Rab lay with his head upon his paws, staring at the man he’d practically tackled with a mournful whine. The stout, besuited man stopped at the open door to the storeroom. The quality of his clothing and the shiny silver buckles on his shoes marked him as one of the merchant class, at least. Perhaps the workmen were his. There was something out of place about him. Finn couldn’t put a finger on it. He didn’t know the man. He was certain of that.
The peculiar fellow closed the storeroom door, tried it again with a key and turned away with a shake of his head, headed to the passageway toward the west tower. At the mouth of the hall, he paused.
Rather, his step hitched a fraction before he bustled ahead.
Finn stiffened, catching a glimpse of the curiously slender calves and well-turned ankles encased in the man’s woolen hose. And he had uncommonly small feet to boot. With a shake of his head, Finn tried to make sense of what his eyes saw in contrast to what he believed.
What heknew.
Nay, it was impossible. A trick of the light. A figment of his imagination. Nothing more.
Acknowledging the impossible didn’t stop Finn from trailing after him.
Didn’t stop him from asking, “I thought ye said ye were no’ afraid of the dark.”
* * *
There was no way he recognized her. None. Her own mother wouldn’t have. Aye, bad example. Well, Brontë nearly hadn’t, even when she’d been expecting her.
Aila kept walking as if she hadn’t heard him. She’d tried the key they’d discovered in the medallion at nearly every single door in the castle, starting in the great hall. From the solar to the apartments above, from bedchamber to garderobe to cabinet, it didn’t fit any lock she’d discovered. Circling around the castle, from the easterly tower to the bailey. Nothing. The only rooms she hadn’t tried thus far were the apartments in the west tower where she was headed now and the one to Derne’s office. The old bawbag had given her a scolding for being in the public rooms and sent her on her way, thankfully without an ounce of recognition.
There was no way Finn could have recognized her in the guise of a stocky old man. He must think her to be someone else.
Without a candle or lantern to carry, the passage was darker than normal. She fought the urge to look back over her shoulder to see if Finn followed much as she struggled to refrain from racing from sconce to sconce. Not that she was afraid of the dark.
Or afraid of facing him.
That didn’t stop her from yelping like a frightened child when his warm hand caught her wrist. Amid the gloomy hall, the inquisitiveness lighting his hazel eyes had the effect of being put under an interrogation spotlight.
“I cannae reconcile what I see with what I ken to be the truth.”
“I…er, I dinnae ken what ye mean, sir,” she tried in an overexaggerated brogue although she knew the effort was futile. Somehow, he knew.
Finn dragged her into the next circle of light and pinned her beneath the sconce before he stepped back to examine her. From head to toe, his intense gaze scrutinized her. Aila simply drank him in. It seemed like years instead of a mere twelve days since she’d seen him. Colorless days that passed like a prison sentence without him despite the hectic activity of the last few. Even covered in layers of male clothing and her face hidden behind thick latex, the effect on her was as overwhelming as ever. Akin to seeing a piece of chocolate following years of dieting. She longed to eat him up.
Gah, this would have gone much easier if she didn’t have to explain this to him. Aye, she had a laundry list of things to confess. Adding this on top of everything else! How could she expect him to make sense of it? She had no idea what to say to mitigate his confusion.
Especially when he appeared as stony and unmoving as the statues that flanked him.
“What is this witchery?” There was the faintest hint of trepidation in his voice.
As logical and educated as Finn was, she didn’t want him thinking she’d consorted with the devil to change her appearance. She’d looked it up. Although parliament passed a law in 1735 banning witch hunts and trials, Aila didn’t plan on becoming an exception.
“I’m nae more a witch than I am a selkie. It’s makeup. Cosmetics,” she clarified when his frown deepened. She had to know how he’d figured it out. “How did ye ken it was me?”
“Yer walk.” With obvious hesitance, he touched her prosthetic nose with one finger. The spongy latex provided little resistance. He jerked his hand away with a grimace. “And Rab.”
Aila looked down at her dog who’d followed Finn down the passage and was currently engrossed with some smell behind one of the statues. “Treasonous beastie,” she mumbled. “Nay, dinnae grouse at me. It wisnae me.”
Nor was it her he was growling at. An odd, low, constant grumble akin to the rumble of distant thunder. Her attention shifted to the object of his discontent.
“Yer turn.” Finn ground out. “How? Why?”
Her eyes flicked to him, but with something nagging at her brain, were drawn back to the statue. What…?”
“Lass!”
She brushed away his annoyance and stepped past him to study the statue. “Hold on, there’s something…. Oh my God. This is it! This is why that necklace looked so familiar. Look, Finn.” Euphoria fermented in her veins with an intoxicating rush that left her head spinning. She groped behind her and caught him by the arm to pull him along. “The shield on Sir Clinksalot’s tunic. That’s it, is it no’?”
