Chapter 12 #3
Ruby sighed. Jeez, he could be infuriating! Trying to get answers out of him was like trying to prize open a bloody clamshell.
“Do you think we managed to lose those men looking for you?” she asked.
His hand stilled. “Aye. I might not like it here much, but there is one thing the city is good for: disappearing. They willnae find us here.”
Ruby breathed out slowly. Good. That was good.
“Get some rest,” he said gruffly. “We’ll look for yer cousin in the morning.”
“And then?”
He looked up, met her gaze. “And then our deal will be concluded. We’ll go our separate ways.”
Ruby swallowed. Separate ways. She’d known it was coming.
She’d known this had only been a temporary arrangement and that when they reached Charlie, all ties between them would be severed.
She’d known it. So why did the thought of it feel like a boulder had settled in her stomach?
Why did the thought of him leaving send a sliver of panic right through her belly?
“Right,” she said, forcing out the word. “I’ll...um...see you in the morning then.”
He didn’t answer. But as she turned away, she thought she heard his breath catch—just slightly—and thought he might say something. But he didn’t. He just resumed sharpening his knives.
THE ROOM FELT TOO SMALL, like a cell closing in around him, trapping him like a rabbit in a snare.
Evan leaned against the wall, arms folded, listening to the sounds outside, to the building settling, to the rhythm of Ruby’s breathing as she fell asleep.
He didn’t like being back here. Despite what he’d told Ruby about being able to disappear in a city like this, he knew that Edinburgh was full of ears, full of people who remembered names and faces long after they ought to have been forgotten. The question was, who would remember him?
A shout echoed up the street, followed by laughter. Evan’s fingers flexed unconsciously on the handle of one of his knives. He forced himself to breathe slowly. The city was restless, aye—but not every noise meant danger. If he reacted to every shadow, he’d never sleep again.
He glanced to the bed. Ruby was already asleep. Good. It had been a close thing earlier. He’d come a hair’s breadth away from saying things that they’d both regret.
I don’t want us to go our separate ways.
Dear God, the words had been teetering on the end of his tongue, ready to fall and ruin everything.
They had reached the end of the road, the end of their short-lived acquaintance, and he’d always known it would come to this.
But that didn’t stop him wishing things could be otherwise. Didn’t stop him wishing that...
Ah, curse it all!
He picked up a knife and turned it in his fingers, grounding himself with the familiar weight. Heavy boots passed outside the inn, slow and deliberate. Evan stiffened, senses sharpening. He moved to the window and cracked the shutter just enough to peer out.
A pair of soldiers stood in the street below, one leaning against a wall, the other rubbing his hands against the cold. They weren’t looking up but Evan’s pulse kicked hard all the same.
He closed the shutter quietly. In the room, the candle guttered as a draft slipped under the door. Somewhere in the inn, a man coughed. Another laughed. Life went on, indifferent to the fact that Evan Campbell stood in the middle of a city that would gladly see him dead.
He sat down heavily on the chair, back to the wall, positioning himself where he could see both door and window, idly turning the knife in his grip. Time passed. Ruby began snoring. Just as Evan was beginning to doze, a shout rose from the common room below.
“...Campbell,” a voice slurred, thick with drink. “Swear I heard that name—”
Evan was on his feet instantly, knife in hand.
Ruby bolted awake, eyes wide as she looked around in a panic. “What is it?”
“Quiet,” he whispered.
Footsteps climbed the stairs. One set. Then another. Evan’s mind raced, calculating angles, distances, exits. He could get himself and Ruby out the window if he had to—drop into the alley, vanish into the warren of streets—but not without risk.
The footsteps reached their door—and carried on past.
Evan didn’t breathe until they faded down the corridor and he heard a door open and close. He lowered the knife slowly, the tension draining from his limbs in an unsteady rush.
“Go back to sleep,” he told Ruby. “There’s naught to worry about.”
Her flat look told him exactly what she thought of that statement, but she settled down again nonetheless. He sank back into the chair to keep watch, knowing sleep would be shallow at best.
In fact, he woke before the light. It was a habit beaten into him by the years he’d lived one step ahead of trouble—by dawn raids, sudden flights, the need to be gone before anyone thought to look for him.
Even now, wrapped in the unfamiliar stillness of a rented room in Edinburgh, his eyes opened at the first subtle change in the air.
The city was waking.
He’d fallen asleep slumped against the wall and for a moment he didn’t move, listening.
Somewhere outside, a shutter creaked open.
Footsteps echoed on stone. A distant voice called out the hour, thin and sharp in the dark.
Edinburgh never truly slept but there was a particular sound to it at this hour, a restless shifting as the city drew breath.
On the other side of the room, Ruby still slept.
She lay on her side, hair tumbled loose across the pillow, one hand curled near her face.
Her breathing was slow and even, the faintest crease between her brows.
She looked softer. More vulnerable than she ever allowed herself to appear when she was awake.
With a soft groan for his aching muscles, Evan climbed slowly to his feet and pulled on his boots, his cloak, his weapons, careful not to make a sound. He glanced at Ruby as he fastened his belt.
He should wake her. Tell her where he was going. But she would only insist on accompanying him and the streets were dangerous. No. She was safer here.
He found a stub of charcoal in the fire and scrawled a short note on the wall beneath the window.
Back soon. Stay inside. Bolt the door.
He hesitated, then added:
—E.
It wasn’t much. But it would have to do.
Evan crossed the room and eased the door open. He paused, listening for movement beyond, then stepped out and pulled it shut behind him, stealing through the quiet inn, through kitchens where the cooks were baking the morning’s bread, and out the back door.
The wynd outside was still dark and silent. The air smelled of damp stone and the smoke from cooking fires. Edinburgh scents. Old ones. Familiar ones.
He pulled his hood low and set off. As he moved through the city, he saw vendors hauling carts into position near the market square, calling greetings to one another in low voices.
Women with baskets hurried past, shawls drawn tight against the chill.
Somewhere nearby, a blacksmith’s hammer rang out, the sound sharp and bright in the gloom.
And soldiers. Too many soldiers.
They stood at the corners of wynds and at the mouths of closes, muskets slung over shoulders, swords at their hips.
Some looked barely more than boys whilst others had the hard eyes of men who’d seen too much action.
They watched the passersby with open suspicion, hands never far from their weapons.
Evan could feel it in the air—the tension, the unease, the way conversations died when they passed too close to the soldiers. Scotland stood on a knife’s edge, and Edinburgh was the point of it.
He moved through the streets like a shadow, keeping to the edges, avoiding the wider thoroughfares. He didn’t want to be seen lingering anywhere too long. Didn’t want to be noticed.
Still, the pull of familiarity tugged at him whether he liked it or not.
He passed the corner where a baker used to slip him warm rolls when he was a boy, all elbows and scraped knees and too much curiosity for his own good.
The shop was gone now, its windows boarded over, but the memory rose unbidden: the smell of fresh bread, the gruff old baker slipping him treats when no one was looking.
Evan clenched his jaw and kept walking.
He reached the market just as it was fully coming alive.
Stalls were being set up in earnest now, canvas awnings stretched and tied, crates of produce unloaded.
The noise level rose—shouts, laughter, the low murmur of haggling already underway.
This was where news flowed fastest. If anyone knew what was happening in the city, it would be the traders.
He drifted closer, pretending to examine a basket of apples while he listened.
“...telling ye, it’s true. French ships, right off the coast—”
“Bollocks. That’s just scare talk.”
“Say that to the Earl of Newborough. He’s the one who rooted the whole thing out.”
Another voice chimed in, eager. “I heard it was his brother, Niall Campbell, who actually exposed it all. Who would have thought? Two pampered nobles actually doing some work for a change!”
Evan’s hand gripped the edge of the stall. So. The rumors were true.
He moved on, keeping his face carefully blank, letting the fragments of conversation wash over him as he passed from stall to stall. It seemed there was one topic of conversation on everyone’s minds.
“...the Articles will ruin us, mark my words.”
“...King’s men everywhere now.”
“...French gold, they say. Whole conspiracy.”
“...foiled just in time, thank God.”
And always the same names, cropping up again and again. The Earl of Newborough. His brother, Niall.
Evan stopped at a stall selling dried fish and leaned an elbow on the counter, adopting the posture of a man with nowhere pressing to be.
“Strange times,” he said casually, nodding toward the soldiers posted nearby.
The trader snorted. “That they are. City’s gone mad with it all.”
“And it would be madder still if it weren’t for the earl and his brother,” Evan said, gently prodding the trader. “Or that’s what the gossip says.”
The trader rubbed a hand over his stubbled cheek. “Aye, that’s what they say.”
Evan kept his expression neutral. “And I hear the younger brother is newly married?”
“Aye. Some Welsh noblewoman. Charlotte...something or other. Word is, she helped unmask the conspiracy too.”
Evan nodded slowly, forcing himself to breathe evenly, even though his heart was suddenly racing. So it was true. Charlotte, Ruby’s cousin. Married to Niall Campbell.
An ache flared in his chest at that thought—sharp and unexpected. He hadn’t known about the wedding. No letter. No word. Not that he’d expected one, after everything that had happened, but still...How far he’d fallen, that all this had come and gone without him ever hearing a whisper of it.
He thanked the trader and moved on, his thoughts a tangled knot.
He ought to be pleased at the news. With confirmation that she was married to Niall Campbell, he at least knew where Charlotte might be found. He could hand Ruby over and then disappear before anyone had time to connect the dots.
He made his way toward the more affluent part of town as the sky lightened to a dull gray and halted in the shadows opposite a townhouse. He’d not been here for many years, but the building was just as he remembered it: tall, elegant, the stonework immaculate.
But now it stood silent and dark. The shutters were closed and there was no sign of life within.
Evan waited and at last, he heard the jangle of keys. The door swung open and a middle-aged woman emerged, closing and locking the door behind her. She was carrying a broom in one hand and a mop bucket in the other.
Seizing his chance, Evan crossed the street and approached her. “Beg pardon,” he said, pitching his voice low and polite. “Is this the Campbell house? Niall Campbell?”
The woman eyed him warily, then nodded. “Aye.”
“Is the master in residence? I have business with him.”
She shook her head. “Nay. Lord Niall and his lady are away. At the country estate.”
Evan’s heart sank. “For how long?”
She shrugged. “I couldnae say. I’m not privy to the lord’s business. I just keep the place aired and see to matters while they’re gone.”
Evan forced a smile. “I see. My thanks.”
The country estate. Damn it. That meant he couldn’t simply drop Ruby off and vanish into the cracks of the city as he’d hoped.
It meant facing Niall. It meant facing the past he’d tried so hard to forget.