“Now,” she said, then understood what that meant. Not later. Not at dawn.
Now.
“Aye.” He nodded. “Now.”
He looked toward the fires, then back at her. “Ye have anything else ye need to set before we walk?”
“A signal,” she said. “If ye need me quiet.”
He held up his right hand and tapped it twice against his thigh. “This.”
“And if I need ye to stop talking?” she said dryly.
“Ye can try,” he said, and the corner of his mouth quirked up. “Do ye ken what ye are taking on?”
“A laird who speaks like a ledger,” she said. “And a shield that draws eyes I cannae afford. I ken it.”
A smile settled on his lips. “Good. Then we are aligned.”
“Well, Laird Macmillan, it looks like ye have yerself a deal,” she eventually said, her voice softer than she had intended.
“Good to ken,” he responded, then lowered his voice. “Wife.”
CHAPTER 5
Morning at MacMillan Castlekept the hour like a clock. The hall was warm, the floors clean, and the table laid in straight lines.
Alex sat at the long board with a tray of bread and cold beef. The girls took the bench to his left, and his grandmother, fondly referred to as Grandmamma, kept the head chair with her cane propped near her knee and her eyes on everything.
“Ye took me cup,” Bettie said, voice low.
“I didnae,” Katie said. “Ye left it on the floor. I saved it.”
“Ye drank from it.”
“Only a sip.”
“Then it is yers now.”
“It isnae,” Katie said, and looked at Alex. “Da.”
“Drink from mine,” Alex said without looking up. “It tastes the same.”
“It doesnae,” Bettie muttered, but she took his cup and sipped.
A maid set oatcakes down by his elbow and moved away. The girls’ feet swung under the bench, Katie’s hair loose in the wind and Bettie’s in tidy, intricate braids. The sound of them, the way they quibbled without heat, the scrape of knives on the board, all of it held a rhythm he knew.
Alex marked it without effort as he kept half an ear on them and half on the small noises of a castle starting its day.
At the back of the hall, a maid folded linen, and in the yard beyond the open arch, a dog barked once, then stopped. The festival felt far, despite having taken place just three days ago. Erica had returned to Bryden that night as well.
“Da,” Katie said. “May I have honey?”
“A little,” Alex said. “Ye both wash before lessons.”
“We always wash,” she said.
“Nay, ye daenae,” Bettie countered.
