The King's Mistress (4 page)

Alarmed, he’d charged into the room and found his countess weeping hysterically and the midwife holding her, a lifeless infant.

He’d snatched her from the midwife’s hands and, placing his mouth over hers, breathed life into her. And Yolande had cried for the first time.

Anton’s brown eyes and hatchet nose had been the first features she’d ever beheld. Not her mother’s, not the midwife’s, but his. And he’d had been at her side ever since.

While her mother taught her to pray, embroider and manage an estate, Anton had taught her to ride, curse and to know when a man lied or cheated at cards.

At thirteen years of age, when she’d developed tender feelings for a visiting diplomat’s son, she’d gone not to her mother but to Anton for advice. A man of few words, he told her, “My sweet lamb, a stiff cock has no conscience.” He then asked if she recalled why they’d placed a ring in the bull’s nose. When she nodded, he told her, “A ring is the key to controlling a man as well.” Laughing, he’d held up his right hand. “No ring.”

Today, at two score and nine, Anton was still as muscular and fit as he had been then, as any man half his age, and he still wore no ring. And here she was once again, in sore need of his advice on men.

“Countess—” He grinned at his lapse. “
Your Highness
, how may I be of service?”

“I’ve had some disturbing news…about Lady Greer Armstrong.”

“Ah. You’ve learned MacKinnon has been ordered to the border to fetch her back to Edinburgh.”

Not the least surprised he had his own spies at Edinburgh, Yolande nodded as she fought the tears burning at the back of her throat.

You’re a woman grown, for heaven’s sake. Not some frightened child. Act it!

He lifted her chin with a finger and looked deep into her eyes. “Oh, now, what have we here, lamb?”

Undone by the childhood endearment, she threw herself into his arms and began sobbing, her tears streaking his leather breast armor. When she finally managed to catch her breath, she stuttered, “That…that slut is with child, Anton. His. And…and I am not.”

There, she’d said it aloud. Yet the ache and fear remained.

“I see.” He held her, stroking her back in fatherly fashion while she cried out her pain in gasping, slobbering sobs.

“I wish… I wish…”

“She would disappear.”

She nodded while his massive chest rose and fell beneath her cheek. Yes. She wanted that woman gone.

“How many know?” he asked.

“That I’m not with child?”

“Yes.”

“Only you…and me.” She took a shuddering breath, relieved she no longer carried the shameful burden alone. Dashing the tears from her cheeks, she stepped out of his arms. “Evette may suspect, but I’ve been most careful to hide the evidence of my monumental failure in the fires I keep burning in the solar.”

His gaze shifted to the distant hills that footed the treacherous Grampian Mountains beyond. “Does His Majesty know his whore may be with child?”

“He never would have permitted her to leave Edinburgh if he had.”

“True.”

Yolande began pacing the frozen earth, which crunched and poked like brittle rushes beneath her doeskin slippers. “If he learns of it, I fear I’m a dead woman. Widowed, he would be free to marry her and have his legitimate heir.”

Montre grabbed her hand, bringing her to an abrupt halt. “Have no fear, lamb. This…inconvenience will be dispatched forthwith.”

“My dearest Anton.” Her lifelong friend and teacher would dispose of this threat. “But what of my husband? Won’t he grow suspicious when the wench and MacKinnon fail to return? I’ve done naught to mask my hatred for the woman.”

Anton remained silent for several minutes, then whispered, “He’ll have no reason to be suspicious of you if you send him a missive stating you believe yourself to be with child. Overjoyed with the prospect of a legitimate heir, he won’t spare a moment’s thought on the whore but will race here to be at your side, whereupon you must use every womanly wile at your disposal to keep him in bed until such time as you
are
with child. By the time he does give Armstrong a thought, he’ll be too content to care what happened to her.”

The wind shifted, bringing the sound of distant feminine laughter into the garden. Frowning, Anton studied the windows and battlements above them. Apparently satisfied they held no threat, he turned his attention back to her. “But bear in mind, MacKinnon knows this land and I do not. I’ll need time to track him. But most importantly, your husband has spies here and is doubtless aware of your current state of discontent. Before you can send your missive saying you think yourself to be with child, you must convince your court that you believe yourself to be so. You must appear happy and perhaps thoughtful—as if harboring a delightful secret—mayhap even act queasy in the morning, if you are to be believed and to remain blameless in Armstrong and MacKinnon’s disappearances.”

Yes, she could do this. What a wondrous plan.

Her nemesis would be dealt with in quiet fashion, while she remained safe and had time and opportunity to fulfill her destiny as Queen Consort of Scotland.

With her heart lighter than it had been in months, Yolande rose on tiptoes and kissed Anton’s scruffy cheek. “Bless you and God’s speed, my dear, dear friend.”

 
“
A cottie stool cannot stand on two legs.
” ~ Old Scottish Proverb

Chapter Five

Annan, Scotland

“No, no, no. Lady Campbell is Sir Lyle Ross sister’s sister-by-marriage, not his brother’s, and Lady Fraser is his cousin.” Greer huffed, then tugged on the woven girdle at Genny’s waist. “And you wear this lower…thus.”

Genny frowned at the ornate silver-and-black rope riding low on her hips. “But now the girdle will fall as I walk.”

Rolling her eyes, her sister took a step back. “You shan’t be tromping through fields in Edinburgh, Gen, but gliding across wooden floors. The girdle will stay put. And stop fiddling with that necklace. You’ll break it.”

“’Tis heavy.” Genny pushed up the cold jet crucifix suspended on large silver beads—doubtless a gift from the king—to relieve the pressure on the back of her neck. A weighty price, even for her deception.

“Aye, and most valuable, so do take care,” Greer growled and held out the delicate leather slippers she’d pulled from her satchel. “Now put these on, and we’re done.”

Genny snatched the foolish-looking pointy-toed shoes from her sister’s hands and settled on a three-legged cottie stool, the only seating in the stable’s storeroom. Seeking a night’s shelter for Greer in the nearby Bruce stronghold had been out of the question. Several within would have recognized her.

The air in the stable might hang heavy with the scents of moldering hay and dung, but no one would see them, and for two pence the smithy’s mistress had provided a coarse but clean blanket to place upon the rush pallet nestled in the corner, a pitcher of fresh water, a few slivers of mutton and a loaf of brown bread.

Greer, looking about, muttered under her breath, “How far we have fallen.”

“It could be worse.” Genny wiggled her cramped toes, surprised to learn her sister’s feet were apparently a tad smaller than her own.

Her sister snorted in derisive fashion and turned to stare out the chest-high window carved into the barn’s plastered wall. After a moment she murmured, “You’ll find no friends at court.”

Genny frowned. “But what of the ladies Campbell and Fraser?” The French ladies at court likely kept to themselves, but surely the Scotswomen—

“They were welcoming when I first arrived, before Alexander took notice of me. Then they grew distant and more so with each passing month.”

“I see.” Apparently her sister’s life at court hadn’t been a bed of flower petals any more than her life in Buddle had been. At least none at court would expect her to share confidences with them.

No one, that was, save the king. How she, an imposter, would deal with the philanderer she had yet to fathom, but deal with him she would. Aye, this deplorable situation her sister found herself in had more than one author.

Noticing the shadows had lengthened, Genny reluctantly rose. “I fear I must take my leave for Buddle. MacKinnon may decide to return early to check on you.”

“He shan’t. He never approved of my relationship with Alexander. I suspect he came under duress.”

“Be that as it may, we dare not risk that he won’t return early.”

Her twin, obviously still smarting from the cruel but truthful accusations Genny had hurled at her the day before, lifted her chin in haughty fashion. “Very well, then. Thank you for the coins.”

“I wish there were more.”

“’Twill do.”

God’s teeth. “I hate leaving you with all this anger festering betwixt us. ’Tis not right.”

When her sister just shrugged in response—her twin was naught if not stubborn—Genny picked up the satchel containing Greer’s finer kirtles, mantle and frippery and, heart heavy, crossed the threshold.

Behind her, Greer murmured, “You do look lovely.”

Genny stopped and, finding her sister now watching her, raised a tentative hand to her hair, dressed for the first time in elaborate braids and decorated with a delicate silver coronet. “Thank you. I shall take great care with your possessions.”

Greer nodded as if never doubting that Genny would. “Should I write when the bairn comes?”

You are breaking my heart, sister
. “Of course you must write. But do so most cautiously for both your sakes.”

When Greer only nodded, Genny, tears welling, let the satchel containing her new identity slip from her hand and stepped forward with arms outstretched, intent on a last farewell embrace. But Greer, her face still vacant, put her back to her to again stare out the window.

Britt slammed a fist against Lady Armstrong’s cottage door. Not only had his morning porridge come with weevils
and
his abbey bed been naught but a slab of granite mounted into a stark chamber wall, but he’d had to suffer the annoyingly persistent Brother John, the hound-eyed monk determined to oversee his salvation.

Every damn time he’d turned around, there was Brother John whispering, “You must repent your sins, my lord.” Or “Killing, even in the name of the king, still breaks the Lord’s commandment.” And it mattered naught to Brother John the number of times Britt, with his teeth bared, glared, reminding the pest, “Some men deserve killing.”

He pounded on Lady Armstrong’s cottage door a second time and looked about her modest husbandland. To his left stood a stone dovecote, a pole barn and shearing shed. To the right of the cottage lay a fallow, walled kale yard tilled and ready for spring. Every farming implement and stone had its place. Someone—and he doubted it was Lady Greer—took great pride in the holding.

Next to the kale yard, in a forty-acre pasture, foraged a flock of about two hundred fat ewes alongside a shaggy cow and ox. Beyond that he could see a dozen small cot-holdings, their chimney pots already puffing wispy gray columns into the cold dawn.

A handsome holding all in all, and the likes of which he wouldn’t mind having himself.

Deciding enough time had passed for a legless man to respond to his knocking, he pressed the latch and opened the door. “Hello! Lady Armstrong, ’tis MacKinnon.”

Receiving no response, he stepped into the parlor. “What on earth…?”

The interior reeked, reminded him of the abbot’s ale house where he’d spent the better part of yesterday hiding from Brother John.

He found the culprit in the kitchen—fermenting dough, apparently left to rise and now overflowing its bowl.

Now why would a woman go to the trouble of making bread, then forget to bake it? She wouldn’t. Something had taken her from her task. She’d either fallen ill or been injured.

Within a heartbeat, he, fearing what he might find, was up the parlor ladder and peering into the sleeping loft, but the large pallet was empty, as were a line of clothes pegs.

So she’d packed.

A moment later, he jerked open the back door, scanned the yard, then headed for the stable.

But the stable stood empty, save for four scratching chickens and a large gray-and-white cat that studied him through narrowed yellow eyes.

Distinctly recalling a horse neighing when he’d ridden up two days ago and his destrier nickering in response, he looked into both stalls and crumbled the few droppings he found in his fist. “Two horses.” Neither of which had been in the barn for at least two days. So where were they?

Dusting the manure from his hands, he searched the distant pasture. Lady Armstrong would not have run off. She had no cause. Nor would she attempt to make the trip to Edinburgh alone, leastwise not with all her worldly possessions strapped to a pack horse which brigands could easily snatch. Which left only one possibility.

She—the king’s mistress—had been kidnapped.

Jaw clenched, he strode to the front of the cottage where he’d left his mount, his eyes sorting through hoof prints on the hard packed earth. Heads would roll when Alexander learned of this, and Britt’s would be the first. Unless he found her.

Genny jerked upright in her saddle and looked about in confusion, surprised to find the sun high and the crumbled ruins of Ballilock tower standing at her right. Good heavens, she’d fallen asleep in the saddle.

“Good lad, Toby, we’re almost home.” Praise God for the auld destrier’s barn sense, else God only knew where they’d have ended up.

Squinting into the sun, she picked up the reins and patted his neck. “Greer should be well on her way to Ireland by now.”

And she’d soon be home. Only five more miles and she’d pass the wee stone kirk in which she and Greer had been baptized and its surrounding collection of mottled headstones, two of which belonged to her parents. The path would then turn and she’d be able to see her cottage. Aye, just another few miles and she and Toby could head for their beds and—

“
Lady Armstrong!
”

Oh my God, ’twas MacKinnon.

Heart thudding, Genny twisted in the saddle, looking for him. Toby, ears alert, spotted him first on the tree-lined ridge above her. Hoping to appear guiltless, she waved as if happy to see him.