Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
Magnus had decided, somewhere between the grain store and his own chamber, that the sensible course was an early night.
A plate sent up, an excuse muttered about the eastern watch needing checking, anything that kept him out of a hall currently overrun with ribbons and Katherine MacDougal’s opinions.
That plan lasted exactly as long as it took Elspeth to come down the stairs.
Katherine had put her in pale green, cut close enough to the waist that it left considerably less to a man’s imagination than Magnus would have preferred at the end of a day already spent failing to master his own thoughts.
Her hair had been swept up and pinned except for two curls that had apparently declined to cooperate and now sat loose against her jaw.
She was laughing at something Agnes had said on the step behind her, cheeks still flushed from it, and Magnus, three strides into the hall, forgot what he’d been walking toward.
He did not stop walking. He very nearly did, which was worse, his boots faltering half a step before he caught himself and carried on toward the head table as though nothing had happened.
Duncan, already seated with a cup in hand, did not bother hiding his grin. “Something catch yer eye, Cousin?”
“Nay.”
“Ye nearly walked into the bench.”
“I didnae.”
“Ye came close enough that I felt obliged to move me feet.” Duncan lifted his cup in Elspeth’s direction, too pleased with himself. “She does clean up well, does she nae?”
“Daenae talk about me wife.”
Duncan laughed loudly.
Magnus sat, rather more heavily than the chair strictly required, and reached for the ale.
Elspeth took her seat one place down, and it was several minutes before he let himself look at her directly.
It was a mistake, as it turned out, because she chose that exact moment to look back, caught him at it, and both of them found something else in the hall to study with sudden interest. She examined her own goblet. He examined the fire.
“The bread,” Katherine said from further down the table, oblivious or too observant to remark on it, “is somewhat dry tonight.”
“It’s fine bread,” Mrs. McAulay said, affronted.
“It’s fine bread for a siege, perhaps.”
The conversation carried on without him.
“It’s nae so bad,” Liam offered, already on his second piece. “Ye’re spoiled by Ben Cruachan’s usual fare.”
“I like it dry,” Agnes spoke up from further down the bench. “It crumbles better for the dog.”
Katherine’s head came up. “There isnae a dog under this table, Agnes.”
“There’s always a dog under the table, Ma.”
“Agnes.”
“He’s very quiet about it.”
“Agnes MacDougal, if there is a dog under this table—”
“I didnae say there was one now. I said there’s always one, in general, everywhere, as a rule.”
Katherine opened her mouth to press the point further. Liam was already fighting a losing battle against his own grin.
It was under cover of the argument that Magnus reached for the bread basket himself… at the precise moment Elspeth reached for it too.
Their hands met over it.
Neither of them moved for a beat too long.
“Ye first,” he said, withdrawing his hand as though it had touched something considerably hotter than bread.
“I daenae mind waiting.”
“Nor do I.”
They sat there, both looking pointedly at the bread rather than at each other, until Duncan reached past both of them, took a roll, and set it down between their plates.
“There. Problem solved. Both of ye can stop staring at baked goods like they’ve personally wronged ye.”
Elspeth took the roll without comment, which struck Magnus as a considerably more dignified response than the one he currently felt inclined toward.
The meal carried on, courses arriving and vanishing, Katherine holding court on the subject of wedding flowers, Liam nodding along with the placid endurance of a man well used to it.
It was the fruit platter that undid him.
Elspeth leaned across him to reach it. There was no other way to reach it, the platter having been set squarely between his place and hers by a servant with either poor judgment or an excellent sense of mischief.
The movement brought her considerably closer than the width of a supper table generally allowed, close enough that the scent of her—rose and something warmer underneath it—reached him well before she’d even closed her hand around the fruit she wanted.
He went very still.
“Pardon,” she said, not looking at him, plucking a fig from the platter with a lot of concentration.
“I’m fine.”
He was not, in fact, fine, and he suspected she knew it because she took considerably longer to settle back in her seat. He found himself staring hard at his plate for the length of several breaths afterward, willing the whole of the last twenty seconds out of his head with no notable success.
Beneath the table, her knee brushed his. He didn’t think she’d meant it. The bench was narrow, and Agnes had wedged herself in beside her mother in a way that pushed the whole line of them closer together than the seating had originally allowed—but it didn’t matter whether she’d meant it.
His whole leg grew aware of the contact in a manner disproportionate to what had actually occurred. It was Elspeth who shifted first this time, drawing her knee back with a small, sharp motion and reaching for her wine with a great deal of urgency.
“Something wrong, Elspeth?” Katherine asked, mid-sentence about lilies versus heather.
“Nay, nae at all.”
“Ye’ve gone quite red.”
“It’s warm in here.”
“It’s the same temperature it’s been all evening.”
“It’s warmer near the fire,” Elspeth said.
Mercifully, Katherine let it go and returned to her lilies.
Magnus drank rather more ale over the course of that supper than he generally allowed himself, and found it did very little to help, mostly because the problem wasn’t thirst. Duncan caught him refilling his cup for the third time and raised an eyebrow, but for once, he had the mercy not to comment on it aloud, which Magnus appreciated more than he cared to admit.
“Magnus.” Liam leaned in. “Duncan tells me ye doubled the watch.”
“Aye. After the fire.”
“Wise, given the circumstances.” Liam’s voice dropped, pitched for his ears only. “Ye think it’s connected to O’Brien.”
“I think it’s connected to something, and I’ve nae ruled out the obvious answer.”
“Ye’ll want more men at the border then, nae just the ridge.”
“I’ve already sent word.”
Magnus was briefly grateful for a conversation that required actual attention rather than the considerable effort of not looking at the woman two seats down.
He gave himself over to it fully, discussing patrol routes and supply lines with Liam for the better part of ten minutes, during which he almost managed to forget the fig incident.
Almost.
Elspeth, for her part, seemed to be having no easier time of it.
He caught her once, mid-laugh at something Agnes had said, glance his way and catch herself doing it, before swiftly looking back at her plate.
He didn’t call attention to it. He understood the impulse rather too well to hold it against her.
By the time the meal wound down, servants clearing plates, Agnes drooping against her mother’s side, Katherine debating flowers with anyone who’d give her half an ear, Magnus had drunk more ale than usual, discussed border patrols, and successfully avoided touching Elspeth again for the better part of an hour, which he counted on the whole as a fairly hollow victory.
He rose when the meal ended, intending a swift and dignified retreat before anything further could test his resolve.
He found, rounding the end of the table, that Elspeth had risen at precisely the same moment, and that the narrow space between the bench and the wall left them standing rather closer together than either of them had planned for.
Neither moved first.
* * *
Magnus had told Duncan more than once that he did not care for surprises, and Duncan had told him more than once that a man about to be married had better get used to them.
So, it was with a certain resignation that he found himself walking down toward the loch the next morning, summoned by a servant boy who’d relayed only that “the ladies want ye at the water, me Laird, and Lady MacDougal said to say it’s urgent, though she was smiling when she said it, so I daenae ken how urgent it truly is. ”
“Smiling urgent,” Duncan said, falling into step beside him, “is generally the worst kind.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“Ye’ve had two days of it now. The trunks. The ribbons. The hat that nearly went in the loch of its own accord.” His mouth curved. “I confess I’m looking forward to whatever this is.”
“That doesnae reassure me.”
“It’s nae meant to.”
They found the whole party assembled at the water’s edge by the time they arrived, Elspeth standing beside a large covered basket with an expression of barely contained anticipation, Katherine beside her looking similarly pleased, Liam a careful few steps back, and Agnes crouched at the very edge of the loch, peering into the reeds.
“There he is.” Katherine spread her arms, as though presenting him to an audience. “Magnus! Come, come, ye’re just in time.”
“In time for what?”
“A handfasting gift.” Katherine drew herself up, visibly pleased with the announcement she was about to make.
“Though I must admit that it was Elspeth’s idea.
I only helped arrange the transport, which was considerably more trouble than either of ye ken, given how they carried on the whole journey. ”
“They?”
“Aye.” Elspeth crouched beside the basket, hands on the lid, practically vibrating with the effort of not throwing it open at once.
“Ye have sheep, and goats, and horses, and even that dreadful chicken ye insist on training to walk beside ye like a hound. But there was one creature missing from yer little kingdom, and the moment I saw yer loch, I kent exactly what it needed.”
“Elspeth.”
“Ye’ll love it. I promise ye.”
Duncan, standing just behind Magnus’s shoulder, made a small sound that might have been a cough.