“Is that what we are?” asked Isabeau, a small smile stretching over her lips despite herself.
“Are we nae?”
“I hope we are.”
Isabeau never thought that she would be friends with a prisoner, no, but she doubted Alyson ever thought she would be friends with the daughter of the man who had imprisoned her—with a girl from a rival clan, who was supposed to be a sworn enemy. And yet, it was her father who had brought the two of them together, his hatred producing one good thing in her life.
“I’ll make it out o’ here, Alyson,” she said after a moment of deliberation. “An’ I’ll send fer ye. I’ll send help.”
Her words were met with silence at first. Then a soft sound followed, like a breath caught in Alyson’s throat.
“Ye’re mad,” Alyson said quietly. “But ye’re the only mad person I trust in this place.”
Isabeau huffed out a gentle laugh. “Ye must be mad tae survive in here. How else did ye think I’d have made it tae this age?”
“Well, ye’re the good kind o’ mad,” said Alyson softly. “Nae like him. Nae like yer faither. Ye’ve risked more fer me than I ever could have hoped fer. Ye could have ignored me, could have stayed quiet an’ comfortable. But ye didnae. Ye bring me food, water, hope. That’s more than I thought I’d ever have under Campbell’s roof. Ye’re nae like him, Isabeau. Ye’re naethin’ like him.”
Isabeau’s throat closed, a knot forming there, choking off her words. Her hand curled into the folds of her skirt, trying to grip something, anything solid to hold onto. Alyson couldn’t possibly understand what that meant to her. She couldn’t possibly knowhow her words affected her, how her reassurance was more precious to Isabeau than any gold could ever be.
She had never feared she would become her father, but she had always feared there was something of him in her. Children always carried their parents inside them, no matter how different they were from them, and Isabeau couldn’t help but fear the darkness she could have in her.
She didn’t want to resemble him in any way, not even a little. She didn’t want to have anything of his within her, nothing that could taint her soul.
“I just want tae be free,” she said, her voice barely audible.
“Ye will be,” Alyson said. “An’ I will be too. I believe that now because o’ ye, Isabeau.”
Isabeau turned and pressed her forehead to the cold stone. The touch of it on her skin was cool, soothing, staving off a headache that threatened to come.
If only she could believe it herself. If only she could believe as fiercely that she could escape before her marriage to Cody Grant trapped her forever.
Then, as she stayed there, breathing quietly the stale air, footsteps sounded faintly above, growing louder.
Her time was up. She reached through the gap one last time and touched Alyson’s fingers—cool, thin, but strong.
“I’ll come back,” she promised in a whisper. “Soon.”
And then she slipped through the shadows, retracing her steps into the bowels of the keep. The fire in her chest still burned, but it was no longer just anger. It was fear—fear for herself, for Alyson, for everything that awaited them—and something far more dangerous—hope.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The keep slept. Or at least, it wore the shape of sleep—quiet halls, torchlight burning low, shadows pooling like ink in every corridor. But Michael knew better. A place like that never truly rested. It waited, it watched. Just like the man who ruled it.
Michael moved like a ghost through its bones, keeping to the servant corridors and old stone passageways the Campbells had likely long forgotten. The borrowed identity of Michael Gordon hung loosely across his shoulders now, useful only by day. That night, he moved as he truly was—MacDonald, second-born son, war-forged fighter, blood brother to the woman shackled below.
His boots made no sound against the worn stone. He passed the kitchens first, quiet and dim but still fragrant with lingering meat fat and burnt bread crusts. The scullery girl—Morag, he’d heard her name mentioned earlier—was long gone to her cot, and the corridor behind the pantry stood open. He slipped in.
There, the air thickened, cooler and staler. The service stairwell angled sharply downward, rough-hewn and narrow, clearly older than the rest of the keep. Michael descended slowly, hand against the damp stone wall. He counted each step—habit from too many nights infiltrating hostile ground. Thirty-three steps before the staircase widened to a cramped passage, the scent of mildew and iron growing stronger.
He paused under the final arch.
Above him, somewhere beyond the thick ceiling, he could hear the soft creak of wood—the upper floor, likely the guard barracks or storerooms. It was closer than he’d expected, a detail to remember. If men were quartered directly above the dungeons, a wrong move could bring a dozen blades crashing down in seconds.
There could be no mistakes. Not that night.
Michael pressed on. The corridor narrowed and bent to the right. Faint torchlight flickered ahead, breaking against the curve of the wall. Voices drifted softly, murmured and bored.
Two guards. Maybe three.
