I was the duke's second wife, chosen because all the other women of my family, mother, aunts and sisters had all had many children. Duke William was not young and he desperately needed an heir, his previous marriage of twenty years having failed to produce one for him.
William had killed his first wife to clear a path to securing a second marriage. Oh, it was never proven or openly discussed but everyone knew it was so. The entire court was aware of it but no one dared to say a word. It was not wise to anger a powerful man like the duke.
Of course that's why I married him. One does not deny William anything that he takes a fancy to. So when I was scarcely a woman I was wed to a man several times my age and for whom I had no feelings of personal affection at all. I didn't complain or question it. That was simply the way things were done, and financially and socially I certainly could have done much worse.
Years went by swiftly and I entered into my twenties. I wasn't necessarily unhappy in my marriage, but apathetic might be a better way to describe my feelings on the subject. I was provided with the sort of life that few ever experience so I had no real reason to complain...at least not until William began to become frustrated about his lacking an heir.
After years of marriage and obediently fulfilling my wifely duties in the bedchamber, we still had no child. Not even a miscarriage. William, as I say, became frustrated. I became anxious, remembering the fate of his first wife.
My older brother became concerned for me as well. It was his suspicion that the infertility was not mine, but my husband's. Not that it would be of any profit to suggest that to William. Andrew, my brother, came up with a plan that he thought might save my life. He thought that I should lie with another man so that I might become pregnant.
At first I resisted. I was an honest woman who had never been with a man other than William in my entire life. Gradually however, I began to become desperate and to rethink Andrew's idea. William was becoming indifferent to me, and sometimes he hurt me when he came to my bed. I began to dread his presence and to fear that my life might be in danger. If I could become pregnant, I knew it would secure my position and possibly keep me alive.
Andrew began to discreetly search for someone to come in to me. Our family had ample amounts of money and bribery would have been easy if not for the terror that everyone had for my husband. Not one man was willing to do this service.
And so my desperation increased. As it did, a plan formed in my mind, based upon the original one of Andrew's. Andrew was married and had fathered many children with his wife so that I knew he was fertile. He was my brother, so no one would suspect our being alone together. We looked alike so that if he fathered a child with me, people would not notice features in the child that might be strikingly different from either mine or my husband's. It would be assumed that the child simply resembled me. The idea of bedding my own brother, of having a child by him, was sickening. And yet I was very desperate and willing to do anything to survive.
Andrew was angry when I suggested my plan to him. He slapped me, called me a witch, and did not speak to me again for weeks. Chastened and humiliated, I fell into depression.
There came an evening when my husband was away on a hunting trip that my younger brother, Allan, came to see me. I did not see Allan that often as he was the rake of the family. He drank, gambled, and visited prostitutes. By the time he was eighteen he'd fathered three bastard children by three different women and by the time in which this story takes place, he had seven in total.
Allan was laughing that night when he came to see me, much amused by something. But then Allan rarely did take anything seriously. It was one of the things about him that vexed my father.
"What are you sniggering about?" I asked.
"Andrew. He told me about your falling out."
I blushed, immediately embarrassed and irritated with Andrew for his indelicacy. "It was wrong of him to discuss it,"
"I agree. I never go about bragging about all the women who want to bed me. Well, not often at least."
"Father will disown you if you continue your wastrel ways."
Allan laughed, "Father is paying off the blacksmith this week. I knocked up that daughter of his."
I frowned in disapproval.
"Anne, why didn't you invite me to your bed?" asked Allan with unusual seriousness.
"Do not mock me," I said, irritated.
"I'm not. I would have agreed. I never turn down a willing female. If you'd asked me to do what you asked Andrew to do, I am willing to promise that you would be round with my child by now."
I felt distrustful of his words, Andrew's slap tingling on my cheek as though it had happened moment's prior. And yet I felt a slight stirring of interest. "You would bed your own sister?"
"I expect that my sister is made as any woman is."
I looked at him searchingly, trying to discern whether or not he was teasing.
Allan shrugged. "The womb of a duke's wife seems a more fitting place for my seed than the dirty cunt of a blacksmith's daughter. Not that her cunt wasn't very tight and wet and pleasant to use."
I blinked, slightly shocked by his vulgarity. I clung to the important part of what he had said, "Would you do that? Would you give me a child?"
"Of course, Anne. And I wouldn't say a word to anyone about it. I'm not interested in children myself --- William can think it's his and no one will be the wiser. I'm only interested in the pleasure of making it. And of course I have affection for you, Anne. I wouldn't want to see harm come to you just because William isn't man enough to father a child and wants to blame you for it."
"Let us lie together then." I agreed, another blush rising in my cheeks at the thought of the abominable thing I was agreeing to do. Surely hell holds a special place for those who commit incest.
Allan smiled smugly. "You are so beautiful. Do you know I always wondered what it would be like? I must confess that the idea of bedding you, of filling you with my seed, is a most attractive one."
"Come with me," I said, turning and leading the way to the bedchamber.
"The servants?" Allan asked.
"They know not to disturb me when my family is here and William will be away all week," I said shakily. A glance back over my shoulder showed me that my brother was following, shedding clothes as he came.
"You will be pregnant by the next full moon, " he confidently predicted "And a pleasant time will be had by both."
I didn't reply. I had led him to the bedchamber and was standing beside the bed, frozen with the fear of what I was doing.
Allan was quite at his ease, not at all concerned by the immorality of the situation. "The whores in town tell me that I have a dick like a horse's," he said cheerfully, "Do you agree with them, sister?"
"I am not a whore," I said primly. Though I privately admitted that he was certainly much better endowed than William was.
He smiled. "I know. And I know this is difficult for you," he said, his eyes softening. "But have you ever stopped to consider that perhaps those whores that you so malign have advantages that you do not?"
