Chapter 30
CHAPTER 30
Logan’s family had sought sanctuary in the two rooms at the top of the keep’s tower. The women were on the right, occupying Adeline’s room, while the men had taken the left.
Every so often, Adeline walked between the rooms to see how Oliver was faring. As far as she knew, he hadn’t woken up since they’d visited Jonah on the cliffs, though he no longer felt hot to the touch.
Still, Adeline busied her mind with routine, changing the cloths on Oliver’s forehead, tipping sanitized water into his mouth, throwing a few more logs in the fire when it started to dim. He’d had some tonic a few hours ago, and she was counting down the minutes until she could feed him some more, just to give herself something else to do.
She hated being idle.
“I daenae mean to tell ye what to do,” Theo said shyly as she entered the men’s room for the fifth time in half an hour, “but there hasnae been any change in Master Oliver. Ye daenae need to keep tendin’ to him. I can manage, and ye should probably get some rest.”
Adeline smiled wearily. “Do you really think I can have myself a nice nap when there’s a stake out there with my name on it?”
She’d glimpsed it from the topmost battlements of the tower, after claiming she needed fresh air. Really, she’d just wanted to see the mob again, hoping beyond all hope that they might’ve gotten bored, given up, and gone home.
They hadn’t.
“Miss Adeline, I daenae think they’ve carved yer name on it,” Theo said, frowning in confusion. “That would be somethin’ like sorcery if ye ask me.”
Adeline had to laugh. “It’s just something people say where I come from. I don’t think there’s any sorcery behind it.”
“Oh.” Theo blushed.
On a man as huge as him, with muscles the size of boulders, it was an odd, weirdly endearing sight.
Adeline went over to Oliver anyway and repeated the comforting routine of changing his cold compress, before rearranging his blankets for the millionth time. “Do you know where Logan went?”
“Hmm?”
“Logan. Do you know where he went?”
Theo gave a non-committal shrug. “Said somethin’ about goin’ to speak to the men, to prepare ‘em for what might come. Usually, it’d be me that does that, but he insisted on doin’ it himself. The lads will like that. If there are orders to be given, they’re more likely to obey if the orders come from the Laird himself.”
“What happens if they don’t?”
Theo squinted at her. “If they daenae what?”
“Obey. What if they think what all those people out there are thinking?” Adeline fought back visions of the villagers sweeping through the keep in search of her, while Logan’s soldiers stood back and let them come for her.
Theo snorted. “They wouldnae disobey him, Miss Adeline. Even if they daenae agree with the fight, they’ll fight all the same. Och, in his faither’s day, I daenae think there were too many at all who wanted to do that bastard’s biddin’, but they still did it. Aye, I think there were a few absconders, but most just did as they were told.”
“Are you allowed to call the previous Laird a bastard?” Adeline chuckled nervously.
She wondered how much Theo would tell her if she pressed him for more information.
Theo’s eyebrow arched upward. “For a man like that, ye can call him whatever ye like. Bastard is the kindest word I could think of.” He shuddered slightly. “Most evil man ye could ever meet. Decided bein’ a Laird wasnae enough amusement for him, so he turned this island into a stronghold for his piracy.”
“He was a pirate?” Adeline’s eyes bugged, picturing peg legs and parrots and tricorn hats.
Theo nodded. “Sailed out with his fleet of five ships. They’d lie in wait for any other ships passin’ by, they’d board ‘em, and they’d take everythin’. Rarely left any soul alive, and if they did, it was always women. I wasnae a soldier then, but me faither was. He saw things he wouldnae ever speak of, but ye could see it in his eyes—it haunted him.”
“Was Logan ever… like that?” Adeline felt sick, her skin crawling.
Theo looked at her as if she were mad. “Nay, hasnae ever been and never will be. His faither tried to make him bloodthirsty, aye, but it’s nae in his nature. He fought battles and won, but only when he had to, and there hasnae been a battle here for a fair while. The Laird sought peace and achieved it.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
“Of course, it might’ve been different if his faither had lived longer and had longer to twist him into some reflection of himself, but he died ten years ago—drowned after an English navy vessel sank his ships. The Laird took the reins of this island at two-and-twenty and transformed it into somethin’… good.” Theo shrugged. “Now, all we have are fishin’ boats.”
Adeline chinned down at Oliver. “What about him?”
“Just like his faither,” Theo replied curtly. “Well, maybe nae so violent, but he draws trouble to him like his faither did. Has caused his brother nay end of bother.”
At that moment, the chamber door flew open, and a figure raced in. Breathless and pale, he beckoned to Theo. Somehow, he was familiar to Adeline, but she couldn’t quite remember where she’d seen him before.
“Och, it’s ye!” The man blinked at Adeline. “I reckon ye daenae ken me, but I ken ye.”
Adeline froze. “You do?”
“I was one of the lads who found ye on the beach,” he replied, smiling. “If I’d kenned the trouble ye were goin’ to cause, I might have put ye in a boat and pushed ye out to sea. But there’s naught we can do about that now, eh?”
She vaguely recalled two men looming over her, before Logan had appeared. Whether or not this man was one of the two, she had no idea, but if he said so, she wasn’t going to contradict him.
“The Laird needs ye in the armory,” the man said, turning his attention back to Theo. “There’s somethin’ else comin’ toward the keep, and if they’ve made themselves a batterin’ ram, we’ll be firin’ arrows before noon.”
He sounded way more excited than someone should be about firing arrows at his fellow islanders.
The man looked back at Adeline. “I ken it doesnae matter, but I daenae think ye’re a witch. If ye were, ye’d have flayed us where we stood for seein’ ye in yer bearskin.”
“Excuse me?” Adeline almost choked on her own spit.
“That bearskin ye were wearin’,” the man said, and Adeline immediately relaxed. He hadn’t seen her naked, after all. “I still reckon ye’re some warrioress from the northern islands. They’re wild out there.”
Theo got up. “She’s nae a warrioress, and, aye, she’s nae a witch. She’s a healer from Wales. Honestly, do ye nae listen to anythin’ that goes on around this keep?”
“Nae really,” the man replied, striding out of the room, with Theo in lumbering pursuit.
Alone in the bedroom with Oliver sleeping soundly, Adeline took the opportunity to sit down in the chair that Theo had vacated. Peering anxiously at the door, then back to the sleeping figure in the bed, making sure no one was there to watch her, she carefully took out the little fabric-wrapped parcel she’d been carrying around with her.
Setting it on her lap, she carefully unwrapped the cloth until she reached the almost pearlescent egg. She stared hard at it, shoving her hands under her thighs so she wouldn’t be tempted to touch it.
How do I get you to work, huh?
If this was her emergency escape route, she needed to make sure there weren’t any obstacles in her way.
Just then, she noticed something she hadn’t seen before. Letters, sewn into the silky, silver square of cloth with thread that was only half a shade darker. Perfect camouflage.
Gingerly, she separated the silver cloth from the rough, golden cloth underneath and used the latter to wrap the egg back up. That done, she brought the silver cloth to her eyes and started turning it this way and that.
In a certain light, the letters stood out, revealing a message. Or rather instructions.
Hold this token in your hands,
Wish your way to foreign lands,
But wait, leave no room for doubt,
Wish hard to find your way out.
In a moment of need, hold this gift tight,
And wish your way back into the light.
Ironically, she wished it was a little bit clearer. When it came to instructions, there couldn’t be any room for errors. But as she continued to read the passage over and over, the words became as simple as hurling a snow globe at a wall and wishing not to be alone.
All she had to do was hold the egg and wish herself back to where she came from, but with one caveat: she couldn’t have any second thoughts.
“Does that mean… I’ll never get back?” she whispered to the silvery cloth as if it could answer her.
Wishing to return to 2023 was as easy as pie, sure, but leaving no room for doubt? If a single thought of Logan popped into her head while she was holding the egg and making her wish, she’d just pass out and wake up again in the same place. Or worse, she might pass out and be returned to the moment she landed on the island, before she met him.
Slowly wrapping the egg back into its layers, she pocketed it and got to her feet. As she made her way to the door, she cast one last glance back at Oliver, watching the rise and fall of his chest to make sure he really was asleep.
Satisfied, she was about to cross the wide hallway to her room, to join Moira and Sophie, when an almighty cry shuddered up from somewhere below.
A scream of “help!” that made her blood run cold.