He handed it over. She turned it, found the embossed face of it, and pressed it experimentally into her palm.
She looked at the faint mark it left on her skin.
“It didnae work,” she said.
“Ye need the wax.”
“Could we do it?”
He looked at her. She looked back at him with the particular expression that meant she had decided something was happening and was waiting to see if he’d argue.
He did not argue.
He melted a small amount of wax onto a scrap of paper, let it pool, and handed the seal to Esther.
She pressed it in with both thumbs, very seriously, and lifted it. A clean impression of the MacGregor crest.
She stared at it.
“That’s the clan crest,” Noah said. “The stag. It’s been the same for six generations.”
“Why a stag?”
“Strength. The ability to hold yer ground.” He looked at it. “And because me ancestor who chose it had an encounter with one that apparently left an impression.”
“What kind of encounter?”
“The kind he survived, which is the important part.”
Esther pressed her lips together in an almost-smile, which was something she often did. She kept her amusement briefly in check, as if still getting used to the idea that it was allowed. Then she looked at the crest again. “Can I keep this?”
“The seal is the official one. I’ll have a copy made for ye.”
She folded the paper carefully and put it in her pocket.
The afternoon went on like this. Her surveying, him explaining.
She spun the globe in the corner, found Scotland, and traced the outline of its coast with a small finger.
Then she moved to the decanter on the side table.
“That’s dram, it’s for adults.”
Then, to the stack of legal correspondence.
“Boring, but necessary, I’ll teach ye someday”.
The to the wooden practice sword propped against the wall that he’d entirely forgotten was there.
She looked at it for a long moment.
“Is that for fightin’?”
“For practisin’.”
“Could I practice?”
He considered this. She was eight.
