Highland Raven

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I’ve been defamed. The Bard of Avon dubbed me a villainess, an angry, evil murderess. I’m forever painted as an ambitious, blood-hungry queen. They’d have you take me for a mad woman. Slander. Small men tell lies. Poets tell half-truths. Maybe I’m a bit mad, but who wouldn’t be after all I have seen? Regardless, I don’t want you to believe such deceits. I don’t want my name to go down in the annals of times with such epitaphs. My name. What is my name? Have you ever heard it? Did your professor of English ever utter it? My name is quite the mystery. My father gave me one, my aunt favored me with another, and the Bard, well, he called me by my husband’s name: Lady Macbeth. But I am more than these simple monikers.

I was born in the year 1010 of an Irish princess and an heir to the throne of Scotland. My mother was the reward from a raid into Ireland and a false treaty thereafter. She’s forgotten now, but I want you to know her name. I owe her that. They called her Emer after the Irish legend of Cú Chulainn. She was tall, thin, and had blonde hair that stretched to the floor. My mother died a short nine months after marrying my father, whose name was Boite. My beginning brought her end. They believe she lived sixteen years. Not a long life. And me, I came into the world killing.

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