms, he howled with anguish. Then, dropping Fergus onto the sandy shore, he stood up, shouting to his clansmen not injured, “To horse!” They ran for mounts, and a village lad, anticipating the laird, had already run up the hill to the house, shouting for horses to be saddled.

Cicely, hearing the commotion, came running from the hall. “What has happened?” she asked of no one in particular as she saw their two stablemen leading horses from the stables down the hill, and clansmen racing up to meet them, clambering onto the animals and racing back down the hill again.

Ian Douglas had wisely kept out of his wife’s line of vision. He had broken off the shafts of the two arrows that had hit him, so if she managed to catch a glimpse of him he would not from a distance appear wounded. Grasping the bridle of his stallion, he pulled himself up onto its back and marshaled his clansmen about him. “Not one of them lives!” he said grimly. “No mercy! We can catch them fastest if we swim our horses across the loch.” Then he led them to the shore and into the water, and urged the beast under him across to the far shore.

The Grahames had already disappeared over the hill. They had not been certain whether it was the laird they had killed or not. But the sound of grief that had pierced the air after their volley satisfied them that they had gained their revenge on the Douglases of Glengorm. They rode swiftly, for they assumed they would be followed, but by the time their pursuers rode around the loch and up the hills
the Grahames would have managed to obscure the trail by sending two horses here, and another three there, in different directions. The Grahames considered themselves quite good at making an escape.

They were therefore very surprised to discover the Douglases of Glengorm catching up to them, and not an hour had passed. The sound of their war cry—
“A Douglas! A Douglas!”
—echoed in the clear autumn air. The stocky man leading the Grahames spurred his horse onward, shouting to his companions to scatter, for that would make it more difficult to catch them. But their tactic was countered, for each rider or group of riders breaking off from the main body of Grahames was followed by several Douglases. And each Grahame was caught and killed.

Unhorsed and on his knees, the stocky man looked up at Ian. “How did you come so quickly?” he wanted to know.

“We swam our horses across the loch,” the laird answered him. “Do you not know the motto of the Douglas family? ’Tis
Jamais arrière,
” and when the Grahame looked up at Ian, confused, he said, “It means ‘Never behind.’ ” He raised his sword.

“Wait! I can see we did not kill you,” the stocky Grahame said. “Whom did we kill? At least tell me that before I die.”

“You killed my younger brother,” the laird told him even as he plunged his sword into his enemy’s chest and twisted it hard to ensure the man died. Then, yanking his blade from the stocky man’s chest, he wiped it off on the fellow’s shirt.

One of his men walked over to the Grahame and, pulling out his dirk, slit his throat. “Just to be certain, my lord,” he said.

The laird nodded, and then a wave of both nausea and dizziness assailed him. “Help me to my horse,” he said to his clansman. “I am beginning to feel the effects of my wounds.” He swayed, and the clansman, putting an arm about him, got Ian to his horse, and then up onto the stallion’s broad back.