Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Isobel carried the bow back toward the castle as though it were something far more dangerous than carved yew and horn.
That was foolish, of course. The weapon itself did not trouble her. It sat easily in her hand, and its curve was balanced with such precision that she could not stop noticing it. No, the danger lay in the reason it fit her so well.
Ruaridh had noticed. He watched the way she moved, the reach of her arm, the strength she used and the strength she held back. He saw something she had not asked him to see, and instead of using that knowledge to command or corner her, he had made her something useful, something hers.
The thought made warmth gather beneath her ribs no matter how sternly she tried to dismiss it.
Beside her, Ruaridh walked with his shirt now pulled back over his head, though the linen still clung damply to his shoulders and chest. Isobel kept her gaze fixed ahead with all the resolve of a martyr.
It was not her fault if the man chose to stride about half-dressed in the training yard like some pagan war god sent to test the virtue of sensible women.
He knew exactly what he was doing… likely.
She glanced at him. His mouth curved.
Definitely.
They passed beneath the archway leading from the yard toward the inner court, where the castle’s evening work had begun to gather pace.
“Me laird.”
Ruaridh stopped at once.
Isobel stopped, too, though she suspected the conversation was not meant for her.
Mairi, who ruled the ovens with the grim authority of a battlefield commander, came toward them from the direction of the kitchens.
Two men followed her, one thin and anxious, the other older, with a ledger tucked beneath his arm.
Brodie and Torin appeared as if summoned by a silent force.
Ruaridh’s amusement vanished so quickly Isobel felt the loss of it like a change in weather.
“Mairi,” he said. “What is it?”
Mairi cleared her throat. “The grain stores are lower than expected.”
Ruaridh’s expression didn’t change. “How much lower?”
The older man behind Mairi opened the ledger. “If we keep present measures, perhaps three weeks before hardship. Less if more men are kept at the walls and fed from the hall.”
“Salt fish?” Ruaridh asked.
“Enough for now,” Mairi answered. “But nae if the weather keeps boats in and ye continue doubling shore watches.”
“And the barley?”
“Poorer than we hoped. Some sacks spoiled at the bottom. Damp got in.”
Ruaridh’s jaw tightened. “Why was I nae told sooner?”
The thin man flushed. “We thought tae make it stretch, laird.”
“With hope?”
The man looked down. Ruaridh exhaled through his nose, holding back anger by force. Isobel recognized the restraint. She had seen it in him often, though seldom directed at those under his care.
“Who kens?” he asked.
“Kitchen women,” Mairi told him. “Store men. A few of the older servants. Nae the hall.”
“Keep it that way.”
The older man with the ledger shifted uneasily. “There is talk of rationing.”
Ruaridh looked at him.
The man swallowed but continued. “If we cut portions for the household now, we may avoid worse later.”
“Cut whose portions?” Ruaridh asked.
“Servants first,” the thin man said too quickly. “Then children, perhaps less ale, less bread, more thin broth?—”
“Nay,” Ruaridh said. The word was quiet, but absolute.
The servant closed his mouth.
Ruaridh turned to Mairi. “Nay child goes hungry in me hall.”
“I ken that,” Mairi urged. “But the food willnae multiply because ye command it.”
There was no disrespect in her voice, only fear made practical by long experience. Ruaridh heard it. Isobel saw that he heard it, and she saw, too, the way the burden settled upon him.
Laird. Protector. Judge. Provider.
Every title was a weight, and every answer was expected before he had even been given the whole of the trouble.
Isobel should have remained silent. It wasn’t her household. She was still measured by the name MacDonald, no matter what ring or vows had been forced around her life. And yet, as the men began speaking again, with every proposed solution worse than the last, impatience rose in her.
At Dunnyveg, lean seasons had come often enough. Her father ignored the household until complaint reached his table, but Isobel didn’t. She watched the women who knew how to make stores last and the fishwives who understood tides better than any councilman understood law.
“There are better ways than cutting from the servants first,” she spoke.
Every head turned toward her. The silence was immediate.
The older man with the ledger shifted.
The thin man’s mouth tightened. Ruaridh’s head turned slowly toward the man.
“Say what ye mean, Fergus,” he spoke calmly, but there was a storm brewing underneath.
The thin man blanched a little, but foolishness, once begun, often needed to finish ruining itself.
“I only mean,” Fergus said carefully, “that Lady Isobel may nae ken how matters are managed here.”
“Because I am a woman?” Isobel asked sweetly. “Or because I am a MacDonald?”
Fergus made the fatal error of not answering quickly enough.
“Me wife asked ye a question.” Ruaridh didn’t raise his voice.
The words struck harder than a shout would have.
Me wife.
Isobel’s anger faltered around a sudden, dangerous warmth.
Fergus swallowed. “I meant nay offense.”
“Then perhaps ye should try again and take care nae tae find one by accident.”
Isobel should have enjoyed that. She did, a little.
But mostly she looked at Ruaridh. She expected him to smooth the matter away himself, to thank her and then dismiss her with softer words than Fergus had used.
Men often did that. They objected to disrespect while keeping the door closed all the same.
Ruaridh did not.
“What would ye dae?” he asked instead.
Isobel stared at him. The question had been simple, but the space it made wasn’t.
“First,” she said, “I would stop speaking of rationing as though the only choice is who suffers soonest. Ye will frighten people intae hoarding before hunger even begins.”
Mairi nodded once.
The older man with the ledger frowned down at the page. “Hoarding?”
“If kitchen women and servants hear the stores are failing, they will hide crusts and handfuls of meal where they can, nae because they are wicked, but because fear makes people practical. Then the counting becomes useless, because ye nae longer ken what remains.”
Ruaridh’s gaze held steady on her. Isobel forced herself not to look away.
“At Dunnyveg, when stores ran lean, we counted everything twice, nae by the men who kept the ledgers only, but by the women who touched the food. Men count sacks. Women ken what is already souring, what can be stretched, what must be used first.”
Mairi’s chin lifted a fraction. Fergus looked as if he disliked the sense in that.
Isobel continued. “The spoiled barley must be sorted, nae discarded all at once. Some may still be fit for animal feed, some for thickening, some perhaps lost entirely. But if ye throw away everything damp touched, ye waste what may yet serve.”
The older man began turning a page. “Aye,” he murmured. “Perhaps.”
“Second,” Isobel spoke, “the best bread shouldnae go tae the high table.”
Now even Mairi looked surprised.
Ruaridh’s brows lowered slightly. “Explain.”
“If ye feed the high table well while thinning the servants’ broth, resentment grows.
If ye thin everything without purpose, weakness grows.
” Isobel looked toward the kitchens. “The men on watch need strength. So dae those hauling wood, carrying water, salting meat, baking, washing, mending. Children need steady food. The laird’s table can bear coarser bread before a kitchen lad can. ”
Brodie huffed under his breath. “I have eaten worse.”
“Ye have cooked worse,” Torin teased.
Brodie gave him a playfully wounded look. Ruaridh ignored them both, though Isobel saw the faint movement at the corner of his mouth before it vanished.
She gathered confidence from it.
“Third, stretch grain with what grows and what can be gathered without endangering the walls. Nettles, kail, leeks if there are any remaining, onions, herbs, dried peas, beans. Broth made thicker by vegetables fools the belly better than broth made thin by fear. If there is shellfish along safe rocks, send women and boys under guard at low tide.”
Mairi was listening fully now.
“The smokehouse?” Isobel asked.
“Some mutton,” Mairi replied. “A little venison. Fish.”
“Use smoked bones for broth twice before discarding them.”
Mairi nodded slowly. “Aye.”
Isobel went on before courage failed. “Fourth, speak tae the village women before ye speak tae the village men.”
Fergus looked genuinely scandalized. Even Brodie blinked.
“Why?” Ruaridh asked.
“Because the men will tell ye what should be available. The women will tell ye what is. They know which household has extra oats hidden from a bad harvest, which widow has hens still laying, whose cow has gone dry, whose children are already eating less. If ye want trade, ask the men. If ye want truth, ask the women first.”
For a moment, no one spoke.
Then Mairi nodded. “She is right.”
The words changed the air. It was one thing for Isobel to speak, and quite another for a MacLean woman of the household to support her before the laird. The older man looked at Mairi, then down at his ledger. His frown deepened with thought.
“If we counted by use,” he said slowly, “nae only by store…”
“And set aside portions according to labor,” Isobel added, “nae rank.”
His gaze lifted. She expected protest.
Instead, he nodded once. “It could stretch longer than three weeks.”
“How much longer?” Ruaridh asked.
The man hesitated, then looked at Mairi.
Mairi answered. “Perhaps five. Six, if the shore gathering is good and nay more stores are spoiled.”
Ruaridh’s expression remained hard, but Isobel saw the tension change shape from immediate dread into something that could be fought.
“And the clan?” Torin asked.
Isobel looked at him. “Dinnae announce rationing. Announce order. Say the laird has commanded a full accounting so nae household goes without through carelessness. People can bear discipline better than panic.”
For once, Torin’s face did not look disapproving. It looked respectful. The realization unsettled her almost as much as Ruaridh asking her to speak had.
“Who managed this at Dunnyveg?” Ruaridh suddenly asked.
“Me faither’s steward liked tae think he did,” Isobel said.
Mairi’s mouth twitched.
Isobel added. “He didnae.”
Ruaridh’s eyes warmed. Then he turned to the others. “Mairi, ye will take two women from the kitchens and count the stores with Alasdair before nightfall.”
The older man, Alasdair, nodded. “Aye, laird.”
“Torin, arrange guarded gathering along the nearest shore at low tide. Brodie, speak with the watch. I want nay talk of failing stores moving through the hall.”
Brodie nodded. “Aye.”
Ruaridh looked back to Mairi. “If any servant has gone short already, I want tae ken it tonight.”
Mairi’s face softened with fierce approval. “Aye, me laird.”
“And the high table?” Alasdair asked.
Ruaridh’s gaze moved briefly to Isobel, then back. “Coarse bread. Whatever broth Mairi thinks wise. Nay one in me hall eats better because they sit higher.”
Mairi gave a decisive nod. The matter began to break apart into movement. Orders were repeated. Alasdair opened his ledger again. Fergus followed Mairi toward the kitchen with the air of a man walking to battle and expecting defeat.
Brodie clapped Torin once on the shoulder. “Shore gathering… lovely. I was hoping tae spend me evening ankle-deep in cold water.”
Torin looked at him. “It will improve yer smell.”
“Naething can improve perfection.”
Their laughing voices faded as they crossed the court. Isobel remained where she stood, suddenly aware of the bow still in her hand and Ruaridh still beside her.
“I did not mean to interfere,” she said at once.
His brows lifted. “That is a lie.”
She blinked.
“Ye absolutely meant tae interfere.”
Her mouth parted in outrage. “I meant tae help.”
“Aye… by interfering.”
She smirked. “Ye are insufferable.”
“And ye were right.”
The words stopped her. He said them plainly as he had said he noticed her, because truth didn’t require ornament. No man had ever made room for her thoughts before other men and ordered them to listen.
“I… am nae accustomed to that,” she said before she could stop herself.
His expression shifted. “Tae what?”
“Being heard.”
The wind moved between them. His jaw tightened, and she knew he was thinking of her father, of Dunnyveg, of all the silences she carried because men had found them convenient.
“I should have asked ye sooner,” he told her.
The quiet admission slipped under her defenses with terrible ease.
Isobel looked away. “Ye had other matters.”
“Aye.”
“And I was angry with ye.”
“That has never stopped ye speaking before.”
She shot him a look. His mouth curved faintly, but his eyes remained serious.
“I have been absent too much,” he said.
It would have been easier if he had not said it, easier if she could keep the shape of her hurt clean and righteous.
“Ye are laird,” she replied.
“I am also yer husband.”
There it was again.
Husband.
A promise he was still learning how to hold.
He glanced at the bow. “Ye should draw it before dark.”
“I thought there were provisions to save.”
“There are always provisions tae save, walls tae guard, men tae correct, enemies tae watch.” His voice lowered. “But I gave ye a bow, and I would see whether it suits ye as well as I think.”
Warmth moved through her again, sweet and treacherous.
“And if it daesnae?”
“Then I shall have another made.”
“That is wasteful.”
“That is why ye will make certain it suits.”
She laughed softly before she could stop herself.
Ruaridh’s gaze fixed on the sound as though he had been handed something rarer than gratitude.
Isobel felt her face warm and looked toward the yard. “Very well. But if I outshoot yer men again, ye must nae blame me fer their pride.”
“I blame them fer their pride often enough.”
“And if I outshoot ye?”
His eyes narrowed. She smiled. The expression felt daring on her face.
Ruaridh stepped aside, gesturing toward the training yard with one hand. “Then, wife, I shall endure the humiliation with all the dignity available tae me.”
“That will be very little, I imagine.”
“Aye,” he said, falling into step beside her. “But I shall try.”
They walked back toward the yard together, not touching.
Yet for the first time since she had entered Duart, Isobel felt the space at Ruaridh’s side was not a place she had been forced to occupy.
It was a place being made for her.