Ciaran paused, and for a heartbeat he thought of turning back the way he had come, slipping into shadow and leaving her to her solitude, sparing them both the awkwardness of a meeting.
But she turned. Gray eyes met his, clear even in the firelight. She started faintly, then spoke quickly.
“I was told it was all right for me to be up here,” she said, as though she feared reprimand. Her hands clutched the shawl more tightly at her throat, but her chin did not lower.
“Aye,” Ciaran said, voice low and rough. “'Tis nae a prison.”
He might have left it at that, might have only nodded same as he had to the soldiers on duty, but was held by her gaze, which flicked over him—sharp, wary, yet curious, he surmised—before it slid away, dropping to the sea below.
He hadn’t noticed his agitation until he realized he’d clenched his jaw. Yet under the low moon, with the brazier’s glow soft on her profile, the resemblance to that other woman seemed less stark, less disturbing.
She turned her face toward him again. “Ivy told me you and...um, your army, and the MacKinlay army were chasing an English army,” she ventured, her tone quiet, uncertain. “Was it...were you successful?”
“We succeeded in what we set out to do,” he said after a moment.
She nodded once and shifted her stance until she faced him fully, resting her hip against the parapet. “Is it... it awful? I’m sorry, that must sound like a strange question, but I...I’m not familiar with war—fighting in hand-to-hand combat... I just...” she shrugged and let the rest stay unspoken.
His teeth clenched harder. He nodded but gave nothing more. It was simply war.
“How long have you been the laird of Caeravorn?” she asked after a moment.
He kicked himself for not moving, for seemingly inviting conversation by lingering. He remained rooted though, his curiosity yet strong, needing to test again that likeness to another that was long buried.
“That can’t be easy,” Claire ventured, a hint of a question in her tone, “trying to run a clan, keep everyone safe, make sure everyone is fed and healthy, and then have to go off to war.”
“I dinna ken on it.” He simply did what was required of him.
With a resigned breath, he finally moved, stepping to the parapet beside her, close enough to share the view, but not soclose to crowd her. Below, the firth lay hushed in the night, its dark surface broken only by the silver trace of moonlight and the slow lap of water against the unseen cliff base.
“But does it... ever feel like too much?” She gave a soft laugh, the sound nervous but sweet. “I don’t suppose you get mental health days here.”
He turned his head slightly, not enough to look at her fully, though the urge gnawed at him, staring at the ends of her hair, tugged and lifted gently by the night’s breeze. He couldn’t say why, but her questions needled him. Perhaps she meant only idle talk, yet they seemed intrusive, probing.
Ignoring her query, he steered the subject away from him. “Where is it ye hail from?” Her speech was remarkably similar to Ivy Mitchell’s strange patterns and sounds.
“I, uh, grew up in the border region,” she said, turning her attention to the silvery water once again, planting both hips against the stone. “I understand my...dialect is unknown around here—well, except for Ivy, of course.”
“Aye, it is,” he agreed. “And how came ye to be found half-senseless in the mountains?”
She drew in a large breath, and he saw the profile of her swallow. “I honestly don’t know. I...I can’t seem to remember much.” She chewed her lip briefly before adding, “About how I got there, I mean.”
She fell silent after that, with no more questions or answers on her tongue. Ciaran didn’t appreciate that he had no measure of her. Her uncanny likeness to a woman long dead was troubling enough, but added to it was the manner of her coming, her rare speech, and the odd garb she’d been found in. All of it made her a puzzle, and puzzles bred mistrust.
Though his body faced the wall and the sea beyond, his head remained angled toward her, attuned to every small movement, the way she blinked repeatedly and worried her lip still, asthough weighing questions left unasked, wrestling with whether to speak again.
Finally, she tilted her face, though she kept her front pressed against the wall. “Do you... um, when I saw you this morning, it looked like you... I don’t know, maybe recognized me? Have we ever...met?”
Ciaran’s head snapped toward her, struck by the gall of her query, by how close she’d come to naming the very thought he’d tried to bury.
“Nae,” he said at last, his voice low, rougher than he meant. “We’ve nae met.” He drew a slow breath, jaw tight. “Nae,” he repeated, as if a strong and constant denial would erase his own uncertainty. “Nae.”
And maybe he denied it too firmly, that she stared at him now with an expression of suspicion, as though she sensed more in his words than he’d intended to give away.
“I was only surprised to find ye yet at Caeravorn,” he amended.
Her gray eyes widened dramatically. “Oh, well, I...I’m so sorry,” she paused and laughed nervously. “I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
He winced inwardly at his own impolite bluntness. “'Tis fine—I dinna mean...ye are welcome at Caeravorn.”
