Page 2 of Wolf Heir (Highland Wolves of Old #3)

She did not pray, but she did weep—a soundless, biting sort of weeping that left her chest aching with the effort not to scream.

When it was over, she wiped her hands on the apron and stumbled back to the door, closing it softly behind her. In the room, Morag waited, her face as unreadable as ever. She nodded once and went to tend to the chief, who was still moaning over a body that could not answer.

Blair returned to the shadows, hugging her arms to her chest, and knew time was of the essence. She needed to move the baby somewhere where he could be taken care of.

Morag leaned in so close that her breath tickled the edge of Blair’s ear. “Did you do as you’re told?”

“Aye, mistress.”

Morag glanced at Blair’s dirt-covered hands. “Go wash up, now.”

“Aye.” Blair raced off and headed back to the baby, uncovered him, hiding him in the basket, and took off with him.

“The baby isna breathing. Morag, what do we do?” Senga asked, one of the maids attending.

Morag hid a smile and held the dead baby swaddled in her arms as if he were the most precious thing ever. “Aye. I’ll…I’ll tell the chief.”

“The baby died too?” Senga asked, sounding like she didn’t believe it. She wiped her brow of sweat and pushed aside a strand of black hair, appearing done in by the news.

“Aye. You can see that he did.” Morag straightened her posture, brushed off her gown, and had the unenviable task of informing Hamish that his beloved son was also dead.

This couldn’t have worked out better for her.

She’d work her magic on Hamish to ensure he mated her!

She had a way of making men do her bidding.

Filled with fear of being caught with the chief’s baby and distraught over Morag’s threats, but not wanting to harm the healthy baby quietly sleeping, she feared she would get caught up in Morag’s murderous scheme.

Blair’s heart beat wildly as she exited the castle, through the inner bailey, and then down the hill into the meadow.

She couldn’t leave him with one of the crofters because she feared the word could get back to Morag.

She carried him to the river where she had seen some crofters fishing early in the mornings.

With a heavy heart, she left the basket in the tall grass, praying someone would find the bairn soon.

She knew that Morag would do anything she could to marry the chief, become the next lady of Middleborough Castle, and provide her own offspring to the chief.

Which was the reason the chief’s bairn was disposable.

Blair had nowhere else to go. No other family to take her in. She was stuck working at the castle under Morag’s rule, and her stomach turned at the notion. She knew that if Morag learned Blair hadn’t killed the baby, Morag would murder her. But she worried that no one would find the baby.

After one last look over her shoulder at the sleeping baby in the basket, Blair vowed to check on him tomorrow, then returned to the castle with a heavy heart. She was fearful Morag would still learn the baby lived.

Elspeth struggled to birth her second-born son, while her mate Magnus lifted Tamhas from the birthing blankets, cradling the slippery heft of their son with a trembling but determined reverence.

He had rushed through the necessary work—tidying up, cutting the cord—a little clumsily while Elspeth had told him what to do.

She was a crofter’s wife, but thankfully had enough experience as a midwife for the crofter families nearby.

Magnus eased Tamhas into the old basket lined with a pelt, tucking the infant in, then promptly returned with her post-birth clothes—soft linen washed with the last of the summer soap—and a clean towel for the child.

She watched him, her heart swelling with a quiet, almost painful gratitude.

It was not lost on her how carefully he navigated this liminal moment.

Her mate had never held a newborn before, but he wiped Tamhas gently, as if even a breath too sharp might startle the spirit from their son.

He smiled at her, sheepish, one hand never leaving Tamhas’s belly.

Elspeth’s body still trembled from the shock of birth, the way the twins had seemed to fight to enter the world, the way the second boy had simply…

failed. Elspeth wept in the nest of pelts and blood-soaked moss.

Magnus hovered close but uncertain, his hands soft against her salt-wet face, gentling her in silence.

“The goddess chose to take one, but dinna fret, sweeting. We have a beautiful son to raise still.”

But it was no consolation, though Elspeth tried to keep her spirits up—for Magnus and their son, Tamhas.

Yet losing the twin was sometimes more than she could bear, and at the most inopportune times, she would break down and cry.

Poor Magnus didn’t know what to do but take Tamhas and would cradle the bairn to sleep.

Magnus worried about her state of mind. But she attempted to focus her energy on Tamhas and her mate. She had been abed too long, though it was only the day after giving birth to her twins.

Elspeth felt the compulsion to go outside, breathe the air, see the world returning.

She wrapped a well-fed and sleeping Tamhas to her chest, a scarf of thick fur binding him to her skin, and shuffled out into the sunlight.

His blond hair looked lighter as the rays of the sun touched the strands, making him look even more like his da.

Though she was surprised he had so much hair for a newborn.

The cool air shocked her, but she drew herself up, pulled her plaid wool shawl closer, and waved at Magnus planting in the field.

He stopped for a moment, and she pointed to the river to let him know where she was going. Ever worried about her, Magnus watched her move through the pink heather in bloom until she was out of sight.

The breeze wrapped her in the smell of fishy water, kelp carried from the sea lying on the rocky bank of the river, way before she reached it, and something else.

The smell of urine—human and wolf, an unfamiliar wolf shifter she hadn’t smelled before.

But also one who was very young. She did not hurry, not wanting to upset a mother and child.

She sauntered, her own child’s breath warming her collarbone. Tamhas stirred, and his eyes opened. He cooed. She rubbed his back in a consoling way. She scanned the riverbank, the reeds, the little inlets where the locals fished.

She heard a baby crying long before she saw it, courtesy of her wolf hearing. Elspeth’s scalp prickled.

The crying grew louder. Tamhas, for his part, went silent, as if he too sensed the gravity of the moment.

At the water’s edge, she found him: a baby boy, wild and flailing in a reed basket, the swaddling that had bound him cast aside. His round face was framed in light brown curls as if he were older than he seemed. Yet he was a newly born babe, thin, needing sustenance.

His mouth opened and he released an angry cry, startling her.

His fists battered the air. There was no scent of his mother, no warmth of recent handling.

The basket’s bottom was sodden with river water that could have carried him away in a few hours.

The boy’s lips had gone a shocking shade of blue.

“Goddess above,” Elspeth whispered, all her doubts and terrors tumbling into a single note of awe. She reached for the baby, her hands steady for the first time since the previous day, and lifted him from the basket.

His skin was slick, mottled with cold, but when she pressed him to her shoulder, he shook with a living force that startled her. He was heavier than Tamhas, but softer, less substantial, as if his bones had not yet made up their mind to stay.

Elspeth scanned the riverbank—no footprints, no discarded blankets, nothing to suggest how the child had arrived.

She looked at the trees, half-expecting to see a desperate mother lurking in the shadows, watching to see if her abandoned son would be found and saved.

Nothing. Only wind and water and the cries of her own new son.

She pressed the stranger’s cheek to Tamhas’, felt the heat and hunger of both their bodies. This was what she had been denied—twins—and now, by whatever sorcery or mercy, the world had restored the balance. She felt her heart crack open, not with grief but with a terrible, impossible hope.

"Ohmigoddess, a gift from the gods," she murmured, and the words tasted sweet as honey on her tongue. Still, she couldn’t quite leave the spot where the baby was until she tried to find the mother.

She called out, “Hello? Is anyone here?” Just to make sure that the mother wasn’t just a stone’s throw away, but the baby was so soiled, she figured he’d been there for some hours. And he was newly born, just like Tamhas.

She secured the basket to her belt.

With one baby nestled against her body in the carrier, the other cuddled against her body, hidden beneath her shawl to warm him, she tightened her grip on both babies and turned for home, her mind already racing through the practicalities—milk, warmth, shelter.

Perhaps this was a trick, an omen, or some test of her fitness as a mother. She didn’t care. She would raise this stranger as her own.

As she walked, Tamhas stirred and offered a thin, wobbly cry, as if to welcome his new brother. Elspeth smiled, the first true smile since her birthing, and with both boys pressed against her, she made her way back to the croft.

Magnus was busy planting crops, but he quickly stopped when the two crying babies caught his attention.

He rushed to her aid, his feet pounding the muddy ground, and peered at the empty basket, his eyes darting to the wriggling bundle beneath her woolen shawl that wailed like a banshee. "What have ye got there?"

"A wee one left by the river's edge. The gods have answered our prayers."