The Castle spoke to him and the Duke came to an abrupt halt. The ancient boards beneath his feet had creaked in a specific way. There was no other place in the entire castle that sounded just so. Not when combined with the sound of the thrushes that nested under the eaves of this particular wing. Or the feel of the sun at this specific time of day, through the tall windows to his right. All of that information combined told Nathan Ramsay, Duke of Hamilton, that he stood before the doors of his late father’s study. It was, in fact, the Duke’s Study, and thereforehis, like every other chamber in the castle.
But to him, it would always be his father’s study. And would always be sealed. He turned to his left smartly, as though on parade, and took two measured steps forward before reaching out with his left hand. In his right hand was a silver-topped cane which he carried always, using it as a guide when walking in unfamiliar places. Places that he had not yet had the opportunity to memorize. His blue eyes were paler than they had been before the fateful day that his sight had been taken from him. There was nothing in them to indicate he was blind and his movements were so sure and confident that an observer would be forgiven for not realizing his disability.
His hand brushed the silky, soft material of the banner. He had taken it from the hands of a dead Frenchman following a skirmish on the road some miles south of Quatre Bras in Belgium. Behind the banner of Imperial France were heavy, rough planks that had been nailed across the doors.
The banner of one enemy to seal up the lair of another. And every day I come here and touch it. Every day I debate telling the servants to wrench down the barriers and open the room. Every day, I walk away and the room remains sealed.
He listened as the Castle whispered to him of a man approaching. A man with fiery red hair, now likely beginning to be tempered by wisps of gray. Nathan let his hand fall and turned to face the stone spiral staircase, knowing that Walter Carlisle would appear there in moments.
“Will I ever be able to sneak up on you, do you think?” Walter said, his native Edinburgh accent still strong, twenty years after he had left his homeland.
“Not in this Castle, Walter,” Nathan replied.
He rested both of his hands on the head of his cane and listened as Walter approached. He heard the tell-tale sound of cloth moving, knowing it indicated a bow being swept towards him in greeting. He inclined his head in reply.
“I cannot remain long. I have urgent business this evening in York, and I will be leaving for France soon after. But I could not pass by and not show my face, eh?”
“And it is good to see you, Walter. As always,” Nathan replied, not ignorant of the irony of his words.
Long ago, he and Walter had decided that they would not change their language to allow for Nathan’s blindness. Nor would they behave as though the subject were taboo or that Nathan’s feelings on the subject were delicate.
“I imagine you also wished to ensure that all preparations have been made for the arrival of your daughter, Emily,” Nathan said. Nathan had vague memories of Emily, Walter Carlisle’s daughter, while he resided in Scarborough with them for eight years. She was meek, and he was so often a recluse around that time, so they hardly ever talked. But he had not spoken to her ever since he left for His Majesty’s Army at the age of sixteen. He sometimes wondered about the kind of woman she had grown into.
“I did. I do. Redundant, I know, given your nature. But, as she is my daughter…”
Nathan smiled. “Old friend. I would expect nothing less. Everything is in hand. She is expected tomorrow and I will greet her. She will be assigned a maid that I have recently appointed to the position and is, at this moment, receiving training from Marshall as to the layout of the Castle and the particulars of her role.”
He began to walk, knowing that Walter would fall into step alongside him. There would be no false deference, with Walter walking a step behind. This man had been more of a father to Nathan than his own true father. As far as he was concerned, the flame-haired Scotsman was his equal. The cane clacked loudly on stone, announcing the threshold of the narrow stone staircase. Without hesitation, Nathan reached for the first upward step and found it immediately. The slight intake of breath from Walter was so soft that only a blind man could have heard.
“How many times, old friend, must you see me navigate the halls of this Castle without a trip or fall before you have some confidence?” Nathan chided with a smile.
“One never gets used to seeing a blind man step with such confidence. I have trained myself out of taking your arm, have I not?”
Nathan counted off the steps in a partitioned part of his mind, splitting his concentration to continue the conversation while maintaining the count.
“I am very grateful for that. I would not strike a man who opened his house to me after my father died, but it came close a few times.”
Walter chortled. “For me too. You were not an easy youth. For understandable reasons but sometimes it seemed like the Lord sent you to test my patience to breaking point.”
They reached the next floor and Nathan walked along the next hallway with confidence. They turned a corner and descended two steps, turning another corner. As they walked, Nathan felt the sun on the left side of his face, sensing the presence of windows there and knowing what those windows looked out over.
“See what I have done with the gardens this year? A third has been given over to fruit and vegetables. Some go to my kitchens and the surplus to the priest in Thormanby for distribution to the poor. A worthwhile project, is it not?”
He heard Walter move to the window and then hurry to catch up, indicating that he had taken a long look.
“You had not mentioned it before. It sounds worthwhile indeed, though it has done nothing for the look of the gardens.” Walter said.
Nathan waved a hand dismissively. “Good looks are wasted on me, after all. My gardeners grumbled when I told them but I have consulted a remarkably far-sighted horticulturalist named Greene, if you can believe that. He was the one that put me onto it.”
Another sign from the castle, a creaking crack of antique wood, told Nathan he had reached a particular door. Turning forty-five degrees to his left, he reached for the doorknob and opened the door, walking into his library.
“My word!” Walter exclaimed. “You didn’t tell me this work had been finished either!”
“I wanted to surprise you,” Nathan said modestly.
He had strode into the room and stopped near its center, turning, and opening his arms as though to show it off. The room had once been four rooms, bedchambers intended for guests. None had been inhabited for at least twenty years before Nathan had decided to move back into the Castle from Walter’s house outside of Scarborough. The library of his father was open and contained many rare volumes that Nathan could not bring himself to destroy or give away. But the room practically reeked of the previous Duke.
“As a man who loves books, I could not be without a library. But the room in this castle that has long been a library is not somewhere I can ever feel at home. So, I have made a room untainted by Benedict Ramsey. Designed for me with the most modern of architectural ideas. Is it not light and airy?”
