The harp music stopped. From her corner of the solar, Robena piped up, proving she’d been listening all along. “I wouldnae mind being married. I just havenae found anyone who appreciates my music enough to live with.”
Leanna nodded knowingly. Robena’s music was her life—not just the harp, although that was considered her most lady-like instrument, but all sorts of music—and any man she married would have to accept he’d come second to that in her heart.
“And he’d have to be from somewhere else besides,” Leanna muttered.
When Robena cocked her brow at her, Leanna realized her words likely hadn’t made sense to someone who wasn’t privy to her previous thoughts.
“I just meant we’re related to practically all of the Oliphants. Our great-whatever had so many sons, and they all got married and had bairns, and we’re up to our noses in cousins!”
Wynda nodded serenely. “Third cousins, mayhap. The Church doesnae frown on the marriage of third cousins.”
Consanguinity or not, Leanna had spent her life surrounded by Oliphant men, and not a one of them had struck her as worthwhile enough to spend the rest of her life with.
“ ‘Tis no’ that I dinnae want to be married,” Leanna argued, mostly with herself. “I do want to marry. I want to meet a man who makes my heart—and other bits—beat faster. I want to fall in love—or at least in lust. I want a man I ken will love me, even if ye all say I’m a bit unlovable. I want a man who wants adventure and fun in his life!”
“Wait, what bits are going to beat faster, if no’ yer heart?” Robena asked in confusion. “Yer feet?”
“Have we already covered the fact Leanna doesnae have a penis?” Wynda asked drily.
Nicola nodded in return, as equally bland. “Och, aye. I piled on the usual guilt: all this is her fault, hoped-for-heir, devastating lack of penis, et cetera.”
“Excellent.” Wynda dropped her chin in approval. “Then, Robena, let us put it this way…Leanna wants to feel a beating in her no’-a-penis.”
“Och,” Robena scoffed with a roll of her eyes, as her fingers plucked out discordant notes from the strings in front of her. “Lust. Aye, why did she no’ just say that? She wants a man to make her lady bits go all gooey. Do we no’ all want that?”
Scowling, Nicola turned back to her worktable. “It seems…inconvenient.”
“Aye,” Wynda agreed. “I have far too much to accomplish first.”
“So…” Robena took up the interrogation and shifted sideways, putting aside the harp. “What does Da’s ultimatum have to do with the Ghastly Drummer?”
“Ghostly Drummer,” Leanna corrected unhelpfully.
Robena scowled.
“Well…” Wynda took a deep breath, and her eyes unfocused slightly, as they always did when she was preparing to lecture them on history. “Our father’s father’s father’s father—”
“That’s too many fathers,” interrupted Leanna.
Wynda ignored her. “—was named William Oliphant, and he had nae legitimate sons. He did have a daughter, but decided she was unsuitable to lead the clan.”
“Coira would’ve hated him,” murmured Robena, smirking at Leanna.
“And he had a half-dozen or more illegitimate sons,” continued Wynda, “each with qualities befitting a future laird. William decided that whichever of his sons married, and produced a son first, would become the next laird.”
Leanna nodded. “Da couldn’t even come up with an original way to control our lives. He had to steal one from his great-whatever-grandfather.”
“As I recall,” Wynda explained, “’twas the son least expected whose wife produced a grandson first. But he, with the help of his brothers, led the clan to a prosperous future. Or,” she corrected, “in our case, a past.” She frowned. “I think.”
“So this was our great-great-grandfather?” Robena clarified.
“Our father is Olaf, his father was Graham, his father was Kiergan, the unsuitable bastard son, whose father was William, who came up with the plan in the first place,” Wynda agreed.
Leanna huffed in exasperation. “But what does this have to do with the Ghostly Drummer?”
“I dinnae ken.” Wynda blinked. “Ye were the one who declared ‘twas his fault.”
Apparently, she had been listening.