Chapter 12 Missed Chances
Missed Chances
Unsurprisingly, Struan couldn’t sleep. He stared up at the dark ceiling, dappled with moonlight, until the moonlight turned to dawn, and the icy dawn light turned to golden sunlight. His eyes burned. He needed sleep, he knew that, but at the moment, sleep simply wouldn’t come.
Images flashed before his eyes. Images of Una, gasping in his ear, her arms wrapped tight around his shoulders, her body pressed against his.
What have I done?
He shouldn’t have touched her. That was for certain. He shouldn’t have teased her, kissed her, done any of it. They’d say that he’d seduced her if it all came out.
Struan briefly closed his eyes. No, he hadn’t seduced her. She’d seduced him without even trying. It was like he was a fish on the line, caught body and soul. It wasn’t her fault. She hadn’t meant for it to happen.
Getting Una on my side was meant to make it easier for me to do my duty, not harder. I’d have done better to pay her no mind at all.
Well, it was too late now. That thought would have to join the ranks of missed chances in Struan’s life, all the times he could have made things a little different but did not and regretted it later.
He sat upright slowly and stiffly, blinking in the morning light.
He’d learned that his new guards wouldn’t come and wake him in the mornings.
He could lie in bed all day if he wanted to.
After the debacle yesterday, they’d refused to spar with him anymore.
Perhaps they’d gotten into trouble for hitting him.
Wincing, Struan lifted his fingers to his sore lip, blood crusted around it. He couldn’t even remember which of the guards had delivered that blow. Did it matter? None of them would speak to him or even meet his eye.
He almost missed Spots, Spaniel, and Chewer.
Almost.
He dressed and washed quickly, then hammered on the door to his cell.
It was still a cell, even if he’d been allowed a few extra pieces of furniture.
There was a writing desk and stool in the corner—but no parchment or ink—and a soft chair pushed up against the window.
He had a proper washstand now, instead of just a basin.
They’re gifts for turning traitor, Struan thought grimly.
The door opened, revealing one of his blank-faced guards. The man lifted his eyebrows questioningly.
“I’d like to go for a walk,” Struan said.
“Where to?”
“I haven’t thought about it. Where would ye like me to go?”
The guard didn’t seem to like this question. He blinked, then scowled, and said nothing. Struan sighed inwardly.
“So, can I go?”
The guard grunted and shrugged and stepped aside. Struan was allowed to step out of the doorway and led the way down the hall.
The guards followed, not at his heels, but at a distance.
That helped him feel less like a prisoner and more like an ordinary man taking a walk.
No doubt the guards didn’t care much about that, of course.
They probably didn’t want to be seen with him any more than he wanted them marching behind him.
Struan walked quickly, with no set idea of where he was going to go. The guards padded along behind in silence.
He passed the feast hall, which was already half full of people eating their breakfast. Struan smiled thinly, considering walking in and sitting down to join them. He ate all of his meals, unsurprisingly, in his cell.
He walked past the feast hall, deliberately not looking inside. His path took him towards one of the back doors and out into the watery sunlight. He paused, turning up his face to the sun, and closed his eyes.
Why can’t things ever be simple?
He opened his eyes again, and movement caught his attention. There, just a few feet away from him, Kyla sat on a low wall, engrossed in a book.
A lump formed in Struan’s throat. She was just there, so close, so unaware of his presence.
Until now, he’d worked hard to make sure he kept away from Kyla.
He didn’t want to see her. He didn’t want to talk to her.
He didn’t want her to look at him and realize, once and for all, what a waste of time he truly was.
I should turn away. Leave her in peace. She deserves peace.
And yet his feet drew him towards her. Closer and closer, and still she didn’t tear her gaze away from the book. In anybody else, he might have assumed they were deliberately ignoring him, but this was Kyla, and everybody knew what Kyla was like with books—even though they had spent years apart.
“For as long as I can remember,” Struan murmured, dropping down onto the low wall beside her, “ye have been oblivious to the world and all around ye when ye have yer head in a book.”
She flinched, jumping so hard she nearly dropped the book. Wide eyes turned his way, framed by large, round spectacles. Kyla’s eyes got huge when she realized who sat beside her.
“Struan,” she breathed. “Ye… Ye are here.”
He smiled wryly. “Aye, lass. I’m here.”
She paused, narrowing her gaze. “Ye have been avoiding me.”
“Aye,” he answered simply. “I have.”
They sat there in silence for a moment or two, with Kyla just staring up at her brother. After a moment, she lifted her hand, shakily, and ever so gently touched the curve of his cheek.
“Sometimes I can hardly recognize ye,” she whispered.
He smiled tightly. “I hardly recognize myself. I have gotten worse, and ye have gotten better.”
“Don’t say that.”
“I only speak the truth, lass. Ye know that.”
She bit her lower lip and let her hand drop.
Struan let himself recall all the stupid, foolish daydreams he’d let himself indulge in.
Dreams of whisking Kyla away—this was before she saved herself, of course—and taking her with him.
They would go somewhere that their father could not reach. They’d start fresh.
Too late for that. The daydreams he’d once tortured himself with were nothing more than a silly idea now. Kyla was married. She’d found a rescuer, not that she’d ever needed help to be rescued.
She doesn’t need my help. She never did. I’m the one who needs rescuing.
“Ye have had chances to escape,” Kyla said suddenly.
He hadn’t expected it and flinched. “What?”
She lifted one eyebrow. “Ye heard me. Ye have had chances to slip away. Plenty of them. But ye didn’t take any of those chances. Can I assume that ye have finally seen our father for what he is and have chosen to leave?”
“I’ve seen him for what he is for a long time.”
“And yet ye still love him,” she stated.
It took Struan aback. “I didn’t mean—”
“Ye still want him to love ye. Ye want him to approve of ye. That’s always been yer way, Struan. Ye chase after the unattainable ones, always. Ye wanted, so badly, for him to smile for ye and tell ye that he was proud.”
He clenched his jaw. “I was like that when we were bairns, aye. But now—”
“Now the feeling has gone deeper and become harder to root out,” she interrupted softly.
She closed the book gently, setting it aside.
“Look, Struan, I am sorry. I didn’t mean to bring all of this up, not when ye are talking to me properly for the first time in…
in goodness knows how long. I miss my brother, ye know. I miss him more than he knows.”
A lump lodged itself in Struan’s throat. He felt eyes on him and glanced up to find one of the guards staring at him curiously. The other two were looking away, but one had his eyes on Struan, an odd expression on his face. It was as if he were seeing Struan for the first time.
When their eyes met, the guard looked away. Swallowing, Struan turned back to his sister.
“Do ye think…” he ventured slowly, weighing each word as he said it., “Do ye think that I am like our father?”
Kyla sucked in a breath. “Struan, how can ye even think that?”
“How can I think it? Can’t ye guess? Ever since ye left Dickson Keep, I have lost the last soft part of myself.
It felt as though ye took a piece of me with ye when ye left.
The best piece. I… I’ve just been going through the motions since ye left.
I was angry, Kyla, I was so angry it hurt.
I suppose Father knew that and got me all wound up and whipped up against ye. At times, I think I almost hated ye.”
Kyla smiled sadly. “I tried to hate ye. When I heard about what ye had done, about the people ye slaughtered for Father, I tried so hard to tell myself that ye weren’t my brother anymore. The thought just wouldn’t stick, and I’m glad that it didn’t.”
For a moment, Struan couldn’t formulate the words. At last, he reached out, groping for her hand. She tightened her grip on him, fingers lacing together. They sat like that for a few moments, the rising sun slowly sweeping over them.
“I think that ye have found people who believe in ye,” Kyla whispered at last. “I have always believed, but others… There are others who are coming round. People who might once have killed ye on sight now see that there’s something beneath the surface with ye, Struan.
I have always known it, and now they know it, too. ”
She was talking about Una, that much was plain to see. Struan glanced at his sister out of the corner of his eye.
How much does she know? Does she know how far Una and I have gone?
How would she react if she did?
“I’m afraid… I’m afraid I’ll destroy ye,” he whispered, the words coming out as if they were choked. “All of ye. I’m afraid I won’t be able to stop it.”
Kyla’s hand tightened on his.
“Ye can, Struan,” she murmured, shifting to face him more fully. “Listen. All of this? It’s almost over.”
He eyed her warily. “What do ye mean?”
“I mean that…” she paused, chewing her lip. “At one time, I wouldn’t have dared tell ye.”
He stiffened. “Then maybe ye shouldn’t.”
“The armies are ready,” she blurted out. “Clans Kenneth and Grahame are ready to fight. They have an army to almost rival the Dickson army, and they’re almost ready to make a move. One last battle, and perhaps all of this will be over.”
There was a taut silence after that. Struan could feel the color draining from his face.
Why did ye have to tell me that, Kyla?
Kyla didn’t seem to notice his agony. She reached up, cupping his face in her hands. He found himself thinking of Una, whose hands were larger, stronger, and rougher.
He missed her touch. He missed it far more than was sensible.
“Ye will do the right thing, Struan,” Kyla whispered, her eyes fixed on his face. “I know ye will.”
Then somebody called her name from inside the Keep, and Kyla’s attention was immediately diverted. She dropped her hands from his face, and Struan could breathe again.
“I have to go,” she said, uncertainly, glancing up at her brother once more. “But ye will think of what I said, won’t ye?”
Struan tried to summon a smile and failed. “Of course I will.”
Kyla nodded, looking relieved, and dove up to press a kiss to his cheek. She scurried off, her book tucked under her arm, leaving Struan sitting on the wall, alone.
He felt breathless. Laird Dickson’s voice echoed in his head.
“So many people misunderstand sacrifice. They don’t understand that a sacrifice must be… well, a sacrifice. Men like ye and I, lad, we sacrifice our souls for our duty. Anything else is a weakness.”
Closing his eyes, Struan felt his own weakness heavy in his chest—love for Kyla, respect for the Abbess, and… something deep for Una, too.
She will be the death of me.
But it didn’t matter. None of it mattered, because he was a Dickson heir, the Laird’s only son.
He was the hammer of the clans, their greatest weapon.
A hammer couldn’t grow soft. What use would it be?
It was clear to him that the price of his duty was his soul, and he’d already decided that he was going to have to pay it.