Neither could she.
Forty
LED BY A PIPERwith a black pennant tied to his pipes, Trick and Niall headed the eight bearers carrying their mother’s coffin from the castle down to the little kirk. Behind them, family, friends, and castle staff followed along in a rather informal procession.
“Why aren’t there more women?” Kendra asked in a low voice from where she walked beside Trick, modestly wrapped in a homely brown shawl she’d borrowed from Mrs. Ross. Her hair was constrained in a plaited bun.
“Most of the women usually remain at the home,” Niall explained. “They’ll be preparing for the return of the mourners. And keeping my father company. It’s not customary for a husband to attend his wife’s burial.”
“And she was his wife in his heart, I’m sure of it.”
Her romantic sigh set Trick’s teeth on edge. “Hamish couldn’t have come along, anyway. Not in his state of health.”
“Well, it’s nice to know his illness isn’t keeping him from something he’d regret missing later.” She leaned close to Trick. “Hardly anyone is wearing black,” she observed beneath her breath.
“It’s unnecessary to wear black in order to pay your respects,” Niall said, obviously overhearing her. “Not everyone can afford special clothes for mourning.”
After that, she kept quiet. The bagpipe music was loud, the notes sad and lingering. All too soon they were gathered in the small graveyard, and the solemn tune came to an end. The single wreath of heather was removed from atop the oak coffin, and the lid was lifted for one last time.
Stepping closer, Trick peered inside, trying to memorize his mother’s features and reconcile them with his faded childhood memories. Had she been the warm woman he sometimes saw in his dreams, or the cold one his father had told him about? What had they said, those letters he’d never read? Had they been written out of duty, or had the pages been spattered with her tears?
Knowing this was his last chance, he reached to touch her.
Her body felt cold and unreal, and touching it did nothing to banish the ghosts of her from his mind, as Niall had said it was meant to do. A shiver ran through him. Their rocky past would always stand between him and what should be happy memories.
Others came forward to pay their respects and touch his mother, then two men moved to replace the lid. Trick bent down with it as it was lowered into place, catching a final glimpse of her face.
“Good-bye,” he whispered, and Kendra squeezed his hand.
He hadn’t even realized she’d been holding it.
A short service was read, but he didn’t hear what was spoken. His mind was numb, the words filtered through a haze. He shuffled his feet on the soft green grass, his gaze wandering the gentle mounds that marked where bodies lay, many of their headstones rendered smooth and unreadable by the ravages of weather and time.
A bell was rung; then the mourners filed past the tree where it hung, dropping coins into the plate below as they went. Burial silver. For form’s sake, he imagined—surely the Dowager Duchess of Amberley wouldn’t need help to defray her funeral expenses.
Or would she? He admittedly knew nothing of his parents’ financial arrangements. Upon his father’s death, he’d clearly failed in his duty as a son. And now it was too late.
He cursed himself roundly, if silently.
The mournful whine of the bagpipes rose again, and people began drifting out of the little cemetery. As he turned to leave, Kendra came around to face him and took both his hands. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
He shrugged. “It’s not that I’ll miss her, precisely.”
“But you’ll miss what could have been.”
She was wise, his new wife. Her fingers tightened on his before she dropped his hands and turned to Niall. Without hesitation, Trick’s brother walked into her arms and stayed there, his shoulders hitching while she murmured words of comfort.
She was not only wise, Trick amended, but compassionate. She would make a good mother for their children. If only he could gain her trust.
But secrets stood between them, and it wasn’t yet time for the truth.
At long last Niall pulled away and gave Kendra a shaky smile. “Thank you.”
“I’m your sister now,” she said kindly. “And you’ve no one here, Niall. Your mother is gone, your father is ill, and your sister and brother—” She broke off. “I’m here for you.”
“I’m here for you, too,” Trick put in, surprised by how good it felt to say that. To be needed by someone, and to need him as well. He hadn’t had that in eighteen years, and he’d never thought he’d have it again.
Despite all his father’s tales of his mother’s treason and treachery, he looked at the stoic backs of the people walking toward Duncraven and knew that once upon a time he’d felt happy in this place. Even living in that forbidding gray keep at the top of the hill.
