She glanced at the door once, a sharp, involuntary jerk of her head, and immediately felt a surge of self-loathing.Weakness.
Amelia, who sat by her, didn't know about the chess game. She didn't know about the wager or the way the air had hummed between them like a live wire. All she saw was the fallout—the way Enya sat now, pale and jagged, looking like she had seen a ghost and was still haunted by its touch.
Enya ignored her. She couldn’t bring herself to look at Amelia and see her reflection in her eyes. Instead, she picked up a piece of bread and tore it with a violence that made the crust splinter. Her fingers dug so deep into the dough that her nails left deep, crescent-moon marks, as if she were trying to throttle the memory of Harald’s voice.
She forced herself to chew, but the bread was dry, tasting of ash.
She bolted from the table before the tea could cool, and Amelia’s frantic eyes could pin her down and demand the truth she didn't have. She moved with small, ladylike steps—a practiced lie—while under her skin, her nerves were vibrating like a struck bell.
The noise of the castle was loud. The loneliness was a vacuum.
Where is he?
She loathed the question. It tasted like surrender.
A guard stood at the yard archway, his spear a vertical line of cold iron. He snapped to attention as she neared. "Me lady."
"Is there a chance ye ken where the laird has gone?" she asked. Her voice was a masterpiece of cool, idle curiosity, but her heart was a riot behind her ribs.
The guard blinked, caught off guard. "Out, me lady."
"Out where?" Her mouth tightened, the composure beginning to fray at the edges.
"I dinnae ken."
She gave a sharp, clinical nod and turned away before he could see the flash of frustration in her eyes. She let her feet carry her toward the garden, then further, toward the cliffs where the air turned jagged and salt-heavy.
Somewhere beyond that line of grey stone lay the lake—the secret he had whispered into the dark of the study. The memory of his voice returned, a low, visceral hum that pulled at her chest, dragging her toward the path.
I want tae see it.Curiosity is nae a crime.
She gathered her heavy skirts, her fingers trembling as she navigated the hidden dip in the track where the brush thickened. The further she went, the more the world changed. The scream of the sea faded, replaced by a silence so profound it felt like a physical weight. The air grew cool and damp, smelling of ancient stone and moss.
The lake revealed itself all at once—a dark, mirror-smooth eye of water tucked into the throat of the cliffs. It looked like a secret held too long. Enya stood at the edge, the stillness of the placesinking into her bones, offering a reprieve from the hammers and the wedding ribbons and the suffocating mission.
She took a step closer, drawn by a gravity she couldn't name.
Then, a sound broke the silence. The heavy, rhythmic displacement of water. A low, steady exhale of breath that sounded far too much like the man who had been haunting her thoughts.
She stopped. Her heart gave a violent, liquid kick against her ribs.
Harald stood waist-deep in the water, his back to her, shoulders broad and bare beneath the light, his skin darkened by wind and sun. For the briefest moment her mind refused the shape of what she was seeing. Then the realization settled with quiet, devastating clarity.
He wore nothing at all.
The heat erupted, a scorched-earth flush that raced from her chest to her hairline. She took an unsteady step back, her knees weakening. Her foot snagged on a gnarled root, and she lurched sideways, her palm slamming against the rough bark of a tree to keep from falling. Her heart was a frantic, thudding animal in her chest, so loud she was certain it was echoing off the rock walls of the cove.
He moved then, pushing deeper into the lake with an ease that drew her gaze despite herself, the water sliding over him in a smooth line as he submerged without hesitation. When he surfaced, he exhaled a long, heavy sound of satisfaction.
Something low in Enya's belly coiled tight—a sharp, throbbing ache she had no name for.
She dropped behind a thicket of gorse, crouching so low her skirts tangled around her thighs, her breath coming in shallow, jagged hitches. This was a trespass. It was a violation of every scrap of modesty she possessed. And yet, she stayed. Her body was a traitor, refusing to move, her skin humming with a restless, hungry energy.
Just one more look, she told herself, the lie tasting like honey and ash.
She peered through the leaves, her gaze devouring the way he swam—long, unhurried strokes that showcased the lethal strength in his shoulders. She had seen statues, heard the hushed, scandalous whispers of the maids, but none of it had prepared her for the sheer, heavy presence of him. He was unguarded, unashamed, a creature of bone and sinew existing entirely for himself.
Watching him felt like a hand sliding over her skin. It was unreasonably intimate, a theft of a moment she had no right to own, and yet she couldn't tear her eyes away. She had never seen a man like that before.
