He did not yet know the color of this woman’s eyes, but it hardly mattered. The face of that other had been etched into his memory for nine long years, refusing to fade. His mother’s image had grown hazy, his father’s voice dimmed in recollection—buthersremained, sharp as the day he first saw it among the blood and fire at Berwick.
Ivy moved beside him, pressing a hand to the woman’s brow. “She’s burning up,” she murmured.
Ciaran’s throat worked, but no words came. He only stared, taut, feeling as if he’d been eviscerated, until Ivy touched his arm.
“Sir, I can’t do the stairs again,” she professed, laying her hand over her rounded stomach. “But while we wait for the healer, we need cold water and clean cloths to try and get her fever down.”
Her voice jarred him back to the present. He blinked, drew a sharp breath, and nodded brusquely, forcing his feet to move toward the door.
But as he left, the image of the woman’s face stayed with him. And he knew, without any resistance to the idea, without any doubt, that he needed this woman to live, to survive, as that other woman had not. He didn’t question even once why that seemed so important to him.
***
Claire’s eyes fluttered open slowly. For one stunned second she didn’t breathe. A stone ceiling loomed above her, dark beams crossing it, and the faint glow of firelight flickered against rough-hewn walls. Not a hospital. Not her bedroom at the quaint hotel where she and Jason had been staying. Not anywhere she knew, but somewhere that had an ancient look to it.
A woman sat in a chair at her bedside—young, with thick strawberry-blonde hair and soft features that, at first impression, seemed dreamy, or at the very least distracted. Having the fifty-yard stare, her mother would have said.
Confused again—or still—Claire didn’t know what to say or if she should speak. But then the young woman seemed to recover from her daydream, blinking rapidly before she turned a pair of hazel eyes onto Claire.
The woman jolted upright, nearly upsetting the chair, and bent over her, a wide smile breaking across her face.
“Oh my God—you’re awake!” she exclaimed, words rushing too fast.
Claire flinched at the sudden brightness of her tone. Awake? Had she been asleep? Well, yes, that made sense; she realized she was in a bed. And then she flinched again as the woman reached a hand toward her, but she only laid it over Claire’s forehead.
“No fever,” the woman pronounced cheerily. “We’ve been fighting it for days. You should’ve seen the awful draughts they made you drink, and I’ve been at you with cool cloths day and night. The midwife’s been here three or four times, I can’t remember—”
The flood of words blurred together, the strange ones lingering. Draughts? Healer?
Her lips cracked open, her voice nothing more than a rasp. “Where...am I?”
The woman froze, her smile faltering. Claire saw something flicker across her face—alarm, hesitation. “Oh, gosh,” she stammered, gripping the blanket between her fingers. “That’s...that’s kind of complicated. I don’t even know where to begin. But listen—” she leaned closer, eyes wide, her voice softer now, “you’re safe. And you’re not alone. I promise you that.”
It was vague at best, nearly alarming at worst, but Claire considered the woman’s friendly face, her words—safe, not alone—and decided it was better than what last she remembered, lost, alone, frightened, cold.
At the moment, she had only enough wherewithal to know she was too weak, too weary to make sense of anything just yet. Her lashes grew heavy, her body betraying her. She tried to hold on, wanted to ask more and know more, but the pull of sleep was too strong.
When next she woke, it seemed as if several hours had passed; the light around the bed suggested late afternoon, or perhaps early evening. The fire had burned low in the hearth, the shadows long across the stone walls.
A wisp of movement caught in her periphery, and she turned her head with effort. The same young woman sat nearby, rising quickly when their eyes met.
“You’re awake.” Her tone was calm this time, not breathless as before. She leaned forward, her dark eyes earnest. “Hi. I’m Ivy.”
Claire blinked, the name catching strangely in her mind. Her lips parted, but no sound emerged. Her throat felt dry, raw.
Ivy reached for a cup on the small table beside the bed, her movements brisk but gentle. Sliding an arm behind Claire’s shoulders, she propped her up. “Just a sip,” she coaxed. “You’ve had a fever for a day and a half.”
The cool water touched Claire’s lips and she drank, coughing once, then sagged back against the pillow, her muscles trembling with the effort. Her hair clung damply, almost sticky, to her neck.
“How...long?” she whispered.
“Since yesterday afternoon. You’ve slept most of it.” Ivy’s fingers brushed her forehead, then her cheek, and she gave a satisfied nod. “No fever now.”
Claire let her gaze drift across the chamber—rough stone walls, heavy beams, a tall, narrow window without glass. Nothing familiar. Nothing remotely modern. Her pulse began to race.
Her eyes darted back to Ivy. “Where am I?”
“Caeravorn Keep,” Ivy answered carefully. “On the west coast of Scotland. You were found up in the mountain, apparently, and brought here.”
