They worked through six more lines, Esther’s pace gaining something that wasn’t quite confidence yet but was its close neighbor.
A willingness to try the next thing before the fear of the current had fully settled. When she stumbled, she stopped, took a breath, and resumed. She didn’t look to Ava for rescue the way she had in the beginning. By the time the candle had burned half an inch, Esther sat back.
“Uncle Noah’s goin’ to be s-so...” She caught herself. The open look shuttered, quick as a door closing. “Nay. D-daenae tell him.”
Ava blinked. “Why nae? He’ll be so proud of ye, Esther.”
“He’ll hear me st-stutter.” Esther’s eyes dropped to the table. Her hands, which had been relaxed a moment ago, pulled into her lap. “I d-daenae want him to hear it.”
Ava kept her voice level, with no rush. “He kens ye stutter, sweetheart. He’s always kent.”
“Aye, but,” Esther’s lip pressed thin. “It’s d-different when he hears it proper. When I’m... tryin’ to say somethin’ good and it c-comes out wrong.” She shook her head. “It sounds stupid.”
“It doesnae sound stupid. It sounds like ye.” Ava leaned forward slightly. “And yer uncle willnae care. I promise ye that.”
Esther was quiet for a moment. Then, with the careful precision of a child who has thought something through, she said, “What if he d-does?”
Ava met her eyes steadily. “Then I’ll deal with him.”
Something shifted in Esther’s expression, not quite a smile but its beginning. “Ye’d argue w-with him? About me?”
“I’ve done it before.” Ava tilted her head. “Turned out all right.”
Esther considered this with the gravity she brought to all important decisions.
“Aye,” she said at last, reluctantly, the way of someone conceding a point they’d have preferred to keep. “Aye, all right. But...” She held up one finger. “More practice first. I want to be b-better before he hears.”
“As much practice as ye need,” Ava agreed. “We’ll work on it every day.”
Esther nodded, satisfied, and closed the primer with both hands. “I’m hungry.”
“Of course ye are.” Ava stood, gathering the books. “Go wash yer hands. I’ll take these back.”
Esther slid off her chair, padded to the door, then paused with her hand on the frame and looked back.
“Ava?”
“Aye?”
“Thank ye. F-for nae making it scary.”
Ava waited until the small footsteps had faded down the corridor before she pressed one hand flat to her chest and took a breath.
She gathered the books, stacked them, and went to put them away.
She did not think about the study. She’d not been thinking about it since lunch, with the same determined focus she’d been applying to not-thinking about towers for the past four days.
She was getting rather good at it.
And then Caitlin appeared at the end of the corridor with an apologetic smile that meant she was about to say something Ava wasn’t going to enjoy.
“He’s ready for ye,” Caitlin said. “The Laird awaits ye in his study.”
Ava looked at the stack of books in her arms.
“Right,” she said. “Of course he is.”
The study door was open.
