Page 49 of Highlander’s Claim

Seoras paced the windowless landing before the bedchamber he and Mhairi shared in the main keep. Torchlight jumped off the rough stone walls, barely illuminating the stairs that led both up and down. Aulay’s chest tightened as he remembered himself doing the same during each of Leitis’s labors.

Just like the last time, a woman’s pained screams and moans sounded from behind the door. Seoras looked older. Not a lad of eight and twenty. As Jenny hurried inside the bedchamber, Aulay squeezed his nephew’s shoulder and said the words he didn’t necessarily believe, but the words Seoras needed. “Have faith, lad,” he said.

“Uncle— But what if—”

What if she was like Leitis, unable to give birth to a live and healthy child. What if she died tonight, just like Leitis. What if Seoras would be like Aulay.

A widower after this day. A man with his heart forever broken.

“I ken,” Aulay said. “But have faith.”

Seoras nodded. Aulay opened his mouth to say he’d stay with him and keep him company, but Bhatair’s angry yells came from behind the door.

“…leave! Dinna ye dare come to me with yer outlandish—”

“She’ll die if we don’t act!” came Jenny’s angry voice.

Aulay didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want to leave Seoras alone to deal with his anxiety, and he didn’t want to be another pair of eyes witnessing Mhairi’s labor struggles and make her even more uncomfortable than she might be.

But Bhatair and Jenny needed someone to intervene.

He opened the door. “What is going on?” he barked.

Bhatair knelt next to the bed where Mhairi was kneeling on all fours and moaning in pain. Jenny was next to the bed, and Bhatair was blocking her way with his arm. His face was a pure outrage, his eyebrows drawn together, his mouth a disgusted chasm.

“Aulay, he won’t let me examine her,” Jenny said.

“She is a charlatan!” Bhatair roared. “I told her to stay away. Nae patient of mine will—”

“Bhatair, you must let Jenny help. She’s capable, I assure ye.”

“I will be the judge of that.”

“Ahhhh…” came a pained moan from the woman. “With all respect, Bhatair, ’tis me who should be the judge of that. I’ve been pushing for hours. Nothing is happening. Mayhap the female healer will ken better… I trust Jenny.”

“But Mhairi—” Bhatair contradicted.

“Ye couldna help,” insisted Mhairi. “I should have asked her to stay with me in the first place.”

Jenny exchanged a thankful glance with Aulay and sat on the bed. Bhatair didn’t block her way anymore, only stood and helplessly opened and closed his mouth. A grimace of worry crossed his face.

Seoras came in, and Aulay moved inside the room and closed the door behind him. Seoras was pale, and it seemed he couldn’t breathe. Both men stood by the door with their arms crossed. Aulay didn’t want to be here, but he needed to intervene if Bhatair and Jenny had struggles again, which, by the looks of Bhatair, might happen at any moment.

Jenny asked Mhairi to lie on her back and examined her.

“She’s fully dilated,” she said. “But the baby is still breech.”

“Aye, I already ken that,” said Bhatair. “Mhairi, the only way ye can give birth is to push.”

“I canna,” Mhairi said weakly.

Seoras turned to Aulay and asked, “Uncle. Tell me how did you keep living?”

How, indeed? Aulay was at a loss. Normally he always knew what to do and what to say. This was his Achilles’ heel. “Ye keep existing, lad. Living has ended with her.”

And it may have started again with Jenny.

Mhairi, usually sweet and kind and talkative, was pale and weak. There were blood smears on the bed around her. Her blond hair was pasted against her face like wet seaweed. Seoras and she had been married for a year, and this bairn would be the first child of the next generation. And if it was a lad, it could be one of the next lairds of clan MacDonald.