Elizabeth MacKay gave Moire Rose an arch look. "The bairn will be born soon," she said with certainty.
***
Nairn did not come to bed that night, and Fiona slept badly. In the morning, however, she was up, dressed in a loose-fitting dark green gown, and in the hall to supervise the servants seeing to the early meal. Oat porridge, fresh bread, two hams, several bowls of hard-boiled eggs, stone crocks of butter, and a new wheel of hard, sharp cheese were set out, along with pitchers of foaming brown ale. The chieftains, most bleary-eyed, were nonetheless awake, and had attended to their personal needs. They sat down at the trestles, eating hungrily as if they had not eaten in a month, swiftly emptying the pitchers of ale.
Then, one by one, they began to take their leave of Nairns Craig. Fiona stood with her husband at the entry to the hall, bidding each man a polite farewell. She knew each man's name and spoke it as he came abreast of her. The chieftains were pleased by her womanly manners, and many complimented Nairn on his good fortune in his wife. When they had all departed but for The MacDonald and his relations, Fiona returned to the hall again to make certain the trestles were cleared off and set to one side of the room. Then the morning meal for the rest of her guests was brought out.
The Lord of the Isles, who had been in the hall earlier to bid his vassals and allies farewell, was already seated at the high board with his sister and his brother-in-law, The MacKay. "Yer wife is a great asset to us, Nairn," he said. "She spoke well, and with much common sense last night. Many commented upon it. I am verra pleased with ye, my bonnie," he told Fiona, a smile lighting his whole face.
"I don't wish to raise my children amid the din of constant war, my lord," Fiona told him. "No woman does, be she of high or low station. 'Tis ye men who cry war and then send our sons into battle. I but sought to keep the peace for as long a time as possible."
"But if our autonomy is threatened, we must defend ourselves," the Lord of the Isles said sternly.
"All James Stewart asks of ye is loyalty," Fiona said. "He has a mighty task to bring Scotland under control. He wants the towns to become great commercial centers like the English have because that is what makes them prosperous, but how can the towns grow when the clans are always burning them in retaliation for one thing or another? If he knows ye will keep the peace here in the north and west, then ye will undoubtedly be left in peace. Why does a man like Alexander MacDonald, Lord of the Isles, a man known for his honor, find it so difficult to swear fealty? If ye were but one man, it would not be so hard, but ye are the key to peace in these highlands. Without yer support most of the others will not swear, and they remain a thorn in the king's side. Eventually he must pluck that thorn or be called craven and weak-willed, as his father was. He will not allow his own honor to be compromised thusly, my lord."
"Let us see if the king calls us all to Inverness," the Lord of the Isles said. "I don't have to make a decision before then, do I?"
Fiona shook her head in despair. How could she tell this great and powerful chieftain that he was making a terrible mistake? By not swearing to James Stewart now, he was but antagonizing the king. James Stewart had a long memory and a single goal: to unite Scotland. He would do whatever he had to to attain that goal, as Fiona well knew. Suddenly a sharp pain caused her to stagger, and a pool of water puddled around her feet. Shocked, she looked down at it.
Her attention engaged, Elizabeth MacKay's eyes went to where Fiona's were. She saw the water and, standing up, announced, "I knew it! The bairn is to be born this day. Did I not say it last night? Did I not say the bairn would come soon? Well, don't stand there, ye great fools! Fiona must be taken to her chamber, and the birthing table brought. Hurry now!"
Chapter 12
Colin MacDonald almost knocked his brother over as he rushed to reach his wife. "Do ye have pain, sweeting?" he asked her, picking her up and walking quickly across the hall to the staircase leading to their chambers. "Ah, Fiona mine, I canna bear to see ye hurting."
"Then ye should not have gotten a bairn upon me, Nairn," she said with a small attempt at humor. She winced. "Ohhhhh!"
The castle servants had been galvanized into action. A serving wench had dashed ahead of Nairn to alert Nelly. Another ran off to find the birthing table.
Elizabeth McKay turned before going up the stairs, saying to her husband and brother, "Keep Colin's spirits up as best ye can when he returns to the hall. And that does not mean getting him drunk, my laddies. Ye’ll both answer to me if ye do!" Then she was gone.
"She did not say we could not get drunk," the Lord of the Isles said to his brother-in-law. "Is it too early for ye?"
" 'Tis never too early, Alex," came the reply, "but I suspect she'd be verra angry with us. She has a fierce temper, yer sister, my wife. I retain a potter in the keep to replace all the crockery she throws at me and anyone else who runs afoul of her ire."
Alexander MacDonald laughed aloud at this revelation.
In her chamber Fiona struggled to bring forth the life she had been nurturing within her womb. At first she would not cry out when the pains wracked her greatly, but Elizabeth encouraged her, saying, "A woman is expected to shout aloud when her babe is being born, Fiona. Don't hold back!"
"My mother never shouted," Fiona said through gritted teeth. "I was the eldest, and I never heard her shout when my five sisters were born alive and ray wee brothers were born dead. My father did all the shouting, screaming at her to give him his son each time, cursing her when the lassies came into the world alive and the laddies were birthed dead and cold as stone."
"Yer not yer mother. My brother cares not a whit if it is a son or a daughter, do ye, Nairn? We want a healthy baby, lass. That is all. Now, cry out with yer pain, and help the bairn to come."
She was rewarded when Fiona shrieked and cried out, "I am being torn apart, lady!"
"Nay, nay, lassie, 'tis an easy birth yer having. Another wee push, and I will see the bairn's head," Elizabeth MacKay promised. "When the next pain comes, bear down with all yer might."
"It's coming!" Fiona shouted, letting out a shrill cry.
"Oh, verra good, dearie, verra good," Elizabeth MacKay praised her sister-in-law.
Colin MacDonald was visibly white as he let Fiona clutch his hand until he thought she would render it bloodless. Seeing his condition, Fiona said, "Get out, Nairn! I don't want ye swooning on the floor. There is no time to attend to ye if this child is to be born. Oh! Oh! Oh!" she gasped.
"I'll not leave ye, sweeting, nor will I swoon like a maiden," he promised her, although he wasn't certain he could keep the latter promise. Seeing her in such obvious pain, realizing he was the cause of it, was almost more than he could bear. He swallowed hard.
"I have no more time for ye, Colly," Fiona told him. "Blessed Mother! Ahhhhhhhhhhh! Lady, what is happening?"
"One, perhaps two more pushes, Fiona, and yer bairn is born," Elizabeth MacKay said. "The head and shoulders are already out." She opened the baby's mouth and yanked out a clot of mucus. The child coughed slightly and began to cry.
"Is it a lad?" Fiona asked her.
"That's the part usually born last," Elizabeth MacKay laughed. "Ye’ll have to give me another push if we're to know. It's got black hair like yers, though."
Another fierce pain wracked Fiona, and she pushed with what she thought was her absolute last bit of strength. Suddenly she no longer felt as if she were being torn asunder. Indeed, she could actually feel something sliding out of her body. Then the child was howling in earnest.
" 'Tis a wee laddie, though not so wee," Elizabeth MacKay said with a wide smile. "Well, Nairn, ye have a son." She held the bloody infant up for her brother to see. "Take yer knife, Colin, and cut the cord as I tell ye," Elizabeth MacKay said, laying the squalling child upon its mother's belly as she directed her brother, then knotted the remaining cord expertly. She handed the baby to Nelly. "Clean him up lassie, and wrap him well so he may go into the hall with his da to meet his overlord and his uncles."
Tears of joy pouring down her face, Nelly cleansed the birthing blood from the baby boy. How very much like Angus Gordon he looked, but Colin MacDonald would not realize it, for he had not known the laird particularly well. He would assume the dark hair was an inheritance from Fiona, and no one ever could really decide who babies looked like Nelly swaddled the baby in fresh soft cloth. Then, without waiting for further instructions, she placed him in Fiona's arms.
Looking into the face so like Angus Gordon's, Fiona felt her heart break again. His father's son, but he was unlikely ever to know his real father. Kissing the damp, downy dark head, she handed the baby to Colin. "Here is yer son, my lord," she said quietly. "I hope he pleases ye."
Colin MacDonald accepted the tiny bundle she offered him. He was delighted, and amazed at how sturdy his laddie was. Blue eyes looked up at him. He felt as if he were being scrutinized carefully, and hoped he would not be found wanting. "Welcome to Nairns Craig, Alastair James MacDonald," he said. Looking down at Fiona, he smiled "Thank ye, Fiona mine. Yer a fine breeder." Turning, he left his wife's chamber with the baby.
Alexander MacDonald watched his brother cross the hall cradling the swaddled bundle. From the grin on Colin's face he knew without asking that the child was a lad. "Congratulations, brother!" he exclaimed, and peering down at the infant he said, "The babe looks strong. He'll survive."
"Let me see him! Let me see my grandson!" Moire Rose pushed past the Lord of the Isles and The MacKay. "Give him to me, Colin." When her son had placed the baby in her outstretched arms, an almost beatific smile lit Moire Rose's face. "Ah, he's a braw laddie," she crooned down at the child. "A verra braw laddie, he is!"
"They say ye would not look upon me when I was born," Colin said, struggling to keep the bitterness from his voice.
His mother gazed directly at him. "I looked at ye," she told him. "When they were not there watching me, I looked at ye. I saw yer father in yer face, Colin MacDonald. For all my red hair and blue eyes ye were a MacDonald. I hated him then, for he had deserted me. But I loved him, too. Ye were a reminder of what I had lost. I believe this bairn looks like my father," she said, "and he is my grandson." She handed the baby back to him.
"He is also a MacDonald and my son," he said to his mother.
"Aye," she answered softly, "but he is not my MacDonald." Then she left the hall without another word.
"I have never seen her like this," Nairn said. "It's as if she has become a different woman. I don't understand it at all."
He took his son back to Fiona, telling her of what had transpired in the hall with his mother.
Strangely Fiona understood, for in an odd way she was in a similar position to Moire Rose all those long years ago. "Perhaps the bairn has brought out the good in yer mother, Colly," she told him. "Don't question it; just accept it. She is an old woman now."
***
The Lord of the Isles and the MacKays had decided to remain at Nairns Craig in hopes that Father Ninian would arrive. Nairn sent Roderick Dhu in search of the priest so the baby might be baptized immediately, since his godparents were there. When Alastair MacDonald was three days old, Roderick Dhu returned with the tall, ageless cleric in tow. The baby was baptized in the hall of Nairns Craig, sanctified for the occasion. The Lord of the Isles and Elizabeth MacKay stood as his godparents. Fiona was brought into the hall upon a litter so she might partake in her son's christening.
The day after the baptism, when the guests had departed, Father Ninian said, "I will hear confessions of any who would come to me."
As priests were few and far between in remote sections of Scotland, the priest knew he would stay for a week to ten days hearing confessions, marrying, and baptizing, as well as praying over the graves of those who had died since his last visit. Each morning he held a mass in the hall, and it was well attended by the inhabitants of the castle.
When Fiona went to make her confession to him, she passed along the information to Father Ninian that she wanted him to have, telling him in careful detail of the talked-of plot to kill the king. "They will not do it, of course, for both are cowards, but the king should be warned nonetheless, I believe."
The priest nodded. "Aye, lady, I agree."
"In the autumn," Fiona said, "the year will be up that the king asked of me. I want to know when I may take my leave of Nairns Craig and return to my own home. If I don't leave then, Nairn will badger me into speaking my vows with him before ye, Father, and ye know I canna wed him. Tell the king I have learned all I can here. And ask why has he not called a gathering of the clans in Inverness so these highlanders may swear loyalty to him and be done with it."
“I will come myself in the autumn before the term of the handfast is up so I may carry the king's answer to ye, lady, and help ye to extricate yerself from this benign captivity. But will Nairn let the bairn go?"
"When I tell him the truth, he will have no choice," Fiona said with assurance. "He is every bit as proud as Black Angus."
"I understand," the priest replied, his amber eyes sympathetic.
Fiona insisted upon nursing her son, for she treasured the minutes spent with the baby at her breast suckling strongly. And the infant grew quickly, his small limbs rounding and fattening, his cheeks smooth and rosy. His bright eyes missed nothing. His little dark head swiveled at the sound of his mother's voice and Nairn's. They had to get away soon, Fiona thought, for Nairn was positively mad for the child he believed was his son. Fiona felt truly guilty-and angrier than ever before at the king.
What was worse, the baby loved Nairn, who could bring an infantile giggle from the child when no one else could. "Ah, there's my laddie," he would croon upon spying the baby cooing in his cradle each morning. "There's his da's little mankin."
And if Nairn loved Alastair, Moire Rose was even worse, pouring all the love she had denied her son out upon her grandson. She would sit in the hall for hours on end rocking the infant's cradle and singing him lullabies in her high, reedy voice.
Alastair James MacDonald was the darling of the household. No servant passed without stopping a moment to speak a word, smile a smile, chuck his chin. And the child responded to it all.
"He's going to be verra spoiled," Fiona said ominously.
The baby had been born on June first. In mid-September the priest appeared once more at Nairns Craig. "I've come to see how the bairn is doing," he told Nairn. "I'll soon be going south, for winter in the highlands is hard for a man on the road."
"Would ye think of sheltering here for those months?" Colin asked him. "God knows we have use for ye. I'd build ye a church of yer own if ye would but remain, Father Ninian. 'Twould not be a rich living, but ye'd have plenty to eat and plenty of souls to save, I guarantee ye. Ye could go traveling in the summer months as ye do now, but ye'd have a home to come back to in the cold times."
" 'Tis a generous offer, my lord," the priest said, "but how could I accept ye when I have refused the lord himself a half a dozen times? 'Tis better I return to my abbey as I am accustomed to doing, but I thank ye."
Nairn shook his head ruefully. "I want a priest for the castle," he said. "Now that we have begun a family, Fiona and me, I would be more civilized. There was once a priest at Nairns Craig, but he was as old as my grandsire and died several years before him."
"I will inquire of my abbot for ye, my lord," Father Ninian said. Then he smiled. "Tell yer steward to send out the word that I am here for marriages, baptisms, and my other usual duties. I will hear the confessions of the castle folk, for my penances must last ye all until I come again in the springtime," he finished with a chuckle.
Fiona could barely wait to speak privately with the priest, but as was her custom she made certain that everyone else in the castle saw him first. Only in the evening of the second day he was with them was it her turn to closet herself with Father Ninian in the tiny room off the hall that was set aside for his privacy. She knelt before him, hurrying through a list of minor sins, asking him to shrive her.
Before h
e did, however, he spoke to her in low tones. "Ye will want to know, my daughter, of the king's answer to yer questions of several months ago. He sends word that he needs ye to remain here at Nairns Craig for the present. He says he is pleased by the information ye have sent him, for it has been invaluable in helping him to decide just how to deal with the Lord of the Isles and the highlands. The Campbells have sworn their fealty to James Stewart, not waiting for a gathering of the clans at Inverness but going to Perth in midsummer. The final thing I am to impart to ye is that the queen's cousin, Elizabeth Williams, has married a gentleman of her royal guardians' choosing, and is already with child. The king wanted ye to know this. Now, my daughter, I will administer yer penance." He placed his hands upon her head.
Fiona, however, felt nothing. It was as if the blood in her veins had frozen solid. She was numb with shock. Deep within her heart and soul she had dared to hope that Angus Gordon would not marry Elizabeth Williams. That one day, perhaps, they might meet once more and together begin anew. It had been, she knew even as she thought it, a childish dream, but still, she had hoped. Now her silly, secret little wish was naught but cold ashes. Angus had not died from pining away for her. She had disappeared from his heart as surely as she had disappeared on the road to Brae. The laird of Loch Brae had done his royal master's bidding and wed the English girl. He had even gotten a child upon her. That child would be the heir to Brae, not her son, Alastair, who would now never know his real father.
Fiona felt close to weeping, but she stiffened her spine instead. She mutely accepted the mild penance that Father Ninian gave her, but her outward appearance of meekness belied the anger that was boiling inside her. Had there ever been a man in her life who had not betrayed her? Her father had little use for her, and had used her as a servant to raise her sisters. The king had used her, threatening her sisters, taking Angus Gordon away from her in order that she do his bidding. And Angus! Her beloved Black Angus! His was the greatest betrayal of all. Why had he not sought after her when he returned from York? Why indeed! He had obviously been too busy dancing attendance upon Elizabeth Williams, toadying to the king and queen. No man shall ever use me again, she thought to herself. No man! Then she arose from her knees, leaving the priest.
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