Chapter 30
“He has stabilized. I’ve done what I can to ensure the wound willnae seep and to prevent fever.”
The healer addressed Keegan as Willow pushed into the quiet room. She slowed the door to keep it from slamming and stood at the back of the space to allow the man to finish before she approached her husband, who visibly relaxed at the healer’s words.
“Yer brother will require tremendous rest as well. I will leave that order to yerself, me laird. Ye ken that he can be a bit of a stubborn man.”
Willow shifted her attention from the healer to Keegan, and he nodded, patting the older man on the shoulder. Just past them, Melissa sat next to Damon’s bed, holding his hand. His eyes remained closed, but Willow could see the steady rhythm of his chest rising and falling.
“Thank ye, Collin. I will call for ye if there is any change.”
The healer nodded, then turned to leave the room. He likely needed sleep as the rest of them did, and Keegan was at last allowing the man to retire for a time. As Collin passed by her, Keegan’s stare found her, and he raised his brows.
“Willow.” Stoic at the best of times, the laird was unreadable at present. “Ye are safe.”
Keeping her steps quiet, Willow approached his side with a soft nod of her head. “Aye. I am safe. As is Lilith, for which I’m eternally grateful.”
She looked around the room. “I daenae see Rodrick. I would have thought he would come this way.”
“He was,” Melissa offered from across Damon’s bed, “but the man could hardly stand, so I sent him to get some sleep.”
All she could think to do was nod again.
It felt useless and unhelpful at the time, but what more did Willow have to offer?
As she returned her stare to Keegan, she noticed how rigid he stood.
He was focused intently on Damon, and she could see his hand gripping the pommel of his sword so much that it turned his knuckles white.
He was also littered with cuts and slashes. Willow noted the dried blood clinging to him, and her stomach clenched as worry with no place to go consumed her. It was obvious that her husband wasn’t too badly injured, but seeing him in his present condition made her heart ache.
“Are…are ye all right, Keegan? Did ye require the healer yerself?”
He shook his head, not looking at her. “Nay. I am nay worse for wear.”
Melissa scoffed, and Willow looked over in time to see her roll her eyes. “So ye say, and still ye hiss and creek every time ye move. And ye’re covered with filth, Brother.”
Shaking his head again, Keegan tipped his head toward Melissa, eyeing her playfully if still exhausted as well.
“I will have meself a bath when I am certain Damon is well.”
Glancing down at the man in question, Melissa whispered low. “Ye hear that, Damon? Ye must wake up so we might rid ourselves of this foul-smelling lump that should be our brother.”
Willow wanted to laugh, but the tension in the room was still too great, and she could hardly summon more than a minute, crooked grin.
Just do it, Willow. Just ask him.
“I daenae mean to be a bother, Keegan, but I understand that…” This was the first time Willow had to speak the words to someone out loud. “I ken that Magnus is dead.”
At that, Keegan turned and regarded her. There was still a healthy distance between them, and Willow felt it as surely as anyone might see it.
“Aye.” The laird’s attention went back to his brother. “I killed him on the battlefield after he tried to murder Damon and me.”
Willow’s eyes welled with tears, but she fought them back, unwilling to let herself turn into a blubbering mess in front of her husband. She knew he would understand, but it felt wrong to be upset when Damon was still in rough shape.
“I ken that ye wish to leave him, but Lilith and I would like to return his body to the castle and bury him. We daenae wish to be seen as heartless as he was in life.”
Keegan cocked his head toward her, meeting Willow’s eyes. “Ye wish to bury him.”
She wasn’t sure if it was a question or statement, so Willow simply nodded. “Aye. Nae for him, but for us, me sister and me. To prove to ourselves that we arenae like him.”
Bobbing his head in a rhythmic nod, Keegan looked back down at his brother, and silence filled the room for several long moments.
“Verra well.”
The relief was instant, but it did not last. Willow could tell that Keegan was still upset, and worse, this even cut to him did not lend itself to the rage she was sure he contained.
He was not screaming or carrying on in a frenzy.
Keegan was so steady, almost calm. But he was also distant and closed off.
“I…thank ye.” Willow swallowed hard, dropping her head to stare at her fingers as they tangled in the tasseled edge of her shawl. “It seems as though yer brother will heal well, then? Collin looked…pleased with the work.”
There was no response from Keegan for much longer than Willow would have liked. Even Melissa looked between the two of them, which Willow noticed out of the corner of her eye.
“I can only hope. I am nae the healer. Still…”
The quiet returned, and Willow was desperate to fill it with anything. A jest, celebration of their win, anything that might break the horrid tension that filled the room and made her feel like she didn’t belong there—with Keegan.
She couldn’t bring herself to offer any of that, however.
As much as it pained her, right now, she could not bring her usually unfailing sunny attitude to the conversation.
Because in one of the few times it had ever happened, that sunlight within her did fail.
Willow was at a loss for what to say or do.
And so she was frozen in inaction.
“I watched him defend himself against several of yer brother’s warriors.”
Keegan’s voice knocked Willow out of her head, and she looked over at him as he pinned his gaze to his brother’s prone form. He’d yet to take his hand off his pommel, and Keegan was planted to the spot where he stood like a great oak.
“There were too many to match, and I had been almost certain that we would not win the day.
I was prepared to give me life to protect me people, a people who dinnae ask for any of this.
And when I was believed to be doin' the right thing—the kind and merciful thing—once again, it was proven to me that there is nay place in this world for that kind of thinkin'.”
“I…” Willow started, but her tongue was suddenly made of lead, her chest so heavy that she couldn’t manage a full breath. “I daenae understand.”
“Nay.” Keegan snapped his eyes to hers, and it hit her like a lightning bolt that she wished he didn’t, for it was not a look she’d ever want to see on her husband’s face.
“Ye wouldnae understand, would ye? Ye havenae stood where I stand now.
Ye havenae nearly lost everythin' to the same man over and over, and all because of the same damned mistake on yer part.”
Willow’s eyes burned, and she could feel the mask of strength she was wearing crumble away.
“Keegan, I—”
“I cannae believe that I allowed meself to be distracted again. To believe that choosing the diplomatic path, the ‘kinder’ one, would serve me. It had gotten in me way of protectin' me family—again. And I have nearly lost Damon to that foolish thinkin' just as I lost me parents.”
Her eyes flared wide, and Willow instinctively took a step backward. Keegan had told her of how he felt responsible for his parents’ death, that he couldn’t help but believe that because he’d argued for peace talks, it cost them their lives.
The only thing that she could think would be a distraction to him now was…
“What do ye mean? What…distracted ye?”
Willow knew the answer. Of course, she did. But she needed to hear it from Keegan’s mouth. Though, Willow didn’t understand why. It was a cruelty to herself, but it was one that her body and mind somehow yearned for as if the pain would be her penance.
“Can ye really nay see it?” Keegan’s brow dipped low over his eyes, and his voice was thick and rough. “Ye, Willow. Ye are the distraction that nearly caused this entire castle to fall.”
She couldn’t breathe, her chest kicked in by his words sure as a blow from an angry mule. Willow stuttered and faltered, failing to rein in the tears now. Her stare flicked back and forth between Keegan and the floor, nausea swirling through her.
“I ken it wasnae yer fault. I do. But because I have allowed meself to be so distracted, Damon got hurt. I could still verra well lose me brother because I put me own compulsions ahead of duty.”
“Brother!” Melissa called out, and Willow recoiled, her eyes shutting as she remembered that his sister was sitting just past him.
Mortification and grief powered through Willow like a raging storm.
She couldn’t be in this room a moment longer.
Because Keegan was wrong. It had been her fault that Damon got her.
None of this would have happened if she had not “distracted” him, if she had not been so unsatisfactory to her brother.
Hell, it would be better if I wasnae born at all. Perhaps then Magnus wouldnae have been such a blighter. Twins truly are a curse.
I am the curse.
“It’s all right, Lady Melissa. It would likely be best if I were to take me leave. It…it has been an arduous day, to say the least.”
She couldn’t stop herself from looking over at Keegan as he faced Damon once more. “Aye. It…I will remain here for the evenin'. I…I am in nay place to be around ye at present.”
Willow’s jaw trembled as she fought back the urge to sob loudly. Instead, she simply nodded, regarding Damon as he lay still asleep on the healing chamber’s table, which had been set up like a bed of sorts.
“I pray that ye recover quickly, Damon. I apologize for me role in all this.” She stared at the juncture between two slabs of stone beneath her feet. “I am sorry, truly. Thank ye for yer kindness in allowing Lilith and me to bury our brother.”
She bowed, curling into a low curtsey even as Keegan did not look back at her.
“Good evenin', me laird.”
Hauling herself up, Willow straightened her spine as much as she could and then proceeded toward the door. Her steps were too loud on the floor, and when she reached for the handle, her fingers trembled.
But she would not fall apart, not here.
So, she pulled the panel open and slipped out into the hall.
As the light from the healer’s room died behind her, Willow let the tears fall.
Whatever had been her plans for her life, it was clear that none of them would come to pass.
And now, she would be forced to find a way to survive the cruelty of another laird, even if Keegan had more of a right to his anger than her brother did.