Highland Avenger
Page 28
“If ye can tell when a lass is fertile or nay, then why did ye keep breeding them?”
“Weel, didnae seem to trouble me much when the fire was burning, did it?”
Brian was not surprised when Sigimor started laughing again. He was torn between joining his cousin and knocking his father right out of his chair. The fact that the man could tell if a woman was fertile was not nearly as startling as the fact that he had gleefully bedded them anyway. After the first half-dozen bastard children he had, one would have thought the man would have taken more care.
Before he could give his opinion on that idiocy, a scream from up the stairs cut through the air. Brian leapt to his feet only to have his father and Harcourt yank him back down. Despite all his efforts and several minutes of wrestling in a vain attempt to break free of their hold, they held him in his seat. He knew that he would not get free unless he wanted to get into a brawl. He glared at both men. It would not be easy to knock them both down but he was in the mood to try, especially when another scream rent the air.
“I need to go up there,” he snapped. “Arianna just screamed. Twice. She screamed twice.”
“Suspicion ye would scream, too, if ye were pushing one of those out of your body,” Odo said, and then stuffed an oatcake into his mouth, shrugging when everyone stared at him.
Ewan cleared his throat. “Verra true but, mayhap, nay something one should say, young Odo. Weel, at least nay without making verra sure there are no ladies or bairns about.” Ewan nodded toward Adelar and Michel, who stared at Odo with wide eyes and worried frowns.
Adelar looked at Brian. “Anna will be fine, will she nay?”
“Aye, she will be,” Brian said, and then slouched in his chair to drink his ale, wishing he were as confident of that as he sounded.
The others worked to reassure Adelar and Michel while Brian returned to staring up at the ceiling. He had spent the last few months, from the moment winter eased enough to allow travel, making sure that the house he and Arianna would share was readied for their family and the land Claud had left his sons prepared for planting. He had done the same with the property Arianna had brought to their marriage.
He had also done a great deal of strutting about as if he had accomplished some rare and wondrous deed by putting a bairn into his wife’s belly. The larger she had grown, the more he had coddled her, and the more he had strutted. He did not feel much like strutting now. Somehow he had blissfully forgotten all the danger and pain of childbed right up until Arianna had been taken to hers.
Once Arianna no longer feared miscarrying their child, her happiness had helped to blind him to those dangers. Even when ill every morning or suffering an aching back as her belly grew rounder, she had been happy. It was not until a fortnight ago when Jolene had arrived to help with the birth—followed quickly by Arianna’s cousins, Fiona’s sister-in-law Gillyanne, and Liam’s wife, Keira—that a hint of fear occasionally shadowed her eyes. Brian knew it was not caused by the possible dangers to herself that came with childbirth or the pain, however. Arianna worried about the health of the child she carried. Nothing he had said had fully banished the fear that, even though she had carried their child to full term, she might still lose it.
All Brian could do was pray that Arianna would soon hold a living child in her arms. He would grieve if they lost the child, but his deepest fears concerned what such a loss would do to Arianna. The prayers he constantly whispered in his mind were mostly for the life of the child. He prayed for Arianna, too, but he was doing his best not to allow his thoughts to linger too long on all the dangers a woman faced when bearing a child. That way led to bone-chilling terror.
“Brian?”
He blinked and looked to find Fiona standing by his chair. “Is Arianna weel?”
“Arianna is just fine. The bairns are fine, too. Ye can go up and see her now.”
Brian was just stepping through the door when what Fiona had said finally settled into his mind. He slowly turned around to see her sitting on Ewan’s lap and grinning at him. Everyone else watched him, too, every last one of them grinning at him.
“Did ye say bairns? As in more than one?” he asked.
“Aye, I did,” she replied. “Ye have two bairns, Brian. One lass. One lad.”
His legs were suddenly too weak to hold him upright and Brian braced himself against the door. He refused to swoon like some terrified maiden in front of all these grinning fools. Two bairns. Arianna had given him twins.
“Both bairns are weel?” he asked, pleased to hear how calm he sounded.
“Aye. A goodly size, hearty cries, have all the right parts. Go and see for yourself.”
Steadying himself, Brian started to do just that. As he strode through the door, he heard Odo say, “Wheesht! She was carrying two bairns in that belly? They must have been fair crowded in there.”
That boy was going to be trouble, Brian thought as, once out of sight of the great hall, he started running. He did not slow down until he reached the door to their bedchamber. Brian paused to take a few deep breaths to calm himself down and then entered the room. Mab rose from her seat by the bed and walked over to him. He briefly hugged her when she stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.
“She is just fine, lad,” Mab said. “The lass can toss aside all her fears. She was made for this, for giving ye lots of plump, healthy bairns.”
“I heard her scream,” he whispered, his fears for Arianna not easily assuaged. “Twice.”
“Ye would scream too if ye were pushing that out of your body. Twice.”
He frowned at Mab. “Have ye been talking to Odo?”
Mab just laughed as she left, quietly shutting the door behind her. Brian moved to where his children were settled in the huge cradle his father had made. Swaddled and asleep, it was impossible to tell which was which. One had a surprisingly thick head of black hair and the other had bright red spikes of hair.
“The one with the black hair is the lass. The one with the red is the laddie.”
Brian hurried over to the bed to find Arianna smiling at him. She had obviously been thoroughly cleaned up after the birth and only looked very tired. He sat down on the edge of the bed and gently kissed her.
“Thank ye, my love,” he whispered. “Ye are weel?”
“Verra weel. And thank ye, Sir Brian. Ye have given me such a wondrous gift. Two of them.”
He cleared his throat in a vain attempt to hide the emotion choking him, and said, “Weel, I had planned on only giving ye the one.”
“We shouldnae be surprised that there are two.” She winked at him. “Ye are a true MacFingal, after all. Verra potent.”
He laughed as he settled himself on the bed beside her, one arm around her shoulders to hold her close to him. “Did ye finally decide on a name? Ye need two now.”
“She will be called Reine and he will be called Crispin, if that pleases ye.”
“I like both the names, love. Are ye certain ye are weel?”
Arianna smiled at him. This man loved her, accepted Michel and Adelar without hesitation, and had given her two beautiful bairns. She doubted he would ever fully understand just how much he meant to her, how deep and fierce her love for him was. Then again, it never hurt to keep a man guessing just a little, she thought, grinning.
“I am verra weel indeed, husband. ’Tis hard to believe any woman could be better than I at this moment. I have my bairns, my laddies with me, a home, a family, and ye to love.”
Brian held her close and rubbed his cheek against her hair and recalled the advice Sigimor had given him not long ago. “Always.”
She closed her eyes and sighed with complete satisfaction. “Always.”
Sigimor was right again, curse his eyes, Brian thought as he held his wife close and gazed at his children. Always was a very good word indeed.
ZEBRA BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyrig
ht © 2012 by Hannah Howell
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
Zebra and the Z logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.
ISBN: 978-1-4201-2793-5