Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The iron nib of Harald’s pen scratched the parchment. It was the only sound in the suffocating silence of his study when, a soft, hesitant knock brushed against the door.
Harald’s heart gave a traitorous, heavy thud. He knew that sound. He didn't have to look up to know it was her. The crushing weight of the day’s work vanished instantly. In its place was a surge of genuine, bone-deep relief.
"Enter," he said, his voice dropping into a low, welcoming sound.
The door creaked open, and Enya stepped into the amber glow of the candlelight. She looked small in the vastness of the room, her shoulders slightly hunched, her fingers twisting the fabric of her skirts. Her expression was veiled in worry.
Harald’s stomach dropped. The warmth that had been building in his chest curdled into a cold, heavy stone.
"Enya?"
He stood up, the chair scraping harshly against the floor. He didn't like the way she wouldn't meet his eyes. He didn't like the way she seemed to be holding herself together by a single, fraying thread.
"What’s wrong? Are ye ill?" He was moving before he could think, the distance between them vanishing in two long strides. He reached for her, his hands desperate to touch her, to fix whatever had brought that look to her face. "Tell me what has happened."
He reached out, his large hands cupping her face with a gentleness that felt clumsy. He used his thumbs to tilt her chin up, searching her eyes. They were bright with unshed tears, shimmering with a frantic, desperate energy. "Ye’re tremblin', lass. Tell me what has happened."
Enya took a deep breath, her eyes fluttering shut against his touch. For a moment, she leaned into his palms, and the intimacy of the gesture made his chest ache.
Then, she pulled back—just an inch, but it felt like a mile.
"I need tae tell ye something," she breathed. "Harald... please, just... fergive me when I dae."
His hands dropped to his sides, the warmth in his blood turning to a sudden, prickling chill. He took a half-step back, his jaw tightening as the reserved, controlled mask of the laird began to slide back into place. Confusion warred with a rising, cold dread.
"Fergive ye fer what?" his voice was lower now, laced with a tremor of fear he couldn't entirely hide. "Enya, ye’re scarin' me. What is goin' on?"
"I havenae been completely honest wi’ ye," she started, her gaze still firmly set on his. "From the very beginnin'. From the moment I arrived at yer gates."
Harald stood perfectly still. He felt as though the floor were tilting beneath his boots.
"Go on," he commanded. He had known from beginning, so why was he so surprised? Had his feelings fully obliterated his suspicions?
Enya’s voice was a thin, ragged thread in the silence. "Finley... never wanted this marriage, Harald. He only agreed tae it because he was certain ye were plannin' tae raze our lands. "
Harald felt a dull, thrumming ache begin behind his eyes. He stayed perfectly still, his breath hitching in his chest. "And?"
"And so he sent me as an… observer," she whispered. The confession spilled out of her like a lanced wound, raw and messy. "A spy. I was supposed tae find the proof o’ yer intent. I was supposed tae tell him when tae strike before ye could."
A cold, sickening numbness began to spread from Harald's stomach to his limbs. He looked at the desk where his maps lay.
"That night... in the hallway," she continued, her voice shaking so hard it almost broke. "When ye found me outside this door. We both ken I wasnae lost, Harald. The truth is I needed tae find yer maps, yer orders... I needed proof fer Finley so he could justify a war."
Harald felt the air leave the room. He remembered that night vividly—how he’d doubted her, how they played chess, and how much he had wanted her that night.
I’m a fool.
"I succeeded another night," she whispered. Her face was as pale as the bone-dust on his ledgers. "I found yer papers. I broke intae this room while ye were out, the way ye showed me."
The words echoed in his skull, a dull, rhythmic thud. He had felt so safe with her. He had let his guard down for the first time in his life, only for her to stand over his desk and pick through his life like a scavenger.
"That was when I realized," she choked out. Her fingers twisted so hard in her skirts that the silk groaned, a sharp, protesting sound in the quiet room. "I realized ye werenae plannin' a war. Ye were plannin' fer the winter. Ye were plannin' tae save yer people, nae kill mine."
Harald didn't answer. He stood like a man carved from the very stone of the keep, his arms crossed over his chest to hold himself together. His silence was a wall as she continued to tear down the world they had built.
"I’d meet him in the forest," she rushed on, the words tumbling out in a frantic, desperate blur. "Finley. I stole away while the keep slept. Those nights... ye caught me, and I told ye I needed air..." Her voice dropping to a jagged whisper. "I was lyin' tae yer face."
She stepped closer, the motion desperate. Her eyes searched his face, but Harald remained a statue.
"When I finally refused tae continue, when I told him the mission was over... that was why he took me," she pleaded, her hands hovering in the air between them as if she were trying to touch him. "He took me because I was a traitor tae him. Because I chose ye."
Harald felt the words hit him, but they didn't bring warmth. They felt like salt in a raw wound. She had chosen him—but only after she’d weighed his soul against her brother’s malice.
She’d looked at his secrets, his private maps, his very life, and decided he was worth sparing.
The betrayal was a cold, physical weight in his lungs.
Harald still said nothing.
His gaze was fixed on a point just above her head, his eyes dark and hollow. Inside, he was drowning. Every word was a jagged blade.
"Say somethin'," she begged, a single tear finally escaping and tracking down her cheek. "Please, Harald. Say anythin'."
He felt a profound, sickening disappointment expanding in his chest. It swallowed the hope he had nurtured so carefully, snuffing it out like a candle in a gale. He looked at her. Enya was shaking now, her knuckles white as she clung to the edge of his desk.
I dinnae ken her.
Then, he finally moved, taking a slow, deep breath.
"What would ye have me say, Enya?" he asked. His voice was calm—terrifyingly so.
"Harald—"
"I understand why ye did it," he interrupted, his tone devoid of warmth.
He turned away from her, walking toward the window to stare out at the dark courtyard.
"Loyalty tae clan... loyalty tae family.
It is a weight I have carried me entire life.
Ye did yer duty. Ye were a good soldier fer yer braither. "
"I chose ye, Harald!" she cried out, her voice cracking. "I stopped the moment I realized ye werenae a threat tae me people."
Harald understood her, yet he still felt a surge of bitter, jagged hurt. He wanted to reach for her, and he wanted to banish her from his sight.
"We are married," he said flatly. "That much is clear. We have a keep tae run and a winter tae survive."
"Is that all?" she whispered, her eyes wide and overflowing with tears.
Harald looked at her, seeing the raw vulnerability in her face, and it made his heart bleed. But he couldn't find his way back to the softness of the dawn. The lie was too big.
"Go tae sleep, Enya," he said, his voice cracking with a sudden, weary weight. "I’ll take me time here. I have... much tae think on."
She stood there for a heartbeat, her face crumpled in a mask of pure, unadulterated pain.
She looked as though she wanted to say more, to reach for him, but something in his face stopped her. With a small, broken nod, she turned and rushed out of the study, the door slamming behind her.
Harald stood in the center of the room, his breath coming in shallow, jagged gasps. He felt the impulse to go after her, to tell her it didn't matter.
But it daes matter.
It mattered that the only person he had ever truly let in was the one person who had been looking for a way to destroy him.
He couldn't stay in the room. It felt like a tomb.
He grabbed his heavy wool cloak and strode out of the studio, through the quiet halls, and out into the biting night air of the courtyard. He needed to breathe. He needed the cold to numb the fire in his chest.
He had barely reached the center of the yard when the sound of frantic boots hit the stone.
"Me laird! Harald!"
Harald turned to see Leo, his face pale and slick with sweat, his eyes wide with panic.
"There’s a fire! I’ve already sent men," Leo gasped, his breath hitching. "In one of the farther villages—it’s their granary! It’s burnin'!"
Harald’s blood turned to ice. The granary. Their winter stores.
"Sound the bell!" Harald roared, already breakin' into a run toward the stables. "Wake the guards! They move now!"