Epilogue #2
Isla stood near one of the guard posts, cheeks flushed, smiling at a young guard who looked as if he’d forgotten how to breathe. Isla’s posture was bold, chin lifted, eyes bright with challenge.
The guard stammered something.
Isla laughed, not unkind. “Say it again. I like the way ye struggle.”
The guard’s ears turned red.
Maxwell glanced down at Ariella, eyebrow raised slightly.
Ariella’s mouth twitched. “Daenae.”
Maxwell’s voice stayed neutral. “She’s going to devour him.”
Ariella murmured, amused, “He deserves it.”
A sudden yelp rose behind them.
Young Ewan.
Maxwell turned in time to see the boy crouched behind Finley, who was lying on the grass dramatically, one arm thrown over his eyes like a wounded hero.
Finley groaned loudly. “I’ve been struck! I am dying!”
Ewan crept closer, gripping a stick like a sword, trying to look fierce and failing because his grin was too wide.
“Stand and fight,” Ewan whispered.
Finley’s voice came out weak. “I cannae. Tell me wife… I loved her.”
Ewan paused and then bubbled over with laughter. “Ye daenae have a wife!”
Finley cracked one eye open. “Then tell me ale I loved it.”
Ewan rolled into a fit laughter, before suddenly remembered he was meant to be sneaking. He covered his mouth, shoulders shaking.
Maxwell felt his chest loosen.
He had never been a man who longed for noise. Noise meant threats. Noise meant someone wasn’t watching something important.
But this noise was different.
This noise was life.
Ariella shifted beside him, and he felt their son’s weight settle more fully against her. The babe slept on, undisturbed by the celebration, trusting the world to hold him.
Ariella glanced up at Maxwell, eyes warm. “He’s out cold.”
Maxwell’s voice softened. “He’s had a long day.”
“He’s had a long life,” Ariella teased quietly. “All one year of it.”
Maxwell’s mouth curved. “Aye. Hard years.”
Ariella’s smile faded into something gentler. “He’s safe.”
Maxwell swallowed. “Aye.”
Her head tipped toward his shoulder, resting there with easy familiarity. The simple trust in the gesture struck him harder than any praise.
Maxwell’s hand lifted slowly, then settled at her upper arm, thumb brushing faintly as if anchoring himself to the truth of her beside him.
Ariella exhaled softly, content.
“Ye’re quiet,” she murmured, echoing Mairi’s words from months ago.
Maxwell glanced down at her. “I am listening.”
“To what?”
“To everything,” he said simply.
He listened to the laughter.
To the clatter of cups.
To the murmured prayers of gratitude that drifted up when the old men lifted their ale.
To the small sigh Ariella made when the baby shifted and she adjusted him with practiced care.
Maxwell’s gaze drifted across the courtyard again, taking in faces that looked to him not with fear, but with pride.
Men who had fought under his command. Women who had trusted him to keep their children safe.
Servants who now moved through the keep without the tightness of dread in their shoulders.
This was what he had spent his life trying to protect.
And for the first time, he allowed himself to feel it without guilt.
Finley rose from the grass with exaggerated effort, clutching his side. “I live!”
Ewan looked offended. “That’s cheating.”
Finley smiled. “War is cheating.”
Ewan raised his stick again. “Then fight me again.”
Finley groaned. “Again? This child will be the death of me.”
Maxwell’s gaze flicked to Ariella. “He’s right.”
Ariella hummed softly. “About what?”
“Ewan. He’ll be trouble.”
Ariella’s smile returned. “Good. We need trouble that does nae involve blood.”
Maxwell’s throat tightened. “Aye.”
Ariella shifted slightly, looking up at him now, her eyes steady. “Do ye regret it?”
Maxwell’s brow furrowed as his eyes flickered over to the window just over her shoulder. “Regret what?”
“Any of it,” Ariella said quietly. “The choices. The battles. The rules.”
Maxwell’s jaw flexed.
He looked down at their sleeping son. At the curve of Ariella’s mouth. At the faint softness in her eyes that belonged to him now, fully and without fear.
“Nay,” he said at last. “Nae now.”
Ariella watched him closely. “Because ye won?”
Maxwell shook his head once. “Because I stopped trying to lose.”
Ariella’s gaze warmed, and she leaned up to press a kiss against his jaw. It was brief. Private. But it sank into him like firelight.
Maxwell drew a slow breath, then let it out.
He looked out over the courtyard one more time.
At Mairi and Callum laughing.
Isla flirting shamelessly, and Ewan waving his stick like a sword while Finley pretended to stagger.
At Hunter at the far end, speaking with a group of men, laughter in his face, eyes brighter than Maxwell had seen in years.
Over the banners snapping overhead, proud and steady.
Maxwell lowered his head slightly, lips near Ariella’s hair, and whispered, more to himself than anyone else, “This is our home.”
Ariella’s fingers tightened gently on his arm, as if she heard the vow beneath the words.
“Aye,” she murmured.
And in that moment, with the child asleep in her arms, with his people celebrating beneath his walls, Maxwell finally believed it.
Not just that he had forged a home.
But that he had built a family.
The End?