Highland Wedding by Hannah Howell

lack of air that killed him and the cord that had kept life going now wrapped around the tiny neck to end it.
    Catalina had been right to curse him as she lay wracked with pain. He should never had bedded her, wife or not. She had not enjoyed the act at all, blessing the pregnancy that killed her in the end, for it had allowed her to ban him from her bed. Her shrill agonized voice still haunted his dreams, rightly blaming him for her cruel and far too early death. She had been but twenty, much too young to seek a cold grave or be pushed into one as he had pushed her. Islaen was but nineteen he recalled and felt like weeping.
    “Oh God,” he moaned softly, “have mercy upon me. Make the lass barren. God, dinnae put me through it all again. I cannae bear it.”
    A soft knock broke into his morbid thoughts. When he flung open the door his first thought was to slam it shut again. Realizing that Islaen was no vision of a mind drunker than he had thought, he yanked her into the room, made a hasty check of the hallway to assure himself of the absence of people, and then slammed the door.
    He then cursed the lust that tightened his drink-weakened body. Despite appearances to the contrary, he felt sure she had not come to his room for a tryst. If nothing else, she looked too solemn, even a little frightened.
    Islaen looked at his dark scowling face and nearly winced. It was going to be hard enough without him being furious before she even started. Although it was an effort, she refrained from looking around his chambers to see if his anger stemmed from her interrupting a last bachelor frolic. It would not surprise her, despite the rumours of his monkish lifestyle, for he did not want the marriage, but was simply obeying his king.
    Another cause of her embarrassment was his attire, or rather its absence. He wore only his hose. The lack of covering on his torso made her very aware of how broad of shoulder and muscular he was. A modest pelt of dark hair covered his chest, tapering to a thin line that dissected his taut stomach to disappear into his snug hose. She had seenmany a man partly clothed, even naked, for it was unavoidable living with so many brothers, but she had never felt so warm before. Neither had she suffered such an urge to touch a man’s chest. She forced her gaze upwards to his face.
    Iain was just drunk enough not to care about his lack of attire before his young bride. “Be ye mad, lass? Why are ye here?”
    “I had to talk with ye,” she replied, following him as he strode to the table by his bed to retrieve his drink.
    Sitting down on the bed he took a long drink before looking at her. “Could it not have waited until the morrow? What if ye had been seen?”
    “I wasnae and what folk I saw about wouldnae have wanted me to see them. What I have to tell ye couldnae wait any longer.”
    He reacted to that statement with increased alertness. Perhaps the girl meant to tell him she had a lover, was carrying some man’s seed. Even as he decided that was impossible he realized that the thought did not cheer him despite the fact that the king would not make him wed her under such circumstances. Shaking his head over his own vagaries, he waited for her to speak.
    “There is something ye maun be told ere we wed. Weel, shown actually. I am not as I seem, Sir MacLagan.”
    “Deformed?” he thought and could not believe it. “I can hardly reject ye for some mark or scar, child,” he said dryly and touched his cheek.
    “’Tis nay a mark or a scar, sir.” She began to shed her houppelande. “I cannae deceive ye any longer. ’Tis unfair and dishonest to do so.”
    After watching the houppelande fall around her pretty feet he studied her. Her night rail was no more than a short shift, revealing a great deal of her lovely legs. There was also something vaguely different about her but he could not pinpoint it. It did not help him to think when he was so attracted, his loins tightened painfully and his hands itched to