She awoke one morning ravenous, and dressing, hurried to the family hall to join Kieran and Charlie in breaking their fast. She ate with enthusiasm. A bowl of oat stir-about with dried apples and heavy cream. Fresh bread smeared with butter and topped with a wedge of sharp cheddar. Two hard-boiled eggs, liberally salted, and topped off with a mug of sweet cider. Suddenly, however, her stomach rebelled. It rolled, and gurgled loudly, and then before Fortune could even stand up, she vomited her breakfast back upon the high board with a groan.
Both men looked somewhat horrified, and jumped up lest they be sprayed with her spew.
"Sweetheart, are you all right?" Kieran asked her, concerned.
Before Fortune might answer her husband, however, her brother spoke up. "You haven't told him, you vixen, have you?"
"Told me what?" Kieran demanded, looking from his wife to his brother-in-law.
"She's with child," Charlie burst out before his sister might concoct some believable tale which he would then have to either agree with, or end up calling her a little liar. "She was planning to tell you."
"When?" Kieran said dryly. "When we were at sea?"
"Aye," Fortune said in a tiny voice. "It seemed best."
Kieran snorted. "You would endanger yourself and our child merely to have your own way?"
The servants were now hurrying to clean up the mess, and the two men brought Fortune down to the fireside. Rois, who had seen what had happened, brought her mistress a mug of peppermint tea.
"Sip it slow, m'lady," she advised. "It will settle your belly. Then I will bring you some dry bread."
Fortune sat down in a tapestried chair. Looking up at her angry husband she said, "Will you go to Mary's Land without me, Kieran?"
"Of course not!" he almost shouted at her.
"Which is why I did not tell you," Fortune replied.
"You are not making any sense, Fortune," he told her.
"Aye, I am, if you will but hear me out, and stop roaring at me, Kieran Devers. I will not be howled at!" Then she burst into tears, sobbing piteously.
He was totally bewildered. She was in the wrong, and now she attempted to wheedle him with her tears. Well, he would not be manipulated by his fine lady. What she needed was a spanking, and had she not been with child, he would have given it to her.
"Women's emotions are outrageously sensitive when they are with child," his brother-in-law said calmly. "Give her a moment, and it will pass," he chuckled. "Fortune, stop weeping, sister, and tell us your reasons for being so secretive."
Fortune sniffled, but then she managed to contain herself. "If we do not go to Mary's Land with the first ships," she said, "we shall not get the best lands available. We need to be among the first! We are not influential milords, speculating with a new colony, Kieran; we are among the few of the colonists of wealth who will remain in Mary's Land, and build the colony. Most of the nobles going, if indeed they are even going and not simply sending their agents, hope for a quick profit. They will populate their lands with whoever they can, and then resell those properties to the highest bidder.
"We are bringing over horses next year. We need open meadows for them. We cannot spend our time clearing forests. If we are among the first colonists we will get those meadows, and shall receive our lands from Lord Baltimore himself. If we wait, we shall be forced to purchase those lands from others. We have to go, Kieran! We cannot remain here!"
"Why not?" he demanded. "There are Catholics in England. Could we not purchase a home here, and live quietly?"
Fortune shook her head. "You know the condition under which Catholics live in England. And the Puritans gain more power every day. Even the king isn't entirely safe from their matterings, and everything the queen does is criticized. And why? Because she is a Catholic. You think me selfish for wanting to go even though I am with child. Mistress Jones will see me safely through my travail, and I am not afraid. Yet you, too, are every bit as selfish as I am."
"Me? How?" He was astounded by her accusation.
"You have told me yourself that your faith is not particularly strong, and that you clung to your Catholicism because it was all you had left of your mother. I think you also did it to irritate your stepmother. You gave her the perfect weapon to use against you so that she was able to steal Mallow Court from you. Mallow Court had one thousand acres, and Maguire's Ford was another three thousand. We might have been a power in Ulster, and certainly in Fermanagh, Kieran, but that you sought to cling to the past, and argue about religion like the rest of them. I love you, Kieran Devers. I gave up a great estate for you, and never have I had a moment's regret. I am to bear your child in early spring. If you do not want me to travel to Mary's Land under those circumstances I will remain here in England; but by God, husband, you shall go with that expedition, and claim us our three thousand acres of well-watered and fertile lands! You are a man now, and have great responsibilities to bear. I am not Lady Jane. You can no longer hide behind your faith, using it to excuse your pride, Kieran Devers!"
He was speechless, and even when Fortune got up, and left the family hall, he could not find the words to stop her.
"Your first dressing down, I presume," Charlie said with a small attempt at humor.
Kieran nodded.
"The women in this family have tempers it is best not to rouse. They are intelligent, and proud, Kieran. My sister is correct when she says you have to go to Mary's Land even if she can't right now. It is no longer just you and Fortune. You have all those people back at Maguire's Ford depending on you to lead them to the New World. You have a child coming. You cannot run away from your duty now, I fear."
"How did one so young learn so much?" Kieran said, finally regaining his powers of speech.
"I had good teachers. My great-grandmother, Lady de Marisco. My mother, and stepfather. And, by nature, my lineage has afforded me great opportunities. One grows up quickly in a royal court, Kieran, particularly if you wish to survive and prosper. Being the king's nephew was never enough for me."
"It's all so strange to me," Kieran admitted. "I never understood the kind of family I was marrying into when I fell in love with your sister. We are so provincial by comparison, but I never realized it until I came to England. The moment I saw Fortune I knew I had to have her, and yet now, I wonder that I have not bit off more than I can chew. Am I a man who can carve out an empire in a new world? I wonder. Will I disappoint Fortune if I cannot? And our child? What of our child?" He ran a big hand through his dark hair in frustration.
"First of all," Charlie said, "you must understand that all the women in this family work with their men. They have this rather irritating knack of bearing and raising their young while managing their affairs quite successfully. Accept this rather strange gift that God has bestowed upon you, Kieran. Sit down with my sister, and decide how you will manage the business of colonizing your bit of the New World. Understand that you must go, and she must stay to have the child. She will come next year. By that time you will have a house built for them. You would not want to stay behind, and leave the responsibility of building a home for your family to others. There is nothing in this that cannot be managed, my friend," Charlie concluded, putting a comforting hand on his brother-in-law's broad shoulder.