1
“Nay! Wot are ye doing?”
Ferra McLeish frowned at the cluster of herbs she had in her hand, poised to fall into the grinding mortar she was working with. “I’m making a potion.”
The clan’s healer, Sorcha, clucked her tongue disapprovingly. “Wot sort of potion is it this time, Ferra? The dying kind? That’s hemlock in yer hands, not anise.”
Ferra frowned as she looked down at the cluster in her hands. “Och, I didnae realize it.”
“Go on now,” Sorcha stated, her voice holding no admonition in it. “Wash yer hands well, lass. I dinnae want ye tae poison yerself accidentally.”
Ferra dropped the poisonous herbs on the linen cloth near the mortar and bound it up tightly, carrying it with her as she made her way through the hut and outside, where the air was heavy with recent rain. Ferra drew in a deep breath and ran her hand through her dark auburn hair, and a smile formed across her face. Her pale green eyes were filled with joy! She loved how everything smelled after a good rain. Things felt fresh, like a blade of grass popping up in the most unlikely place.
After burying the hemlock so that no one else would find it, Ferra used some of Sorcha’s lilac soap to wash her hands, dredging them in the cold water a few times so that she was certain she got the remnants off her skin. She didn’t know what had possessed her to mix up the two herbs, as she had always been so careful in the past.
Perhaps she was growing lax in her attention to detail.
After Ferra’s hands tinged blue in color, she wiped them on the cloth next to the basin and walked back into the hut. For years she had been visiting the healer, learning all that there was to know about the art of healing others. At first, Sorcha had been against teaching the laird’s daughter her trade, but since she had no other apprentices, Ferra had finally worn her down.
The hut was the very picture of what Ferra hoped to have one day, from the drying herbs hanging from the rafters to the ever-present smell of lilacs clinging to the air. While Sorcha didn’t require coin for her services, her patrons saw the need to give her payment nevertheless. She always had an abundance of rations, clothing, and trinkets being left at her door.
But that wasn’t the reason that Ferra wished to be the clan’s healer. She wished to help others, to feel the success flooding through her veins at bringing a bairn into this life or helping another remain here for a few more years.
Healing gave her purpose, and when they did lose a member of their clan, she mourned harder than most, her mind wondering if there was something that she could have done differently to prevent their demise. Sorcha had often told her that she couldn’t save everyone, but Ferra liked to think she could.
Sorcha looked up from her worktable as Ferra picked up her pestle. “I wilnae let it happen again,” Ferra stated.
“’Tis not like ye, Ferra,” Sorcha sighed. “Is there something else ye are needing tae discuss?”
Ferra gripped the pestle in her hands, feeling the smooth wood that had been worn from many years of use. “’Tis mah da. He wishes tae speak tae me.”
“Ah,” Sorcha replied, understanding dawning. “Ye’re worried this time.”
Ferra drew in a breath. She had just reached the twentieth year of her life, and by all accounts, should be wed with a passel of bairns clinging to her skirts. Why her father had not forced his hand until now was a surprise to Ferra, but she imagined it was because her other sisters had already fulfilled the duties of begetting grandchildren for them. Her sister, Garia, lived on McDougal land with her husband and their bairns.
Her other sister, Breta, also lived on McDougal land, though her home was in the McDougal keep instead of a hut in the village. Both of her sisters had wed hardened warriors, and both were known to be the apple of their husbands’ eyes as well. Ferra visited them often, if nothing more than to revel in the love they had both found and the bairns that were the product of that love.
“Aye,” she finally said. “I’m worried.”
Sorcha braced her hands on the worktable. “’Tis only a matter of time, lass. Ye are a laird’s daughter, after all. Ye are bound tae have tae wed.”
Ferra closed her eyes after hearing those words. When she was younger, she had thought about her own bairns someday, a house she would keep, and a faceless Scot that would become her husband.
But as she grew older, Ferra realized there were other loves she had, namely the art of healing, and her dreams of a family faded into existence. “I dinnae wish tae be a wife,” Ferra said firmly. “I wish tae be a healer.”
Sorcha chuckled as she returned to her work. “I dinnae think ye will have much tae say aboot yer future, lass, but ye can be both, ye know. There’s nothing stating ye cannae.”
That would mean she would have to find a husband that was willing to have a wife as a healer, and Ferra doubted that many would allow their wives to have a trade instead of just begetting bairns. She had come here today to get her mind off what her father might say, but in worrying about their meeting, she had nearly made a grave error.
It seemed the only way to move past this day was to face it head-on. “I must go.”
“Of course,” Sorcha replied, not looking up. “Whatever he says, Ferra, doesnae mean that ye must settle for only that course. A course set is meant tae stray when the timing is right.”
Ferra quit the hut before Sorcha could say anything else on the matter, forcing a smile for the clansmen that she passed on her way back to the keep. This was her home, and if her father wished for her to wed inside the clan, then it would be a small price to pay. Perhaps if she stayed here, then she could still work with Sorcha until her soon-to-be husband grew comfortable with her trade.
Ferra held on to that hope as she walked into the keep, her mother the first person she saw. “Ferra, there ye are!” her mother stated, grasping her hand. “Yer da is finished with his meeting and is asking after ye.”
“Do ye know wot he wants?” she asked hesitantly as she walked with her mother, her heart pounding in her ears.
