Wee William's Woman, Book Three of the Clan MacDougall Series (21 page)

Again, he was only half listening. He was making plans to talk to Angus about getting a little plot of land on which to build a wee cottage.
What the hell is wrong with me?
He had never before entertained thoughts of cottages, wives, bairns or parcels of land. Wee William was a warrior. Most women were afraid of him, simply because of his size. Mayhap his unruly hair and beard and scars had something to do with it as well. But Nora? She seemed different. She didn’t twitter on incessantly about topics in which he either had no interest or didn’t understand. She didn’t walk in the opposite direction when he approached. She talked
with
him, not at or about him.

She was bonny, that he could not deny. But he knew that the moment he first laid eyes on her, even if she did have a blackened eye and bruised face.

As she talked, the candlelight bounced off her gray-blue eyes and made them sparkle like stars in the sky. He also took note of her ample bosom and the way the dress hugged her curves. She was quite striking in the gray and yellow dress and the arisaid that hugged her tiny waist. He was having a difficult time concentrating on what she was actually saying.

“So you see, William, you saved me, you saved all of us. Were it not for you, I’d probably be dead and I doubt it would be from natural causes and old age. I think Horace would have eventually killed me.”

At the mention of Horace’s name, all the pleasant images of Nora evaporated from his mind.
Horace
. Wee William hoped the man was burning in Hell.

“So I have much to thank you for. Most importantly, for making me a widow that night.”

Widow?
Yes, she still thought she was a widow. Thankfully, no one had told her there was a possibility that
that
wasn’t the case.
 
Wee William tried to reason with himself that it was better she did think Horace dead. How could he tell her otherwise? How could he, in good conscience, take that feeling of safety and hope away from her? He couldn’t.
Let her think he is dead, for we do no’ really ken the truth of it.

“Do you think badly of me, William, that I do not mourn the loss of my husband?” She had stopped eating. She had one hand resting on her lap, fidgeting with her napkin, while she held Elise’s tiny hand in the other.

“Nay, lass.” He couldn’t hold that against her. How could you mourn someone who had treated you so poorly?

“I would feel worse pretending, William. To pretend that I care he is dead would be wrong, would it not?” It was one of the many things she’d been contemplating before he had arrived.

“Aye, I believe it would.”

Nora nodded her head and brushed away a strand of loose hair from Elise’s forehead. She was still burning with fever. Elise began to shiver and her eyes fluttered before opening. “Nora,” her voice was scratchy and hoarse. “I am s-so c-cold.” A coughing fit quickly began and Nora helped her to sit up, patting her on her back.

“I’ll get her another blanket,” Wee William offered. His voice was laced with concern and worry.

Nora thanked him as she grabbed a tankard of water from the table beside Elise’s bed. Once her coughing quieted, Nora encouraged her to take a drink of water.

“I don’t feel good,” Elise whispered as she shivered and fought to catch her breath.

“Ssshh, don’t talk, now. You need to rest.” Nora rubbed her little back and gave her time to settle her lungs.

“I’m glad we’re not outside anymore.” Elise said as she wiggled her toes under the covers. “Thank you for taking care of me.”

“Don’t be a goose, of course I’d take care of you.”

Elise started coughing again. It was a long, dry cough that made Elise sound like a small barking dog. Nora found it quite unnerving. She did her best to mask her concern.

“I’m glad Horace is dead.” Elise coughed again. “’Cause now I get to be with you again.”

Nora could not, in good conscience, chastise Elise for speaking her mind on that topic. “Elise, please, don’t talk, it makes you cough. You need to rest.”

“But I am glad!”

“I am too,” Nora whispered. “But we shouldn’t say such things aloud and you need to rest.” Nora took a clean cloth, dipped it in the bowl of cool water, and began to wash Elise’s face and hands. Elise began to shiver again, her little teeth chattered and her breathing sounded labored. Nora set about applying a fresh poultice just as Mary and Isobel had shown her to do earlier.

She had just finished applying fresh cloths over the noxious paste when Wee William returned with not one, but two additional furs. Without a word, he spread the blankets over Elise and tucked them in under her chin.

“Thank you, Sir William,” Elise said sleepily and with a slight smile.

“Yer welcome, Princess Elise.”

“You know I’m not a princess,” Elise said with a yawn.

“And ye ken I’m no knight, lassie,” he told her with a smile and a pat on her head.

“You should be,” she said as she closed her eyes.

Wee William’s warm smile was aimed at Elise, but Nora felt it just the same. “And ye should be a princess.” He smoothed her hair away from her face before slowly standing upright. He turned his attention back to Nora.

She sat there, looking at up at him as if she wanted to say something, but hesitated. Instead, gave him an affectionate, warm smile and looked back to Elise. Sometimes words weren’t necessary.

Nora stayed by Elise’s side all night, dozing between the little girl’s coughing fits and spiking fevers. She was relieved and thankful to learn that the room had its own privy and therefore she would not be gone too long from Elise’s side.

By the time dawn arrived, Nora’s shoulders, back and bottom ached from sitting on the stool for so many hours. Elise would wake for only a few minutes at a time. None of the herbs that Isobel had prescribed seemed to be doing anything to help break the fever.

By noon, her cough had turned from dry and hoarse to wet and phlegmy and things had only grown worse from there. John was brought into the room with a fever of his own later that day. Nora’s worst fears were coming true; both children were very ill.

A small bed was set next to the larger bed and Elise was moved to that. Nora planted herself between the two beds and did her best to take care of them.

John’s fever and cough seemed to be following the same path as Elise’s. It started with the high fever and that was followed later by the dry hoarse cough. He too, slept for hours at a time.

It didn’t seem possible, but Elise’s cough had worsened and soon she was vomiting due to the coughing fits being so severe. Her fever raged on and she began hallucinating at sometime past the midnight hour. She cried out for someone to get the fish off her feet. Had it been merely a dream, one might have found some humor in it. But as it was, a heavy pall had fallen over the room.

And so it went for the next several days. Poultices were applied to their chests and they were encouraged to drink the herbal teas. Fevers raged and broke, but for only an hour or two at a time. John’s cough changed into the same rattled state as his sister’s.

Nora rarely left their sides, and then only to see to the most necessary of her own needs. Isobel and Mary made frequent appearances to bring more herbs and concoctions that they hoped would help the children. She dozed off and on when she was able, sometimes resting her head on the large bed.

In less than a week, both children were so ill with raging fevers and unrelenting coughs, that they were seldom truly awake or aware of their surroundings. Dark circles had formed under their eyes and their skin had taken on a gray pallor that shook Nora to her bones. They were dying and there was naught she could do to help them.

Nora’s only sense of comfort was that no one else had yet fallen ill. It was all she could do to not blame herself a hundred times a day for Elise and John’s current state. If anyone else had become ill because they were here, she would not have been able to live with herself.

On the morning of the eighth day, the priest was called to their room. Though she was exhausted and tired beyond anything she had ever experienced, Nora became enraged.

“Who called you?” she demanded as she wiped a cold cloth across John’s forehead.

“Lass,” the young man began in a soothing tone. “I’m no’ here to give last rites. I’m here to offer prayer.”

Nora studied him closely for a moment. The man couldn’t be more than five and twenty. He was tall, broad in the shoulder, and built much like the other Highlander men she had encountered. His light blonde hair was cut close to his scalp and his brown eyes had a peaceful countenance to them. He wore the course brown robes of a priest, but they stretched over his muscles. Had she been in a better mood she might have laughed at how odd he appeared. It looked as though he had stolen the robes and was trying to disguise himself.

“I’m Father Michael,” he said as he stood at the foot of John’s bed. He hadn’t taken his eyes from Nora.

Nora wanted nothing to do with the priest at the moment. Priests who appeared when people were ill were bad luck in her mind. It meant death was near. Priests simply pushed the sick toward the inevitable. She bit her tongue to keep from lashing out that he could take his prayers and leave.

“How fare they today?” he asked kindly.

“The same as yesterday and the day before,” Nora bit as she rinsed the cloth in the basin.
You cannot have them, not yet.

“That is good then,” he said quietly.

Nora’s brow knotted confusion. “What do you mean
that is good then?
”

Father Michael tucked his hands into the sleeves of his robe and smiled. “No change is better than turnin’ fer the worst, wouldn’t ye agree?” He offered another smile that went unrewarded.

Nora continued to glare at him. He chose to ignore it. “Och, ’twould be far more pleasin’ of course, if they would turn fer the better, that I ken.”

They stared at each other for a long while. Father Michael refused to wipe the smile from his face and Nora refused to thank him for his presence. It was Nora who finally broke the silence.

“I’ll not have you issue last rites, Father. I will not have it.”

He cast her another warm smile. It made the corners of his eyes wrinkle ever so slightly. “And I assure ye that I’ll no’ issue them. They be young, strong children, am I right?”

Yes, yes, they were. Or they were until they spent the last year cooped up inside a dark, damp, dank castle without proper nourishment or clothing. Nora’s eyes began to water when she remembered everything John and Elise had told her of their time at Firth. The pain of it stabbed at her heart and made her stomach tighten. If they died, it would be all her fault.

“I failed them,” Nora managed to choke out. “They are ill because I couldn’t keep them safe.” Her shoulders began to shake and she could not hold the tears back any longer. “If they…” she could not say the word aloud, didn’t have the strength for it. She wiped her tears away with the backs of her hands. “There will be no one to blame but me.”

Father Michael had spoken with Isobel earlier that morning. It had been Isobel who had come to him first, to ask him to please pray for these children. She had told him all that she knew about the circumstances surrounding their arrival at Gregor.

Father Michael nodded his head and pursed his lips together. “I see. So ’twas ye that sent them to live at Firth?”

Nora’s eyes grew wide with horror at his suggestion. “Nay! I would never have sent them away!”

Another nod of his head. “That’s right. I believe Isobel told me ’twas yer late husband that did that.”

Nora blew her nose on a handkerchief and nodded her head.

“But ye were the one who would no’ let them come back to yer home, am I right?”

“Nay!” she’d done everything she could to get them out of Firth. “I tried to get them out, I did! But every time I ran away, Horace would find me and…” Her words trailed off. She didn’t want to think about the punishments he had meted out.

Father Michael took a step toward Nora. “Lass, none of this is yer fault. I’m sure ye did yer best to help them.”

“But I failed every time!” The tears came flooding back as Isobel and Mary walked into the room.