Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The ink had barely dried on the letter to his Covenant brothers when unease prickled down Euan’s spine.
He set down the quill, listening to the castle’s nighttime sounds—the distant clank of guards changing posts, the whisper of wind through stone corridors, the crackle of his dying fire. Nothing seemed amiss, yet something felt wrong in a way he couldn’t name.
Moyra.
The thought struck with the force of certainty.
She’d left his office barely an hour before, the memory of her standing there in that thin nightshift still burning through his mind.
But what if she’d grown restless again? What if she’d wandered somewhere she shouldn’t, gotten lost in corridors that all looked the same in darkness?
What if she’d decided his castle was just another cage and tried to leave?
The last thought had him on his feet before conscious decision caught up with instinct. He moved through Dunvegan’s shadowed halls with the silent efficiency of someone who’d walked those stones since childhood, taking the quickest route to the east tower, where her chamber lay.
The door stood ajar.
His pulse kicked. Euan pushed it open carefully, half-expecting to find her asleep despite the hour. But the bed was empty, covers thrown back as if she’d left in haste. The window stood open to the night air, curtains billowing like ghosts.
For one terrible moment, he thought she’d climbed out. That he’d find her broken body on the rocks below, driven by desperation to escape even at the cost of her life.
Then reason reasserted itself. The drop was too far, the walls too sheer. She was clever enough to know that path led only to death.
Which meant she was somewhere in his castle. Alone. In the late night hours.
The search began systematically—library, great hall, kitchens. Each empty room tightened the coil of worry in his chest. Where would she go? What had driven her from the relative safety of her chamber into Dunvegan’s maze of corridors and secrets?
He was passing through the lower hall when he heard it—the faint rush of water, barely audible beneath the castle’s usual night sounds.
Not the sea, though that crashed eternal against the cliffs.
This was different. Closer. The hidden stream that fed the castle’s water supply before cascading toward the rocks.
The garden.
Euan changed direction, moving toward the small courtyard garden that few knew existed. It was more sanctuary than ornament—a place his mother had tended before her death, that his father had visited with him as a bairn to tell him about her.
He found Moyra seated on the low stone wall beside the stream, her feet dangling above water that caught moonlight and turned silver.
She’d wrapped a shawl around her nightshift, but the thin fabric did little to hide the curve of her shoulders, the line of her spine as she bent forward to trail one hand through the rushing current.
For a moment, Euan simply watched her. The way the moon’s light caught in her auburn hair, turning it to flame and copper. The vulnerable curve of her neck as she tilted her head, listening to water’s endless song. The loneliness that radiated from her small frame like cold from winter stone.
She looked lost. Not in geography—she clearly knew where she was. But lost in the way of people whose foundations had crumbled, leaving them floating unanchored in a world that suddenly made no sense.
He understood that feeling better than he cared to admit.
“Still couldn’t sleep?” His voice came out rougher than intended, startling her badly enough that she nearly toppled into the stream.
Moyra’s hand flew to her chest, eyes wide in the darkness. “Saints, Euan! Ye’re going tae give me heart failure sneaking up like that.”
“Ye were too lost in thought tae hear me comin’.”
She turned back to the water, but tension had replaced the melancholy in her shoulders. “I couldn’t stay in that chamber another moment. The walls were closing in.”
“So ye came here.” He moved closer, settling onto the wall a careful distance away—close enough for conversation, far enough to avoid crowding. “This was me maither’s garden. She said the sound of running water helped her think.”
“It daes.” Moyra’s fingers traced the stream’s edge, following the current toward where it disappeared over the cliff.
“Everything moves so fast here. Water rushing, wind howling, even the clouds race across the sky like they’re fleeing something.
But the stream just... flows. It daesnae fight or question. It just goes where it’s meant tae go.”
“And ye envy it.” Not a question.
“Wouldn’t ye?” She pulled her hand from the water, wrapping both arms around herself. “Tae have a clear path, a purpose that makes sense? Instead of being pulled in different directions by forces ye cannae control?”
Euan was quiet for a moment, watching moonlight dance across water that had flowed that same path for centuries.
“I used tae come here after Loch Eilein.” His hand went unconsciously to his shoulder.
“I’d sit exactly where ye’re sitting now and wonder if the stream ever wished it could stop.
Just... stop rushing toward whatever waited at the cliff’s edge and rest.”
Her head turned, green eyes finding his in the darkness. “Did ye ever find an answer?”
“Aye.” He met her gaze steadily. “The stream cannae stop. It’s water—stopping means stagnation, death. But sometimes it can change direction. Find new channels. Flow around obstacles instead of battering against them until both stream and stone are worn away tae nothing.”
Understanding flickered across her features, quickly followed by something that looked like pain. “Ye’re talking about more than water.”
“I’m talking about the fact that ye’re nae trapped here, Moyra.
Nae really.” He shifted closer, drawn by forces he didn’t fully understand.
“Ye think ye have nay choices because yer faither abandoned ye and I’m keeping ye here fer political reasons.
But there are always choices. Always new channels tae find if ye’re willing tae look fer them. ”
“Like marriage?” The words came out flat, bitter. “That’s what yer Council wants. What yer Covenant braithers will probably advise once they read yer letter. Chain me tae ye legally so me faither cannae use me against the MacLeods.”
“Like partnership.” His correction came swift and firm. “If—and that’s a significant if, lass—if marriage ever becomes something we both choose, it wouldnae be chains. It would be...” He trailed off, searching for words that wouldn’t sound like manipulation or empty promises.
“Would be what?” She turned fully toward him now, moonlight catching the challenge in her lifted chin.
“A new channel.” He held her gaze despite how those eyes made his pulse race. “A way forward that neither of us can see yet because we’re both too busy fighting against the current instead of working with it.”
Silence fell, broken only by water rushing toward the cliffs and waves battering stone below. Euan watched doubt flicker across her features, saw it soften into something that might have been hope. The way she bit her lip, considering—it made something flutter in his chest.
“Ye really believe that?” she asked finally. “That we could find a path that daesnae require sacrifice on either side?”
“I have tae believe it.” The admission came easier than expected. “Because the alternative is accepting that we’re both prisoners of circumstances beyond our control. And I’ve spent too many years being defined by what happened tae me as a bairn tae accept that now.”
Something shifted in her expression—the defensive walls lowering just a fraction. “What did ye have in mind? This hypothetical new channel?”
“First?” He stood, extending one large hand toward her. “I thought we might ride. Ye’ve been cooped up in stone walls fer months. Between Norham’s dungeon and me castle, ye havenae had proper freedom since... when? When did yer faither send ye tae the priory?”
“Three months ago.” The words came out hollow. “Though it feels like years.”
“Then it’s past time ye remembered what the Highlands look like beyond battlements and bars.” His hand remained extended, steady despite how his heart hammered. “Will ye ride with me, Moyra? Just the two of us and the cliffs and whatever freedom we can steal from this impossible situation?”
She stared at his offered hand for a long moment, and Euan could practically see her weighing the risk. Trusting him enough to leave the castle’s relative safety. Believing he wouldn’t use the opportunity to manipulate or control.
Then slowly—so slowly it made his chest ache—she placed her smaller hand in his.
The contact sent electricity up his arm, that same jolt he’d felt every time they touched.
Her palm was cold from trailing through stream water, her fingers delicate but strong as they wrapped around his.
He pulled her to her feet with careful strength, hyperaware of how small she seemed standing before him, how the top of her head barely reached his shoulder.
How right it felt to have her hand in his.
“I’ll need tae change,” she said, not pulling away despite how close they stood. “This nightshift isnae exactly riding attire.”
“Aye.” He forced himself to release her hand before temptation to keep holding it became too strong. “Meet me at the stables at first dawn light. I’ll have the horses ready.”
She nodded, then paused halfway to the garden door. “Euan?”
“Aye?”
“Thank ye.” The words were quiet, almost lost beneath water’s rush. “Fer nae treating me like I’m made of glass. Fer remembering I used tae have a life before... all this.”
Then she was gone, disappearing into the castle’s shadows like a ghost made of moonlight and copper hair.
Euan stood alone in his mother’s garden, listening to water flow toward its inevitable destination, and wondered if he’d just made the wisest decision of his life or the most dangerous mistake.