Chapter 12 #3
Is he moving closer? His expression is suddenly so serious. I don’t know what’s happening. Or what I want to happen.
Steadfast. Beauty. Does he really believe those things about me?
I search his face in the dim barn light, looking for some truth. The bruise on his cheek looks worse in the shadows. My hand lifts instinctively, but I catch myself, pulling back just before my fingertips reach his skin.
This guy is the closest thing I have to an ally. Which means I need to keep it cool. Definitely no cheek-touching.
I drop my arm, fisting my hand tightly at my thigh. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you. And…thanks for, you know, taking a beating for me.”
“I’ve known worse.” His voice is raspy, a little abashed. Even in the low light, I can tell he’s blushing.
“Yeah, but…” I look down, taking in the blood on his shirt. The arm he’s cradling just so over his ribs. “How do you not hate me? I’d hate me.”
His reply is instant. “I knew the moment we met I’d never hate you.”
I grind my fingernails into my palm.
He’s standing so close I can make out the ghost of a scar alongside the bump on his nose.
And another one, just barely visible, bisecting his eyebrow.
His hair is scruffy but clean, thick black waves sticking out every which way.
His shoulders are broad, the life of real, physical work making him seem more powerful than any modern athlete his age.
“When the Campbell’s in a rage, there’s always someone who gets in his way.” He takes a half step closer, carried by the force of his words. “I couldn’t let it be you. I wouldn’t.”
He practically reverberates old-fashioned honor. Purpose. Courage. All aimed at me.
“You knew that the moment we met?” My voice comes out barely above a whisper.
“Before that even. In your room, when I saw you, ’twas like I knew you. As though I might remember you, were I only to think hard enough. You were as real to me as if we stood, breathing the same air. Real, but far. As brilliant and untouchable as the stars above.”
A shiver runs through me. “I know what you mean.” My words ride on a warm tide of relief. I’d felt him too. Trusted him. I thought I’d imagined it, but now I know I wasn’t alone.
“I thought you were a ghost. I should’ve been scared. But I wasn’t.”
Somehow my hand is raised again, drifting toward his cheek.
He’s not stopping it.
“Callum James,” someone shouts, “where’ve you—”
We jump apart.
Donag stands in the barn doorway, her eyes narrowing the second she sees me. “What’s she doing here?”
I don’t know what an actual witch is capable of, but the way she’s looking at me makes my gut turn to ice.
Callum squares his shoulders, already rattling off an explanation. “We’ve seen the Campbell. He wanted to know who Rose is. I told him she’s here to care for our animals. I wanted to show her the barn. Where the animals are.”
She gives a sharp sniff, seemingly placated. “Rose,” she mutters. “Insipid name.”
She studies me, nodding slightly as if weighing something in her mind. Then her gaze sharpens. “Do you know from birds?”
“Birds?” The randomness of it throws me.
“She means hens,” Callum says quietly.
“We have chickens on our farm,” I say carefully. “Cows, too. I practically grew up in a barn.”
Something about this tickles Donag, and she bursts into giddy laughter. I catch a glimpse of her smile, gap-toothed and a little wild.
“No. No barns for you.” Her laughter fades into something more sinister. “You’ll serve another kind of animal. The Campbells. I can think of no finer revenge.”
A cold weight sinks in my gut. “What are you saying?”
She chuckles again, lower this time, almost to herself. “You won’t work here at the barn, girl. You’ll work there. In the big house.” She points in the direction of the castle. “And try not to speak. Tell people you’re from an isle where they havena the Gaelic.”
My throat tightens. I want to look to Callum for help, but I dare not. “But I don’t want to go back there.”
“There is no ‘back there,’” she snaps. “This.” She waves her hand down the barn aisle, then points toward the distant estate. “That. The lands outside…all belong to the Campbell. We belong to the Campbell.”
“So you are related?” It doesn’t seem like such a stupid idea. Everyone here seems to be a Campbell, and if the land all belongs to them—
Donag goes ballistic. “Hold your tongue! Thank the angels above and the demons below we’re nae related to that nest of vipers.” She spits the words like venom. “Vipers,” she grumbles. “Cowards. Brutes.” Her gaze cuts back to me, sharp as flint. “No, fool. Campbell is not my clan.”
I hit a nerve. But if I’m going to survive here, I need to understand the full lay of the land.
“Okay.”
I glance at Callum. He’s closer than I’d realized, standing rigid and alert beside me. “If you’re not Callum Campbell, then what is your name? What’s your clan?”
Donag answers for him. “His name is Callum Black.”
She grabs my arm and shoves me toward the door. “Enough questions. He has naught more to say.” Then, over her shoulder, she throws one final command. “Callum, from now on, you’ll bed here. In the barn.”
Donag leads me back to her cottage in silence. Well, not complete silence. Every so often, she erupts into angry muttering. Something about sluttish ways and apples not falling far from trees.
When we reach the cottage, she shoves the door open, and I hesitate.
It had been bad enough in the dark. In daylight, it’s worse.
Just a small, rectangular room, its walls smudged black from smoke.
A dull, scarred butcher block table stands in the middle, looking anything but hygienic.
A gray, goosebumpy thing hangs upside down over the hearth, probably once a bird.
I shudder.
Donag gives me a rough push over the threshold. “No complaints from you. You live here now.”
She gestures to the cot in the far corner. “You’ll bed there.”
Knowing it had been Callum’s spot makes it slightly less menacing.
I stagger inside and collapse numbly onto the thin mattress. I should be starving. I haven’t eaten since…yesterday? The day before? But fatigue drags me under faster than hunger ever could.
Tomorrow, I’ll remember what hope feels like. I’ll make my plans, find a way home.
But for now, dread has me too exhausted to care.