“I didnae lie, did I?”
Ciaran didn’t speak, but his response hung in the air just like the smell of beeswax and polish. Ava was kind, brave, clever, and easy to like. It made him feel cornered, and hehatedfeeling cornered.
He twisted his mouth and stared hard at his brother. “That is a child’s answer.”
“Perhaps,” Hector conceded. “But it isnae wrong.”
Ciaran had no response to that. At least nothing adequate enough.
Then Hector added, almost under his breath, “But so did Isla at first.”
Ciaran felt his skin suddenly grow heated at the mention of that name.
Isla.
It was quite bizarre how, even after all these years, her name could still have such an effect on him.
Hector was not being cruel in mentioning her, and he knew that. He wasn’t old enough to have fully understood what wasgoing on that fateful day, but he had witnessed it. He had seeneverything.
Ciaran’s voice cooled. “Whatever Isla did, or didnae do, it was Duncan who should have been more careful.”
The words sounded messy even to his own ears.
Duncan had been the brother who had married Isla. He had been the one who loved openly, trusted openly, stood in a wedding hall believing goodness and order would protect what he had chosen. If anyone should have seen more, guarded more, doubted more, it was him.
Or perhaps that was only the version of the story Ciaran still used because it let the lesson remain intact. Love makes fools, and trust makes people think they know better. Once people cared about something too much, blood would always follow.
Hector did not argue the point directly. He only leaned back further and raised an eyebrow. “And do ye mean to be careful?”
The question hung in the air.
Ciaran let out a breath through his nose. He could have lied. He could have said yes with all the certainty he had once trusted in. He could have even claimed the week of avoidance as proof enough that he was just as cautious as he’d always been. But Hector had already seen too much, and Ciaran had gone too far into this to step back out cleanly.
“Ava doesnae strike me as the kind of woman one backs down from,” Hector added.
Ciaran felt a breath leave him. “Nay, she doesnae, does she?”
“So how do ye plan on keeping her at arm’s length?”
He exhaled. “I’m nae going to lie, I daenae ken yet. I’ll probably die trying.”
Hector fell quiet after that. He did not offer comfort. He did not turn wise all at once and start naming remedies for wounds older than either of them had known what to do with when they were made. He only sat with the truth, which was perhaps the most brotherly thing he could have done.
Outside the study, life moved with the ordinary sounds of a stronghold trying to settle after violence.
Inside, the older danger had been buried on paper.
Jack was dead. The message would be sent. No feud would follow. The old enemy with the blade was gone.
And still Ciaran sat there knowing that the greater threat now wore no steel, carried no hatred, and had twice been given the chance to leave him.
Twice she had stayed.
Neither brother said her name again. They did not need to. It sat between them plainly enough, in the letter set aside, in the silence that followed, in the grim shape of the answer Ciaran had just given.
Ava was more dangerous to him now than any armed man had been.
And worse, he already knew the walls that had kept him safe for so long were not holding as cleanly as they once had.
