The Border Vixen Read online

  Maggie stood up. “Very well,” she said. “Come, and I will show you how I work my magic with numbers.”

  They departed the hall, and she brought him to her grandsire’s library. It wasn’t a particularly large chamber, but it was cozy with a small hearth that was already alight, and a row of three tall arched windows on one wall. Surprisingly there was a wall of books, some leatherbound, others in manuscript form. There was a long table that obviously served as a desk facing the windows, and a high-backed chair behind it at one end. Upon the desk were several leather-bound ledgers. Maggie opened one.

  “I keep an account of every expenditure made,” she said. “This is the account book for the household expenses. We are, of course, like most border keeps, self-sufficient but for a few things. The servants are paid for the year at Michaelmas as are the men-at-arms. The other books are records of the livestock bought and sold, the breeding book, and the book of the Aisir nam Breug,” Maggie explained. “Since the beginning, a careful record has been kept of all those going south into England, and coming north into Scotland. The Netherdale Kerrs keep a similar record.”

  “And ye do this yourself?” he asked.

  “Aye. Grandsire says ’tis best we handle our own business,” Maggie told him.

  “How do ye fix the rate of the toll charge? Or is it simply a set rate?” he asked.

  “ ’Tis one rate for a single traveler or a couple, male and female. A merchant with a pack train of animals pays according to the number of animals he has. A peddler riding with everything on his back pays a set rate. There are fixed rates for wedding parties, families traveling together, messengers,” Maggie explained.

  “ ’Tis well thought out,” Lord Stewart remarked. “You note travelers in both directions though you collect tolls only one way,” he noted. “Why?”

  “To keep use of the traverse honest,” Maggie said. “Over the centuries there have been times when some sought use of the Aisir nam Breug for less than peaceful purposes. We have caught the few and ejected them. Once we blocked the way. The watchtowers above the pass know who is in each party. We allow travel north from dawn in the morning, and south from the noon hour until sunset. In the dark months, travel alternates days going north Monday, Wednesday, and Friday; and south Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Sundays the pass is closed but for emergencies such as a messenger.”

  “How long have the Kerrs on both sides of the border held this responsibility?” Lord Stewart asked.

  “For more than five hundred years,” Maggie told him.

  How sad, Lord Stewart thought, that Maggie should be the last of the Kerrs of Brae Aisir. Perhaps he should add the Kerr name to his own. Others had done it in similar situations. Yet he was proud of his name. He would think on it.

  “That is all I have to show ye,” Maggie said, breaking into his thoughts. “Do ye have any questions to ask of me, my lord? If not, I should like to go to my chamber and bathe. We have another day of hunting ahead of us on the morrow.”

  “Stay,” he said to her. “Can we not talk together?”

  Maggie looked puzzled. “Talk? About what? Have ye questions?”

  “Aye, questions about the girl who is my wife, yet not my wife,” Fingal Stewart answered her. “Sit by the fire with me.”

  “There is only one chair,” Maggie told him.

  “Then sit in my lap,” he said. “Or I can sit in yers,” he teased.

  She eyed him warily. “Sit in yer lap? Can I not answer yer questions standing? And what can ye possibly want to know about me? Why should it matter, for yer wed to me by the king’s command, my lord.”

  “Aye, I am,” he agreed pleasantly, “but what I know of ye so far, Maggie Kerr, I like. I would know more. And I would have ye like me.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Maggie said bleakly. “We’re wed.”

  “I was told ye had no other ye preferred,” Lord Stewart said. “Have I taken ye from another who has engaged yer heart?”

  “Nay, I don’t,” Maggie answered, “but I have never liked being told what I must or must not do, my lord. ’Tis childish, I know. Even if I might control the Aisir nam Breug alone, I canna bear an heir for Brae Aisir without a husband. Had there been a man among our neighbors who pleased me, I might have taken him as such, and shared the responsibilities of the traverse with him. But there was none. The young men fear me, for I am not a maid willing to sit by the hearth, and murmur yes, my lord, to a husband I canna respect, or one who does not respect me. I have said it often enough. None of them wanted me for myself, but only for my wealth and power. So I chose none among them. They thought my grandfather was so desperate for a husband for me he would do whatever he had to do. But my grandsire knows me well, and he loves me. He understands my needs. But now King James has interfered in this matter.” She sighed. “I will not let you win, Fingal Stewart. Ye must overcome me fairly.”

  “I will,” he promised her.

  “I know some think me selfish that I would have my way. I am not. I have controlled the Aisir nam Breug for almost three years now by myself. Grandsire is not well enough to do what must be done. I need a man who is willing to learn from a woman. That fool Ewan Hay was hardly the man.”

  “I have heard you beat him badly,” Fingal Stewart remarked.

  “I did!” Maggie admitted, restraining a wicked grin that threatened to break out upon her face. “I had to so he would give up and go away. I never expected the wretched weasel to go crying to the king. The damned fool had not a chance of outrunning me. Even if I had loved him, and I certainly did not, I could not have thrown the race, for everyone in the Borders knows there is none who can run as fast as I do. I outran him and rode the course a-horse as he sat nursing his bloodied feet, the fool!”

  “Yer a hard lass,” Fingal Stewart said, his tone grudgingly admiring, “but to carry all the responsibility ye have carried, ye must be hard. But I can beat ye, Maggie Kerr, and I will.” He sat down in the chair by the fire, and surprising her, reached out and yanked her into his lap. “That’s better,” he said. “Now tell me more about yerself, and I will tell ye about myself. I’d like us to at least be friends before I bed ye.”

  Maggie made a quick attempt to bolt, but Fingal Stewart pulled her back, his arm tightening about her.

  “Nah, nah, lassie, yer my wife. A husband has the right to cuddle with his woman.” His gray eyes caught her hazel eyes. “Have ye not cuddled with a sweetheart?”

  “I’ve never had a sweetheart, my lord. Do ye think me wanton? I have more important things to be about,” Maggie told him angrily. She was not comfortable. She didn’t like being imprisoned by his arm. Her head had no place to go but his shoulder. She could smell the damp leather of his garments. It was strong, and it was too masculine. He reeked of power, and it frightened her. “Let me go,” she said, attempting to keep her voice level and without fear. “Please release me, my lord.”

  “Yer afraid,” he said, surprised. “Why are ye afraid?”

  “I don’t wish to be constrained,” Maggie answered him.

  He was silent a moment and then said, “I am but attempting to know my wife, lady. If I loosen my arm, will you remain in my lap for the interim? I know your word will be good.”

  “Ohh, that is so unfair!” Maggie cried softly.

  “Why?” His tone was innocent of any deception, but they both knew better.

  She laughed. She couldn’t help it. “So you either hold me within yer embrace, or trust me to remain within it by my own choice,” Maggie said. “And ye do not think it an unfair preference ye put before me?”

  “Nay,” he replied in the same bland tone. “Ye are too used to gaining yer own way, Margaret Jean Kerr. Now there will be times in the future when it will amuse me to let ye run headstrong as yer grandfather has done these seventeen years, but ye will not always have yer way with me. I’ll be wearing the breeks in this family.”

  She stiffened. First with the use of her full Christian name—how had he known it?—and t
hen with her outrage at his speech. “Ohh, yer an arrogant man!” she told him. She was actually more at a loss for words than she had ever been. Never had she been spoken to in such a manner. She was Maggie Kerr, the heiress to Brae Aisir, damn it!

  “Excellent!” he praised her. “Yer beginning to understand me. I am Fingal David Stewart, Lord of Torra and one day laird of Brae Aisir. I am arrogant, but not without cause. I descend from kings, lass, and the master of Scotland himself has sent me to marry ye, get bairns on ye, and keep the Aisir nam Breug as it has always been. My family has ever been faithful, and I will not shame them or their memory. Now will ye let me court ye, or will this be a war between us?”

  His arm had loosened from about her. Maggie jumped from his lap. She had made him no promises, and she would make him none. “I don’t know,” she said in answer to his question. Then she ran from the library.

  Fin sat before the small chamber’s little hearth for some time after she had gone.

  He had had enough experience with women to know she was confused and frightened. God deliver me from skittish virgins, Fingal Stewart thought to himself, but he knew that her fear of intimacy between them wasn’t really the problem. Once he could kiss and caress her, he would win her over, and their bedsport would be pleasant, not that that mattered. Her duty would be to produce bairns for Brae Aisir; sons and daughters to ally them with other border families. But that wasn’t the true difficulty between them.

  It was control of the Aisir nam Breug that stood between them. The old laird had been wrong not to impress upon his heiress that it would be her husband controlling the pass, and not Mad Maggie Kerr. Still he had a great deal to learn about that traverse, and it was Maggie who would have to teach him for her grandfather was old. He had already turned his duties over to the lass. Oh, Fingal Stewart could beat his bride in the physical challenge she demanded. Of that he had no doubt, though others had failed. But it was his education regarding the Aisir nam Breug that would win Maggie’s heart once she realized he could manage the responsibilities involved.

  Martinmas came, and they still had not enough meat to last the winter. They hunted each day from dawn to dusk as the days shortened. Slowly the cold larder began to fill up. The meat from the deer they took was butchered. It hung alongside strings of rabbits, geese, and ducks. The boar, however, continued to elude them, but Maggie didn’t care now that she was satisfied the keep and village were safe from starvation.

  Like many border keeps, the Kerrs had royal permission to fish in the streams, rivers, and lochs in their area. They smoked and salted their catch, storing them in barrels. Dugald Kerr was a kindly man. He allowed the head of each household in his village to trap two coneys a month for their families and to lay away a small keg of salted fish. It was considered a generous gesture, especially given that the laird allowed them to grind in his mill the little grain they grew each growing season. The miller, of course, was allowed to take a tenth share for his trouble.

  On St. Andrew’s Day, Maggie pronounced the larder was filled to capacity. The weather was growing colder each day, and the nights were much longer now than they had been in September. The moat beneath the drawbridge was covered by a thin sheet of ice most mornings. It melted away during the daylight hours, but re-formed each night. Eventually it would not melt until spring. The stone walls of the keep began to show rimes of frost except in the few chambers where the hearths blazed. The men-at-arms began to sleep in the hall most nights now, for their barracks just within the walls had no hearth. In the stables and barn, those caring for the beasts slept with them in the hay for warmth.

  The first day of December dawned sunny and unnaturally mild. A peddler asked shelter for the night. He would be traveling through the Aisir nam Breug in the morning. He had come from Perth via Stirling and Edinburgh. The peddler brought with him a large fund of gossip he was only too willing to share with the hall. He was surprised to learn the heiress to Brae Aisir had a husband, and one who had been sent by the king himself.

  “Our Jamie has gone to France to seek a bride,” he began, and he chuckled. “He’s well funded to go courting, thanks to the church.”

  “What has the church to do with it?” the old laird asked.

  “Why, sir, with these Protestant heretics rising up all over across the water, and even in England, our king’s allegiance to Holy Mother Church is a valuable commodity for the pope to have. The king needs an income, and the church is wealthy. I heard he is to have seventy-two thousand Scots pounds over the next few years. ’Tis a fortune! And three of our most important abbeys and three priories of great consequence are to be given to his bastards for their income. He has six, and I’m told his latest mistress, Janet Munro, is with child.” The peddler chortled. “Why, this fifth Jamie is every bit the man his da was, God bless him!” The peddler raised his tankard, drank to the king’s health, and continued on with his gossip.

  “They say he can have his choice of a wife from among the noble and royal families in Italy, France, and Denmark. That devil who rules England, King Henry, has even suggested a match with Princess Mary, his daughter,” the peddler said. “And our Jamie has been presented with many diplomatic honors by those wooing him.”

  “The king prefers a French match,” Lord Stewart said quietly.

  “Aye! Aye! So he does,” the peddler agreed. “They say the Duke of Vendôme is offering one hundred thousand gold crowns as a dower for his daughter, Marie. But the king turned the lass down.”

  “How on earth could you know that?” Lord Stewart demanded.

  “Ah, sir, I passed through Leith recently. Word had just come that the king visited the court of the Duke of Vendôme in disguise. Despite her great dower, ’tis said he found the lady deformed and crippled. He left the duke’s household quickly without making an offer for the lass. He has, it is said, fallen in love with Princess Madeleine, King François’s daughter. It is reported she is a bonnie lass. The king offered for her, and the betrothal has been made. The marriage will be celebrated in January at the great Cathedral of Our Lady in Paris. We’ll have a new French queen when the king brings her home,” the peddler said, pleased to have been able to deliver this news to Brae Aisir.

  But he had also gained some excellent gossip to pass on to the Netherdale Kerrs. It would gain him a night’s lodging and a few meals in their hall on the morrow when he had traveled through the Aisir nam Breug. While he had told his tale standing before the high board, he had not, of course, been invited to be seated there. He was, after all, only a humble peddler. He had sat below the board with a trestle full of men-at-arms. It was there he had learned that the heiress to Brae Aisir’s bridegroom was a cousin of King Jamie himself and had been sent by the king to wed Mad Maggie Kerr.

  The contracts, he was told, had been signed weeks ago, but the couple had not yet bedded because Lord Stewart had yet to fulfill the famous challenge issued by the bride that was known throughout the Borders. The challenge was to take place on December fifth. The peddler wished he had an excuse to remain at Brae Aisir so he might relate firsthand what transpired. Looking at Fingal Stewart, however, he already knew. The man stood at least eight inches taller than the lass. He was muscled and in prime condition. If he couldn’t outrun, outride, and outfight Mad Maggie Kerr, he didn’t deserve to bed her.

  The next day, however, dawned cold and rainy. The old laird invited the peddler to remain until the weather cleared. He accepted. He was in no hurry for he was on his way home to Carlisle where he would spend the winter months with his wife making another bairn. The peddler had plans. One day he intended to open a shop in the town, and it would be his sons he sent out to spend the spring, summer, and autumn months on the road while he remained behind in his shop. Word that he was in the keep had spread to the village. The women came to purchase ribbons, threads, needles, pins, and the fine lace trim he was known to carry. It turned into a profitable day, and when the peddler departed the following morning, he was in an excellent mood. The day might b
e cold, and the north wind had begun blowing, but he had a plump purse, and his wife was waiting for him at the end of his journey.

  It took him the daylight hours to ride through the pass, leading his pack horses behind him. But as a weak sun was setting, he came in sight of Netherdale Hall where he was warmly welcomed by Lord Edmund. “Let me eat first, my lord, and then I shall bring you all the news I have gathered along my way,” the peddler said. “I have some that will be of particular interest to you.”

  “Eat,” Lord Edmund Kerr said, curious, but hardly anxious. The peddler was an unimportant fellow, but amusing, and the quality of his merchandise was excellent. “News of King James, I expect,” he said.

  “Aye, and of the Kerrs of Brae Aisir,” the peddler replied as he dug a spoon into the wooden trencher of hot rabbit stew.

  Lord Edmund raised an eyebrow but remained silent. To appear eager would make him look foolish. He would wait for the fellow to eat his meal. An imperceptible nod of his head brought a servant to fill his goblet. He sipped it slowly, thoughtfully, as he waited to learn the latest news. Had his cousin Dugald died? He doubted it. The old man for all his frailty was going to outlive them all.

  Edmund Kerr had lived a half century. He had buried two wives. The first had given him six sons and three daughters. The second had borne three sons before she died in childbed with a sickly daughter. He was a handsome man with nut-brown hair just now being sprinkled with flecks of silver. He had the hazel eyes so many of the Kerrs on both sides of the border had. He stood six feet in height and was stocky with his age. And while he had a very satisfactory mistress, he wanted another wife.

  Dugald Kerr would have to wed his granddaughter sooner than later. And who better to husband the wench than Edmund Kerr? He might even get a son or two on her, for a woman without children was prone to mischief. He had fathered several bastards. His mistress, Aldis, had given him a fine little daughter just a few months back. With nine legitimate sons to his credit, a new female child was more than welcome.