dry oats, dug Tav’s grave one-handed wi’ a broken sword, faced down the king and near lost my head to the bargain. All that, after herdin’ a hoard of lowland pikers through the bloodiest battle of the century. ’Tis not bed sport on my mind this night; so dinna worry on it.”
She shook her head and wrung her hands. “I must tell you, I am enceinte,” she blurted.
Alan frowned. Enceinte? Enchanting? In sin? What?
“Verra well, then,” he said agreeably, hoping she would elaborate so he wouldn’t need to admit to further ignorance.
She looked vastly relieved. “God bless you for your understanding, sir. This babe is all I have left of Tavish.”
“Babe?” The news hit him harder than Bruce’s fist had done earlier. “God’s truth, ye carry Tav’s bairn?”
Alan had not grasped until that moment how the thought of bedding her had wormed its way into his mind. He had not intended to do it this night because of the reasons he had just given her, but he certainly meant to do it soon. Guilt washed over him like a cold wave. Taking Tavish’s woman to bed ought not have occurred to him at all. Even with Tav’s blessing—and king’s orders—it seemed devilish wrong even to consider it, let alone do it.
“You will wait until after the birth?” Her fingers worried her lips as though she were frightened he would change his mind.
“Aye, of course I’ll wait,” he said gently, nodding, even as the import of his promise sank in. He had been celibate for nigh on a year, since just before he had joined Bruce’s army. Now he must needs delay until Lady Honor delivered of her child and recovered from the birth.
Easing himself with another woman after wedding Honor would be unthinkable. Even were she not breeding, Alan wondered if he could really allow himself to bed his best friend’s widow. But he would have to bed somebody. Eventually.
Ah well, his own discomfort was not the lass’s fault, and she looked nigh to collapsing from fretting over it. He smiled and reached for her hands. When she allowed him to clasp them, he squeezed her fingers with gentle reassurance. “Ease yer mind, my lady. We’ll share yer chamber for the looks of the thing, but ye need no’ worry I’ll risk Tav’s heir. ’Tis precious to me, too.”
A single tear broke over her lashes and trailed down one cheek. With a callused thumb, he brushed it away. “There now, dinna greet. Come, let’s go and give yer wee’un a foster da, eh?”
Honor sniffed and nodded. “We will need protection.”
“Just so,” he agreed as he placed one of her hands on his mailed arm and led her to the hall.
Three women surrounded her as they entered, the skinny one gabbling excitedly in French and shooting him wary looks. He kept an eye on Lady Honor as they led her away from him, noting the quiet reserve in her manner now that she had accepted her lot.
A pang of longing pierced him like a crossbow quarrel. What must it be like to win the heart of a woman like herself? Fairer than dawn, she was, so cool and clean, and sweetness itself until she thought something threatened her babe.
He blamed her in no way for her recent defiance. She did not know him at all, and had only sought to protect the child. Honorable as her name, she was. So brave, for a lass.
Tavish had known and appreciated her well. He had loved her dearly despite their short acquaintance and brief union. Two months of heaven, Alan did not doubt. Tav had declared as much, more than once. How proud he would have been of his wife’s courage, and to know of the coming child.
Alan knew Honor had led a sheltered life until now; born and reared in her mother’s castle in Loire Valley in France, a frequent visitor to the court. No doubt shamelessly indulged by her father, a Scots baron embroiled in the tangle of French politics. Coming to Scotland with naught but her women and one lone priest must have been a shock for one born into cultured splendor.
She had weathered it well, Tav said. The hall Alan stood in shone as proof of that. She had made this keep a home, a comfortable refuge and delight to the eyes. Tavish often had boasted of it and rightly so.
Now, newly widowed and pregnant, hardly more than a child herself, wee Honor risked the wrath of a rough warrior husband by denying Alan his marital rights even before they said the vows. All to protect Tav’s bairn. Her loyalty and courage stirred something inside Alan that pushed aside his dread of a loveless union. It would not be completely loveless, after all, if he loved her. For all he knew of the woman now, he believed what he felt might be more akin to worship.
“Ah, Tav, I see now. I ken why ye sent me here. She’ll be needing a strong arm and I’ll try to do ye proud,” Alan whispered. “Lady Honor has, and so shall yer son. I’ll see to it.”
Chapter Three
Honor only half listened as her women exclaimed over the news of Tavish’s death and this eve’s rushed nuptials. She barely noticed their comments on the hard-muscled warrior who stood alone in the midst of the hall. She just watched him.
He waited at his ease, as though he had nothing better to do. She supposed he did not. He just stood there, weight resting on one foot, arms crossed, and green eyes lively as they surveyed the gathering of castle folk.
“You should send him away, madame,” said Nanette, her trusted maid. The woman spoke in French so the others would not understand. “Even smiling, that one looks fiercer than your lord father ever did on his worst of days. You mark me well, he means you no good! No good at all. How can you marry such as he, especially now?”
Nanette’s dainty hands fluttered like crazed butterflies when she got excited and this Scottish knight certainly provided excitement if nothing else.
Honor ignored Nan then and stole another long look at Sir Alan. In a strange way, he appealed to her senses. However, handsome did not exactly describe him if one judged by court standards. No doubt many women swooned over him with a combination of terror and wild fantasy. Or simple lust. Not sensible women, of course. Not her.
His hair, a wild dark chestnut and probably combed with his fingers, escaped bit by bit from its tenuous tethering at his nape. A soft waving strand drifted over his high, wide brow and just missed covering one dark-lashed eye. Thick brows, a darker auburn than his hair, rose and fell, changing his expression from curiosity to satisfaction when Father Dennis approached him, Book of Prayers in hand. She liked the fact that he did not make the least attempt to conceal his feelings.
The knight’s full, mobile lips broke into an amazingly open smile, revealing two rows of even, unspotted teeth. He had good strong teeth, Honor noted, exasperated with herself for giving attention to that. One did not judge men as one did horses, after all. If so, Tavish might have been a fine, sleek Arabian, while this fellow looked a hell-inbattle destrier. But the teeth were fine, nonetheless.
Why had God seen fit to take her gentle Tavish and leave this warlike specimen to live? She could not help but question, though she knew it impious. Well, piety had gotten her nowhere.
Nanette pulled on her arm. “Listen to me! This man will be your undoing, madame. He will! Send him away and forget this nonsense.”
Honor tore her gaze from the knight and settled
