by Amanda Scott
“You are right about that,” Mairi said. “We can discuss everything more comfortably after the ceremony, at supper.”
But the ceremony was brief. And, at supper, Phaeline showed little disposition to linger and Rob even less. The servants had scarcely taken away the meat platters before he made it clear that he was impatient to be alone with his bride.
His brother, who had helped himself generously to the whisky, raised a goblet to him and said, “Here’s to a good future for the two of you, Rob. I’m thinking you’ll enjoy being called ‘my lord,’ but how will ye like submitting to her ladyship’s every wish and decree, eh?”
Mairi felt her breath stop in her throat, but Rob laughed and said, “Sakes, Alex, I thought you of all people would see that I have done the wisest thing a man can do. I’ve found a wife who will control all and leave me to do as I please.”
Hugh hooted with laughter. When Alex joined him, Mairi relaxed.
Her husband stood and took her arm, and she went willingly with him to the stairs. He had exerted himself to be charming to Phaeline, who had reacted as most women seemed to react to him. So, Mairi teased him with tolerant amusement.
“She was as wax in your hands, sir,” she said as they reached the landing near her chamber. “Faith, but I fear your skill with women will cause me—”
“Hush, lass,” he said, bending swiftly to silence her with a kiss.
Releasing her a short time later to open her door, he added quietly, “Fear nowt of such matters, sweetheart. Having won you, I am yours now and for all time… and, by the Rood, you are mine.”
Inside, they wasted no time. Someone had thoughtfully left enough hot water for two, and the bed was freshly made. On the small hearth, a cheerful fire blazed, and the shutters were still ajar. A soft breeze stirred the bed curtains.
Going to the window to adjust the shutter, Mairi saw that darkness had fallen and the moon in its last quarter was rising.
Rob came up behind her and put an arm across her shoulders. “I have missed your conversation, sweetheart.”
She hid a smile. “Do you want to talk, sir?”
“Nay, my bonnie vixen, I do not,” he answered with a chuckle. “I have missed other things even more. This, for example,” he added as he slipped a hand behind her neck, raised the silky hair there, and placed a warm kiss on her nape.
A thrill shot through her to her toes, and she turned to him eagerly, her fingers reaching for her bodice lacing.
His hand gently caught hers. “I want to do that,” he said. “’Tis my right on this night of nights to see what I have won. Put your hands behind your back and leave your undressing to me.”
With an involuntary gasp, she obeyed.
Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoyed Seduced by a Rogue. The bones of this story come from an unpublished sixteenth-century manuscript about a fourteenth-century incident in Galloway and Dumfriesshire. A sixteenth-century Lady Maxwell wrote it about her husband’s Maxwell ancestors. So her version was a trifle biased.
It left out pertinent details such as what the exact conflict was between Alexander Maxwell and Lord Dunwythie that resulted in Alex’s trying to take the Dunwythies’ land. However, research and help from many folks here and in Scotland resulted in discovery of the odd differences in how the three dales composing Dumfriesshire were administered then. When I discovered that the office of Sheriff of Dumfries was hereditary and belonged to the Maxwells, the rest fell fairly logically into place. However, for the sake of this story, I took liberties with the timeline and some of the details.
The names of the following characters were real: Mairi, Robert, Alexander, Phaeline, Thomas Dunwythie (now Dinwiddie, Dunwoodie, etc.), and Fiona. Also, Archie the Grim and John, Lord Maxwell. The others are fictitious, and much about the main characters is the product of the author’s imagination.
The Scottish office of sheriff in the fourteenth century was not only hereditary but included vast powers. However, to avoid complicating things, it is also one with which I took great license. The actual hereditary sheriff then would have been John, Lord Maxwell of Caerlaverock. Hereditary sheriffs nearly always left everything to their sheriff-substitutes or sheriff-deputes (think deputy, today). We know Alexander Maxwell was not a lord but clearly wielded great power, so he was likely the sheriff-substitute for Lord Maxwell. To simplify things, I just let Alex be the sheriff.
Descriptions of problems regarding taxes and the administration of the dales are true, as well. Annandale was a stewartry, Nithsdale a sheriffdom, and Eskdale was a regality. That just meant the barons there paid their taxes directly to the King.
Those of you who have visited Galloway and seen its barren hills may wonder about the forestlands with which I endowed Borgue and much of the landscape west of Kirkcudbright. I refer you to the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland, p. 423: “In early times [the area] appears to have been covered with woods, and at a comparatively recent period it had several extensive forests.”
Details of geography, towns, and dales come from many sources but primarily from Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland, edited by Francis H. Groome (Scotland, 1892).
My primary sources for Douglas history include A History of the House of Douglas, Vol. I, by the Right Hon. Sir Herbert Maxwell (London, 1902), and The Black Douglases by Michael Brown (Scotland, 1998).
I must thank, first and yet again, the one and only Donald MacRae, who introduced me to this story by asking me if I’d be interested in a tale about a woman who nearly started a clan war. Little did he know it would result in three books. I hope he enjoys it and doesn’t think I tampered too much with the facts.
If I explain that the real Robert Maxwell supposedly kept the real Mairi Dunwythie locked up in one room for two years without anyone else in the area ever suspecting she was there, you will perhaps understand why I changed a few details of Lady Maxwell’s account.
The truly odd discovery was that the Maxwell-Dinwiddie (or Dunwythie) connection occurred twice, the second time in the sixteenth century with Lady Jane Dinwiddie marrying another Robert Maxwell. That time, however, the title did change to Maxwell-Dinwiddie—after Lady Jane’s death.
As always, I’d like to thank my wonderful agents, Lucy Childs and Aaron Priest, my terrific editor Frances Jalet-Miller, master copyeditor Sean Devlin, Production Manager Anna Maria Piluso, Art Director Diane Luger, Senior Editor and Editorial Director Amy Pierpont, Vice President and Editor in Chief Beth de Guzman, and everyone else at Hachette Book Group’s Grand Central Publishing who contributed to making this book what it is.
If you enjoyed Seduced by a Rogue, please look for the third book in the trilogy, Tempted by a Warrior, at your favorite bookstore in July 2010.
In the meantime, Suas Alba!
Sincerely,
http://home.att.net/~amandascott
Don’t miss Amanda Scott’s next captivating Scottish romance!
Please turn this page for a preview of her next novel,
Tempted by Warrior
Available in mass market July 2010.
Chapter 1
Applegarth, Annandale, Scotland, 1377
The traveler approaching the open kitchen doorway along the path that ran behind Spedlins Tower paused at hearing a soft feminine voice inside:
“‘I expect I should be spinning, too, aye,’ the maiden said sadly. ‘But it would be to nae purpose. I could never finish so great a task in time.’”
The traveler took a step closer as the voice went on, creaking now with age, “‘Och, but I could spin it all for ye, aye,’ the old woman said.”
“Gey good o’ the auld crone!” cried several childish voices, as if they had many times heard the story and exclaimed always at the same place.
The traveler smiled, recognizing the tale from his own childhood. He moved nearer, trying to muffle the sounds his feet made on the loose pebbles of the path.
He saw the speaker then, seated on the stone floor of the scullery with her back to the doorway. Five small, fascina
ted children were gathered around her.
Beyond, in the darker kitchen proper, he discerned bustling movement and heard sounds indicating preparation of the midday meal.
The storyteller went on in her own soft, clear voice, “So the maiden ran to fetch her lint and put it in her new friend’s hand. Then she asked the old woman for her name and where she should call for the spun yarn that evening.”
One of the children, a lad of five or six, looked right at the traveler.
The tall, powerful-looking stranger put a finger to his lips.
Although the boy obediently kept silent, he continued to stare.
The storyteller continued, “But the maiden received no reply, for the old woman had vanished from where she stood. The lass looked long for her, and at last became so tired that she lay down to rest.”
Three of the children eyed him now as a fourth, a lassie, piped up, “Aye, and when she awoke, it was gey dark!”
“So it was,” the storyteller said. “The evening star was shining down, and as the maiden watched the moonrise, she was startled by an uncouth voice from—”
“Who is he?” the same lassie demanded, pointing at the traveler.
The storyteller, turning, saw him and scrambled awkwardly to her feet, saying as she did, “Sakes, where did you spring from?”
He noted first that she was black-haired, blue-eyed, and beautiful—and then, with unexpected disappointment, that she was heavy with child.
“Forgive me for interrupting you, mistress,” he said. “They told me at the stable that I should come this way as it was quicker and none would mind. But if you will bid someone take me to Old Jardine, I will leave you to finish your tale.”
“Nay, this is a good place to stop,” she said, frowning and putting a hand to the short veil she wore over her long, thick plaits as if to be sure it was in place. “I can finish the story later.”
To the instant chorus of indignant protests, she said firmly, “Nay, then, you must all go now to Cook and ask how you can help him. As for you,” she added, turning her lovely blue eyes on the traveler again as the children obeyed her, “someone should have told you that Jardine of Applegarth sees no one these days.”
“He will see me,” the traveler said confidently.
“Mercy, why should he? Have you no respect for a dying man?”
“I doubt that that ill-willed old man is really dying. But he will see me because he sent for me. I am his heir.”
Instead of the hasty apology he had every right to expect from a maidservant who had spoken so rudely to him, she grimaced and said scornfully, “You must have taken that notion from a tale of the same sort I’ve just been telling the bairns.”
His temper stirring, he said, “Mind your tongue, lass, lest—”
“Why should I? Do you dislike being proven a liar?” she demanded. “For so you are if you claim to be the heir to Applegarth.”
Doubt stirred. No servant of Old Jardine’s would dare speak to him so impertinently. Despite their kinship, he barely knew Jardine. But if even half of what he had heard about the contentious old scoundrel was true, Jardine’s servants would tread lightly and with great care.
“Who are you, lass?” he asked.
She gently touched her belly. “I am his heir’s mother, or mayhap his heir’s wife. Whichever it is, I can tell you truthfully that you are not his heir.”
Stunned, he realized in much the same moment that the fact of Old Jardine’s lie did not surprise him. In fact, he had expected a lie. He had just expected to learn that the old man was not dying. Suppressing the fury that had leaped at her words and attitude, he said, “I expect, then, that you must be Will Jardine’s lady.”
“Aye, of course, I am,” she said. “Who are you?”
“Kirkhill,” he said.
She frowned. “Should I know you? Is that all anyone calls you?”
“People call me several things, depending on who they are. Some call me Seyton of Kirkhill. As I am Will’s cousin, you and I are clearly kin by marriage, so you may call me Richard if you like, or Dickon.”
“I’ll call you Kirkhill. I warrant it must be Lord Kirkhill, though.”
“More to the purpose, my mother is that old scoundrel’s sister,” he said.
“Sakes, I did not know he had a sister!”
“I think she’d liefer not be one,” he said with a slight smile. “But he did send word to us that he was dying and bade me hurry to Spedlins Tower.”
“Then I expect I should go and tell him you are here and see if he will receive you,” she said with a sigh.
“Nay, my lady. I did not come here to kick my heels whilst my uncle takes his time to decide whether he truly wants to see me. You will take me to him. First, though, I want to hear what happened to Will.”
“So would we all,” she said with a grimace.
“Sakes, do you not know? Jardine’s messenger told me that my uncle was on his deathbed and that I was to be his heir, so I assumed Will must be dead. But as you’ve said you might be either the heir’s wife or its mother…” He paused.
“Aye,” she said, touching her belly again. “In troth, I do not know which. See you, Will was here and then he was not. He’s been gone for over a fortnight.”
“I hope you will pardon me if I ask if you and he were actually married. I am sure that no one told my mother of any such occasion.”
“Aye, sure, we were,” she said with an angry flash in her eyes. “If my good-father did not tell his sister, I am sure that is not my fault.”
“Nay, it would not be,” he agreed.
Looking away, she added, “My good-father has clearly called you here for no reason, sir. Doubtless, you would do better just to turn around and go back to wherever you came from.”
“Do I look like the sort of man who would do that?” he asked gently.
She met his gaze again. This time he detected wariness in her eyes.
Seventeen-year-old Lady Fiona Jardine did not at all think that the man facing her was one who would cheerfully go away just because she had suggested that course. In truth, she was not sure what to make of him.
He was taller than she was by nearly a head, and looked as if he might be twice as broad across the shoulders. He did not look much like the dark Jardines. His hair was the color of dark honey and curly, and his face revealed dark stubble, revealing that no one had shaven him for a day or two. But he moved with athletic grace, spoke well, and seemed very sure of himself. She envied him that confidence, remembering a time when she had enjoyed similar self-assurance.
But was she actually married? What a question to ask one! A true gentleman would never challenge a lady so. At least, she did not think one would, but the truth was that she had not met many gentlemen.
The only ones that came quickly to mind were her deceased father, her sister’s husband, Robert Maxwell, and her cousin Jenny’s husband, Sir Hugh Douglas. She scarcely knew the latter two, though, and she certainly did not count her cantankerous good-father as a gentleman. Nor would she count her husband so if Will was still among the living.
But gentleman or not, Kirkhill did not look like a patient man. And, if he was kin to Old Jardine and to Will, she would be wise to do as he told her.
“Come this way, my lord,” she said quietly, and turned toward the kitchen.
They passed through that vaulted chamber and up the winding stairs to the hall, crossing it to the inner chamber behind the dais.
She paused then, glancing at her unwanted companion. “His chamber is no pleasant place,” she told him. “And my good-father will be in no good humor.”
“I’ll bear up,” he said, leaning past her to open the door and gesturing for her to precede him inside.
Grimacing, she did. The odors of Jardine’s sickness were strong, and she wanted the business over quickly. Her companion, however, showed no sign of minding the noisome atmosphere.
The fat old man was awake, propped on pillows, glowering at her through his pi
ggy eyes. His personal servant hovered over him, holding a cup in his hand.
Old Jardine waved him away. “What d’ye want, lass? I ha’ told ye afore that ye must rap on the door and wait till ye’re admitted.”
“That was my doing, Uncle,” Kirkhill said, urging her farther into the room with a touch of his hand.
“Richard! ’Tis yourself, then? Ye’ve come? By, but I’d scarcely know ye!”
“I warrant I was no more than seven when last we met, for I’ve not been next or nigh this place since then. And apparently I’ve come on a fool’s errand now.”
“’Tis no foolish thing to answer the cry of a dying man,” Jardine muttered, his voice suddenly much weaker.
Fiona nearly rolled her eyes. She did not believe he was any weaker than he had been a moment before. Evidently Kirkhill agreed with her, because his voice took on an edge as he said, “But why did you declare yourself dying and me your heir? I expect the first part may be true, but the second is plainly false.”
“D’ye think so? Only God kens the answer to that.”
Fiona gritted her teeth. She would have liked to remove herself from the old man’s presence, but curiosity bade her stay as long as they allowed it.
Kirkhill said, “Your good-daughter is obviously with child, Uncle. And she assures me that Will and she are married.”
“Aye, ’tis true he did marry her, the young fool.”
“From your message, I thought he must be dead,” Kirkhill went on with a new note in his voice, a harder one, that made Fiona look quickly at him to try to judge what manner of man he might be.
Not that she counted herself a good judge of men, for she knew she was not. But she had learned to recognize certain important things about them. So she studied him carefully as he continued to gaze sternly at his uncle.
Old Jardine continued to look at him, too, as if he were also sizing him up.
When the old man’s silence made it clear that he had forgotten the question or did not choose to reply, Kirkhill added softly, “Is Will dead, Uncle?”