Chapter 14
Chapter
Fourteen
Ihad hidden like a coward all day.
The stillroom had been my first refuge, but when I heard Dawson’s voice in the corridor asking Moira where I might be, I had slipped out through the back and made my way to the north tower.
From there, to the old storage rooms beneath the kitchens.
Then to the abandoned dovecote near the eastern wall, where the cold seeped through the stones but no one thought to look.
Each time I heard footsteps approaching, I fled to somewhere new. Each time I caught a glimpse of his dark blond hair across the courtyard, my heart seized with a terror I couldn’t name.
He told me the door opened today. At sunset. And I had told him to go.
Go back to your time. Your wealth. Your family who loves you.
I had meant it when I said it. Had believed, with the desperate certainty of the wounded, that pushing him away was the kindest thing I could do—for both of us.
He deserved better than a ruined woman with walls around her heart.
He deserved a life where medicine could save him from fever, where he was wealthier than the king, and where machines could ease his labor and everything made sense.
But as the hours crept by and the shadows lengthened across the frozen ground, the certainty had begun to crack.
I emerged from the dovecote as the sun touched the western hills, painting the sky in shades of fire and blood.
The keep was quieter than usual—the clan preparing for the evening meal, children being called in from their games, the ordinary rhythms of life continuing while my world threatened to shatter.
All at once I understood with horrible clarity what the quiet meant.
He’s gone to the beach. To the door. He’s choosing—right now, without me—
I ran.
I didn’t stop for a cloak, didn’t pause to call for help. I simply ran, my feet pounding against the cold stone floors, my breath coming in ragged gasps. The eastern gate guard shouted something as I flew past, but I couldn’t hear him over the roaring in my ears.
The path down to the cliffs was treacherous with ice, but I barely noticed. All I could think was that I was too late. That he was already gone. That I had pushed him away with my fear and my walls and my desperate insistence that he leave—and he had finally listened.
Please, I thought, though I didn’t know who I was praying to. Please let me not be too late.
The wind tore at my hair, my skirts, my unprotected skin. I could barely see through the tears streaming down my face—tears I hadn’t realized I was crying until they began to freeze on my cheeks.
I had spent the entire day hiding from him.
Hiding from the choice I was too afraid to make.
While he had searched for me—I knew he had searched, could imagine his growing desperation as the hours slipped away and the sunset approached—I had been cowering in dusty corners, pretending that if I didn’t see him, the pain of losing him wouldn’t be real.
And now he was gone. Now the door was opening, and he was stepping through it, and I would spend the rest of my life knowing that I had driven away the only man who had ever truly wanted to stay.
No. No, please, no—
I crested the ridge and looked down at the beach below.
The last rays of sunlight caught the waves, turning them to molten gold. And there, at the water’s edge, a figure stood with his back to me—tall and solid, the ancient sword gleaming in his hands.
He was still here.
A shimmering light hung in the air before him, strange and beautiful, like a doorway made of starlight and storm. The Cailleach’s magic. The path back to everything he had left behind.
And as I watched, frozen at the top of the cliff, the light began to fade.
Dawson didn’t step through it. He stood motionless as the portal dissolved into ordinary twilight, as the doorway between worlds closed forever, as he chose—
He turned as if he sensed my presence. Even from this distance, I could see his expression change. Concern. Hope. Something that looked like joy breaking across his features.
I was moving before I could think, half-running, half-falling down the cliff path. My foot slipped on the ice, and I would have tumbled headlong if he hadn’t been there suddenly, catching me, his arms strong and solid around my waist.
“Elspeth—”
“I thought you were leaving.” The words tore out of me, ragged and raw. “I hid all day like a coward, and then I couldn’t find you, the sword was gone from your chamber, and I thought—” A sob caught in my throat. “I thought I was too late. I thought I’d lost you.”
“Hey. Hey.” He cupped my face in his hands, forcing me to meet his eyes. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
“But the door—the Cailleach—”
“The door is closed.” His voice was steady, certain. “I closed it. I chose, Elspeth. I chose before you even got here. It’s done. I’m staying.”
The words didn’t make sense. Couldn’t make sense. I stared at him, my mind struggling to catch up with what he was telling me.
“You... you stayed? Even after I told you to go? Even after I hid from you all day?”
“I looked for you everywhere.” A ghost of a smile crossed his face, though his eyes remained serious. “The stillroom. The tower. Every corner of the keep. When I couldn’t find you, I thought maybe you needed space. Time to think. So I came here alone to make my choice.”
“And you chose to stay.” My voice cracked. “Without knowing whether I—without any guarantee that I—”
“I didn’t need a guarantee.” His thumbs brushed the tears from my cheeks. “I needed to know that I could live with my choice, no matter what happened after. And the only choice I could live with was staying.”
“Dawson.” My hands fisted in the fabric of his shirt. “Why? After everything I said to you—after I told you that no woman was worth giving up the world for—why would you stay for someone who spent the whole day running away from you?”
He was quiet for a moment, his green eyes searching my face. The last light of sunset gilded the planes of his cheeks, caught the gold in his hair. Behind him, the sea had gone dark and quiet, as if even the waves were holding their breath.
“Do you remember what you said to me in the stillroom?” he asked quietly. “When you were trying to push me away. You said that I would resent you. That I would regret choosing you over everything I had built.”
I flinched at the memory of my own cruelty. “I didn’t mean—”
“You were protecting yourself. I understand that now.” His hands slid into my hair, cradling my face like I was something precious.
“But you were also wrong. Because you are worth it, Elspeth. You’re worth giving up the world for.
You’re worth every mountain I’ll never climb and every ocean I’ll never cross.
You’re worth two billion dollars and hot showers and antibiotics and everything else I left behind. ”
“Dawson—”
“I’m not finished.” His voice roughened with emotion.
“You asked me why I would stay after everything you said. And the answer is that I finally understand something I never understood before. Love isn’t about finding someone who makes your life easier.
It’s about finding someone who makes your life matter. ”
He leaned closer, his forehead pressing against mine.
“You make my life matter, Elspeth. Every moment I spend with you, every small thing I learn about this world, every morning I wake up knowing you exist—it matters. It means something. And I would rather have that—I would rather have one real life with you than a hundred empty ones without you.”
I was crying openly now, tears streaming down my face, but I couldn’t look away from him. Couldn’t break the spell of this moment, this man, these words I had never dared to hope anyone would say to me.
“I don’t deserve you,” I whispered.
“You deserve everything.” His voice cracked. “You deserve someone who sees you—really sees you—and chooses to stay. You deserve to be loved without shame, without secrets, without conditions. And I’m going to spend the rest of my life proving that to you, if you’ll let me.”
“Dawson—”
“Let me stay, Elspeth. Not because I need you to love me back. Not because I expect anything in return. Just... let me stay. Let me earn your trust. Let me be the man who doesn’t leave.”
And something cracked open inside me—the last wall, the final defense, the armor I had been wearing for four long years. It shattered like ice in spring, and beneath it was something raw and new and terrifying.
Something that felt like hope.
“I don’t want you to earn it,” I said, my voice trembling.
“I don’t want you to wait, or be patient, or prove yourself anymore.
I want—” I had to stop, had to breathe, had to find the courage to say what I had been so afraid to admit.
“I want you to kiss me. I want you to kiss me like you’re never going to leave.
Because I’m done being afraid. I’m done protecting myself from something I want more than I’ve ever wanted anything. ”
His breath caught.
“Are you sure?”
“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.”
Dawson kissed her.
Not gently. Not carefully. Not the way he had kissed her before—those tentative brushes of lips, those almost-moments interrupted by duty or fear or the weight of everything between them.
This was different.
This was a claiming.
His mouth slanted over hers, hot and demanding, and Elspeth melted into him like snow before a flame. Her hands fisted in his shirt, pulling him closer, and a sound escaped her—something between a sob and a sigh—that made his heart crack wide open.
She tasted of salt tears and cold wind and something sweeter beneath—something that was purely her. He kissed her deeper, his tongue sweeping against hers, and felt her whole body shudder in response.
“Dawson,” she gasped against his mouth. Just his name, nothing more, but the way she said it—like a prayer, like a promise—undid him completely.
He gathered her closer, one hand splayed across the small of her back, the other tangled in her auburn hair. She was trembling, and so was he, both of them shaking with the force of everything they had been holding back.
“I love you,” he said between kisses. “I love you, Elspeth. I love your strength and your stubbornness and the way you pretend you don’t care when you care more than anyone I’ve ever known.”
She laughed—a broken, beautiful sound—and pulled him back down to her.
The kiss deepened, turned urgent. Her fingers found the back of his neck, threading through his hair, and the sensation sent fire racing down his spine.
He had kissed women before—many women, in many countries, in many circumstances—but nothing had ever felt like this.
Nothing had ever felt like coming home after a lifetime of wandering.
He kissed the tears from her cheeks. Kissed the hollow of her throat where her pulse raced beneath his lips. Kissed the corner of her mouth, the line of her jaw, the soft shell of her ear.
“Stay,” she whispered. “Stay, stay, stay.”
“Always,” he promised against her skin. “Forever. As long as you’ll have me.”
She pulled back just far enough to meet his eyes, and what he saw there stole his breath completely.
Her walls were down. All of them. For the first time since he had known her, she was looking at him without fear, without reservation, without the desperate need to protect herself from caring too much.
She was looking at him as if he were everything.
“I love you,” she said.
The words were quiet, almost wondering, as if she couldn’t quite believe she was saying them.
“I love you, Dawson Carrington. I don’t know when it happened—somewhere between the stillroom and the market and the thousand small moments when you refused to give up on me. But I love you. And I’m done being afraid of it.”
He kissed her again—softer this time, reverent. A promise sealed against her lips.
And as they stood wrapped in each other’s arms, the storm clouds parted overhead, revealing a sky full of stars. The wind gentled, carrying with it the faintest whisper—a voice like winter bells, like ice and eternity.
“Wish granted.”
They pulled apart, looking up at the clear sky. The Cailleach was gone, but her blessing lingered in the air like the last notes of a song.
“Did you hear that?” Elspeth breathed.
“I heard it.” Dawson pressed his forehead to hers, smiling. “I think we passed the test.”
“What test?”
“The only one that matters.” He kissed her once more—quick and sweet—before pulling back. “The courage to choose love over fear. To stay when staying is hard.”
Elspeth’s eyes glistened. “I should have chosen sooner. I wasted the whole day hiding from you—”
“No.” He shook his head firmly. “You needed that time. You needed to be sure. And now we have all the time in the world.”
She laughed—a real laugh, bright and unguarded—and the sound of it filled his chest with warmth.
“All the time in the world,” she repeated. “I rather like the sound of that.”
He took her hand, lacing his fingers through hers, and turned toward the cliff path. The last light had faded from the sky, but the stars were bright enough to guide their way.
“We should go back,” he said. “The clan will wonder where we’ve gone.”
“Let them wonder a little longer.” Elspeth squeezed his hand, her smile catching the starlight. “I’m not quite ready to share you yet.”
Dawson pulled her close, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Then we’ll take the long way back.”
“Dawson?” She touched his plaid. “Why are you soaked?”
He grinned and pulled out the leather pouch, handing it to her. “A gift from the Cailleach.”
Eyes wide, she opened it, gasping. “This is a fortune.”
“Aye.” He pulled her close, kissed her again. “Enough to make a life, to help the clan, to provide for us.”
“Elspeth snorted. “Wish granted, indeed.”
They walked together along the beach, hand in hand, as the night wrapped around them like a blessing. Behind them, the sea whispered its ancient song against the shore.
And for the first time in his life, Dawson Carrington understood what it meant to be exactly where he belonged.