Chapter 4 #2
Calum squinted against the brilliant shaft of sunlight that suddenly lit the Moray Firth and turned it into a restless silvery bonfire.
At first, heavy clouds made the light bearable for his initial foray outside without an eye covering.
But no longer. The wind was rising, tearing the low clouds apart, making ragged edges that let sunlight glow.
Reflections flashed in the agitated water’s surface.
The healer had finally removed the last bandage yesterday, giving him back the depth perception he’d sorely missed and a blurry but useful return to vision on his left side.
Still, he struggled to focus on the target set up against the outside wall of the keep.
His eyes were still sensitive to bright light, making the injured one fill with tears and sting.
He lowered his longbow and wiped away the wetness on his cheek with the back of his left hand.
Mhairi had warned him not to touch his eye and ruin all her work and his hard-fought patience.
On pain of death, she’d scolded. And she would make it a painful death, he was certain she knew how.
So he let the eye leak and fought the urge to rub it.
She’d warned it might do this for days or weeks to come, and he must let it be.
Let it be. Like he did everything in his life now.
Including Ella. She was avoiding him. Or he was avoiding her.
He wasn’t certain which was more true. Perhaps both.
She’d lied to him. And he’d hurt her. Badly.
The healer was not happy about that and never missed an opportunity to remind him that what Ella did showed how much she cared about him.
For him. And that she deserved his forgiveness.
The last time she lectured him, he warned the healer to cease bringing it up or he would stop coming to her.
“Just try it, laddie,” she’d scoffed. “Ye must be careful for sennights more, or the thing ye fear most could still come to pass.”
The thing he feared most? Losing his sight in one eye?
Or losing Ella? He’d already done that. Or as near as could be.
Both possibilities seemed to have changed his life for the worse.
And the only one he could control was not rubbing his damned eye, even when any stab of bright light made tears run down his face like he was a greeting wean.
He’d accused Ella of thinking of him as a bairn.
Now, except for his size, he must look like one.
With his tears, all that was missing was a wean’s wailing, and God’s bones, he remembered times when he’d been tempted to give in to the urge to cry out in his despair.
He missed his friendship with Ella, but he couldn’t find a way to let go of his anger. What would it take for him to forgive her? He didn’t know how to fix any of this.
Perhaps Euan was right. Ella lied to him because he was being an arse then, just as he was now.
But she, as Janet, also tried to tell him that his skills as a scout were his way forward.
When she’d taken him outside, even blindfolded, he’d still been able to identify where he was in the bailey and what was around him.
And where she was when she slipped, close enough to scoop her up into his arms. The onions hadn’t been what made him aware of her presence.
It was her. Ella. She had tried to prove to him that he was enough, his senses were undimmed, and he could still thrive.
He never should have doubted that she would go to any lengths to care for him. Even to act against his wishes.
Disgusted with himself, he dropped the bow and his arrows on the ground and stalked toward the seaside cliff.
The firth danced and shimmered in the changeable light.
In the past, he might have admired the beauty of the display, but today it only served to add to his anger and frustration.
He could see, damn it. Not perfectly. Not as well as he used to.
But well enough on a cloudy day. He lifted his gaze to the ragged sky, then turned quickly away as another spear of light pierced his eye.
And his temper. Damn it! Days more of this he might be able to abide, but sennights?
Months? And what if it never stopped? What good would he be then?
Footsteps sounded behind him. He recognized Euan’s tread and stiffened.
“The clouds are starting to clear,” his friend announced as if it wasn’t immediately apparent to anyone who bothered to look. “If yer eye is paining ye, we can do this in the gloaming later today.”
Calum tensed, all but overcome with the urge to whirl and hit something, but the only target was Euan, and he didn’t deserve Calum’s ire.
Instead, he heaved a breath and nodded but didn’t turn to face his friend. “Go on in. I’ll follow ye shortly.”
Euan knew his temper better than to question him. Calum imagined he stared, then nodded before turning away to gather bows and arrows. He’d leave the target in place for after sunset, when they’d try again.
As much as Calum hated the necessity, he’d never survive a battle unless he learned to compensate for his vision. He should be thanking Euan, as the Brodie arms master and as his friend, for standing with him, rather than fighting the urge to pummel him into the ground.
He stayed where he was until he no longer heard his friend, then he turned back to the wall. The target was still in place. They would return later. Euan meant what he’d promised. He always did.
Something moved and Calum lifted his gaze.
Shocked, he took a step back when he spotted Ella looking down at him, then realized his peril so near the cliff’s edge.
He straightened and moved forward to safety as he studied her.
Thank the saints he hadn’t been standing on the edge of the cliff or he would have gone over.
Her hair blew in the breeze. She clutched the shawl around her shoulders together in one hand, the other lay over her mouth, her expression unreadable.
No, not that. Controlled. Sad and fighting not to show it.
Terrified by his near plunge over the cliff? Or pitying him?
That, he could not abide. With an oath, he strode away, around the curve of the palisade to the wall’s gates and through. He headed straight for the keep’s heavy oak door, never looking to see if Ella still stood on the rampart. He didn’t want to know.
Why was she up there? Had Euan told her he would be helping Calum outside? He couldn’t believe Ella still wanted to watch over him. But surely she wasn’t there by chance.
It made no sense. Why would a woman want a mate who was so weakened? Was that why she went against his wishes? Because she treated him like anyone ill or injured, doing for them what they needed, and not what they wanted? Had he misread her all along?
His memory of her expression stabbed at him every time he recalled it. How dare she pity him.
When Ella heard Euan was taking Calum outside for his first attempt at archery since he’d been injured, she hurried to the wall walk to find them.
Clouds that threatened rain all day were starting to thin, and she wondered how much stronger sunlight would affect him.
But when she saw Calum outside, bow in hand, a sheaf of arrows on his back, her worries fled.
He seemed comfortable. Even focused as he studied the target Euan set up.
He was making great strides. The healer had finally removed the covering from his eye and warned him to be careful or she’d have to put it back.
Ella was certain that threat would make him take care of his eye.
And if he didn’t, well, the healer’s tincture had served him well so far.
She hoped it would continue to ensure his eye healed completely and well.
Target practice would help him adjust to the changes in his vision. It was something he’d done since he was a lad. The technique, the movements, should be second nature to him. All but instinctive.
So why did he hesitate?
He grimaced as sunlight lanced through a break in the thinning clouds, and her heart dropped as he swiped at his cheek below his left eye.
She wanted to call out to him to be careful, but knew that would only make his frustration worse.
After he and Euan exchanged a few words, Euan picked up their weapons and left Calum near the cliff’s precipice, staring out over the firth.
It would embarrass him to know she was watching him like a mother watches a wean.
Without thinking, she lifted a hand to cover her mouth.
A mistake. She’d done it as he turned back toward the wall.
The movement attracted his attention, and he saw her.
His quick recoil took him a step closer to the cliff’s edge.
She blanched, her breath frozen in her throat until he took a few steps forward, away from certain death.
He’d nearly fallen. If he had gone over, it would have been her fault.
She dropped her hand to her heart and did her best to alter her expression into a neutral one, but he was already walking to the gate, no longer looking at her.
She leaned her forehead against the cold stone, berating herself for even being up here.
Being seen. He must have recognized the dismay in her eyes.
She’d made things worse for him, which was not at all what she’d intended to do.
Indulging her curiosity led to this and probably deepened the rift between them.
She was a fool.
Both Euan and Kenneth showed up at his chamber door after the supper hour, a meal he’d skipped while he sought solitude to nurse his foul mood. As tempted as he was to tell them to go away, Calum knew he wouldn’t be able to deny them.
“I told ye we’d try again in the gloaming. Ye’d best come now before we lose the light altogether,” Euan said.
Kenneth stood at his back carrying their weapons and sheaths of arrows.