Chapter Twenty-Three Munro #2
“Ye’re a stubborn lass,” I whispered, reaching out to press my hand to her forehead. “Most would have given up by now.”
Her skin was still hot with fever despite the cool compresses we applied regularly.
The wound itself was an angry red beneath the poultices of herbs the healer changed twice daily.
Each time the bandages were removed, I held my breath, searching for signs that the corruption was receding rather than spreading.
“I was a fool,” I said, taking her limp hand in mine. Her fingers were slender, almost delicate compared to my calloused palm, yet I knew the strength they contained. “A blind, stubborn fool who could nae see what was right before him.”
The silence that answered me was awful. I wished she would ramble or murmur as she had that first day when she’d lain unconscious.
I’d pieced together the treachery, lies, weakness, and murder committed by Uncle Gordon and Aunt Magdalene from the words Murieall spoke from wherever her mind was.
It had seemed Murieall had to get it out to rest, but now I worried in the utter silence, if she’d told the tale from the depths of her sleep, so that I would know the full truth, because she would not be returning to tell it.
“I was so sure I kenned the truth,” I continued, my thumb tracing circles on the back of her hand. “So certain that the dead did nae speak to the living.” My voice broke, and I had to pause, swallowing against the knot in my throat. “I was wrong.”
I stood, my knees protesting after so many hours seated, and moved to check the fire. The logs had burned low, leaving mostly glowing embers. I added fresh wood, watching as the flames licked hungrily at the new fuel before turning back to Murieall.
“The healer says she thinks ye can hear me,” I said, returning to my chair and leaning forward to brush my fingertips along her fevered cheek. “I hope that’s true, because there’s something I need ye to ken.”
The blanket covering her had shifted, exposing one shoulder. I gently tucked it back around her, taking care not to disturb the bandages visible at the neckline of her shift.
“Isabella spoke to me in the woods,” I whispered, still scarcely believing it myself. “After I pulled my uncle off ye, I thought I’d lost ye. The blood…” I closed my eyes against the memory. “I begged ye to live, and that’s when I heard her.”
“She said she’d saved yer life, and now I must give ye the one ye deserve. The one we both deserve.” I lifted Murieall’s hand to my lips, pressing a kiss against her knuckles.
The candle nearest the bed guttered, casting strange shadows across Murieall’s still face. In the flickering light, she looked both vulnerable and somehow ethereal, as if she might slip away to join the spirits she communed with.
“Ye came here to make me feel again,” I said, my voice rough with emotion.
“And ye succeeded, though nae in the way either of us expected.” I carefully brushed back her hair, letting my fingers linger against the warmth of her scalp.
“I feel everything now, mo chride. The grief I tried to drown, the joy of reconnecting with my lasses. And love, Murieall. I feel love for ye.”
Something in my chest constricted as I spoke the word. It felt both familiar and terrifyingly new, like picking up a sword after years away from battle.
“But ye must come back to me,” I pleaded. “Ye must fight this fever. I can nae lose ye now, nae when I’ve only just found ye.”
Behind me, the door creaking alerted me to someone entering.
I glanced over my shoulder to see James standing in the doorway, his face grave in the dim light.
He hesitated there, as if uncertain of his welcome after all that had passed between us, before stepping inside and closing the door with deliberate care behind him.
The tap of his boots against the stone floor seemed unnaturally loud in the quiet chamber as he approached. His eyes moved from me to Murieall, assessing her condition with a practiced gaze that had seen too many wounded warriors on too many battlefields.
“Any change?” he asked, his voice low.
I shook my head, rubbing a hand over my face to chase away the fog of exhaustion. “The fever holds, and…”
“She has nae awakened,” James finished for me.
“Aye.”
He placed a hand on my shoulder, and I felt the weight of our shared history in that touch—years of friendship, of battles fought side by side, of trusts both kept and broken. I’d nearly destroyed all of it with my suspicion and rage, yet here he stood, loyal as ever.
“I bring news,” he said after a moment, his grip tightening slightly on my shoulder. “Magdalene is dead.”
I looked up sharply, searching his face for details his words hadn’t provided.
“Dead?”
“Aye. She took her own life in the dungeon cell. Hung herself with strips torn from her gown.”
I absorbed this information with an odd detachment, as if he were speaking of a stranger rather than the woman who had been my aunt since childhood. The woman who had murdered my son and wife. The woman whose actions had nearly cost me Murieall as well.
“When?” I asked, my voice sounding hollow even to my own ears.
“Just before dawn. The guard found her when he brought the morning meal.”
I nodded slowly, turning my gaze back to Murieall’s still form. Magdalene’s death should have meant something to me. Instead of feeling relief or the grim satisfaction of justice served, I felt only a dull acceptance, as if some part of me had expected this end all along.
James moved to the opposite side of Murieall’s bed, studying her pale face with concern etched in the lines of his brow. “She saved us all,” he said softly. “Had she nae arrived when she did, had she nae heard Isabella’s voice…”
“I ken it well,” I replied, the weight of my debt to Murieall pressing on my chest like a physical thing.
“Ye need rest, Munro,” James said. “Ye’ll nae be of use to her if ye collapse. Let me sit with her for a few hours while ye sleep.”
For a moment, the offer tempted me. My body ached with fatigue, my eyes burned, and my mind felt slow and dull from lack of sleep. But the thought of leaving her, even in James’s capable hands, sent a spike of panic through my chest.
“Nay,” I said firmly, my gaze never leaving Murieall’s face. “I will nae leave her.”
“Munro—”
“I will never leave another woman in a time of need again,” I declared, the words carrying the weight of both promise and penance. “I left Isabella to face the birth of George alone. I abandoned my daughters to their grief while I drowned in my own. I will nae do the same to Murieall.”
I looked up at James then, meeting his concerned gaze with unwavering resolve. “If she dies,” I said, my voice breaking on the word, “she will nae die alone. If she lives, she will wake to find me here, waiting.”
James studied my face for a long moment before the tension in his shoulders eased, and he nodded once, accepting my decision without further argument.
“At least let me have food brought to ye,” he said. “And perhaps fresh clothing.”
I glanced down at my blood-stained plaid and nodded reluctantly. “Aye, I’d be grateful for that.”
As James turned to leave, a question that had been nagging at the edges of my mind suddenly surfaced.
“James,” I called, stopping him before he reached the door. “Why did ye believe her? About the ghosts, about Isabella, about all of it. Why did ye nae think her mad or manipulative as I did?”
He paused, his hand on the door latch, and turned back to face me with a small, sad smile. “Because I saw the way she looked at ye,” he said simply. “A woman does nae look at a man she means to destroy the way Murieall looked at ye.”
I found myself so choked by his words, I could do no more than nod. James inclined his head and departed, the heavy door closing behind him with a sound that echoed in the quiet chamber.
Alone once more with Murieall, I reached for her hand, drawing it into my lap, and turning my thoughts to the news James had brought.
My aunt was dead, having chosen to face her own judgment rather than mine or the clan’s.
Justice of a sort had been served, though it felt hollow, incomplete.
It would not bring back George or Isabella.
It would not erase the years of grief and betrayal.
But perhaps, if Murieall survived, it might be enough to build upon.
“Live,” I whispered, pressing her hand to my chest, where my heart beat steadily beneath. “Live, and I will spend every day proving myself worthy of yer faith in me.”
A soft moan escaped her lips, and my pulse leapt into my throat.
“Murieall?” I whispered, scarcely daring to hope. “Can ye hear me, lass?”
Her eyelids fluttered but did not open. Still, it was more response than I’d seen since she’d been wounded, and hope surged within me like a tide.
The sound of the door creaking open pulled my attention away from Murieall’s face. I turned, expecting the healer, but instead found Guinn and Bess standing in the doorway. They hesitated there, clearly uncertain of their welcome, their small faces solemn with worry.
“Come in, lasses,” I called softly, managing a smile for them despite my exhaustion.
They approached with careful steps, as if afraid that too much noise might somehow harm Murieall further. Guinn, ever the protector, kept a hand on Bess’s shoulder as they drew near the bed.
“Is she any better, Da?” Guinn asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
“She made a sound just now,” I replied, unable to keep the hope from my voice.
Bess moved to the edge of the bed, her small face intense as she studied Murieall. Without hesitation, she reached out and placed her palm against Murieall’s forehead, much as the healer did when checking for fever. The gesture was so adult, so practiced, that it caught me off guard.
“I think she’s dreaming of her sister and Mama,” Bess announced with quiet certainty.
My breath caught in my throat. Four days ago, I would have dismissed such a pronouncement as childish fancy. But now, after all that had happened, after hearing Isabella’s voice myself in those desperate moments in the forest, I did not doubt that Bess might be right.
I looked back at Murieall, at the still features that had just shown their first sign of life in days. Was it possible? Were the dead speaking to her even now, in her fever dreams? Was Isabella there with her, guiding her back to us?
“She can take as long as she needs to dream,” I said, surprising myself with the certainty in my voice. “But then she has to come back to us.”