Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
The wool of Alpin’s trews was stiff with frozen brine, grazing his skin with every step up the rocky track from the shore.
The first grey light of morning was just cutting through the mist, turning the stone walls of Herston Castle the color of iron.
He stopped at the postern gate, his thumb tracing the thick line of the scar under his jaw where the cold salt always settled first, aching in the bone.
The heavy oak door swung inward before his boot touched the threshold.
"Twenty years I've kept this keep," Mistress Greer said, standing in the opening with a thick piece of dry tartan slung over her arm and her mouth drawn into a thin, hard line.
She didn't move aside to let him pass, instead thrusting the wool straight into his chest. "And never for a man so determined to feed himself to the sea.
Look at ye. Soaked to the thigh, and the fire in the hall barely laid. Sit. Eat. Be a Laird for an hour."
Alpin caught the plaid, wiping the spray from his forehead with the rough fringe. "The nets were clear, Greer."
"The nets are always clear when ye're looking for things that arenae there," she snapped, finally stepping back to let him into the warmth of the lower passage. "Get inside before the kitchen girls see their master looking like a drowned sheep."
The great hall smelled of old peat smoke and toasted barley.
At the long table, Isobel was already slicing a loaf of dark bread, the knife moving with steady, unhurried strokes.
She didn't look up when his heavy boots thudded against the stone, but she set a thick wooden bowl of hot porridge at the place next to her.
"Ye're dripping from the postern gate to the hall," she said, not looking up. "Greer will have yer hide before she has yer breakfast."
Alpin dropped into the heavy oak chair, his joints cracking. He reached for the wooden spoon but didn't dip it.
Isobel set the knife down with a dull thunk and pushed the butter dish toward him. "Six eggs went missing from the larder this morning. Six, Alpin. Either the hens have taken to stealing from one another, or Senga's new lad has a taste for raw yolk before matins."
That earned a short huff through his nose, not quite a laugh, but close enough that Isobel counted it as a win.
"I've put me coin on the lad," she said, dropping onto the bench across from him and folding her hands under her chin. "Though I wouldnae put it past the hens either. They've been strutting about like they own the coop since ye let them loose in the kitchen garden."
Alpin picked up the loaf, breaking off a piece with his large, calloused hands. "Ye let them loose."
"I opened a gate, Alpin. What they did with their freedom is their own affair."
He smiled and said nothing after that.
By afternoon, the great hall was colder.
The six men of the council sat opposite Alpin, their grey heads bowed over their small stoups of ale.
At the end of the bench sat old Dougal, his broad shoulders hunched forward, his scarred hands tucked into his belt.
Dougal’s eyes stayed on the stone floor; he hadn't looked Alpin in the face since the sun had passed the mid-heaven.
"The clan is loyal, me Laird," Eachann said, his old voice scraping through the quiet room like a shovel on gravel.
"And they follow ye without question. But a Laird without a lady is a Laird without a future.
They want to see the next generation of Herstons born. They want to ken the line continues."
Alpin leaned back, his fingers curling around the arms of his chair. "The borders are quiet. The black cattle are fat. The grain stores are fuller than they've been in a decade, and the MacCarrons havenae tested that border since I sent their last raiding party home short two men and a herd."
"No one questions yer sword arm, Alpin, nor yer head for grain and cattle," Ranald said, striking the table with his knuckles.
"But a keep this well-run with no bairn to hand it to is a waste this council cannae abide.
Ye are thirty years old. There is no lady at that table, and there is no child in this keep.
In ten years, who inherits what ye've built?
A MacCarron cousin who'll undo it inside a season? "
Alpin's gaze shifted to Dougal. The old man-at-arms shifted his weight, his chin sinking lower into his collar.
"Ye've made this clan richer and safer than it's been in a generation, lad," Dougal said, his voice thick and low. He finally raised his eyes, his brow furrowed. "No one at this table doubts it. But a Laird needs sons to hold it after him, or all of it dies with ye."
Alpin stood up. The heavy legs of his oak chair scraped against the stone floor with a sharp, screeching rattle that made Eachann blink. He stood at his full height, his broad shoulders casting a long shadow across the council table.
"When I have a name, ye'll have it," Alpin said, his voice flat as the sea before a gale. "Nae before."
He turned and strode out of the hall before any of them could open their mouths again, his heavy plaid snapping against the iron hinges of the door. He didn't tell them that the only vow that held him was the one buried five fathoms deep, and the sea.
The next morning, the sun didn't bother showing itself at all, leaving the keep in a dark, wet fog. Alpin sat at the smaller trestle table in the kitchen corner, Niall across from him, chewing through a platter of salt herring.
A short, red-faced boy from the lower village burst through the door, his breath coming in loud pants, a small leather packet gripped in his hand. He stopped, bobbing a quick head to Alpin, and laid a folded square of heavy paper on the grease-stained wood.
"The mail-rider left it at the change-house, Laird," the boy said, wiping his nose with his sleeve. "Said it came all the way from the south."
Niall looked up, a piece of fish halfway to his mouth. "South? The MacCarrons havenae used paper that thick since the old king died."
Alpin didn't answer. His eyes were fixed on the bright red wax on the back of the letter. His thumb pressed against the seal. He took his small hunting knife, slicing through the edge of the paper with a clean, sharp stroke.
He opened it. The handwriting was sharp, wild, and entirely unfamiliar.
My dear Alpin, the letter began.
Alpin’s brows drew together. He read the line again.
I think of your courage often. I think of you rowing out alone against the beast no other man would face...
Niall watched him over the rim of his wooden mug, his eyes narrowing as Alpin’s face went completely still.
The Laird didn't blink. His breath stayed trapped in his chest, his eyes moving back to the top of the page, reading the words three, four, five times until the ink seemed to burn into the paper.
"What is it?" Niall asked, setting the mug down with a small click. "A tax from the Edinburgh courts?"
Alpin didn't move a muscle. The letter was a love song to a phantom, praise meant for the old man who had gone under the grey waves twenty years ago, yet every line of it felt like an iron collar locking around his own throat.
Niall let out a short snort, lunging across the table before Alpin could draw his hands back. His large fingers snatched the paper away with a loud grin. "Let us see what has the great bear of Herston looking like he’s seen the kelpie."
"Give it back, Niall," Alpin said, his voice dangerously soft.
Niall ignored him, his eyes scanning the page.
He was the only man who could ignore the lethal command of his Laird and come out unscathed.
The grin on his face faltered, his jaw dropping open slightly as he read the words aloud in a low whisper.
"Rowing out alone... the beast... my God, Alpin. Who is Grisselle Hunter?"
"I have never heard the name in me life," Alpin said, his hand closing into a tight fist on the table.
"Well, she seems to think she's promised to ye," Niall said, a loud, barking laugh breaking from him as he shook the paper. "She’s written a love letter to a man she thinks is a hero out of the old songs. Look here, she calls ye her betrothed!"
"It means nothing," Alpin muttered, reaching across to tear the sheet from Niall’s fingers. "The woman is either mad or writing to a ghost. The deeds she writes of belong to me grandfather."
"A man who means it doesnae let his porridge go stone-cold while he stares at the ink," Niall retorted, leaning over the table, his amusement fading into sharp curiosity.
"She signs her name to it, Alpin. A viscount's daughter from London.
How does a girl in the south get hold of yer grandfather's stories? "
Alpin didn't answer. He folded the letter back into its creases, his thumb rubbing against the broken wax crest. The hall around them was silent, save for the crackle of the green wood in the hearth.
The heavy latch on the kitchen door lifted, and Isobel walked in, her arms laden with fresh wool ironed from the drying racks. She stopped three paces away, her eyes sliding from Niall’s face to the tight, white-knuckled fist Alpin had clenched over the paper.
"What is it?" she asked, her voice dropping the lightness she usually kept for the mornings. "Has something happened at the shore?"
"Someone in London," Niall said, his mouth twisting into a strange smile as he pointed at the letter, "thinks she's going to marry yer brother. And by the look of it, she knows the heart of him better than his own council does."
Isobel set the wool down on the bench slowly. She didn't look at Niall; she kept her eyes on Alpin’s face. "Alpin?"
Alpin didn't look at her. The words from the council room were still bouncing off the stone walls of his head.
A Laird without a lady is a Laird without a future. Come back to the living.
And here, in his fist, was a lady who had already given her name to his.
A woman who wanted a legend, who had bound herself to a dead man’s memory, costing him nothing but the time it took to cross the border.
No courting, no drawing-room games, no soft words by the fire.
A contract signed in ink by a girl who didn't even know he was breathing.
He stood up, shoving the letter deep into the pocket of his heavy coat.
"Ready a horse," he said to Niall.
Niall blinked, his laughter completely gone now. "Alpin, the south road is mud from here to the Tweed. The horses will be ruined before ye hit the border."
Alpin didn't look back as he reached the door. "Then ready two."