Chapter 3
The Great Hall felt wrong.
It was decorated for a celebration, rushes newly strewn, candles lit in iron sconces, trestle tables lined along the walls for the feast to come.
The priest waited near the front with his worn book, his expression politely blank. Clanfolk crowded the benches and stood shoulder to shoulder, a murmur of voices swelling, then dipping, then swelling again.
Yet the space at the center of it all, the space where the groom should have stood, remained empty.
“Where has he gone?” Frederick hissed, adjusting his plaid impatiently.
Ariella heard the whispers in the crowd.
“Late, is he?”
“Bad fortune, that.”
She stood near the dais between her mother and Frederick, her hands clasped so tightly in front of her that her fingers ached.
Her best gown, the pale blue one carefully mended at the seams, felt too tight around her ribs.
The veil weighted her hair, and the little silver circlet Frederick had given her seemed to dig into her skull.
Her heart did not pound the way she had expected on her wedding day. It trudged.
Maxwell Murdoch stood a few paces away, a dark and silent wall beside Frederick. He wore his full plaid, the deep green and dark blue of McNeill thrown over one shoulder, a sword at his hip. The scars on his face were more visible in the wash of daylight that slanted through the high windows.
For some unknown reason, she was keenly aware that he had not even glanced in her direction. Not once.
Her mother fidgeted with the edge of her veil. “He will come,” she murmured, more to herself than to anyone else. “Men are ever late. He will come.”
Frederick’s jaw tightened. “He should have been here at dawn.”
The priest cleared his throat and shifted his weight. The murmur of the crowd grew louder.
Ariella swallowed. Part of her had expected this after Hunter’s words in the solar, his half-jest about escape, his careless invitation to choose something else.
Still, she had risen at dawn, allowed Elodie to braid and pin and smooth her hair, had walked into the hall with her knees weak, ready to speak the vows that would bind her future. Ready to do her duty.
Now there was nothing to speak to. No one to bind herself to.
“Perhaps he is ill,” her mother whispered, wringing her hands. “Perhaps his horse cast a shoe. Perhaps…”
Frederick cut her a sharp look. “Enough, Maither.”
A footman hurried through the side door, flushed and breathless. He went straight to Maxwell and spoke in a low voice.
Ariella watched Maxwell’s expression as if her own life depended on it.
It did not change. Not much. A slight narrowing of the eyes. A faint tightening at the corner of his mouth.
Then he looked directly at her.
Her stomach dropped.
Maxwell moved to stand closer to the center of the hall. He did not raise his voice much, yet somehow it carried to every corner.
“Hunter Murdoch isnae within these walls,” he announced. “Nor on these grounds.”
Silence dropped like a bomb.
Her mother made a faint, strangled sound. Frederick swore under his breath, then checked himself and straightened.
“Do ye mean he has left?” he asked, his voice cool but strained.
“Aye,” Maxwell replied. “His horse is gone. So is his gear. The guards saw nay sign of him after supper last night.”
Ariella’s cheeks went cold. The words she had heard in the solar echoed in her mind.
“If ye truly daenae wish to marry me, there are ways.”
Her own escape across the yard. The way Maxwell had stepped out of the shadows. The way he had looked past her, as if already expecting trouble.
He used me as cover.
The thought landed without heat, without even much surprise. Hunter had tossed his suggestion into the air like a jest, while in truth, it had been his own plan all along. Let the lass run, let everyone chase her, while he slipped away to whatever freedom he fancied.
A bitter little laugh rose in her chest and loosed like a wild arrow.
Around her, whispers swelled.
“He left.”
“Abandoned the wedding.”
“Shameful.”
“Poor lass.”
Her mother seized her hands. “He will come back,” she said wildly. “There must be a mistake. Men do foolish things, but he will come back.”
Frederick did not join in the hopeful scramble. His face was carved from stone. “If this is a jest, it is a poor one.”
“It is nay jest,” Maxwell replied.
Ariella glanced at him. His eyes were not calm, not truly. There was rage banked deep in them, a hot, steady thing that did not flare outward. It sat at the core of him, contained by iron will.
“Then what happens now?” Frederick’s voice lowered further. “The clans are gathered. The priest stands ready. Me sister stands there, dressed for vows. The alliance.”
Ariella distantly became aware that she was breathing too fast. The veil clung to her lips with each inhale.
Maxwell’s gaze darted from Frederick to her. It held a weight that made her spine straighten in reflex, even as the floor under her feet felt unsteady.
“What happens now,” he said, the words slow and controlled, “is that the alliance stands. O’Douglas willnae see McIntosh weakened, nor McNeill shamed, by me braither’s actions.”
Frederick’s eyebrows drew together. “And how do ye propose we manage that?”
Maxwell did not look away from Ariella. When he spoke, his voice did not rise. It did not need to.
“I will marry yer sister instead.”
The words hung in the air.
For a heartbeat, Ariella thought she had misheard. The room tilted, the faces around her blurring at the edges. It was as if she stood underwater and someone had spoken above the surface, the sound distorted.
Her mother gasped, hand flying to her mouth.
Frederick stared.
The priest’s eyes widened over his worn book.
“He… Ye… What?” her mother breathed, panic lacing each word.
Maxwell’s jaw clenched. “I will take Hunter’s place.”
The hall erupted.
Voices crashed into one another, a wave of sound that made Ariella sway. Her mother protested. Someone near the back exclaimed that it was not proper. Another hissed that it was more than proper, that it was the only way.
Opinions spilled from every side, hot and sharp.
Through it all, Ariella stood very still, her heart beating in a strange, distant rhythm.
He will marry me? Maxwell?
It wouldn’t be the charming brother with quick words and an easy laugh, but the Laird. The scarred man who had caught her in the yard and called her foolish. The one whose words the night before had lit a spark of understanding that had nothing to do with affection and everything to do with duty.
He will marry me.
Her knees wobbled.
“Ariella.” Her mother gripped her arm hard enough to bruise. “Tell them this is madness. Tell them ye will wait for his braither.”
Frederick had recovered enough to find his voice again. “This is highly irregular,” he said, though there was calculation in his eyes now too, moving quickly behind the shock. “The contract was written for—”
“The contract was written for McNeill,” Maxwell interrupted coolly. “Me name is on it as Laird, as is yers. The bride is the same. The clans remain bound.”
Ariella’s head spun. Words darted past her, too quick to catch. Irregular. Proper. Reputation. Duty. Safety.
Somewhere amid the confusion, relief coiled like a guilty serpent.
She had not wanted to marry Hunter, not truly.
She had convinced herself she could bear it, for the sake of her people.
Yet the idea of being bound to a man who would slip away in the night and leave her standing alone at the altar cut deeper than she had expected.
Maxwell was another matter. He did not run. He did not laugh things away. If he vowed something, he would stand in it until his bones broke.
That thought steadied her and terrified her all at once.
“Ariella, say something,” her mother begged.
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.
The hall spun. Hunter’s careless grin flashed through her mind. Maxwell’s eyes in the dark yard. Frederick’s haunted face when he spoke of O’Douglas. The children in the village, who would be caught between fires if war broke out.
For our clans.
The words from last night rose from a deep place inside her. She clung to them like a rope.
For our clans.
The hall was still roaring when Maxwell moved. One step, two, and he stood closer, the storm of voices parting around him.
He did not shout for silence. He did not need to.
He simply waited.
And somehow, through some current of fear and respect that had nothing to do with raised voices, the hall quieted around him.
The quiet rang louder than the uproar had.
Her mother’s hand wrapped around her wrist. “Ye cannae. See some sense, child,” she hissed. “Nae him. Yer braither was enough of a compromise. To live in the same house as The Beast of Murdoch, but this? Nae this. Ariella, tell him. Tell them ye willnae have it. I willnae have it. Frederick!”
“Maither,” Ariella tried, but her tongue felt thick.
The hall blurred. The priest’s face, the watching clansmen, the flicker of candlelight, all seemed to tilt and smear, as if they belonged to a dream she could not quite wake up from.
Frederick found his voice again. “Laird McNeill,” he began, attempting a tone of reason. “This is nay small thing. To wed a lass who was promised to yer braither, and with nay time to consider…”
“There is nay time to consider anything else, Laird McIntosh,” Maxwell argued. His voice was calm, cold as winter water. “Every hour we delay gives O’Douglas more room to poke at our borders. He watches us. He will hear of this day. I daenae intend to give him the pleasure of an unstable alliance.”
Caitlin’s eyes were bright with unshed tears. “And what of me daughter? Ye speak of alliances and borders and men with swords, but what of the lass who must live beside ye? Did ye think of her at all?”
Maxwell’s gaze did not waver. “I am thinking of the life she will have if O’Douglas rides through these gates. Even if they ride through me own first, yers will certainly be next.”