Chapter 23
Aiden had spent most of the day lost in the clamor of the village, his hands blistered and raw from the axe he had been wielding since the morning. The rhythmic thud of wood splitting beneath the blade was the only thing that seemed to drown out the torment in his mind.
He was a man who had always been confident, always sure of his place in the world. But today, his certainty had shattered, leaving him adrift in a sea of doubt.
The village was a place of simple pleasures and honest work, a far cry from the castle’s chapel, where his wedding was supposed to take place.
No one in the village knew who he truly was.
Here, he was just another face in the crowd, just another pair of hands willing to work for a bit of bread and ale.
They called him Tom, a name he had chosen because it was plain and unremarkable—a name that didn’t carry the weight of expectation.
As he worked, he kept his head down, focusing on the task before him as if the very act of chopping wood could somehow split his heart in two, severing the pain that throbbed within him.
The old woman who had given him the axe had been grateful, her gnarled hands clasping his in thanks before she hobbled back into her small cottage.
He had nodded, offered her a tight smile, and returned to the pile of logs.
Each swing of the axe was a release, each crack of the wood a reprieve from the thoughts that plagued him.
“She’s better off without me,” Aiden muttered to himself, gritting his teeth as he brought the axe down again.
The log split cleanly, but the act brought him no satisfaction. Katie didn’t deserve the life he could offer her—the uncertainty, the danger. She deserved stability, a man who could provide for her without the looming shadow of his past.
The villagers had spoken in hushed tones about the wedding all day, their excitement palpable.
They knew nothing of his connection to the event, only that their new Laird was to marry a fine Lady from a noble family.
They spoke of Katie with admiration, praising her beauty and her grace.
The thought of her standing alone at the altar, waiting for him, twisted his gut into knots.
“Aye, we’re lucky,” one of the men had said earlier, wiping sweat from his brow as he paused his work. “Laird MacNiall is a good man, and from what I hear, Lady Katie is a fine match for him. The two of them together… they’ll do right by us, I think.”
Aiden had kept his eyes on the ground, not trusting himself to speak. The man’s words felt like knives stabbing the heart Aiden was trying so desperately to numb. He didn’t deserve their praise and didn’t deserve Katie’s love. He was a man with too many secrets and too much darkness in his soul.
The villagers were wrong—Katie would not be better off with him. She deserved more than a man who couldn’t even bring himself to stand by her side on their wedding day.
“She’s lucky to be marryin’ a man such as him,” another villager had chimed in, a woman with a broad smile and a basket of freshly baked bread. “And we’re lucky too. ‘Tis been a long time since the village had somethin’ as grand as this to celebrate. A new Laird and Lady… ‘tis just what we need.”
The guilt gnawed at him and refused to let him be.
He wanted to tell them the truth, to confess that the man they praised was, in truth, worse than the rest, that he had run away from the very thing that would have brought him happiness.
But the words wouldn’t come, so he had simply nodded in acknowledgment of their comments before returning to his work.
As the day wore on, the sun began its descent toward the horizon, casting long shadows on the village.
Aiden’s hands were slick with sweat and blood, the blisters on his palms burst and raw.
He should have felt something—relief, exhaustion, anything.
But all he felt was a yawning void where his resolve should have been.
The thought of Katie waiting for him, her heart full of hope, tore at him with every passing minute.
But he couldn’t go back. He couldn’t stand at the altar and promise her a future he wasn’t sure he could give her. He couldn’t let her marry a man who was haunted by his past, who feared that the darkness within him would one day consume them both.
“She’s better off without me,” he whispered again, trying to convince himself of the truth of those words.
Finally, when his muscles could no longer lift the axe and his hands were too battered to grip the handle, Aiden made his way to the local pub.
The tavern was a modest place, the air thick with the scent of ale and roasted meat.
It was the kind of place where the villagers gathered after a long day’s work, where they shared stories and laughter, where the worries of the world were left at the door.
But Aiden wasn’t there for the company. He came because he needed a place to hide, a place where he could lose himself in the crowd. He approached the innkeeper, a burly man with a gruff demeanor, and asked for a room.
“Just for the night,” Aiden said, keeping his voice low. “I’ll pay whatever ye ask.”
Aiden sank down onto the bed, cradling his aching hands in his lap. He could feel the blisters throbbing, but it was nothing compared to the pain in his chest and the guilt that racked his soul.
For a moment, he allowed himself to imagine what might have been.
He saw himself standing beside Katie at the altar, saw the love in her eyes as they exchanged vows.
He imagined the life they could have had together, a life filled with laughter, children, and love that could have healed the wounds of his past.
But it was just a fantasy, a cruel trick of the mind.
The reality was that he was here, alone in a small room, hiding from the very thing he wanted most. He had convinced himself that he was doing it for her, that he was sparing her the pain of being shackled to a man like him.
But deep down, he knew the truth—he had run because he was afraid that he wasn’t enough, that he would never be enough.
As the night wore on and the sounds from the tavern below began to fade, Aiden lay on the hard mattress and stared up at the ceiling. The room was dark, but the darkness inside him was even deeper.
He closed his eyes, trying to silence the thoughts that plagued him, but they wouldn’t leave him alone. They circled in his mind, relentless and unforgiving, reminding him of the life he had turned his back on and the love he had walked away from.
In the silence of the room, Aiden made a vow to himself.
He would stay away from the castle, from Katie, until he was sure that he could be the man she deserved.
He would not let his fear and guilt dictate his life any longer.
He would find a way to make peace with his past, to heal the wounds that festered within him.
And when he was ready, when he was sure, he would return to her.
But until then, he would remain in the shadows, a man with no name, no past, and no future. He was a man who had lost his way, but who was determined to find it again.
Aiden’s hands were blistered and cracked, the skin splitting open in places where the axe handle had worn through the calluses.
His back ached from the constant strain of chopping wood, hauling it and tending to any other work that the villagers required.
He had thrown himself into the work with a fervor that bordered on desperation, trying to outrun his thoughts.
But no matter how hard he worked or how raw his hands became, the sorrow and fear never dissipated.
It had been nearly a dozen days since he had disappeared from the castle, leaving Katie standing at the altar with no explanation or farewell. The guilt gnawed at him relentlessly, turning his stomach every time he thought of her. And he thought of her often—too often.
Each night, when he finally collapsed onto the narrow bed in the small room above the pub, he expected his nightmares to be of the sea, of the waves that had once threatened to pull him under and drown him.
But instead, his dreams were filled with images of Katie—her eyes wide with hurt, her voice trembling as she called out to him, asking why he had left her.
He had barely slept, his mind too consumed with the weight of his decision. Even during the day, as he worked alongside the villagers, the thoughts were there, lurking just beneath the surface. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her face and heard her voice.
He couldn’t escape her.