Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
The tavern rose before her like a hallucination, a smudge of amber light against the dark. The sight of it struck her with a force she had not expected. A sudden warmth rose inside her that made her pause where she stood, her breath catching as she stared at it.
Warmth. Food. People.
Her body moved before her mind could fully catch up.
She crossed the remaining distance quickly, her steps uneven now. She pushed the door open and stepped inside.
The heat wrapped around her at once, carrying with it the scent of cooked meat, of ale, of smoke and damp wool. The sudden shift made her head spin slightly, her body swaying before she steadied herself.
The room was a haze of peat smoke and murmurs. Then, she stepped through the threshold, and the air changed.
The murmur frayed. It was a slow, agonizing bleed of sound as eyes snagged on her.
Rose felt the attention like a heavy weight on her. She became too aware of her posture, her mud-caked boots and her disheveled hair. Every instinct screamed at her to shrink, to vanish, but twenty years of propriety lessons had a stronger hold.
She collected herself. Shoulders back. Chin level. She donned her dignity like a coat of mail, masking the tremor in her marrow with the cold geometry of a lady.
She crossed the floor, the rhythm of her steps precise and unhurried. Behind the scarred timber of the bar, the tavern keeper watched her approach. He was a mountain of a man, bearded and silent, his curiosity buried under a gaze that measured her worth in seconds.
Rose met his eyes, her pulse a frantic hammer against her ribs, but her face remained a mask of iron.
“I would like something to eat,” she said, her voice soft and controlled, though it felt as though it had been scraped thin by the days behind her.
The man did not answer at once. His eyes moved over her face, then lower, taking in the cloak, the state of her dress beneath it, the faint dirt at the hem.
He nodded slowly.
“Aye,” he said again. “Sit yerself. I’ll bring it.”
Rose inclined her head slightly in thanks, though the movement felt stiff, her body already turning toward one of the empty tables.
As she sat down, the accent of the man behind the counter settled into her thoughts. It wasn’t just him. It was in the way that every voice sounded differently from anything she knew.
I’m in Scotland.
The thought landed fully then, and her head spun. She had crossed the border without knowing. Every step she had taken had led her further away, and she had not even realized when it had happened.
The room seemed to tilt around her. She felt a faint unsteadiness that made it harder to keep her thoughts in place. The voices blurred, their meaning slipping as the sound pressed too close. She kept her gaze lowered, forcing herself to remain still.
She was too far from Briar Hall or any relative she had. Too far to go back.
Her hand pressed more firmly against the table, grounding herself in the solid surface, holding onto it as she drew in a slow, controlled breath.
It did not matter. She was inside, out of sight, waiting for the first food she had seen in two days. For now, she was safe.
Rose lifted her gaze to see whether her food was coming.
Instead, she noticed him.
He was set slightly apart from the others.
One arm rested along the back of his chair with an ease that should have made him look idle, but nothing about him felt careless.
He seemed to fill the shadowed space around him without effort.
Even seated, he was tall, his shoulders broad, his dark tunic stretched across a powerful frame that made the men nearer him look somehow smaller.
His long, brown hair brushed the edge of his collar in soft disordered waves, and there was something in that slight disarray, paired with the hard, still line of his body, that made heat rise unexpectedly into her face.
His gaze moved over the tables in calm sweeps, missing nothing. The steady, watchful quiet of him drew her eye far more than any loud man might have.
For one brief, foolish moment, Rose forgot her hunger. He was, quite simply, the most striking man she had ever seen.
The realization sent a pulse of embarrassment through her. Warmth rushed into her cheeks before she could stop it, and she lowered her eyes at once, annoyed with herself, with the heat in her face, with the absurdity of noticing such a thing now, in the middle of all her fear and exhaustion.
What did it matter how handsome he was? She had no business with him.
Rose turned her attention back to the door. She would eat, gather her strength as best she could, and leave as quickly as possible. That was all.
She held onto the thought as the tavern’s sounds pressed in around her once more, the scrape of wood, the low murmur of voices, the crackle of the fire, clinging to that thin, practical certainty even while the image of the man in the corner lingered far longer in her mind than it should have.
Until the door burst open.
The crack of wood hit like a whip. Conversation died as heavy boots hammered the floor.
Rose went ice-cold. She forced her chin up, despite her gut telling her not to. Four men. Their eyes raked the room and locked onto hers.
“There!”
The command was a strike. They moved. The gap between them vanished in a blur of motion. Rose shoved back, her chair screaming against the floor, but her reflexes were too slow.
A hand clamped onto her arm like an iron vice.
“No—”
Pain flared. She lunged away, twisting her body, but the grip only dug deeper into her skin.
“Let go!” her voice cracked.
“You’re coming quietly,” he growled, dragging her off her feet.
She fought. She swung wild, fingers clawing for a hold, for anything. The room blurred—faces, shadows, a sea of witnesses who did nothing.
A second set of hands seized her. Then a third.
Her boots skidded. They hauled her toward the threshold, the night air already bleeding inside, cold and predatory.
“No—you can’t?—”
The words broke. She thrashed against their weight, pouring every ounce of adrenaline into a struggle she was already losing.