He shrugged. “I haven’t changed. Still your wee brother.”
She laughed, then angled to study his face. “Oh, I think you have changed. For such a long time, you have kept others away and built a wall around yourself, especially after Neil and then Elspeth died. Then Father went, and your wall grew higher and thicker. But I think you’re breaking out of it.”
“I have done that to some extent, I suppose,” he admitted.
“I haven’t seen you for a while, but you seem different. I hoped perhaps you might have found someone. Only that would soften you. Is it Amy? Or perhaps Dora?”
He huffed, shook his head. “I care for both of them, but neither of them has stolen my heart.” It belonged to Christina, but he was not about to tell his sister. It was difficult enough to acknowledge it to himself.
“Well, you’ve changed for the better, my dear. Last time you were here, you were brusque and rumbling like a bear disturbed in its den.”
“You might feel that way too, if you were at Dundrennan with Amy and Aunt Lill going full bore with tradesmen and work crew and the whole place draped in tartan and whatnot,” he drawled.
Mary laughed. “I’m sure you have little patience with that!”
He smiled faintly and watched purple streaks in the sunset fire. “I built a wall around me for a reason, and you know why. I felt as if Elspeth’s death, and Neil’s too, were my fault in a way.” He was surprised how easy that was to say, after carrying it for years.
“You had nothing to do with either tragedy, Aedan!”
“I should have gone to war when Neil did.”
“You were the levelheaded one who stayed home with our ailing father. You saved him in a way. He had energy for thehouse and estate with you there. If anything, Neil’s death is partly on my hands,” she added.
He drew back to look at her. “Why on earth do you say that?”
“You know they brought Neil into the field hospital where I was working as a nurse in those months. I had only met Connor recently, and we had a fierce argument, silly as it seems now, over bandage supplies. He demanded more and I insisted we had no way of acquiring more. And then Neil came in with others who were wounded, and I could do nothing to save him, could scarcely make him comfortable. Connor did his utmost to tend his wounds—but Neil died. If it was anyone’s fault—I was too late, tending to other men before I got to him. Before I saw he was even there.” She caught her breath.
Aedan put his arm around her. “You did your best. It was in God’s hands. We cannot change these things. You know that.”
“As for Elspeth,” she went on, “it was not because of Dundrennan’s curse. It was illness, just a devastating and fast illness. Even if it coincided with your becoming heir to Dundrennan after Neil died—that is not what caused her illness or death.”
He sighed. “I’ve always wondered.”
“Of course. But you are pragmatic in most things. Surely you realize it was only coincidence. And besides, you were not laird then. You were the heir.”
“Not then,” he said slowly. “But I am now, and so I have to be careful how I—”
“So thereissomeone!”
“Even so, I cannot risk that dreadful curse ruining—something that could be good.”
“What if you are wrong?” She pressed his arm. “Sometimes we hold on to pain and fear because it is more familiar than the unknown. We can let that go. Miracles do happen.”
He was silent for a moment, thinking, hoping. Then he nodded. “You are always the steady, wise one.” He kissed the top of her head. “Miracles, is it? I wish that were the case.”
“Maybe it is. Now, will you tell me—”
“I will not.”
“Then tell me the state of things at Dundrennan. Will the house be refurbished by year’s end, as Father’s will stipulated?”
“It might be,” he said. “It is looking rather marvelous.”
“I thought you hated chintz.”
He grinned. “I’m growing more fond of it. And the mural in the dining room promises to be stunning. Father would have been very pleased with it. Mr. Blackburn—John Blackburn—is a gifted artist with a real sense of that legend.”
“I cannot wait to see it. What about the old wall you discovered on Cairn Drishan?”
