Her youngest sister was busy fussing with the pins in Ailsa’s hair. She would, at least, have plenty of flowers to decorate her brown locks. It was one thing that had gone right, given that she was in a borrowed dress for a hasty wedding due to, oh, yes,the incipient threat of war.
“Stabbingthe captain. That’s certainly what she wants to do,” Eilidh continued.
Her comment was so suggestive that Ailsa let out a shocked little laugh.
“Eilidh!” she exclaimed.
Her youngest sister blushed, but the look she gave Ailsa was self-satisfied.
“At least I got you to laugh,” she said with a shrug.
Ailsa had to give her that. She’d spent the morning of her wedding with nerves coursing through her so severely that it had been a genuine challenge to sit before the looking glass and let a maid put her hair up.
“Well,” Davina said tartly, still looking at Vaila and her daggers with disapproval, “I can only hope you won’t be so difficult on your own wedding day. You know that now that we’re seeing Ailsa wed, you’re next, don’t you?”
Vaila’s polishing paused, but only for a second.
“No,” she said, shaking her head decisively. “There is no man in this Keep that could entice me to marry him.”
“Mairi,” Eilidh asked, raising her voice so that Vaila was sure to take note. “Captain McGregor is on his rounds right now, is he not? By which I mean,” she fluttered her lashes at Vaila through the looking glass, “he is out of the keep?”
Vaila threw her polishing cloth at her youngest sister, who laughed in delight.
Ailsa sucked in a deep breath, feeling a rush of gratitude for these women. Even after the extremely pleasurable kissing two nights prior, she could not dispel the anxiety that she and Ewan didn’t know one another well enough to wed. His possessive talk had been alluring when they’d been together in the sitting room, but what if he truly meant to control her? How could she survive in that kind of marriage?
And yet, she had no choice. She needed this marriage to protect her people.
So all she could do was try to trust him.
Still, though. She was afraid. That fear lingered, no matter what she did to try to banish it.
Ailsa kept her spot at the dressing table even after Eilidh decided that she had fussed enough and turned to join Davina in teasing Vaila about her future matrimonial prospects, which got more and more absurd with every name proposed. Mairi took advantage of this moment of distraction to approach Ailsa.
Ailsa hadn’t had as much time as she would have liked to speak with Mairi since returning to Buchanan Keep. She’d known Mairi as a child, but the near grown woman standing before her was a stranger. It had been clear enough that Mairi had had her doubts about Ailsa’s return, and Ailsa could hardly blame her, given everything.
The look that the younger woman gave her now was soft.
“I have something for you,” she said, reaching into her pocket and taking out a leather pouch that looked as though it was butter soft. Someone had lovingly stamped it with a pattern of vines. She opened the pouch to reveal a delicate necklace, a silver chain upon which hung a pendant, shaped according to the Buchanan coat of arms. The detailing was exquisite, each detail cast in miniature.
Ailsa couldn’t hold back her gasp.
“Mairi,” she breathed. “This is… It’s beautiful, but it’s too much.”
“It is not,” Mairi said, already moving to latch the necklace around Ailsa’s neck. Apparently, Buchanan stubbornness ran in the family. “It was initially supposed to be for when I married so that I could remember my origins, but I doubt that I’ll ever…” she trailed off, then cleared her throat. “Anyway, it’s more fitting this way. I asked my mother, and she agreed, too, so you shall be insulting both of us if you refuse.”
Ailsa recognized that this teasing turn was designed to distract from whatever genuine emotions Mairi was experiencing about possibly marrying or not. The elder sister in Ailsa wanted to pry, but now wasn’t the time.
“Thank you,” she said instead. “I… This means quite a lot.”
She meant it, too.
Mairi smiled fondly as the necklace settled against Ailsa’s skin, apparently quite content in her decision. Then, as if acting on impulse, she suddenly bent down to press a fleeting kiss to Ailsa’s cheek. Ailsa grabbed a hold of Mairi’s arm before she could retreat, and hugged the girl. It was a little strange, but nice anyway, which Ailsa supposed was as good as she could hope for with this madcap marriage to save her family.
“Thank you,” she repeated.
“Welcome to the family, sister,” Mairi said with a smile.
And if Ailsa had to wipe away a tear at that, everyone was polite enough to pretend not to notice.
