Ailis set the tray down and came closer. “Sit, then. Talk if ye can. I’ve ears better than most walls.”
Davina sank onto the edge of the bed. Ailis perched beside her, waiting with patient attentiveness.
“He will nae speak tae me,” Davina said at last. “Something happened below, something that’s eaten him alive. And instead of letting me help, he banished me tae the chamber as though I were a bairn.”
Ailis nodded slowly. “I’ve seen that look in a man. He’s frightened.”
Davina frowned. “Baird? He’d rather lose a limb than admit fear.”
“Aye,” Ailis said. “And that’s the trouble of it.”
Davina rubbed at her temples. “He’s shut every door between us. I dinnae ken how tae reach him.”
Ailis sighed, the sound filled with old understanding. “We all carry past and guilt like a heavy burden.” It appeared that Ailis wanted to share something else, something deeper, but she changed her mind at the last moment.
Davina stared at the fire grate, where embers glowed dully. “I want tae help him. I want tae stand beside him. But he treats me as if I were glass.”
“Because he thinks everything breaks,” Ailis explained. “People, peace, family… even himself. And he thinks if he keeps ye behind walls, ye’ll be safe from whatever’s coming.”
Davina whispered. “But safety without trust is nae safety at all.”
“Aye,” Ailis murmured, placing a warm hand over Davina’s. “Then help him see that. But gently, me lady. A man’s heart is a fortress when it’s been battered all its life. Ye’ll need more than force tae open its gates.”
Davina let those words settle, fragile yet hopeful. But as she looked toward the door Baird had closed on her, she felt the walls of the keep closing in, too, leaving her in stone and shadow, grief and silence.
A fortress was meant to protect her. But that same fortress might very well destroy them both if she could not find her way through.
CHAPTER 23
For three days, the keep held its breath. The wind whipped across the cliffs, rattling shutters and howling through arrow slits, but inside the castle the air was strung like a bowstring ready to snap. Baird felt it in every step of the stone corridors, every glance from his men, and every low murmur that cut off the moment he passed.
He welcomed the silence. It mirrored the one inside him.
He strode along the battlements as dawn bled into the sky, with the horizon nothing but a cold line of steel and smoke. His cloak snapped behind him in the wind, but he barely felt it. Everything in him was honed sharp.
Kenny approached from the far end of the wall. “Patrol reported movement by the old bridge,” he said. “Could be nothing. Could be another Sinclair scout.”
“It’s something,” Baird replied, with his eyes fixed on the distant ridge. “I’ll ride out.”
Kenny frowned. “Alone again?”
“Aye.”
“That’s unwise, laird.”
“So is letting Sinclairs crawl under me nose.” Baird cut him a sideways look. “Have me horse prepared.”
Kenny hesitated, then gave a curt nod. “As ye say.”
Baird walked on, as the rising light revealed the courtyard far below. It was a constant chaos of guards changing shifts, stable hands brushing frost from the horses and smoke curling from the kitchens.
And Davina.
He spotted her in a far corner of the courtyard, wrapped in a shawl, speaking with Ailis. Her posture was stiff. She reminded him of a bird in too small a cage. She did not look up. Baird jerked his eyes away before the ache in his chest could sharpen further.
Distance is safety.
That was the lie he repeated until it hardened into truth.
