Her heart caught somewhere between disbelief and wonder. “Ye were the one who asked me fer the last dance,” she whispered.
He smiled—that small, rare thing that softened every sharp edge of him. “Aye. And when ye turned away, I swore I’d find ye again.”
She laughed then, a soft, breathless sound. “Ye might’ve told me sooner.”
“I wanted ye tae love me fer who I am, nae who I was.” His thumb brushed her cheek again. “Seems ye dae.”
“I always did,” she said quietly.
The words hung between them like light. He kissed her again, deeper this time, until the air between them vanished. The priest coughed softly behind them, muttering a blessing neither of them heard.
When they finally pulled apart, Aidan pressed his forehead to hers once more, his breath steady against her lips. “Ye’re mine now,” he whispered, not as possession, but as promise. “An’ I’m yers.”
She smiled, her fingers curling in his shirt. “Aye,” she said. “Forever.”
Sunlight spilled through the high windows, catching the dust in soft gold. For the first time in months, the land was quiet. The airsmelled of heather and smoke and something sweeter—peace, maybe.
Catherine stepped out into it with her husband’s hand still in hers, the sky opening above them in pale, endless blue.
He looked at her, the faintest smile tugging at his mouth. “Dae ye ken what I was thinkin’ that night at the ball?”
She shook her head, her braid catching the wind.
“That I’d dance wi’ ye again one day,” he said. “That time wi’ nay mask between us.”
Her laugh was soft, carried away by the breeze. “Then dance wi’ me now.”
He drew her close, his arm around her waist, and together they moved slowly across the grass, to the rhythm of the wind and the beating of their hearts. His lips brushed her temple, her hand rested over his chest, and the rest of the world fell away once more.
The storm had passed. The war had ended.
And somewhere in the quiet that followed, Catherine Cameron lifted her face to the morning light, and knew she was finally home.
EPILOGUE
One day later
The morning had the quiet of something trying to remember how to live again.
Mist clung low to the hills beyond Achnacarry, curling over the grass like smoke that refused to lift. The air was damp but calm, touched with the faint scent of heather and wet ash. Inside the courtyard, men worked to clear the remnants of battle, the broken spears stacked by the wall and armor piled for repair, the blackened gate still standing though scarred.
Aidan stood near the archway, watching them with the stillness that came after too many nights without sleep. His arm was bound tight beneath his tunic, but the pain barely registered. He had known worse. What stayed with him was the silence that came after war, the kind that pressed on a man until he forgot how to breathe.
Yet this silence felt different. It wasn’t the heavy quiet that follows death, nor the emptiness that used to settle in him when the fighting stopped. It was softer somehow, like the land itselfwas trying to rest, to heal. For the first time in years, he wasn’t standing alone in it.
He looked toward the keep, where the morning light spilled faintly through the narrow windows, catching on the pale stone. Somewhere behind those walls, Catherine would be waking. His wife.
The thought still felt strange in his mind—wife. He’d never thought himself built for that kind of life, for belonging to anyone. But the memory of yesterday kept returning to him in flashes: her hand in his, trembling but steady; the sound of her voice sayingI dae; the way the world had gone utterly still when she smiled at him.
For all his scars, for all the darkness that had made a home inside him, that moment had felt like light breaking through. He hadn’t known a man could be so battered and still feel joy. But he did. It lived quiet and fierce beneath his ribs, something he didn’t dare show but couldn’t hide either.
He touched the ring that now circled his finger, running his thumb over it once. A simple band, nothing grand, but it was the only thing in his life that had ever feltcertain.
And for the first time in longer than he could remember, Aidan Cameron was happy, truly happy, and it unsettled him more than any war ever had.
Behind him, the keep doors opened. He didn’t have to turn to know it was her.
Catherine’s steps were soft on the stones, her voice low as she spoke to one of the healers at the door. When she reached him,she stood beside him without a word, the wind catching at the braid down her back.
