“That, or mayhap I should woo the lass meself,” Acair said with a slow smile.
“What?” Aulay turned on him with surprise.
“Well, I’m a Buchanan too, lad. And unmarried as well as without a keep. I’ve a decade or two o’ good years left in me and could muster up enough energy to plant a bairn or two in a woman’s belly.” Grinning suddenly, he added, “At least, that’ll be me story to convince Geordie he has competition. ’Tis always good to make a lad think he’s no’ the only option a woman has. Makes him appreciate her more. Think on how it was with Dougall when the boys were all hankering to save Murine through marriage.”
“Aye,” Aulay said thoughtfully, and then shook his head. “So long as ye explain the way o’ things to Mavis. Else the woman might kill ye both in her jealousy.”
Acair stiffened. “Ye ken about Mavis and me?”
“O’ course.”
Acair frowned over that and glanced to Geordie. “Do ye think Geordie kens?”
“I doubt it,” Aulay said after a moment, and then admitted, “I only ken because Jetta sorted it out and told me. I do no’ think she’s mentioned it to him. She’d protect yer privacy.”
“Good,” he said with satisfaction. “Then I’ll pretend to woo the lass.”
“What about Mavis?” Aulay asked. “Will ye explain things to her so she’s no’ jealous?”
Acair considered that briefly, and then shook his head. “Nay, ’tis best no’ to tell her. Just in case Geordie does ken about her. He’ll expect her to be jealous and me Mavis canno’ lie to save her soul. Besides,” he added dryly, “she’s been a mite testy with me o’ late, and I’m thinking it canno’ hurt to remind her that I have other options too.”
Aulay raised both eyebrows at this and shook his head. “Ye’ll do as ye like, but it’s me experience that there’s nothing makes a woman more bitter or dangerous than being scorned by a lover. So I’d watch meself around her if ye do pretend to woo Dwyn.”
Shrugging carelessly, Acair stripped off his shirt and followed Geordie into the water.
“There you are!”
Dwyn didn’t bother to glance up from the book she’d been reading when her sisters burst into the bedchamber. But she gasped in surprise when Aileen snatched the book from her hand. Sitting up abruptly, she cried, “Do no’ lose my page!”
“Oh, I willna,” Aileen said with exasperation, slipping the bit of linen Dwyn kept as a place marker out of the front of the book, and laying it between the pages.
“Honestly, Dwyn,” Una muttered, grabbing her hand and dragging her off the bed. “We’ve traveled days to get here and win ye a husband, and what do you do? Ye hide in the bedchamber and lie about reading books all day.”
“’Tis crusading poems by Gille Brighde Albanach,” Dwyn explained, watching worriedly until Aileen set it carefully on the table. “We do no’ have that at Innes.”
“We do no’ have men there either. At least, no’ the kind ye could marry, and that’s what ye’re here for,” Una said firmly. “Now let me look at ye.”
Sighing, Dwyn stood still under her sisters’ inspection, unsurprised when they both began to frown.
“What are ye doing wearing that gown?” Una snapped.
“’Tis the only gown that I can breathe in without me bosoms popping out,” Dwyn growled unhappily.
“Well, that is too bad. ’Tis what ye wore to travel here and is filthy. You canno’ wear that to the evening meal,” Una said firmly. “Aileen, fetch her a clean gown. That rose-colored one looks nice on her.”
“Oh, nay,” Dwyn cried, her eyes going wide with alarm. She’d tried on all her gowns once she’d managed to sneak back into the keep. Not one of the damned dresses fit, but the rose gown was the worst. If she took more than a shallow breath in it, her breasts popped up and out like a vole sticking its head out of its hole to look around.
“Oh, yes,” Una said firmly. “It looks good with yer coloring. Speaking o’ which—”
“Ow!” Dwyn jumped back and glared at her sister when she suddenly pinched her cheeks painfully.
“I was just trying to give ye more color,” Una said with exasperation.
“Do no’ be mad, Dwyn,” Aileen said quietly, rushing over with the rose gown. “We are just trying to get you a husband. We both feel so bad that we are betrothed while you—”
“Fine,” Dwyn interrupted on a sigh, and shook her head as she began to undo the lacings of the gown she was wearing. Her sisters, both younger than her, acted like it would be the end of the world if she did not marry. Neither of them could understand her attitude on the subject, and why she was not doing all she could to find a husband, but she knew her value. She was a good woman, and she wasn’t ugly, at least she didn’t think so. But she also wasn’t pretty, not the sort of pretty to draw the eye when pitted against the much lovelier women here at Buchanan anyway. The only way she was likely to get a husband was if someone came to Innes and stayed for a while for some reason. Once they got to know her . . . Of course, that wasn’t likely to happen, so she had resolved herself to being an old maid, or perhaps taking herself off to a nunnery someday in the future. But since it meant so much to her sisters, she would wear the rose dress . . . and hope she didn’t faint from lack of air, or alternately humiliate herself and her family by having her breasts pop right out of it.
“There,” Aileen said moments later as she finished helping with the lacings and stepped back to examine her critically.
“The dress looks lovely,” Una said finally. “But . . .”
“Her hair,” Aileen said for her, and the other girl nodded.
“Oh! No, wait!” Dwyn cried, reaching up to cover her head.
“Nay. Ye have lovely hair, sister. Ye should show it, no’ keep it all pinned up on top o’ yer head like— Oh,” Una said with surprise as she pulled several pins from Dwyn’s hair and the golden strands unraveled and fell down her back.
“My,” Aileen breathed. “’Tis so long. When did it get so long?”
Una shook her head and moved away. “I’ll get the brush.”
“’Tis glorious, Dwyn,” Aileen said solemnly, grasping several strands and pulling them out to the side before letting them feather away. “Why do ye never let it down? I do no’ think I’ve seen it down in years, no’ even when I’ve come to harass ye awake in the mornings.”
“I never let it down,” Dwyn said on an exasperated sigh. “’Tis curly and it gets terrible knots do I no’ keep it up in a bun.”
“’Tis too heavy to curl anymore. Now it just lies in lovely waves,” Una announced, returning with a brush and handing it to Aileen to hold while she took out the thong that held Dwyn’s hair in a ponytail. Once she had her long hair lying flat along her back, she began to brush it, but asked, “If ye do no’ like it so long, why do ye no’ cut it?”
Dwyn grimaced at the question. “Mother made me promise never to cut it. She said I would be grateful one day, but . . .” She shrugged.