Page 115 of Outlaw Ever After

“Lips of gold if truth be told, sing oh sing me laddies!”

She squealed! Basked in his hold as her hair jostled loose from her coif to feather around her face. As his clear, rich baritone bellowed the lyrics.

“Steal a kiss and twirl the miss! Sing oh sing me laddies! ”

He spun her, then swooped down to her, his lips puckered exaggeratedly to a rowdy cheer of delight from the Comyn staff.

She batted him away and wagged her finger at him. “Do nay dare, sir!” she scolded.

“Till her brother doth said I’ll have yer head! Run oh run ye laddie !”

She laughed as he waggled his brows, and made chase at him as he ducked out of her way, ignoring Kendrew MacGregor’s sister, who scowled.

Laughter roared. “Seamus’ll have yer head, man!”

He whipped out his flute and began puffing the tune as he skipped backward to the rhythm, like a piper leading his fray, and she followed, relinking her arms with her sister and this time, Jossy, dancing their way into the dusky woods. She didn’t mistake him eying her though, worry behind his sparkling emeralds. She should never have doubted him. She could love him for the rest of her days…

Love?

Aye, that’s what the heartache had been. The months of grief. She’d grieved the loss of their bairn, but more than that, she’d grieved the loss of a dream. I imagine it’s the moment he fell in love with ye. Her heart soared at the realization, then plummeted at the pending tumult with Seamus’s return, simmering with the uncertainty of the melee on the morrow.

They sloshed through the burn and rose over the hillock to the village draped in turnip carvings.

They knocked upon the first cottage door to the delight of a bairn in a handmade mask. He reached for a soul cake. “ Souls, souls for a soul cake! I beg ye good mistress a soul cake !” he sang.

“Ah-ah, my darling.” She waggled her hand, grinning. “Ye must give me a trick, first, or a treat, or perhaps a prayer?”

The traveling party gathered around to watch as the lad spun around, then jumped and touched his toes.

Laughing, she passed him a soul cake from the basket Alex held for her.

“Hallowtide blessings, sweeting.” She smiled, cupping the child’s head as he tore off an enormous bite and gazed up at her.

The bairn and his family joined the procession, songs of prayer on their lips for the souls of loved ones not yet transcended to heaven.

At the next door, a shy lassie in a mask twisted back and forth and sang softly, “Souls, souls for a soul cake, I beg ye good mistress a soul cake .”

Peigi knelt down at the threshold and took her nervous hand. “Will ye do a trick for me, or give a treat? Or recite a prayer?”

The girl held out a rudimentarily carved turnip. “A treat for ye, mi lady.”

“’Tis lovely, lassie. I shall put it on my mantel in the verra middle.”

That earned her a huge grin, revealing a lost tooth. Peigi handed the turnip up to Alex, who passed down a soul cake for her to give the child. The procession moved on, the next cottage door opened to the singing—an older couple and granddaughter on the cusp of coming-of-age.

“A trick, or a treat, lass?” Peigi smiled when the girl replied.

“A prayer, for our late laird’s soul. As I do every year.”

She felt Alex still beside her. Solemnity hovered. Peigi nodded and took the girl’s hands as her father spoke the prayer for all of them. She reached for a soul cake, yet noticed the glances at Alex from the villagers while the nobles and lairds around them chatted among each other. Alex, smiling wanly, wasn’t looking at anyone. As the evening progressed, though tricks and treats were offered to the children, the prayer that everyone made as the basket emptied of cakes was for Alexander Comyn’s soul. Nay another.

And Alex looked…aged, despite still being young and hale, as he gazed up at the sky, the land, the silhouette of the ruin in the distance. It was the same distant look he’d cast at the trees when they’d ridden to the hamlet with the Communion Bread or each time they broke bread in the great hall. Searching, or perhaps yearning for all that had been stripped of him?

Did he think of his sire? A soul trapped in a skull that had long ago gone missing, leaving a void of unanswered questions?

She passed out another cake.

“Samhain blessings, Alpin,” she said to the mayor, offering him her hand.