Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Is he goin’ to be all right?” Archer asked, his words coming out gruff with his worry.
The healer, who until that moment had been bent over Louis examining the young boy’s injury, turned to look at Archer.
“Aye,” the healer said with a nod. “It appears that nothin’ is broken. Just a bit of strain. He’ll have a wee bit of trouble walkin’ for a few days, and it might still be tender for a while after that. But he’ll shape up just fine.”
Archer blinked, trying not to sag under the relief that coursed through him. The healer, a woman who Archer guessed was in her mid-fifties, turned back to Louis. He was lying in his bed, his foot propped up on pillows and books to lift his leg high enough for the woman to examine him.
Archer watched as his son winced, flinching against the pain as the healer tried to set his foot in a makeshift splint.
“I’ll need to give him milk of the poppy,” she said, not turning to look at him again. “It’ll be a mild dose. As he’s young and a bit small. And we daenae want him puttin’ weight on that leg for the rest of the day. He needs to get some rest, so it’ll put him right to sleep.”
Archer nodded, then remembered the woman wasn’t looking at him and answered audibly.
“Aye, that’ll be all right.”
“Louis!”
Aurora’s voice filled the space, making Archer turn to face the door. Already, his daughter was bounding toward the bed, her eyes locked on her brother with worry creased brows.
“Is he all right?” she asked, her voice was waspish and seemed much older than her six years. “Will he be all right?”
She arrived at the bed, leveling the last question directly at the healer. Her tone was hard and filled with an authority that would have been comical in other circumstances.
“He’s goin’ to be fine, lass,” the healer muttered, never once taking her gaze off of the work she was performing on Louis. “But ye’ll want to stand back. This leg is goin’ to be a bit tender and ye daenae want to jostle it any.”
Aurora nodded, immediately retreating several steps from the foot of her brother’s bed. But she did not take her eyes off him. Not once.
Archer felt more than saw someone arrive at his side. He didn’t need to look to know who had just arrived. He could smell her, could feel her warmth, and could sense her with every fiber of his being.
“How is the lad doin’?” Emilie asked, her voice low enough that only Archer could hear.
He still did not turn to look at her, opting instead to keep his gaze focused on his son.
“He’s goin’ to be all right,” Archer grunted, the relief filling him still palpable as he finally said the words out loud. “Just a few days of some pain.”
Archer started as he felt pressure on his arm. He glanced down at it, shocked to see Emilie’s hand resting on his bicep.
She meant it in a comforting gesture. Archer felt sure of that. But he found no comfort in it at all.
The warmth of her hand resting on him washed through him, chafing against the deepest part of his soul.
How long had it been since someone had offered him comfort? How long had it been since someone had looked at him with the softness and encouragement that he could feel her looking at him with?
Too close. I am too close.
Shrugging his shoulder, Archer stepped back from under her touch.
“Come and see me with any updates,” he commanded the healer, not waiting for a response as he turned and strode from the room.
Today was a mistake. I never should have let her convince me to do this. If I hadnae, Louis wouldnae be hurt. And she wouldnae feel like she can be this close to me.
Archer strode toward his chambers, wanting the solace and the silence of the space to help get his wits about him. The moment he reached the door, he threw it open and stepped inside.
The sound of the door snapping shut behind him sent him whirling, finding Emilie standing before it.
“Why are ye avoidin’ them?” she asked, leveling her gaze at him and crossing her arms across her chest.
Gone was the dithering, wilting flower that she had been a few days ago. The woman standing before him was the one who had sat across from him, riding home from their wedding. It was the woman who had intrigued him.
It was the woman who was the most dangerous to Archer, and to everything he wanted his life to look like.
“Avoidin’ who? I daenae ken what ye’re jabberin’ about,” he said, shaking his head.
He turned his back to his wife again, stalking over to his bed. But once he reached it, he could not sit down.
His skin felt like it was on fire, tiny pinpricks of heat rushing across his body. He needed to move. So, Archer began to pace.
“Ye ken exactly what I’m talkin’ about,” Emilie said, drawing Archer’s attention once more.
He looked at her while he paced, turning his head this way and that to keep her in his line of sight.
Emilie dropped her hands back to her side and began to take a step forward before seeming to think better of it.
Maybe she realized if she wasnae standin’ directly in front of that door, that I would walk out of it right now.
“Why are ye always so distant with the bairns?” she pressed on, her blue eyes icy as she regarded him.
“Daenae play daft. Nae when I’ve seen the way ye act around them.
But then today, in the forest, ye were the first at Louis’ side.
So, why? Why do ye seem to go out of yer way to pretend that ye daenae care and keep yer distance, especially when it’s quite clear ye care a lot? ”
Archer stared at her, but Emilie did not flinch away as people so often did when he glared at them. No, she just turned up her chin, holding her head high like a queen without a crown. Meeting his stubbornness with some of her own.
And by God, if it didn’t reach inside of him and make him want to open up to her. For the first time in Archer’s life, he wanted to pour it all out of him.
I could. I could tell her everythin’. It doesnae have to mean anythin’. Doesnae mean that we will be friends, or even close. I could go right back to tryin’ to ignore her after.
Archer did not spend any time analyzing how much he was lying to himself before turning to face Emilie head-on, glaring at her, and allowing himself to speak.
“Me faither hit me maither,” Archer explained.
His voice came out a little gruffer than he had intended, and he let out a small cough to try to clear the tension from his vocal cords. When he was ready, he continued.
“When he thought that I was big enough, he hit me too,” he said, his tone now almost entirely flat.
He turned his gaze to Emilie, expecting to see a look of shock or pity on her face. Instead, she was still staring at him with the same hard look she had been mere moments before.
“And that makes ye keep yer distance from yer own bairns?” she asked, crossing her arms across her chest again.
“Are ye afraid that they’re goin’ to hit ye, too?
I have to say, I’m nae sure Louis would do much damage to someone of yer size.
I’d keep me eyes on Aurora, though. I’m sure she could give ye a good wallop. ”
Archer stared at Emilie, shock rippling through him.
“That’s what ye have to say?” he growled, more than a little aghast. “Ye want to be jokin’ at a time like this?”
Emilie nodded. “Seems as good a time as any.”
Rolling his eyes, Archer turned away from her. He crossed their room in a few short steps, making his way to the large, overstuffed reading chair in the far corner.
He collapsed into it, running his hands through his hair. Archer had never spoken the words aloud before, had never talked about the events of his past with anyone. Not even Marcus.
He felt a bit of relief having spoken it all out loud. But he had not expected the facts of his past to be treated with such levity.
The sound of Emilie’s boots clicking against the wooden floor made Archer raise his eyes. His wife, clearly having decided that he was no longer going to go running out the door to avoid the conversation, was walking in his direction.
Emilie’s blue eyes had softened a bit. And, when she stopped mere feet from him, the corner of her mouth ticked up in an apologetic smile.
“I daenae mean to make light of the situation,” she explained. “I just daenae ken what that has to do with the bairns. It is a terrible thing, what happened to ye. But it doesnae mean that ye daenae get to be an actual faither to yer own bairns.”
“I am a faither to them,” Archer bristled. “I am a faither to them in all the ways that count.”
“By doin’ what?” she argued back, clearly not keen on dropping the conversation any time soon.
“By nearly barkin’ at them any time they so much as smile or behave like the young age they actually are?
By never talkin’ to ‘em about anythin’ other than things that will make them a good Laird or a good Lady?
Never about anythin’ that will make them good people. ”
“I talk to ‘em plenty,” he growled, but his words were hollow even to his own ears.
“About what?” Emilie badgered.
“About the things that they need to ken,” Archer hissed, pushing himself back to standing.
With Emilie crossing the room, his act of standing brought them incredibly close together. They were mere inches away now, and he could feel the body heat rolling off of her.
The scent of her pervaded his nostrils. It was equal parts maddening and alluring.
Archer did not know if he wanted to push past her and storm out of the room or pull her in and kiss her.
“There is so much more that matters than just their studies,” Emilie argued.
“It’s better this way,” Archer said, the truth of it all finally seeping out of him. “It is safer for them. Because me faither’s blood runs in me veins like rot. And I willnae hurt them. I willnae be like them.”
Emilie’s mouth popped open in surprise, her eyes immediately beginning to shine as she stared up at him.
“Ye think that ye would hurt them?” she asked, her tone markedly softer than it had been a second before.
Archer didn’t answer. He just seethed down at her, staring and daring her to continue.
“Ye care, Archer,” she said after a brief pause.
He opened his mouth to talk, but Emilie held up her hand, immediately silencing him.
“Ye can try to tell me that ye daenae,” she continued on, “but I saw ye in that forest today. I saw how ye rushed to Louis’ side and all but ran at the speed of light back to the castle.
I saw the worry on yer face when ye were standin’ in his room.
And I’ve heard the way the staff talks about ye.
I heard the way ye take care of yer people, how ye’re fair and just and protective. ”
She raised a hand, poking a finger into his chest to drive home her point. Archer’s eyes darted down to where she was prodding at him.
Usually, this kind of thing would make him irate. But for some reason that he didn’t understand, it only served to fill him with a bit of amusement.
“So daenae stand there and try to tell me that ye daenae care,” she forged on, unaware of the effect that her nearness and her brazenness were having on him. “Because if ye utter those words, we both ken that it would be a lie. And ye daenae strike me as a liar.”
“I’m nae a liar,” he grumbled, still warring with the conflicting emotions taking place inside of him. “But I ken how dangerous it would be for the bairns to get close to me.”
“Just because yer faither was a monster, it doesnae mean that ye are one,” Emilie said simply.
She shrugged her shoulders after she spoke, the words falling from her lips as if they were the simplest things in the world. But they were far from it.
The amusement Archer had been feeling a second before left his body entirely. He stepped forward, their chests nearly pressing together.
“Ye think ye ken me?” he growled, his agitation rushing through him like ice in his veins.
He still wanted Emilie. That much was true. And her nearness was doing absolutely wicked things to his mind and his body.
But that did not mean he did not have his wits about him. Archer still had control over himself, was still able to see all the ways in which his wife was so horrifically wrong.
“Ye ken nothin’,” he continued.
Emilie seemed to sense the shift in his demeanor, her blue eyes flaring with surprise as they stared up into Archer’s face. A strand of chestnut hair had fallen down beside her cheek, framing her eyes and making them look even icier than normal.
“I ken enough,” she hissed back, but this time her voice sounded unsure.
“I’ve killed people,” Archer growled. “Just as surely as me faither did. I’ve sliced a throat. I’ve buried a sword in someone’s belly and an ax in someone’s skull. So, just because I’ve nae raised me fist to a bairn, ye’re tryin’ to tell me it means I’m nae a monster?”
He stared down at his wife, waiting for her to answer. There was a part of him that wanted her to fire back. Wanted her to say that she could understand why he did those things. That if they were during war, or to save those that he cared about, she could understand them entirely.
But it seemed that for the first time since entering their chambers, his wife was at a complete and total loss for words.
Disappointment washed through him, and Archer sneered down at her.
“That is exactly what I thought ye’d have to say,” he growled. “Now, stop speakin’ about things ye ken nothin’ about.”
Archer pushed past her, saying absolutely nothing else as he made his way toward the door.