“Then keep the lad as heir until he isnae needed any longer,” said Kerr.
“But that would tie Annys here and I am thinking she would like to be with Sir Harcourt. I had thought, for a moment, that I would just get a dispensation from the Church and wed her myself, but I dinnae want a lass whose heart is given elsewhere. She would ne’er leave that boy, though.”
“Ye dinnae need the lad here for him to remain your heir until ye can have one of your own,” said Andrew.
Nigel looked at Andrew and slowly nodded. “Nay, I dinnae, do I. Do ye ken? As Annys’s brother, I believe it is my duty to make certain she isnae shamed.”
“Shamed?”
“Aye, used by some rogue of a Murray and left behind, her good name ground into the mud, her tender heart broken.” He smiled faintly when his companions laughed. “He should be offered the chance to do what is right and honorable for our lady. Aye, that is what a good brother would do. Kerr, go see if we still have a priest in Glencullaich and bring him to the keep.”
“Ye mean to put his back hard up against the wall, dinnae ye?” Andrew asked as soon as Kerr left.
“I do. I also think those two need someone to do just that.” He turned back toward the doorway into the keep. “Time to go and sort out the last of the tangles my brother left behind. Mayhap we will e’en be guests at a wedding.”
Chapter Twenty
“Benet isnae David’s son.”
Annys stared at Nigel. She could see no anger in him but her heart pounded with fear. If he thought she had betrayed David or was trying to falsely sit her child in the laird’s seat, Annys was certain he would be furious. Yet he just studied her and Harcourt as if he was looking for something.
She carefully sat in the chair facing the table he sat behind. Harcourt sat next to her and she could feel the tension in him. Then she decided to just tell the truth. David would have told Nigel himself if he had been able to. Annys was certain of that. So, she could do no less.
“David claimed Benet as his son before all,” she said. “The Church and the court consider him David’s son because of that claim and the fact that he was born while David and I were husband and wife. Everyone here at Glencullaich accepts him as David’s son.”
“But he isnae.”
“Nay, not by blood. David could nay sire his own child but ye kenned that.”
Nigel looked at Harcourt. “How did my brother get ye to agree to give him a child? Your child?”
“I owed David my life,” Harcourt replied. “He also told me what would be the fate of the people here if he didnae have one, people who had been naught but good to me. And, I dinnae think I tell ye anything ye havenae already guessed when I say I found it easy enough because I already coveted his wife.” He almost smiled at the deep blush that covered Annys’s soft cheeks.
“But then ye left both behind, the wife and the bairn.”
“I did. T’was what was agreed to. A mon’s honor demands he keeps a promise made. And that is what I told myself, repeatedly, for five long years. That, and that it was the right thing to do, the best thing to do, for all concerned.”
Nigel sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “David could be both cunning and convincing, nay doubt about it. And, aye, an heir might have settled things if he had been dealing with a mon who wasnae half insane with greed and envy. And one who kenned full weel that David couldnae sire a child. It didnae work and, in the end, my brother still lost his life. I suspicion he didnae realize that it was Adam who had been the cause of his maiming for David wasnae a fool and would have kenned that his plan would ne’er work then.”
Annys shook her head. “I think David suspected but then he couldnae recall if he had bedded that woman or nay. At times, I wondered if he thought it had been some punishment for his sins as he saw them.”
“My parents’ teachings,” Nigel said, his tone making it very clear he disdained such teachings, “but mayhap David found an odd sense of peace in thinking that.” He tapped a finger against a small ledger on the table in front of him. “It appears he also tried to bribe Adam and the other MacQueens to leave Glencullaich alone.”
“Oh, ye found it!” Annys glanced at Harcourt. “I forgot that Biddy had stolen it that day I followed her to her meeting with Clyde.” She looked at Nigel. “’Tis where David noted what little we could discover about you and a precise accounting of all he gave to the MacQueens.”
“It will be useful in ending their aspirations,” said Nigel. “David preferred to use bribery. I prefer to use threats. They let Adam do all the work but supplied coin and men to help him. Adam also had a wee ledger in which he noted who gave him what help and how much. I suspicion it was so he would ken how to divide up his gains when he won Glencullaich.”
“Ye actually mean to confront them over all of this?”