The Love Slave (5 page)

Regan sighed, and bent down to pick up a small flat stone, skimming it expertly across the ruffled surface of the water. She walked slowly along the shoreline, contemplating her future. She had never been more than a mile or two from Ben MacDui in her entire life, yet the place to which she was to be sent was across the width of her homeland, Alba, on the farthest coast of Strathclyde. She would never see Ben MacDui or her twin again. Tears flooded her eyes. Despite the difference in their stations, Gruoch had always been loving to her. As for the others, none but Sorcha could tell the twins apart, and so everyone had been pleasant to her, never certain who was Gruoch, the heiress, and who was Regan, the unimportant child. Now she would have nothing but her fragile memories. Yet was there really a great deal more to life? Would she ever know if there was?

A drop of rain fell upon her cheek. Looking up, Regan saw
the spring storm clouds gathering beyond the hills about the loch. She hurried back to the house to find Gruoch sitting by the fire. “Hae ye sent for the MacFhearghuis yet?” Regan asked her twin. “He will want to know of Malcolm’s birth and our mam’s condition.”

“Nay, I hae sent no one,” Gruoch replied. “I hae been sitting here thinking how odd it will be to nae hae our mother wi’ me. I shall be alone when yer gone, Regan mine. I cannot bear to think on it.”

“You will hae a husband and children to fill yer days, Gruoch,” Regan answered her. “I am the one who will hae nothing. I dinna think I particularly like the sound of this convent, but then what other choice do we hae than accept the fates decided at our birth by the MacFhearghuis? We will be warm, and dry, and fed, but is that enough, I wonder?”

“There is love,” Gruoch said softly.

“I dinna know what love is,” Regan admitted. “No one hae ever loved me, Gruoch, except perhaps you. Our mam has nae loved me. The lads will nae even smile at me for fear I am you, or for fear I am me, and to be a holy nun.” She laughed almost sadly. “What is love? It is naught to me, Gruoch, but if it is a good thing, then I wish it for ye, my sister. May you hae it in abundance!”

“I may nae get the opportunity to say it once the MacFhearghuis comes, but I thank ye for yer sacrifice, Regan MacDuff,” Gruoch said.

“I would nae do it, but that it is for you,” Regan replied seriously. “Yet you are a part of me, Gruoch. I canna deny it. There is a bond between us, and if it is in my power, I will nae let any harm come to you. I think our mam wrong to have convinced you to do this thing. It will nae bring back our father. Yer marriage will unite the MacDuffs of Ben MacDui and the Fergusons of Killieloch. Hae ye ever thought if our sire had lived, he might hae ended the feuding between our families with such a marriage?”

“But he dinna five. He was murdered by the Fergusons,” Gruoch said harshly. “I will revenge him and our poor mam
who lies dying now because of the Fergusons. And what of ye, Regan MacDuff? The Fergusons hae condemned ye to a barren life wi’ out love. How can I nae revenge
that?
”

Cha
p
ter 2

T
he MacFhearghuis was finally sent for, and he came quickly. He admired his latest son, raging Malcolm; observed Sorcha’s deteriorating condition; and ordered that the wedding be held that same evening.

“She’s a strong woman, but I canna be certain she’ll last the night,” he told the twins. “I want her to see ye wed to my laddie, Gruoch MacDuff.” His glance swung to Regan. “Prepare yer sister, lass, as yer mam canna now. I’ll fetch the priest myself.”

“Bring water for bathing,” Regan commanded the servants, and when they had obeyed her, she sent them away, saying, “I will tend to my sister alone. Come for us when the MacFhearghuis returns wi’ the priest and the bridegroom, but do not disturb us before then.”

“Why did ye send them away?” Gruoch asked her sister curiously when they were alone.

“I dinna want anyone to see ye naked lest yer belly, small though it may be, arouse suspicion,” Regan told her. Then she smiled. “See,” she said, holding out her hand to show Gruoch. “I made a wee cake of soap for this day, and scented it wi’ lavender for ye.”

The two girls stripped off their clothing, and then each in her turn bathed, Gruoch first, and then Regan, washing not just their bodies, but their long golden hair as well, which they dried by the fire. Regan went to the storage chest and removed clean clothing for them both: first, fine soft linen chemises, and then high, round-necked tunics, both under and over. The bride was garbed in an undertunic woven of light wool, green
in color, and a shorter outertunic of rich purple silk belted in gilded leather with an enamel buckle. Her sister wore the same colors, but reversed. Neither wore shoes, as they would be indoors.

Gruoch fitted a narrow gold band studded with small sparkling stones about her forehead to hold her hair. Neither she nor Regan knew what the little jewels were, but Sorcha had always said the band was to be worn by the bride on her wedding day. It had been part of her own dowry. Gruoch’s hair was loose, befitting a bride. Regan’s single braid was bound with a piece of transparent fabric topped with a silver band. Each girl had attached to her shoulder a small sprig of red whortleberry, the badge of Clan MacDuff.

“How will we switch places later?” Regan asked her sister.

“Ye will prepare me for the bedding in Mam’s place,” Gruoch answered her. “ ’Tis then we will change identities.”

“And afterward?” Regan pressed her.

“I dinna know. Perhaps ye’ll be forced to spend the entire night wi’ Ian, but if he sleeps, and ye can slip out of the chamber, I will be waiting to take my rightful place back. If nae in the night, ’twill be in the morning,” Gruoch told Regan, patting her twin’s hand comfortingly. “I canna thank ye enough, Regan mine. Remember, though, dinna show Ian any fear even if ye feel it. He can be cruel, I am told, if a woman is weak. Ye must be strong. Just do what he tells ye, and try nae to weep.”

When they were finally called into the hall, they found that Sorcha had already been brought down from her chamber on a cot, carried by two of the MacFhearghuis’s sons from one of his earlier marriages. Everyone was assembled: the Fergusons of Killieloch and their clansmen, the surviving MacDuffs of Ben MacDui and their clansmen, and the priest.

“Come forward! Come forward!” The MacFhearghuis beckoned them with a bony finger. And when they did so, he took Gruoch by the arm, drawing her next to his son Ian.

He never even looked at her, Regan thought. Were it not for the jeweled gold band she wears, he would not really know which of us is which.
None of them would
. For some reason
she didn’t even understand, it made the deception they were going to play on the Fergusons all right. Regan’s eyes met those of her mother in the first direct gaze that either of them had ever shared. A tiny smile of acknowledgment touched Sorcha’s lips only briefly. Then her attention was once again all Gruoch’s.

Oh, bitch, Regan said silently to herself. You have sacrificed both of us to your vengeance, and will leave us now to fend for ourselves separately, we who have always had each other. I wonder what my father really would have thought of what you have done, Sorcha MacDuff?

Regan’s thoughts so absorbed her that she had paid scant attention to what was going on about her. Suddenly she saw that her mother was showing relief. The MacFhearghuis was slapping his eldest son upon the back. Gruoch was pretending to look the blushing bride. The marriage ceremony was over, and the pipes had begun to play. As the servants passed about wine to the assembled guests, the sisters joined their weakening mother and the MacFhearghuis at the high board while the groom and his brothers danced for them.

Whatever Sorcha MacDuff might think of the Fergusons, Regan had to admit that they were handsome men, with their russet hair and bright blue eyes. They were all dressed alike, with lengths of Ferguson plaid wrapped about their waists, the dark blue, green, white, and red fabric held in place with wide leather belts. White linen shirts, open at the neck, revealed for all to see the mat of chest hair that all but the youngest sported. Their footwear followed the line of their feet and were laced halfway up their shapely legs. The bridegroom wore leather, but his brothers wore shoes of heavy waterproof cloth. They noisily drank toast after toast to their sibling and his new wife, even while dancing for the guests.

A fit of coughing overtook Sorcha, and when her daughters had eased her pain, she managed to gasp, “
The bedding
. I must know Gruoch has been properly bedded before I die! Take your sister, Regan, and prepare her for her husband as I cannot.”

The two young women slipped from the high board unnoticed by the MacFhearghuis and the other guests, who were quite busy helping the bridegroom and his brothers with the creation of a particularly bawdy toast. The twins ran as quickly as they could up the tower stairs to the bedchamber that had been prepared during the ceremony for the newlyweds. Hurriedly, Gruoch stripped off her bridal garments, replacing them with Regan’s clothing, and hastily braided her hair.

“Am I to be naked?” Regan asked her sister, standing in her linen chemise, combing swift fingers through her own golden locks.

“Aye,” her sister told her. “It saves on the clothing, Regan mine. He’ll only tear it off ye if yer wearing it, I fear.”

“
Gruoch
,” her twin corrected her. “I am Gruoch, and yer now Regan,” her sibling warned her.

“Get into the bed,” the false Regan told her. “I can hear them coming up the stairs from the hall already. Mam dinna gie us much time, did she? She’ll die before the night is out, I think.”

The counterfeit bride had no sooner climbed into the bed when the door to the small room was slammed open, and almost broken off its hinges, by the Fergusons. A naked Ian Ferguson was thrust into the chamber by his family.

“Do yer duty by the wench, Ian,” his father said loudly. Then reaching out, he pulled the substitute from the room. “ ’Tis no longer any place for ye, my little nun,” he told her.

Gruoch was astounded. She had never imagined that Ian Ferguson would be so … so … 
well proportioned
. Jamie MacDuff was a fine lover, but Ian Ferguson’s ample manhood portended many pleasurable hours. Perhaps Regan was correct. Their mam would shortly be dead. The feud was over. Her MacDuff child would inherit, ensuring the MacDuffs’ revenge; but she, Gruoch, would be content to let peace grow between their two clans as the MacFhearghuis had intended all along. As for her twin, once Gruoch was certain nothing had come of whatever attentions Ian might lavish on Regan, she would be sent with all haste to St. Maire’s to live out her life.

“Attend to yer mam, Regan MacDuff,” the MacFhearghuis ordered her. “I will wait here outside the bridal chamber to make certain that my son does what he should,
and
to ensure that yer sister is the virgin she is purported to be. If I find the MacDuffs hae played us false …” He made a slicing motion with his forefinger across his throat.

“My lord,” she asked him, “why would ye think Gruoch is nae a virgin and would play ye false?” Who had put such an idea into his head?

“Yer brother Donald says she had been verra friendly wi’ young Jamie MacDuff,” the older man answered her.

“Ye must beware of our brother Donald,” she told him. “He tells terrible lies, and seems to gain pleasure from causing trouble between us. Mam hae beaten him for it many times, sir. Both Gruoch and I hae always been fond of our cousin Jamie, but there hae been nae naughtiness between any of us, I swear it. I was always wi’ them, for Mam was insistent upon the proprieties being observed.”

“Yer a good lassie, Regan MacDuff,” he told her. “Go to yer mam now, and ease her final moments upon this earth.”

“Will ye nae see her again, sir?” she importuned him.

“Yer mam and I hae said our farewells,” he said, and gently pushed her toward the stairs, turning his full attention back to the bridal chamber and its inhabitants.

Within, a single candle burned. Ian Ferguson paraded for the girl who awaited him within the bed. “Well?” he demanded of her.

“Well, what?” she replied. Regan’s heart was beating violently, but her fear was invisible to the man before her.

“Do ye not think I’ve a fine lance, Gruoch? ’Tis nae even half roused, but the little nun’s eyes grew as round as twin moons when she saw me. She’ll ne’er see its like, or any other for that matter, e’er again, puir wee lassie. ’Tis a shame I canna be like the infidels and hae both of ye to wife. Our ancestors took more than one wife, I’m told; and the pagan Saxons still do it now as well. Would ye like to share me wi’ another, my wee wifie?”

“I hear that I already do,” Regan answered him, amused. “They say ye hae a dozen or more of yer bastards scattered about the countryside, Ian Ferguson. The bairns ye get on me, howe’er, will end a feud, and be yer legitimate heirs,
husband mine
.”

“Yer bold,” he said, not knowing if he should hit her for her impudence or let it be. He decided he liked her fearlessness. “Donald says ye hae played me false wi’ Jamie MacDuff, Gruoch. If it is so, I shall kill ye, and the wee nun will be my new wife.”