Maxwell’s gaze shifted from Frederick to her. It held a weight that made her spine straighten in reflex, even as the floor under her feet felt unsteady.
“What happens now,” Maxwell said, the words slow and controlled, “is that the alliance stands. O’Douglas will nae see McIntosh weakened, nor McNeill shamed, by me braither’s actions.”
Frederick’s brows drew together. “And how do ye propose we manage that?”
Maxwell did not look away from Ariella. When he spoke, his voice did not rise. It did not need to.
“I will marry yer sister instead.”
The words seemed to ring in the air.
For a heartbeat, Ariella thought she had misheard. The room tilted, the faces around her blurring at the edges. It was as if she stood underwater and someone had spoken from above the surface, the sound distorted.
Her mother gasped, hand flying to her mouth.
Frederick stared. The priest’s eyes widened over his worn book.
“He… Ye… what?” her mother breathed, panic lacing each word.
Maxwell’s jaw clenched. “I will take Hunter’s place.”
The hall erupted.
Voices crashed into one another, a wave of sound that made Ariella sway. Her mother protested. Someone near the back exclaimed that it was not proper. Another hissed that it was more than proper, that it was the only way. Opinions spilled from every side, hot and sharp.
Through it all, Ariella stood very still, her heart beating in a strange, distant rhythm.
He will marry me? Maxwell?
It wouldn’t be the charming brother with quick words and an easy laugh, but the laird. The scarred man who had caught her in the yard and called her foolish. The one whose touch beneathher chin had steadied her, whose words the night before had lit a spark of understanding that had nothing to do with affection and everything to do with duty.
He will marry me.
Her knees wobbled.
“Ariella.” Her mother gripped her arm hard enough to bruise. “Tell them this is madness. Tell them ye we wait for the braither.”
Frederick had recovered enough to find his voice again. “This is highly irregular,” he said, though there was calculation in his eyes now too, moving quickly behind the shock. “The contract was written for —”
“The contract was written for McNeill,” Maxwell interrupted coolly. “Me name is on it as laird, as is yers. The bride is the same. The clans remain bound.”
Ariella’s head spun. Words darted past her, too quick to catch.Irregular. Proper. Reputation. Duty. Safety.
Somewhere within the confusion, relief coiled like a guilty serpent. She had not wanted to marry Hunter, not truly. She had convinced herself she could bear it, for the sake of her people. Yet the idea of being bound to a man who would slip away in the night and leave her standing alone at the altar cut deeper than she had expected.
Maxwell was another matter. He did not run. He did not laugh things away. If he vowed something, he would stand in it until his bones broke.
That thought steadied her and terrified her at once.
“Ariella, saysomething,” her mother begged.
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.
The hall swirled. Hunter’s careless grin flashed in her memory. Maxwell’s eyes in the dark yard. Frederick’s haunted face when he spoke of O’Douglas. The children in the village who would be caught between fires if war came.
For our clans.
The words from last night rose from some clear place inside her. She clung to them like a rope.
