Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
Duart rose from the darkness like something carved out of the island itself.
Isobel saw it first as a black shape against a blacker sky, then by degrees as the birlinn drew nearer and the torches along the walls came into view.
It was a keep built not for beauty––although there was a brutal kind of beauty in it––but for endurance.
It stood above the water as if daring the sea to strike harder.
Her stomach, already unsettled by the crossing, tightened again.
Enemy stone.
The men moved quickly once they reached shore.
Isobel forced herself to stand before Ruaridh could come for her, though the boat swayed beneath her feet and made the world tilt one last time in protest. She stepped onto the wet stones with as much dignity as she could summon.
Ruaridh came after her, steady as if the sea had never touched him.
The climb from the shore to the castle yard felt longer than it surely was. By the time they passed beneath the gate, dawn had not yet broken, but the sky carried the faintest suggestion of gray. Torches burned in iron brackets. Servants emerged from doorways with cloaks and lanterns.
Isobel drew her cloak tighter against the cold, but the movement only made the length of MacDonald plaid across her gown more visible.
It had been fastened at her shoulder since leaving Dunnyveg, held there by the silver brooch bearing her father’s house mark.
Salt spray had darkened the wool and loosened the folds, yet nothing could have made it unmistakable within these walls.
When they saw her, the entire yard seemed to still. No one shouted. No one openly insulted her. That might have been easier.
Instead, silence spread in a widening circle.
Faces turned toward her. A groom stopped with a saddle over one arm. A young kitchen maid froze on the steps. Two guards near the entrance exchanged a glance so quick it might have been missed by anyone less accustomed to being judged. But Isobel missed nothing.
MacDonald.
The word did not need to be spoken. It moved through the yard all the same. Isobel lifted her chin. If they expected her to cower, they would be disappointed.
Ruaridh stepped slightly ahead of her before the silence could become something uglier.
“Torin,” he called out.
A man to his right came forward at once. He was broad, fairer than Ruaridh, with a soldier’s alertness and eyes that missed very little. He had not the same dark severity as his laird, but there was command in him all the same.
“Aye,” the man answered.
“See the men settled. Double the watch at the lower gate until I say otherwise. Nay one leaves before sunrise without word from me.”
Torin’s gaze flicked once to Isobel, not rudely, but with unmistakable surprise. “Aye, laird.”
“Brodie.”
Another man stepped from near the archway, taller, harder, and scarred along one cheek in a way that made his expression seem permanently carved into suspicion. If Torin looked like command, this man looked like war. His eyes settled on Isobel, and there was nothing welcoming in them.
She looked back without blinking. Grim approval passed over his face before it vanished.
“Men on the walls,” Ruaridh ordered. “Full count before the hour is out.”
Brodie did not ask why. “Done.”
Isobel noted that. Ruaridh did not explain himself to either man. He did not need to. They obeyed with the ease of men long accustomed to trusting him, and he gave orders with the same certainty.
Ruaridh turned toward the steps where several women had gathered in uncertain silence. “Sorcha.”
A young woman came forward. She was not much older than Isobel, perhaps nearly the same age, with dark copper hair braided simply over one shoulder and a face that would have looked sweet if not for the anxious intelligence in her eyes.
She wiped her hands quickly on her apron, though they were already clean, and dipped into a small curtsy.
“Me laird.”
“Take Lady Isobel tae the chamber beside mine. See that a fire is lit and that she has food, water, and whatever else she requires.”
At the name, another ripple moved through the yard.
Lady Isobel. His chamber.
Isobel felt every glance land upon her like thrown stones.
Sorcha’s eyes widened for only a moment before she mastered it. “Aye, me laird.”
Ruaridh’s gaze moved across the gathered servants and men, cold enough to cut. “She is under me protection. Any man or woman here who forgets that will answer tae me.”
No one spoke. The warning had found its mark.
Isobel should have felt some satisfaction in their discomfort. Instead, the words ‘under my protection’ made something in her twist unpleasantly. Protection, as she had stated to him, was only another kind of possession when spoken by the man who had taken her.
Sorcha stepped closer, careful but not timid. “Me lady, if ye will come with me?”
The voice surprised Isobel. It was gentle, without that usual false sweetness.
But before she could answer, Torin moved to hand Sorcha the lantern he had been holding.
Their fingers brushed. It lasted scarcely a heartbeat.
Yet Sorcha’s lashes lowered, and Torin’s mouth softened in a way that transformed his stern face so quickly Isobel almost doubted she had seen it.
Then he looked away too fast, and Sorcha turned with color high in her cheeks.
Ah. So there was something there.
Even in a MacLean castle, hearts behaved foolishly, it seemed.
The thought amused Isobel in a way she did not entirely understand.
She glanced back once before following Sorcha.
Ruaridh had already turned to Brodie, speaking low and sharply.
He did not look at her. The yard began to move again around him, but quieter than before, as though the entire household had been struck awake by more than his return.
Isobel followed the maid inside, and the castle swallowed her in stone and shadow.
The passage beyond the yard was narrow and cool, while the walls were thick enough to hold the night in them.
Their footsteps echoed faintly. Torches burned low in sconces, and the air smelled of smoke, rushes, wool, and the distant, comforting hint of bread from some unseen kitchen.
It was not what she expected.
She did not know what she had expected. Blood on the walls, perhaps. Men sharpening blades in every corner. A place full of snarling wolves.
Instead, it was just a castle. Enemy stone, yes, but lived-in stone.
Sorcha slowed her pace to match Isobel’s. “The stairs are worn near the turn, me lady. Best keep tae the inner side.”
Isobel looked at her. “Ye neednae call me that.”
Sorcha hesitated. “Would ye prefer Lady Isobel?”
“I would prefer tae be elsewhere entirely.” The words came sharper than she intended.
Sorcha did not flinch. She only nodded, as if the answer were perfectly reasonable. “Aye. I imagine ye would.”
That was not what Isobel had expected. She had braced for coldness, for contempt hidden beneath obedience, for a MacLean servant eager to remind her, with every lowered glance and stiff word, that she had entered a hostile house.
She had not braced for understanding. It made her suspicious at once.
“Dae ye always agree so easily with women brought here against their will?” Isobel asked.
Sorcha glanced at her, and a faint sadness touched her face. “Nay. It hasnae happened often enough fer me tae form a habit.”
Despite herself, Isobel almost smiled.
She looked away quickly. “I am a MacDonald.”
“I ken.”
“And that daesnae trouble ye?”
Sorcha considered the question as they climbed the stair. “It troubles many people here.”
“That isnae what I asked.”
“Nay,” Sorcha answered softly. “Nae enough tae be cruel tae ye.”
The answer was simple. Worse, it sounded true. Isobel had no ready defense against that, so she gathered what remained of her dignity and said nothing.
The chamber Sorcha led her to was larger than Isobel expected and warmer than the corridors.
A servant had already lit the fire, or perhaps the room had been prepared before their arrival.
Flames caught low in the hearth, throwing gold over the heavy bed, the carved chest, and the woven hangings along the wall.
A narrow window looked out toward darkness and the faint silver movement of the sea below.
The sea again.
Isobel quickly looked away.
Sorcha set the lantern down and moved about the room without fuss.
“There is water here. I will have more brought up for washing. The bed linens are clean, and there are blankets in that chest if ye are cold. The laird said food, but I thought perhaps broth might sit better after the crossing, so I sent for that.”
Isobel stared at her.
Sorcha paused. “Unless ye would prefer bread and cheese?”
“Ye noticed?”
“That ye were ill?” Sorcha’s expression softened. “A little. Ye hid it well.”
Isobel stiffened. “I wasnae ill.”
“Of course.” The agreement was too quick.
Isobel narrowed her eyes.
Sorcha’s mouth twitched. “Broth, then?”
For the first time since Inveraray, something inside Isobel loosened by the smallest measure.
“Broth,” she nodded. “If it is nay trouble.”
“It is me work, me lady. And even when it is trouble, I am very good at pretending otherwise.”
That time, Isobel could not quite stop the brief huff of breath that escaped her. Sorcha smiled. She crossed to the basin and poured water from a covered jug into it.
“Would ye like help with the mask?”
Isobel’s hand lifted to her face. She had nearly forgotten it was still there. Or rather, she had merely grown used to its insult. Her fingers found the ties, but they had been knotted tightly, and the cold had made her clumsy. She tugged once, then again, growing angrier as the knot resisted.
“May I?” Sorcha asked.
Isobel went very still. She didn’t want another stranger’s hands near her. She didn’t want to be handled, adjusted, arranged, inspected. But Sorcha stood several paces away and waited as if refusal wouldn’t offend her.
That, more than anything, made Isobel lower her hand.
“Aye.”
Sorcha came behind her and worked at the ties with careful fingers.
She did not pull Isobel’s hair. She did not speak too much.
She did not make some foolish remark about beauty or fortune or duty.
The knot loosened, and the mask came away.
Cool air touched Isobel’s face. For a moment, she could not breathe properly.
Sorcha stepped aside at once and laid the mask on the table, face down. Isobel liked her for that. She wished she did not.
“There,” Sorcha said quietly. “Better?”
Isobel looked toward the small polished mirror near the basin and saw herself for the first time since before the auction.
Her hair was wind-tangled. Her face was pale.
Her eyes looked too bright, and her mouth too tense.
Without the mask, she seemed less protected and more herself, which was somehow worse.
“I look wretched,” she sighed.
Sorcha studied her reflection with a practical eye. “Ye look like a woman who has crossed half the world in a gown meant fer standing still.”
A laugh almost came again. It frightened Isobel more than the silence in the yard had.
She turned from the mirror. “Ye are very bold fer a maid.”
“Aye,” Sorcha admitted, utterly untroubled. “But usually only when nay one important is listening.”
“I am important?”
“Ye are the lady me laird brought home in the middle of the night.” Sorcha reached for a folded cloth and handed it to her. “Whether ye wish tae be or nae, everyone in this castle will think ye are important.”
Isobel took the cloth slowly. There was no malice in the words.
“I didnae ask him tae bring me here.”
“I didnae think ye had.” The gentleness of it struck too close.
Isobel looked down at the cloth in her hands. Her throat tightened before she could stop it, and she hated herself for that most of all. Tears would be a greater humiliation than any stumble into a boat or saddle.
She would not cry in Duart. She would not.
Sorcha seemed to understand something of the struggle, because she turned away and began fussing unnecessarily with the fire.
“The laird’s chamber is through that passage,” she told her, nodding toward a door near the far wall.
“It will be locked from this side if ye wish it, though I dinnae ken what arrangement he intends. The guards outside will answer if ye need anything. They may look grim, but most of them are more frightened of doing wrong than they are of being kind.”
Isobel’s head lifted. “Guards?”
Sorcha glanced back.
Isobel’s temper, blessedly familiar, rushed in to save her from every softer feeling. “He put guards at me door?”
“I expect he will.”
“Because I am a prisoner.”
Sorcha’s expression became careful. “Because this castle willnae ken what tae make of ye at first.”
She folded the cloth once in her hands. “And ye? Dae ye ken what tae make of me?”
Sorcha looked at her for a long moment, then smiled faintly. “Nay. But I think I should like tae find out before deciding.”
No one had said anything like that to Isobel all night. She did not know what to do with it. So she looked toward the fire and pretended the warmth there was the reason her chest felt less tight.
“I willnae be grateful tae him,” she said, though less fiercely than before.
Sorcha did not ask whom she meant. “Then dinnae be.”
Isobel looked at her.
Sorcha shrugged slightly. “Gratitude given by force is only another kind of obedience.”
That settled between them quietly. Isobel found, to her irritation and reluctant relief, that she liked the words very much.
A knock came at the door, and another maid entered with a tray. Sorcha took it from her before the girl could stare too long and dismissed her with a look that was polite but firm. Then she set the broth and bread on the small table near the fire.
“Eat what ye can,” she urged. “Sleep if ye are able. I can return in the morning tae help ye dress.”
“And if I cannae sleep?”
“Then the fire will keep ye company. And if that proves dull, ye may curse the walls. They are old enough tae have heard worse.”
Isobel’s mouth softened before she could stop it. Sorcha noticed, but wisely pretended not to.
The room was warm. The mask was off her face. The broth smelled plain and good. And Sorcha looked at her not as a MacDonald prize dragged into a MacLean keep, but as a woman who had endured a terrible night and deserved somewhere to sit. It was more than Isobel had expected.
She lowered herself into the chair by the fire and wrapped her cold hands around the cup of broth.
“Thank ye,” she said stiffly.
Sorcha’s smile was quick and bright, but not teasing. “Ye are welcome, Lady Isobel.”
This time, Isobel did not correct her.