The healer’s voice softened slightly, but not enough to make it gentle. “She said she needs to ken that ye will nae keep her by force. Nae with fear. Nae with duty. Nae with love used as a chain.”
Maxwell closed his eyes for a brief moment.
Then he nodded once.
“Tell her,” he said, voice rough, “she may go wherever she wishes. And she may return when she chooses.”
The healer watched him for a long beat, as if searching for falsehood.
Then she nodded. “I will.”
And Maxwell stood alone in the corridor again, realizing with a sick clarity that love did not bend simply because he finally wanted it to.
He did not sleep.
Not because he couldn’t. Because he didn’t deserve the ease of it.
Maxwell sat in the study long after the candle had burned low, staring at the table where he had once laid out maps of borders and troop movements. Tonight the table held something smaller and somehow more terrifying.
A simple list.
What Ariella needed. What the babe needed. What he could give without taking her choice away.
Finley had left hours ago, muttering that Maxwell would turn himself into a ghost if he didn’t stop. Hunter had drifted in and out, hovering like a man afraid to admit he cared. Isla had avoided Maxwell entirely, except for one stiff bow in the corridor that felt like punishment.
Maxwell deserved that too.
At dawn he rose, washed, and went straight to the kitchens.
Mairi was there already, hair pinned up, sleeves rolled, moving with the practiced economy of a woman who had run a keep through war and peace alike. She looked up when Maxwell entered.
Her expression changed instantly.
It hardened.
“Me laird,” she said, tone polite in the way a blade could be polite.
“Mairi,” Maxwell replied.
She did not offer him a smile. She did not offer him warmth. She simply waited, ladle in hand, as if daring him to say something foolish.
Maxwell respected her for it.
“I heard Ariella wishes to stay with ye,” he said.
Mairi’s eyes narrowed. “Aye.”
Maxwell nodded once. “She’ll be safer there if she wants quiet.”
Mairi’s mouth tightened. “She’ll be safe because I will keep her safe.”
Maxwell held her gaze. “Aye.”
That single agreement seemed to surprise her more than any defense would have.
Mairi set the ladle down with a careful clink. “Ye’re letting her go?”
“I am,” Maxwell said.
