Page 30 of Kilted Sins

“Good mornin’,” said Cillian, in an attempt to appear friendly and avoid any further arguments, at least for the day. The servants bowed to him and Thora gave him a curtsy, finishing her task before she approached him, her haze glued to his shoulder.

“Good mornin’,” she said. “How are ye feelin’?”

“I am well,” said Cillian. For a brief moment, he considered questioning Thora again on the matter of his injury, but in the end, he decided against it. Not only did he not think he would ever get an answer to his questions, but he also feared that asking them in the first place would only end up causing another rift between them, to add in the long list of arguments that had brought them to this strange point in their acquaintance. “The paste certainly helped.”

“I am glad,” said Thora and then for a while, the two of them stared at each other in silence, neither knowing what to say next.

Instead of speaking, Thora grabbed a sprig of holly and draped it over Cillian’s head, the stiff leaves tangling into his hair. Cillian stared at her, half surprised and half incredulous, not knowing what to make of the gesture.

“Ye must help us with the decorations,” she said as she grabbed a few more sprigs and pushed them into Cillian’s hands. “I’ll show ye how tae weave them into a wreath.”

Cillian hesitated, looking at the clump of sprigs in his hands. “I dinnae think that is a good idea. I have never done anythin’ like this afore.”

“There is a first time fer everythin’,” Thora said, stubborn as ever. “Come, help. Ye may find that ye enjoy it.”

Cillian very much doubted that. All his life, he had done his best to avoid putting up decorations or dealing with the preparations for any holiday as much as he could, and it was no different now. He was good at other things—anything that required a sword, anything that required a degree of persuasion, anything that had to do with running a clan, as long as it wasn’t this. Thora had a hand on his arm, though, and she was pulling him insistently aside, towards a table where they could work on the wreaths and the garlands.

With a sigh, he took a seat next to her, gingerly placing the sprigs on the table. He doubted he had the dexterity needed for this. Thora’s hands were small and her fingers long and nimble, practically made for delicate tasks like this. His, on the other hand, only knew how to handle a fork, a pen, and a sword.

“Ye must weave them like this,” said Thora as she grabbed a few twigs and a length of twine, and began to demonstrate the technique. “Over an’ under. This thread will keep them secure.”

As she spoke, she showed Cillian how to tie the white thread around the wreath and how to add more and more holly, until it could hold its shape. Then, it was his turn to make one and just as he had expected, it was far from an easy task. His fingers kept slipping, the twigs kept falling from his hands, and the twine ended up tangled all around the holly until he had what he thought was an abomination of a wreath, something that not even a child would make.

Thora laughed and the sound startled him for a moment. That, too, was a first. Cillian thought he may have heard her laugh around someone else, but only from a distance, only when he wasn’t around. Now, though, they were sitting close and her hands came to grab his, guiding him slowly and gently, and though she was laughing at his expense, he found that it didn’t matter to him at all.

He just wanted to hear that laugh again. He just wanted to know that he could make her laugh.

What am I thinkin’? I must have lost me mind.

It wasn’t the first time Cillian had acknowledged his attraction towards Thora. After all, when she had tended to his injury, it had been difficult to ignore the way his heart had raced in his chest, every touch of her hands causing him to shiver. The proximity had been torturous, almost unbearable, and it was no different now. The only thing that kept him a little saner was the distraction of his task and the frustration when he saw the result of his efforts.

Just because it wasn’t the first time, though, it didn’t mean that he was comfortable with it. From the very first moment that he had learned he was to be betrothed to Thora, he had been searching for ways to get out of the arrangement without offending her family or the king. When he had met her, he had decided it was the best thing he could do, getting rid of her quietly and efficiently. And yet now she plagued his thoughts, always lingering in his mind. There was nothing he could do to stop thinking about her, nothing that could save him from this torture and lead him to salvation.

It must have been nothing more than a temporary insanity, he told himself. There was no other explanation for it.

“Ye’re very bad at this,” Thora said. Cillian turned an unimpressed look towards her but there was no real malice behind it.

“I told ye I cannae dae this,” he reminded her. “It is ye who insisted I should.”

“How would ye learn if ye didnae try?” Thora asked, as though he needed to know how to do this at all. “Besides, are ye nae enjoyin’ yerself?”

Cillian didn’t know how to answer that question. He supposed he was enjoying parts of it—specifically the part where he was close to her, the two of them working together—but he wasn’t enjoying the fact that he seemed to be the only one there incapable of making a wreath.

“I cannae say that I am,” he grumbled, but something in his tone must have given him away, as Thora only chuckled and shook her head. For a moment, Cillian was mesmerized by the movement of her long, dark hair, the way it caught the soft light of the morning. “Must I really dae this?”

“Me lady,” one of the maids called and Cillian twitched, surprised by the sudden intrusion. “We need more evergreens. Should Caitriona an’ I fetch some more?”

At the maid’s words, Thora’s eyes lit up in a way that Cillian didn’t like one bit. “Nay, nay, the laird an’ I will go an’ fetch them,” she said, as she sprang up from her seat and looked at Cillian expectantly, as if he was meant to follow.

“We will?” he asked, frowning at her. “I can have someone else bring it. We dinnae have tae⁠—”

“Ye claim this is too difficult,” Thora said. “Surely, it isnae difficult tae gather some holly. Come now. There is too much tae be done an’ we must help as much as we can.”

Cillian wanted to point out that the reason why there was so much to be done was that Thora had demanded all of it. Had she been more reasonable, had she not tried to antagonize him while they were discussing decorations, then there would have been plenty of time for everything to be done without either of them lifting a finger.

But he also suspected that Thora enjoyed this, and wanted to help. What kind of laird would he be if he refused to help with the preparations for his own castle?

Pushing himself to his feet, Cillian followed Thora outside to the courtyard. The moment they stepped outside, though, they both froze, the chill instantly seeping into their bones.