They were lingering, too many of them, and too still. A cluster of Campbell guards, pretending to busy themselves with repairs, their eyes fixed on him more than on their tasks. One leaned on his spear as if idly resting, yet never looked away. Another pretended to speak with the stable hand, though his gaze flicked to Michael again and again.
The realization came sharp as a blade’s edge.
Laird Campbell kens.
Or at least, he suspected.
The next strike came fast; Michael barely parried in time. The boy’s blade grazed his shoulder, jolting him back into the fight, and he ended it a moment later with a twist of the wrist and a knock to the lad’s ribs—not enough to wound, just to remind him of his place.
Michael had hardly broken a sweat, but the practice fight was low on his list of priorities now. He had no time to waste. He needed to think of a way to throw suspicion off his shoulders, or at least to leave with Alyson before Laird Campbell moved against him.
An’ Isabeau… I must find a way tae free Isabeau.
“Good effort,” he said absently, lowering his sword.
The boy grinned, proud to have lasted as long as he had. Michael forced a smile, then turned away, pretending to clean his blade on a rag, but his gaze swept the yard once more, measuring. Three near the gate, two by the armory door, one pacing the upperchemin de ronde—watchers all.
The laird’s hounds had their scent.
He could almost hear Angus Campbell’s cold voice in his head, amused, patient, dangerous.Let the man think himself safe. A liar will always hang himself if ye give him time enough.
Michael sheathed his sword and left the yard at an unhurried pace, the guards’ eyes pricking at his back. His every instinct screamed to move fast, to vanish before the trap closed, but that was what they wanted—a single slip, a wrong turn, and his disguise would unravel like a rotten seam.
He crossed the courtyard to the outer stair, nodding casually to one of the sentries. “Yer men fought well the other night,” he said lightly. “Ye’ve strong blood here.”
The guard grunted, offering no reply. His stare didn’t waver.
Inside the keep, the corridors felt narrower than before. The thick stone walls that once promised safety now pressed in like a prison. The servants moved quietly, their glances wary, and Michael knew why. Laird Campbell’s suspicion poisoned the air, unseen, but felt in every whispered conversation that stopped when he entered a room.
For the rest of that day, he trained; he ate in silence; he smiled when spoken to. And every moment, he felt the weight of eyes upon him.
When night fell, he stood at the window of his chamber, watching the torches flicker along the walls below. Somewhere beyond those hills, no more than half a day’s ride, Tòrr and Daemon waited for word. They would be restless by now, impatient. The plan had been to meet again by the lake, to mark the next strike and free Alyson.
But Michael could not go.
If he tried to slip past the gate, the watchers would follow. If he sought the dungeons, Laird Campbell’s spies would see. Every step he took would be reported before sunrise.
Michael ground his teeth, gripping the windowsill until his knuckles blanched. The air smelled of cold stone and damp earth. Beyond the keep, the Highlands stretched wide and black and he was trapped in the heart of his enemy’s hold.
In the days that followed, his world narrowed further still.
Michael rose before dawn, trained in the yard, spoke little. He laughed when he had to, drank with the men when they pressed him to, and kept his mask firmly in place. But he did not go near the dungeons again. Even to glance in that direction would be folly. Still, Alyson’s face haunted him each night, pale, patient, waiting for the brother who could not come.
And then there was Isabeau.
Each time he passed her in the corridors, his heart betrayed him. A shared glance, the faintest brush of her hand when they exchanged a word, each moment a danger more perilous than any blade. She seemed to know the risk too; she kept her distance, her smiles fleeting, her eyes shadowed with things she could not say.
The watchers saw it, he knew they did. And so he hardened himself.
The mission came first; Alyson’s freedom, the clan’s honor. But at night, when all else was still, Michael found his thoughts wandering—not to the plan, nor to war, but to the soft echo of Isabeau’s laughter under the pear tree, and the taste of sweetness shared between them.
The keep slept under the weight of night. In Isabeau’s chamber, a single candle burned low, its light fluttering against the stone walls. She stood by the narrow window, her cloak clasped around her shoulders, her heart pounding like a drum.
Maisie watched from the bed, pale in the candlelight. “Me lady,” she whispered, wringing her hands, “if yer faither learns o’ this?—”
Isabeau turned to her, the shadow of a smile softening her face. “If he learns, I’ll say I needed air… that I was restless, that I wished tae pray an’ headed tae the chapel.”
For a long moment, Maisie hesitated—then nodded. She reached for the robe draped across the chair, the one Isabeau wore on cold mornings, and drew it about herself. “Ye’ll be the death o’ me yet,” she mumbled.
