So why was he disappointed that she hadn’t protested? Why had a tiny part of him hoped the idea of marriage to him wasn’t so inconceivable?
He stopped at a small burn in the Broad Wood to water the horse for the last time before reaching Sundrum. His leg was much improved since acquiring the mount, but it grew tight without movement, and it felt good to move about.
He wasn’t delaying.
Janet returned from tending her needs and sat on a rock by the stream, nibbling on a piece of dried beef, while he held the horse to water.
“Tell me about Helen.”
He glanced over at her in surprise. Not exactly the conversation he was expecting after their last. He stiffened slightly, wondering if she’d noticed something about his leg. He was careful not to favor the other, but the lass was too damned observant. “What do you want to know?”
She shrugged. “She’s good at what she does?”
“She’s one of the best.”
“You said she could be a physician? How could that be? She is a woman.”
“It’s rare, but not impossible. Your brother-in-law’s brother, the Earl of Sutherland, is married to a woman who trained in Edinburgh for a while at one of the guilds until she married. Helen might have as well.”
“But then she married Magnus?”
Ewen wasn’t sure where she was going with this. “Aye, but Helen never wanted the guilds. She’s happy doing what she’s doing.”
“And what exactly is that?”
Ewen finished letting the horse drink and then led it from the burn, tying the rein around a tree. He crossed his arms and looked at her, knowing he was treading dangerous ground. She was no doubt trying to trick him into revealing something about the Guard or confirm his place in it. “She tends to the ill; what else would she do?”
“Does she go into battle with you?”
“No.”
“But she is nearby?”
“Why are you so interested in this?”
She shrugged. “I just am. It’s not usual, you must admit, for a gently born lady to take on such a role.”
“Helen is unusual.”
“As is her husband. He is a rare man to permit his wife to put herself in such danger.”
He laughed. “MacKay hates every bloody minute of it.”
She looked genuinely perplexed. “Then why does he go along with it?”
“Because he knows she is needed. And—”
He stopped.
“And?”
He shrugged uncomfortably. “And because he loves her.”
“Oh.” It obviously wasn’t the answer she expected.
His mouth twisted in a smile. “Surely you’ve heard of it?”
Their eyes met, and a sharp frisson of awareness passed between them.
