Sidra woke to an empty bed. She lingered in the blankets for a moment, letting her eyes adjust to the dawn. She slid her hand to Torin’s side of the mattress and found it cold, as if he had been gone for a while.
Her heart was heavy as she rose. She was surprised to find a fire burning in the hearth, a cauldron of parritch cooking, and the tea kettle simmering. But there was no sign of Torin in the cottage, and Sidra frowned as she peeked out the front shutters. The yard was empty, save for the plants, dancing to the morning breeze.
She went to the back door and cracked it open.
He was there, kneeling in the garden. Sidra watched for a moment, startled as she realized Torin held a kitten in one hand while he weeded with the other. He was uprooting all the wild things she had let grow in her herbs and vegetables, setting them aside in a pile. She glanced down when she felt something claw at her stocking. The other cats had gathered on the stoop, where he had set out a bowl of milk for them.
She didn’t know what to think, but she was smiling when she looked at Torin again.
He hadn’t heard the door open, and he steadily continued to work, eventually setting the kitten down so he could gather up all the weeds. He stood and walked to the edge of the garden, where he tossed the weeds over the stone wall. Sidra was amused by that—she always took the weeds to a pile down the hill—and stepped out to greet him.
Torin saw her as he returned. The corner of his mouth tugged upward, as if he were embarrassed to be caught gardening.
“You’re up early,” Sidra remarked, hoping to hear his voice.
He only lifted his dirt-steaked hand, and she noticed the wound on his forearm was still weeping. Her mood instantly fell, and she beckoned him inside.
Torin washed his hands before sitting at the table, enduring her ministrations. She saw that the wound on his shoulder had closed up overnight, leaving behind a cold, gleaming scar. The cut of fear. But the wound that had stolen his voice and words still festered, and Sidra swallowed as she applied a new salve and rebandaged it.
“Perhaps I should find another healer to tend to you,” she said, gathering the soiled linens.
Torin was quick to stop her, grasping her chemise. He shook his head, adamant. His faith in her was absolute, as if it had never crossed his mind that she might be unable to restore his voice. To distract her from her statement, he rose and served the parritch.
Sidra sat when he motioned her to, and she let him fill her bowl with clumpy oats.
“I didn’t realize you knew how to cook parritch,” she said.
Torin made a motion with his hand, as if to say, What islander doesn’t know how to make parritch?
The oats smelled a bit burned, but Sidra added some cream and berries and was able to force a few spoonfuls down before Torin tasted his own cooking. His face puckered, but he scraped the bowl clean, wasting nothing.
His appetite was back. He was doing chores around the house, which he had never done before. Sidra knew he was trying to prove to her that he was better, so she would permit him to escort Adaira at noontide.
Together, they washed the bowls and the cauldron, where burnt oats were now welded to the bottom. They both dressed for the day, and Sidra asked Torin to drape and pin the plaid over her again. She read through her grandmother’s old healing account while Torin returned to the yard, determined to free the garden of weeds. He left the back door open so he could behold Sidra from time to time as he moved down the rows.
She watched him, thinking how much he had changed over the past few days.
She closed her eyes when the ache within her turned vibrant, as if she had stepped into the point of a sword.
She had given her vow to him four years ago. She had chosen to weave her future with Torin’s, because she knew life would be good with him. She would have a little companion in Maisie. She would have her own croft at last; her father and brother would no longer hover over her. She would have a cottage to conduct her profession of healing, a kail yard to grow all the things she loved. And it felt like her own place, because Torin was rarely there, which Sidra liked in the beginning.
But he would come if she needed him. All she had to do was stand in her garden and speak his name into the wind, and he would come when the whisper on the breeze found him. When he recognized her voice within it, whether the wind blew from the north, the south, the east, or the west. Sometimes it took hours for him to arrive, but he always faithfully answered her.
She remembered one particular instance. A spring evening when she had summoned him, how he had appeared only moments after she breathed his name. He had arrived with dusk-tangled hair and worried eyes, thinking something was wrong. There had been nothing amiss, only the two of them standing in a quiet cottage with elderflower wine on the table and a chemise with loose draws at Sidra’s collarbones, ready to fall.
Even then, it had not been love but something like hunger. Sidra had never hoped for the impassioned love that bards sang of, the sort that warmed blood like fire. She had always trusted Torin, even knowing who and what he was, but she had never expected him to love her as he once had loved Donella.
He and Donella had been of one mind. He and Sidra were stark opposites; he killed while she healed.
Sidra opened her eyes. They were brimming with tears, and she blinked them away, trying to set her focus on her grandmother’s words. She read one salve recipe of Senga’s, and then notes about how to cure a cough before she closed the book.
How can I heal him when I haven’t healed myself?
She needed to tell Torin how she was feeling. She needed to be honest with him, to share the most vulnerable parts of herself. But Sidra realized she was afraid.
She was afraid to be so open with him, uncertain how he would respond. Would he want to break their vows? Would he want to let her go? Would he want to continue life with her, just the two of them?
The thought of drifting away from him created such agony within her that she had no choice but to admit that she had indeed been pierced by a blade, one that made a heart wound she didn’t know how to mend.
There was a glimmer on the other side of the table. Donella materialized with her diaphanous beauty, and Sidra stiffened. The ghost had never visited her while Torin was on the grounds, and Sidra didn’t know what to think of it now. If he happened to glance into the house, would he catch a glimpse of her?
“Donella,” Sidra greeted her, speaking in a low tone so her words wouldn’t drift beyond the door.
“He is afraid, Sidra,” Donella said, and her voice was faint, as if she were about to fully fade. As if her wandering soul had found its peace at last.
“What does he fear?” Sidra thought she knew the answer, but she decided to ask it, knowing Donella had insight she didn’t.
“He is afraid of losing you, first in heart, then in body. And if you follow me to the grave, he will not be far behind you. His soul has found its counterpart in yours, and he belongs with you, even after Death’s sting.”
Sidra flushed, her blood coursing through her. She let a moment pass before she whispered, “I don’t know if he wants to stay with me. I can’t … I can’t even heal him when he needs me the most.”
“You must heal yourself first, Sidra,” Donella said.
Sidra, wide eyed, stared at the ghost. Without another word, Donella evanesced with a sigh.
She decided she couldn’t bear to dwell on those parting words. Sidra made a second breakfast, which Torin was thankful for. They ate in the sunlight on the back stoop, watching the kittens scurry across the garden path.
“I’ll find a home for them soon,” Sidra said, ignoring the welt in her throat.
Torin touched her knee. No, they’re fine, she read in his hand, in his eyes.
She nodded, and they remained there a while longer, quiet and warmed by the sun.
When Adaira came for Torin, Sidra stood in the front yard with Yirr, watching them depart. Their entourage soon melted into the hills, pressing north, and Sidra stood like a statue until the afternoon brought an unexpected squall.
The rain dampened her dress, brought her to her senses.
She turned to go inside, but the house felt too empty without Maisie and Torin. She didn’t want to wait inside its shell; she wanted to disregard the overwhelming voice in her mind. One that was whispering for her to look inward, to acknowledge her many pieces.
To heal herself.
I’ll go to Graeme’s, she thought, shutting the door and beginning to walk the hill between their crofts, Yirr trotting dutifully behind her. Graeme would be able to distract her with his stories of the mainland.
But she stopped in the heather, her heart pounding.
This was the place where her faith had first cracked. The ground where she had been attacked and had come to know firsthand the sinister ways of the world. And she heard a beloved voice in her mind, as if it were carried on the wind. Her grandmother said, Go to the place where your faith began.
Sidra stood in the storm until the rain hid her tears, and yet she didn’t go to Graeme’s, which would have been the easiest path. She yearned for her grandmother, and she turned and walked south with Yirr, into the mist of the valley.
Adaira waited on the abandoned northern road that led into the west. The old signpost was weathered and gray but still stood, even after centuries of being forgotten. Waist-high weeds had grown up through the packed dirt, marking the clan line with thorny stems and yellow blooms.
The Aithwood surrounded them, granting Adaira only a slender view of the Breccans’ land. From where she stood, it looked the same as the east, a thick gathering of pines, junipers, oaks, and rowans, with a rug of bracken on the forest floor. She wondered what it would feel like to step foot on her enemy’s territory. If they would truly welcome her, or if Moray had been playing her for a fool.
She still had yet to hear from him, but she could only surmise that his mother had learned of the raid and read his post, coming across Adaira’s ultimatum.
It was odd, how obliging the Laird of the West was being. Innes had never been so before now. She had always permitted the raids to continue in their cycle of violence and thievery.
But what would you do if your clan was starving in winter? Adaira asked herself, her eyes fixed on the overgrown curve of western road. What would you do if your people were bloodthirsty, their children skin and bones when the ice arrived?
Adaira wasn’t sure, but she wouldn’t be stealing lasses from the clan who was feeding them.
She didn’t know what Torin would advise, but Jack had been adamant that Adaira withhold the information about the missing girls.
“If Innes knows about it,” he had said to her that morning, “then she is complicit and she isn’t an ally to us in this matter, no matter how gracious she appears today. It would be better for us to gain our confirmation another way, and to take our lasses back by surprise.”
Such as a raid.
Adaira almost laughed, envisioning Tamerlaines secretly crossing into the west, to take back what belonged to them. But it was a heady imagining, and it had haunted her sleep at night.
She felt that Jack’s advice was sound, and while she wanted to make an emotional decision about the girls, she knew she had to be patient and be wise. Above all, she didn’t want the lasses harmed or moved to a different location.
She had to maintain the appearance of ignorance.
Adaira continued to wait. They had arrived early. Jack and Torin stood close behind her on the road, and ten other guards were stationed, deep into the woods but within sight. She didn’t anticipate a skirmish, but neither had she thought a raid would happen in summer.
Sweat traced down the curve of her back. It was warm in the forest, and the wind was quiet that day.
At last, Adaira could hear the Breccans approach. Clomps of hooves and the rattle of a wagon disturbed the peace of the woods, and she flexed her hands.
A breath later, she took her first glimpse of Innes Breccan.
The Laird of the West rode a great horse, and she was dressed as a warrior—in knee-high boots, a tunic, a leather jerkin, and a swath of blue plaid. She was older, but the strength gathered around her, as if she were a storm. The silver shone in her long blond hair, contrasting with the golden circlet on her brow. Her face was narrow, difficult to look away from, and woad tattoos danced up her throat and along the backs of her hands and fingers. Her eyes were keen as she brought her horse to a halt, just before the clan line. She met Adaira’s stare, and there her gaze rested for a heavy moment, as if she were measuring her opponent.
Adaira stood in her leather armor and crimson plaid, her face carefully guarded. But her bones were buzzing with tension. She was beholding her enemy, the nemesis of her clan. She was seeing her face-to-face, with only a few handbreadths between them.
Perhaps she comes to kill me, Adaira thought, even though Innes was unarmed. The leather scabbard hung empty from her belt. Perhaps this will be the beginning of the war.
Behind Innes, a wagon came to a halt. She had brought only three guards with her, although perhaps there were more, waiting in the woods. She dismounted and moved to stand before Adaira.
“Heiress,” she said, her voice deep and smoky as a forge.
“Laird,” Adaira responded.
“I have recovered most of everything that was taken,” Innes replied. “However, the livestock has been lost. I can offer only gold coins in reparation.”
Adaira was quiet, wondering if the Elliotts’ cows and sheep had already been slaughtered. It inspired a shiver in her spine, but she nodded.
“The coins will suffice for now.”
“May I cross over to your side?” Innes asked, and her gaze shifted to Torin. She must have recognized him as the Captain of the East Guard, since he was standing armed and directly behind Adaira.
“You alone have permission,” Adaira replied.
Innes nodded and walked to the wagon. She took a crate, loaded with sacks of grain, and walked it over the clan line. She set it down at Adaira’s feet before returning to fetch another crate. One by one, the laird brought three crates total, brimming with the Elliotts’ winter stores. After that, she stood face-to-face with Adaira and extended a purse of coins.
“This should be enough, I hope?” she asked.
Adaira accepted the payment and looked inside the purse. It brimmed with gold, and she nodded, thinking this was overpayment for the missing cows and sheep.
It was odd, how generous Innes was being. Adaira didn’t know what to make of her, whether she was genuine or only engaged in a diversion, with another betrayal soon to follow.
As if reading her thoughts, Innes said, “I hope this ill decision of my clan’s can be forgiven, and that the trade you suggested can be continued between us.”
“I’ve been speaking to Moray about the trade,” Adaira said, making a point to glance around at the guards Innes had brought. “I was hoping to see him today.”
“My son is currently disciplining the men who raided your lands,” Innes replied, and her voice turned a shade cooler. “Or else he would have accompanied me today.”
Adaira felt uneasy. This meeting could still go awry. She said, “We also desire to move forward with the trade, and there is a specific item that we would like to receive from your clan.”
“Name it, heiress,” Innes said. “And I will bring it myself to the next exchange.”
Adaira held up the glass vial. The Orenna flower had yet to wilt, and the golden sheen on its petals glistened in the light. She watched Innes’s face closely, and the laird’s brow rose.
“Your clan desires the Orenna flower?” she asked.
“It grows in the west?” Adaira countered.
“It does,” Innes replied. “Although it is quite useless to us, as the spirits are weak.”
“The same can’t be said of the spirits in the east,” Adaira said. “If you can provide us with a basket of flowers, then I can bring resources your clan needs to prepare for winter.”
“Very well,” Innes said. “I will harvest these flowers for you. Give me three days to prepare, and we can meet again for the trade, in a place of your choosing.”
“Agreed,” Adaira said.
She watched as Innes returned to her side of the clan line. She mounted her horse and gave Adaira a nod in farewell before she trotted away, the guards following her with the empty wagon.
Adaira released a shaky breath. She turned only when she felt it was safe to, and even then, Torin immediately guarded her back. Jack, who had been a quiet support, fell into stride beside her. She waited to speak until they had emerged from the woods and returned to their horses, hobbled beneath an elm tree.
“I have at least one thread of proof now,” Adaira said.
Jack frowned. “Which one?”
She met his gaze and held up the Orenna again. “Moray Breccan has lied to me.”
Jack parted ways with Adaira in Sloane, making a stop at Una’s forge. His dirk was sheathed at his side, and his heart was pounding as he waited to speak with her. Una was bustling about her work with sharp focus, and she had several apprentices working with her, one her own daughter, who pumped the bellows and hurried to bring her mother tools.
“Forgive me for interrupting your work,” Jack said when Una had a spare moment to speak with him. “Is everything well?”
She only arched her brow, the silver in her black hair catching the afternoon light. “Of course it is, Jack. What have you brought me today?”
He set the dirk in her waiting hands. “I would like to know who commissioned you to make this blade. Do you remember his name? It was most likely a long time ago.”
“I remember all my clients and all of my blades,” Una said, continuing to scrutinize the dirk. “And I fear I can’t tell you the name you seek, Jack.”
“Why is that?”
Una leveled her dark eyes at him. “Because I didn’t make this blade.”
He frowned. “Are you certain?”
She laughed, but he could tell she was annoyed by his question. “Do you remember each piece of music you compose? Recognize each instrument you have ever held and played?”
Jack felt his face warm. “Forgive me, Una. I meant no offense.”
“None is taken, Jack.” She handed the dirk back to him.
“I merely thought …”
She waited, and he sighed.
“You are the most skilled blacksmith in the east,” he continued. “And whoever had this blade forged … I believe he would want only the finest hands to create it.”
“It’s fine work, I won’t deny it,” she said, her gaze lingering on the dirk. “But it’s not mine.”
“Is there a way to discover what enchantment it holds?”
“There’s a way, yes. And it’s not by looking at it.”
He knew what she was implying. He slid the dirk back into its sheath.
“As I thought. Thank you for your help, Una.”
Una watched as he began to drift into the street. “Be careful, Jack.”
He lifted his hand to her, acknowledging her admonition. But his thoughts were troubled. If this blade had been forged in the east, Una would have known it.
He retreated to his castle chambers for the remainder of the afternoon. He didn’t pass Adaira in the corridors, and he imagined she was with her father.
When Jack removed his plaid, he noticed that a thread in the wool had started to unravel. He stared at it for a disbelieving moment, tracing the pattern with his fingertip. Part of the enchantment was gone, and he could see that the green fabric had lost its luster. He swallowed hard as he sat at his desk. Whatever secret his mother had woven into this plaid was coming to light.
Jack attempted to distract himself by working on his composition. The ballad for the wind was nearly complete, but he could focus on it only for so long. His mind was swimming with questions, and he eventually unsheathed the dirk once more, to study the slender blade in the fading sunlight.
He had never felt the sting of an enchanted weapon. And he never wanted to, especially after witnessing Torin’s most recent wounds. But if his father had this blade made for him … Jack needed to know what enchantment it possessed. His hands trembled as he stood up from his desk and walked to the fire that burned in his hearth, deliberating.
A small cut, he decided, remembering how swiftly these sorts of wounds healed. A shallow slice on the forearm.
Jack drew in a breath as he traced a cut, just above his wrist. The dirk was sharp; it gleamed as it bit his skin, and his blood welled in the mark, bright as summer wine.
He waited to see which enchantment would greet him, his blood dripping onto the hearth stone between his boots. He waited, and yet nothing happened. He didn’t feel compelled to flee, he wasn’t afraid, he didn’t lose his voice. He didn’t feel despair, nor did he feel anything taken from him, like memories or peace or confidence.
Jack stared at the cut and his blood, full of wonder and irritation.
That was when a knock sounded on the hidden door.
“Jack?” Adaira’s voice melted through the wood. “Jack, may I enter?”
He froze, torn between telling her no and telling her yes. He hid his hands and dirk behind his back. “Come in.”
Adaira opened the door and stepped into his chamber. She had changed since their meeting with Innes. Her hair was loose, untamed waves drifting past her shoulders, and she wore a simple black gown. She noticed his stiff posture, his hesitation. How his hands were clasped out of sight.
She drew closer to him. “Are you hiding something from me?”
And that was when he discovered the enchantment of his father’s dirk. Jack wanted to respond one way, to give her an evasive reply. But he was compelled to speak truth, and it spilled from his mouth.
“Yes. An enchanted blade.”
If Adaira was surprised by his stilted reply, she gave no evidence of it. She reached out to touch his arm, light but confident, and her fingers traced downwards, where the weapon was clenched in his fingers. She brought his stubborn hand forward and studied the dirk’s gleam, the bloody edge of the steel.
“What have you done?” she whispered.
Once again, he was compelled to respond with the truth, and he ground out, “Like a fool, I cut myself to discover which enchantment it holds.”
Adaira reached for his other hand and drew forth his bleeding forearm. “A truth blade then?” she mused. Her gaze united with his, and he saw the mirth gathering within her. “You know that while your blood runs from this blade, you are compelled to answer anything I ask you with brutal honesty.”
“I know that all too well.”
Jack was eaten up by dread as he waited for Adaira to begin asking him all manner of uncomfortable questions. But when the silence deepened, he remembered how she often surprised him. She was not one who conformed to his assumptions, but one who shattered them.
She took the hilt of the dirk from him and cut her palm. Her blood welled, and he wanted to scold her. But her voice emerged first, sharper than any blade he had ever felt.
“I want no secrets between us, Jack.”
His gaze dropped as he studied their wounds. He thought about the blood vow that often took place at weddings, the deepest and strongest of bindings when palms were cut and laid against each other, blood mingling. He and Adaira hadn’t taken that vow, and they wouldn’t do so unless they decided to remain married after the term of the handfast.
And yet seeing Adaira’s blood and her willingness to meet his vulnerability, wound for wound … the air began to change between them.
“I want to talk about the meeting with the west, Jack,” she said, her voice breaking his introspection. “But before I do … let us speak as old friends who have been separated for many years and who realize they now have much ground to regain. Tell me something about you that I don’t know, and I will do the same.”
She walked to the chair that sat before the hearth, and Jack followed with two strips of cloth, one for her and one for him. She bound her hand as he wrapped his forearm, and afterward he drew up another chair to sit across from her. He realized he wanted to behold her fully, no matter what words sounded from his mouth.
He was quiet for a moment, uncertain. But then he began to speak, and it was like a door unlocking and opening just a sliver, but enough to allow the light to spill in.
“When I was younger,” Jack said, “I wanted nothing more than to be worthy of the clan and to find my place. Growing up without a father only fueled those feelings, and I longed to be claimed by something, by someone. I could think of no better honor than to join the East Guard by proving myself to Torin.”
“As I already know,” said Adaira, but she smiled. “That is, perhaps, the most common ground between us. We once dreamt of the same thing.”
“So we did,” he agreed in a reminiscent tone. “But sometimes you discover your place and purpose is not as you once thought. When I was sent away to the mainland, I was full of bitterness and anger. I thought Mirin wanted nothing to do with me, and so after my homesickness eased, I began to settle in at the university and I swore that I would never step foot on Cadence again. Despite those claims, I still dreamt of home when I slept. I could see Cadence and her hills and mountains and the lochs. I could smell the herbs in the kail yard and hear the gossip riding the wind. I can’t tell you when the dreams began to fade, when it was that I had fully convinced myself I didn’t belong here. But I suppose it happened in my third year of schooling, when I had my first harp lesson. As soon as I passed my fingers over the strings, the storm and anger that had endlessly brewed in me dimmed, and I realized that I could indeed prove myself worthy of something.”
“And so you have, bard,” Adaira said.
He smiled. “Now tell me something about you that I don’t know, wife.”
“That might be more of a challenge,” she said, settling deeper into the chair and crossing her legs. “I fear my life is often on display.”
“But we are two old friends who have just been reunited,” Jack reminded her. “A stormy expanse of water and an unforgiving stretch of kilometers have been between us for a decade.”
“Then let me begin as you did,” said Adaira. “My greatest aspiration was the same as yours. I wanted to join the guard and fight at Torin’s side. He was like an older brother to me, and ever since I can remember, I have yearned for a sibling. I saw how the guard were like brothers and sisters, like one united family, and I wanted to be a part of that comradery.
“But my father swiftly cut that dream away. It was too dangerous for me to join the guard. Being their only living child and heiress … there were many things I couldn’t do. My mum saw the anger in me and tried to ease it in the only way she knew how. She began to teach me how to play the harp. She thought I might find myself in the music, but while it calmed the storm in someone like you, Jack, it only deepened the resentment within me.
“I was young and full of spite, and I scorned the lessons she tried to give me. The music would not take to my hands, and all I could think of was the guard I was not able to join. It is the greatest regret of my life now. To think back on those years and how I wasted those moments with her. There are some days when I can hardly bear to look upon her harp, because I am seized by the desire to find a way to step back in time, to choose differently. If I could only speak to my younger self … oh, the things I would say to her. I never once imagined I would lose my mum so soon, and I long for those moments with her, for the music she once tried to give me.
“These things I share with you, Jack … they are like thorns in my mouth. I rarely speak of my regrets and my heartache. As a laird, I am not to dwell on such things. But I also know that to hold my tongue and remain silent is sometimes the greatest regret of all for our kind. So let me say this to you: a small part of me looks at you and sounds a warning. He will leave after a year and a day. He will return to the mainland, where his heart yearns to be.
“I tell myself I should remain guarded against you, even as we are fastened together. And yet another side of me believes that you and I could make something of this arrangement. That you and I are complements, that we are made to clash and sharpen each other like iron. That you and I will stay bound together by that which is nameless and runs deeper than vows, until the very end, when the isle takes my bones into the ground and my name is nothing but memory carved into a headstone.”
Jack stood. She had captivated him, and he needed a distraction before the truth spilled out of him. Before he confessed how his feelings for her were becoming entwined with everything—his dreams, aspirations, desires. He wanted to reassure her, to answer her without words, but first he walked to his bureau, where a bottle of birk wine sat.
He poured them each a sparkling glass. Her fingers were cold as they brushed his, accepting his offering. She didn’t remain seated but rose, so their eyes were nearly level, with little space between them. They drank to their wounds, their regrets, and their hopes, to the past, to how the choices each had made unknowingly brought them back together.
“My heart doesn’t yearn for the mainland,” he said at last. “I thought I told you, Adaira, that it’s safe to say I won’t be returning.”
“And yet you’ve told me from the beginning that the mainland is your home,” she countered.
Jack wanted to tell her that he had been withering away there, bit by bit. So infinitesimally that he hadn’t realized how faded he was until he returned to Cadence and found that he could set down roots in a place, roots deep and entwined.
Instead, he whispered, “Yes, but I once thought home was simply a place. Four walls to hold you at night while you slept. But I was wrong. It’s people. It’s being with the ones that you love, and maybe even the ones that you hate.” He couldn’t help but smile, watching how his words raced across her skin, making her flush.
Adaira set aside her glass. Her eyes were keen when she looked at him and said, “Do you know that I once hated you?”
He laughed, and the sound spread through his chest, warm and rich as the wine. “I thought we were telling each other things we did not know.”
“I was glad to see you leave that evening ten years ago,” she confessed. “I stood on the hill at dusk and watched you board the boat. I watched until I could no longer see you, and I counted it a triumph, for my old menace would no longer haunt the isle. I had defeated and banished you, and you would no longer steal my thistles, or feed me pimpleberries, or yank the ribbons from my braids. You can imagine my shock when I saw you weeks ago. After all this time when I had convinced myself that you were my nemesis, that I was destined to hate you even ten years later … I felt a portion of gladness again, but it had nothing to do with your leaving.”
Jack set his glass down and shifted closer to her. The wound in his arm was beginning to itch; it was healing swiftly, and soon this moment would be lost to them. He gently traced the golden light that danced on her cheek.
“Are you telling me that you were glad to see me, Adaira?”
“I was,” she said, and her breath caught beneath his caress. “I was glad to feel something stir within me after years of being cold and empty. I just never imagined I would find it in you.”
It was like she had stolen the very words from his mouth. And he wanted them back.
He brushed her lips with his own, a taunting kiss. She tasted like dark red fruit, like the summer berries that grew wild on the fells, and she took hold of his tunic and drew him closer until they were sharing the same sweetened breath. The air crackled as their raiment caught the static between them. Jack’s mouth was gentle as he drank her sighs and memorized her mouth. But all too soon he felt an obliterating ache in his chest. Dazed, he realized that he was overwhelmed by Adaira, by the feelings she roused within him. He wondered how something as soft as a brushing of lips could resound with such agony in his body.
She must have felt it too. She broke the kiss and released her hold on him, stepping away. Her face was composed, her eyes calm. But her mouth was swollen from his, and she rolled her lips together as if tasting a lingering trace of him.
“Are you hungry?” she asked.
Jack merely stared at her, uncertain what sort of hunger she spoke of. Half a beat later, he was thankful for his silence, because Adaira said, “I think our next conversation will go down better with a plate of haggis.”
He had forgotten all about her initial intention to discuss the meeting with Innes. He watched as she strode to the door and sent a request with one of the servants to bring dinner up to Jack’s room. She approached his desk and took hold of it, inching it across the floor toward the hearth. She seemed to burn with endless energy, while he was utterly zapped and frozen, as if drunk from their kiss. But he joined her at last, helping her carry the table to the fire and their two chairs. His musical composition was still carefully piled on the polished oak. Adaira noticed it, and he saw that, while she couldn’t read the notes, she studied them intently.
“Is this your ballad for the wind?” she inquired in a careful tone.
“It is.”
“Nearly complete?”
“Not quite.”
He was relieved that dinner arrived then. He didn’t know if Adaira would forbid him to play the ballad. But his health was fine. He still suffered from bouts of headaches and throbbing fingers, but it would take many years for such symptoms to kill him.
Jack carefully cleared the table, and they sat across from each other with steaming plates of haggis and potatoes and wilted greens, bread and a crock of butter arranged between them. He didn’t notice until he was pouring them each a fresh glass of wine that the wound in his arm had healed and the truth enchantment had fully waned in power, leaving behind nothing more than a cold, tender scab on his skin. And yet, when he looked at Adaira, he realized that the words and affection they had shared were not lost to either of them. The feelings hung like stars above them, waiting for another moment to align, and he felt the anticipation in his bones, humming like a harp string.
“What do you wish to discuss, Adaira?” he asked.
She gave him a half smile. “Eat first, Jack.”
He heeded her but soon noticed she was struggling to eat, as if her mind was overcome with thoughts. She studied her palm, the cold scar now marking it, and drank her wine to the dregs.
“All right,” she eventually said. “I have a plan to take our lasses back.”
Jack set down his fork, watching her intently. He had a feeling he wasn’t going to like it, but he was quiet, waiting for her to explain.
Adaira took him completely by surprise when she asked, “Could you finish the ballad for the wind tomorrow?”
His brow lowered. “Is this your way of asking me to play, Adaira?”
“Yes. But with one condition, Jack.”
He groaned. “What is that?”
Adaira drew the glass vial with the Orenna and set it down before him. “You consume this flower before you play.”
She had been saving this blossom for days now, uncertain when to use it. He studied it, seemingly innocent in the glass, and said, “What is your reasoning behind this?”
“I’ve talked to Sidra,” Adaira said. “She has consumed one, and said it granted her the ability to see the spirit realm. It gave her unnatural strength, speed, and awareness. I think it will guard you from the worst of the magic’s cost.”
Jack sighed. “But what if it affects me otherwise? What if it interferes with my ability to play?”
“Then you won’t play. We’ll wait until its effects have passed, and you’ll play in your own strength, with your tonics prepared,” she answered. “Because you’re right, Jack. The wind knows where the lasses are in the west. If they can provide us with the exact location, then we can execute a plan to save them.”
“And you think we’ll be able to do so after Innes Breccan provides us with enough flowers to eat and cross the clan line unnoticed?” Jack said.
Adaira nodded. “Yes.”
His stomach clenched. He felt a pulse of dread, thinking how many things could go wrong. Imagining sneaking through the west like a shadow. Being caught and imprisoned or possibly killed.
“What if you’re wrong, Adaira?” he asked. “What if the Orenna flower doesn’t grant the power to cross over the clan line?”
“I think there’s a strong possibility it does,” she said. “How else would the Breccans be doing it? If the flower grants them heightened awareness and power between our realm and the spirits’ realm, how could it not?”
“But if they knew of this earlier, why didn’t they harness this flower before?” Jack argued. “Why not use it to their advantage when they raid? It seems they only began to use it weeks ago, with the sole purpose to steal lasses.”
“And the most recent of raids,” Adaira added. “You claim you saw more Breccans than Torin counted.”
He sighed, leaning back in his chair. His sister had also seen a Breccan standing in their garden that night, and he worried Frae was next. She would be easy to snatch, so close to the clan line.
“Perhaps the Breccans didn’t know of the Orenna flower until now,” Adaira said. “Either way, whether it is or it isn’t the secret to crossing, we’re going to find the location of the lasses via the wind, and then we are going to steal into the west to take them back.”
“Then we should prepare for war, Adaira,” Jack said. “For whatever reason the Breccans are taking eastern lasses, they’ll be angry when they discover we used the object of their trade to deceive them and sneak into the west.”
“I don’t think I can make peace with a clan that steals children,” she said.
He nodded, but that icy feeling was creeping up his spine. What would war on the isle look like? Could the Tamerlaines prevail against a clan built of warriors? If they lost, what would become of Adaira?
Jack stared at her, lost in terrible thoughts.
The firelight and shadows danced over her, and her eyes glittered like two dark gemstones as she held his gaze. The sun was beginning to set; he had been oblivious to the fading light. Only an hour ago, he and Adaira had stood in a different world, with time crystallized around them. Now time rushed, caught up in an alarming current. He could feel it pull on him, the minutes slipping away one by one.
“If this is what you want,” he said. “Then I am with you.”
She stood and walked to his side. He felt her fingers in his hair, a faint caress.
“Thank you,” she breathed. “I should leave you now. The sun is setting, and I know you need to return to Mirin’s. But if you’re ready to play tomorrow, come find me.”
She retreated to her chamber before he could say another word. But she left the Orenna behind, and Jack tucked the vial away in his pocket as he began to pack up his music.
He hadn’t given himself time to think deeply about what had happened today. He didn’t have the chance until he was walking home to Mirin’s.
He thought about the night of the raid, and he could hear Frae’s voice saying to him in the dark, There’s a Breccan in our backyard. Perhaps the man had come to steal his little sister away, but perhaps he had stood as a sentry over their home, to deflect a raid from descending upon them.
Jack saw his mother in his mind’s eye, remaining on the lands she had earned despite the danger of the clan line that was so close to her croft. He recalled all the times he had asked for his father’s name, and every time Mirin had been unwilling to share even the smallest of morsels about him.
Walking the hills, Jack unsheathed his dirk. The only tangible legacy he now possessed, for he had been given no name, no lands. He had been granted nothing but a lone blade enchanted with truth, as if Jack’s father had anticipated all of the lies and secrets his son would be raised beneath.
Jack would have never believed it possible, not until Torin claimed that Breccans were passing over the clan line without notice, and Adaira claimed they were stealing the girls of the east. If they crossed secretly now, perhaps they had done so then, long ago when Jack’s mother lived alone on the edge of the border.
He had always wondered if he had ever unknowingly seen his father in the city market, on the road, in the castle hall. Jack had always wondered, and those thoughts had fallen on fallow ground over the years, left to rot. But no longer.
He had always wondered why his father had never claimed him. He now knew why.
His father was a Breccan.
