Chapter 14 #2
“It was like that day in the forest when we met,” he said. “When they tried to burn the cottage with the woman and her bairn inside.”
Clara’s hand tightened on his. It was a small gesture, but the comfort it offered was enormous.
“My da was a farmer,” he continued. “We dinna have much, and he’d never been trained in battle.
He was in the field when the English came into our home.
They kicked in the door and entered. Mum gathered us up and told them to take what they liked but to leave us be.
They ransacked the cottage, turning over furniture, breaking a new chair Da had made for Ewan, my little brother. ”
The memory of that damn chair sank its teeth into Reid’s emotions. Ewan had been so proud to have a seat just like Reid, his big brother, not to have to sit on their mother’s lap like a baby anymore.
“Once they stole what they wanted, they went outside,” Reid said, hating remembering it all as clearly as he did.
“Mum went about setting the house to rights, then the odor of smoke filled the house. That’s when we realized they’d set the thatch on fire.
We tried to run outside, but the Englishmen jabbed their swords at us to keep us inside.
As they did so…” Reid shook his head in disgust. “They were laughing. As though our lives—our deaths—were merely a game to them.”
Clara winced in empathy.
“An English baron sat on his horse outside, looking on as if he were bored by their antics.” That was the first time Reid had noticed Lord Rottry, or so he’d been called by his men.
He was tall and lanky with a nose that appeared to try to compensate for the absence of a chin.
His tunic was a light blue with a golden yellow sun stitched upon it.
“I heard my da shouting outside.” Reid swallowed. “He’d come from the field to help. But he wasna a warrior. The closest things he wielded to a weapon were his farming tools or a small knife he used for whittling wee animals with.”
“Oh, Reid,” Clara breathed, evidently knowing what he would say next.
“My da tried to stop them.” In Reid’s mind, he could see his father, racing toward the Englishmen with a pitchfork clutched in his fists.
Lord Rottry had snorted with mirth then and told his men to kill him.
An armored man stepped forward, his sword at the ready.
The tip of that sharp blade went clean through and jutted out the other side.
Da, who had always been so strong and stoic, went soft, his body slumping to the ground.
The guard yanked his weapon back and returned his attention to the burning cottage, rejoining the others in their jeers and calls.
As if Da were nothing at all. “The first man cut him down without any effort. Without any feeling. And all the while, the cottage was burning around us without a chance of escape.”
Even all these years later, Reid could still recall the heat of the flames and the choking smoke growing thick in the home.
“I knew it was left to me to save them.” Reid gritted his teeth as a fresh wave of anger rolled over him at how his father had lain there, dead. Not one of the Englishmen had appeared remorseful for what they’d done.
“I rushed outside to attack them as my da had done, to do whatever was possible to save my mum and Ewan, but they dinna run me through,” Reid continued.
“They hit me instead, their gauntlets so hard, it knocked the sense from me. I staggered about for a moment, then heard the baron order his men to hurry up and kill us, so they could be on their way. The world went dark then, and when I woke up…”
When he had regained awareness, there was little left of his smoldering home.
His father’s body remained in a crumpled pile with a swarm of flies buzzing around him.
It had taken several minutes to scrape together the courage to look inside the ruined cottage.
That was where Reid had found the charred remains of his mother and Ewan still in her arms.
“When I woke up, they were all dead,” he said raggedly.
That hollow ache in his chest sucked at him with the same visceral agony as before. As if his entire self were being drawn into the pain.
“Reid,” Clara said in a thick voice.
Something warm and wet landed on their joined hands. A tear. Hers.
He reached for her face with his free hand and tilted her head up. She met his gaze with watery eyes, the tip of her nose pink.
Clara shook her head slowly. “No child should ever go through something so terrible.”
“I lost everything because of them,” Reid said. “Because of a rich baron and his men. It almost destroyed me.”
She nodded in understanding. “But it did not. Ye grew up strong, into a warrior who has protected others from such a fate as yer family suffered.” She withdrew something from the pocket of her kirtle and put the cold, heavy figure into his hand.
He looked down to find a carved fox. The one he’d done the night they had slept outside.
“Was that yer da’s?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Nay but thank ye for bringing it along. He taught me how to carve animals out of bits of wood when I was a lad. My skill has never been near the level of his, but I still enjoy doing it. It makes me feel as if some part of him survived.”
“I like that,” Clara said. “And I’m sorry. For everything ye lost.”
“I’ve no’ ever let anyone close since,” he said gently. “Because I…” His words caught in the tension at the back of his throat. “I dinna think I could stand it if I were to lose someone I love again. I…” He swallowed hard. “I dinna think I could stand it if I lost ye.”
“And that’s why ye don’t want to wed?” she asked.
He fingered the carved fox, then set it aside. “I saw how easily it could all be taken away. I know the pain that I suffered when everyone I loved was slain.”
She touched her hand to his jaw. The clean, floral scent followed the caress. “But what of happiness?”
“What of it?”
Her eyes searched his. “Are ye happy, Reid?”
“With ye, I am.”
She gave a sad smile. “When ye aren’t with me, I mean.”
He looked toward the hearth as the logs in the fireplace collapsed, issuing a spray of embers.
He survived. After years of training and fighting, he had camaraderie with his fellow soldiers and warriors.
But those things were not enjoying his life. They were merely living.
Clara rose and stood before him, so her thighs were between Reid’s knees. She kept his face in her hands and guided his attention back to her.
Was he content when he wasn’t with her?
“Nay,” he admitted.
“We can be happy together,” she said. “I will not force ye into something ye genuinely don’t want. But neither can I stand by and watch ye lead a life less than ye deserve.”
His chest ached at her words. He wanted to release his fear, to open up and allow himself to love her.
“Ye can’t let them win like that,” she said.
He straightened at those words, ones that echoed what Sister Agnes had told him. “What did ye say?”
Clara gave him a sweet smile, her affection for him shining from her beautiful face. “That I want ye to be contented?”
“The last bit.” He grinned. “Though that bit is verra nice as well.”
She ran her thumb down his cheek. “That ye can’t permit them to win?”
He nodded.
“If ye live in fear of what ye may lose, ye’ll give them power. And for what?” She shrugged.
Aye, for what indeed?
“Reid.” She bit her lip, and a pretty blush colored her cheeks in the way he’d always found alluring. “I admit, I may be selfish in saying this to ye.”
“I dinna think it’s possible for ye to be selfish.
” He chuckled. “Ye’re too good. Ye’re kind and genuinely caring, more so than anyone I’ve ever met.
Ye throw daggers better than any mercenary I know, but ye’re no’ arrogant about yer skill.
Ye heal in a world where others hurt, and ye have the patience of a saint. ”
“Ye see me as better than I am.” Still, the pleasure of his words was evident in how the corners of her mouth lifted. “I’m telling ye because I don’t want to become a nun. Because I would rather wed and be a wife and a mum.”
His heart twisted. “Any man would be lucky to have ye as a wife.”
He wasn’t sure what made him say the latter part, but he did not regret it. For it was true.
He knew at that moment, he couldn’t let her walk out of his life, that she could never be anyone’s wife other than his. She would take the light of his soul with her when she left, the joy they’d shared together. Without her in his world, it would all be snuffed out.
Her breathing quickened as though she followed his thoughts but didn’t dare put a voice to them. She didn’t have to. That was for him to do.
“I canna let ye go back to the abbey, Clara,” he said.
Tears sparkled in her eyes. “What do ye mean by that?”
“I mean to make ye my wife.” He tenderly brushed an errant tear from her cheek. “I mean to choose happiness.” He kissed her smooth brow. “With ye.”
“Ye mean…”
He knelt before her. “Clara Fletcher, will ye marry me?”