Chapter 21
Ye are a prize fool, are ye nae, Evander? How many more times will ye make this mistake? A hundred? A thousand? Or just until ye heart breaks into a million pieces and there’s nothing left to put them together again?
He untangled his arms from around Skye’s body, briefly steadying her before he stepped back.
Arousal thrummed through him, unaddressed desire coiling tighter and tighter in his chest, as if it would split through his skin and spill out into the air. Tightening his jaw, he forced himself to breathe.
Nay. Enough is enough.
Now was the time to end it. It should have ended long ago.
Skye turned to face him, a tentative smile creeping onto her face. “That was… I enjoyed that. Very much. Now it is yer turn, surely?”
Evander swallowed. “That’s enough, Skye.”
Her smile wavered. “I’m sorry. Did I offend ye? I only meant… Well, I want things to be fair between us.”
He took her hand in his own and lifted it to his lips. Her knuckles, warm and rough, brushed his cheek.
“Ye are a fair lass,” he murmured.
Her throat worked, her eyes wide.
She kens already, but she willnae let herself accept it.
“So, ye are keeping me, then?” she asked, her voice quavering just a little. “It makes sense for me to stay here, aye?”
“I’m afraid nae.”
She yanked her hand out of his grip and took a step back, her fists clenched at her sides.
“Ye are afraid nae?” she echoed, the corners of her lips tugging down. “Surely ye are keeping me, Evander. Surely I am staying. That’s fair. After what… what happened between us and what ye said… Ye said that I would be the woman ye would choose.”
“If I could,” he corrected gently. “Lass, this was goodbye. Maybe I should have kept control of meself, but I ken that this is the right thing to do.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, just for a moment, before opening them again.
“So that’s that, then,” she said flatly. “Ye are sending me away.”
“The truth is that ye were always leaving.”
“Ah, so ye were always thinking of the best way to get rid of me?”
“Nay, nay.” He dropped his face into his hands, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes until sparks exploded behind his lids.
“Skye, ours was never a proper relationship. It was just… just convenience. Staying together served our clans more than parting ways. And now, living separate lives is what serves our clans best. Relations between our clans have soured. I must look to me clan, ye to yers, and so on.”
“This is me clan. It became me clan when I wed ye.”
“And when the marriage is annulled, MacCrimmon will be yer clan again. Take heart, love. Ye can marry again, some fine, strapping man who ye choose for yer own sake, and nae for the sake of yer clan.”
He reached out, intending to cup her cheek in his hand, but she slapped it away.
“Daenae ye dare patronize me,” she seethed.
Evander blinked. He hadn’t thought that he was patronizing her. He had thought it was… well, comforting. She could marry again. She knew a little of what pleasure felt like. She’d experienced new things, and this… this was the right thing for her.
I was never the right man for her. I would only make her miserable.
The proof was all around them, really. It was his fault that she had been kidnapped and drugged. Without Mason’s interference, perhaps she would have been murdered long ago.
“I’m bad luck,” he said. “Me whole family is bad luck. I sometimes think that me faither cursed us all with his treason. Ye daenae want to be with me, Skye. This is for the best.”
“Do ye really believe that?”
She took a step forward, her eyes fixed on his. Her chest heaved, as if she were having difficulty getting air into her lungs. She watched him closely, a tiny line between her eyebrows.
This time, he let his thoughts get the better of him. Lifting his hand, he pushed the pad of his thumb against that line, gently pressing until her brow relaxed and the line disappeared.
“Aye, I really believe that,” he whispered. “Come on, lass. Ye are too young and clever to frown, are ye nae?”
“Evander, please. Daenae send me away. I am telling ye now, face to face, eye to eye, that I want to stay. Ye promised me a month to make up me mind. Let me stay for the rest of the month.”
He turned away, his gaze sliding away from hers. She kept staring up at him, trying to catch his eye.
“I already wrote to yer braither to tell him that ye were coming home,” he murmured.
She flinched, rocking back on her heels. “What?”
“The message is on its way to him. Ye will leave tomorrow at dawn to ensure that ye can get home before dark. I’ll send an envoy of riders with ye. I want ye to travel in a litter, to be safe, but ye can take the horse I gifted ye. And Blackberry, of course.”
He gave a faint smile. She didn’t return it.
“Ye truly think that I hate ye,” she whispered, almost as if the idea was occurring to her for the first time. “Ye think that I am miserable, and that ye ken better than everybody else.”
“Nay, I only think that ye are still nae yerself. When yer full memory returns, ye will—”
“I will what?” she interrupted with a biting, mirthless laugh. “I’ll become a different person? If ye are so desperate to have me leave, Evander, then perhaps I should go.”
“Ye are confused,” he insisted, holding her gaze once more. “Ye are afraid. Ye are grateful, perhaps, for what I have done, and ye feel—”
“I swear that if ye daenae stop telling me how I feel, I’m going to throw something heavy at yer head.”
He gave another faint smile at that. “That’s more like it. That’s the Skye I ken.”
Silence ensued once more. This time, it wasn’t a comfortable, warm kind of silence. There was no possibility in this quiet, no sense of waiting for something to happen naturally. Instead, tension filled the air, almost heavy enough to bite into.
It was the pause of a man standing in the middle of a frozen lake, staring at his feet and watching cracks in the ice spiderweb out around him. Far from the shore, with nobody to help. Gray, snowy sky above and crisp, cracking ice beneath. Cold water below it all, ready to drown…
Evander smiled mirthlessly at that image.
Is there any version of this story where I daenae freeze and drown at the same time? Nay, I daenae think so.
“Ye deserve more than this, Skye,” he said.
She’d dropped her gaze to the floor, staring at nothing, but lifted her eyes at that.
“Ye deserve to be in a clan at peace, nae torn apart from the inside out. Ye deserve to be with someone who’ll give ye the love ye need.
The love ye deserve. Ye deserve a family.
Ye deserve happiness. I cannae give ye any of those things. ”
She gripped the sides of her skirt, tears glistening in her eyes. “Ye havenae even tried to give me those things.”
“I just cannae, lass.”
“And what about ye?” She took a step forward. She was close enough now for him to wrap his arms around her and hold her close if he wanted.
He didn’t.
“What about me?” he asked.
“Well, what do ye want? What do ye deserve?”
He tilted his head. “I am a laird. Lairds daenae get to want anything. In fact, it’s better if ye daenae, because ye never quite get what ye want.”
“That’s a pessimistic view of the world.”
“I see things as they are, unfortunately.”
More silence.
She shifted her weight from foot to foot. “And what about if I go home and me braither and cousin decide to declare war on ye? What then? What will ye do?”
He shrugged. “I will manage it. Me clan will survive. I’ll make sure of it.”
“Without me? Without me help, here, with ye?”
“Ye would be better placed to talk sense into them at their side.”
She growled in frustration. “Me braither willnae attack a keep I am staying at. Nor will me cousin. Me being here guarantees yer safety.”
He gave a wry smile that did not quite reach his eyes. “If ye are the only thing standing between me and a declaration of war from MacCrimmon and MacColl, then our situation is precarious indeed.”
“Evander—”
“I have made me decision,” he interrupted softly.
When had he gotten so tired? Exhaustion had crept over him like a blanket, tugging him down to the ground. He wanted nothing more than to sleep, to curl up and stick his head under a pillow until the world went by without him.
Tears glimmered in Skye’s eyes. One escaped, rolling down her cheek, glittering like a precious stone.
“Ye have made yer decision,” she repeated. “So, that’s that? I leave and daenae look back?”
“I’m sorry, lass,” he whispered. “Ye leave at dawn. Pack yer things tonight.”
Her lips formed a thin, bloodless line.
“Ye arenae sorry,” she stated, her voice cracking. Angrily, she dashed the back of her hand across her eyes. “And I can only hope that ye daenae have cause to regret it.”
Someone knocked on the door.
“Now’s nae the time,” Evander snapped. “Whoever’s there had better leave, and quickly. I’m nae hungry, I daenae want more tea, and if ye are bringing me documents or papers to look over, ye have picked the wrong moment.”
There was a moment of silence outside the door. He couldn’t hear the sound of footsteps retreating. Then, to his amazement, the knob turned, and the door inched open.
Leah peered into the room, pale-faced. “I’m sorry, me Laird. I hoped to speak to ye at supper, but there was no sign of ye. It’s urgent.”
She paused, her eyes running over the chaos in the room.
In the hours since Skye had left, darkness had fallen completely. All trace of the golden-pink sunset had vanished, leaving only a drab black sky in its wake and some shifting shadows where the fairyland forest had been. The darkness intruded into Evander’s study, since he had not lit any candles.
“Go away, Leah. I’m thinking.”
Wordlessly, Leah reached into her belt and unhooked a small, wax-dribbled candlestick with a stub of a candle attached. She lit it, and a small bubble of yellow light enveloped the two of them.
Evander winced, squinting against the light.
“Ye have candles on that belt of yers?” he huffed.
She blinked. “Aye, of course. What did ye think? That I wouldnae?”
“Aye, that is what I thought.”
She glanced around the room, her eyes running over the recently erupted chaos.
There was the abandoned tea tray left by the maid, the one who’d disturbed him and Skye.
There were the tables and chairs he’d kicked over in an impotent rage, papers scattered, maps torn, books thrown from one end of the room to another.
“It’s a wee bit messier than usual in here,” she noted.
“Are ye offering to clean the room?”
“Nay. I came to talk to ye about Mason. I hoped Skye would be here.”
Evander clenched his jaw till his teeth hurt. “I believe she’s retired to her room.”
Leah let out a brief sigh, obviously steeling herself. She cleared her throat, squared her shoulders, then met his eyes as fiercely as she could.
“I daenae want ye to kill Mason. I ken he’s been foolish, but he’s nae a traitor.
He regrets what he’s done. He’s ready to be punished; he told me that.
He said he’ll take whatever ye dish out.
Whether ye want to keep him in the dungeons or flog him, that’s yer choice.
But please, please daenae execute him. Daenae keep him in the dungeons for the rest of his life.
He wants to undo what he’s done. He wants to make it right, I ken it. He—”
“I’m nae going to execute Mason.”
She missed a beat. “Ye arenae? Ye called him a traitor, and traitors are always executed. Always.”
“Always?”
She swallowed. “The previous Laird, he… ye… He was executed, was he nae? For treason?”
“Are ye referring to the fact that I am rumored to have killed me own faither?”
Leah wisely stayed silent.
Evander heaved himself to his feet. The tiredness that had descended on him earlier hadn’t left. He still felt sick and queasy with exhaustion. His legs still wobbled. He wanted to sit down, but lairds rarely had the chance to rest.
Besides, why should he rest after this? Why should he, when Skye was leaving tomorrow, forever?
And it’s all me doing.
“I am laird here,” he said. “I am responsible for seeing that justice is served. Sometimes, justice means the death of a traitor. However, more often than nae, it means sparing a life. I willnae execute Mason as a traitor. I willnae have him flogged to within an inch of his life, and neither will I keep him in the dungeons until he goes mad or dies. I willnae do any of those things, Leah, because that is nae fair.”
She blinked at the vehemence in his last two words.
“I… I am glad to hear that, me Laird. I ken ye didnae do it for me, but thank ye anyway.”
He inclined his head woodenly.
I could lie down on this wooden floor and sleep right now.
Footsteps on the stairs made them both flinch. Fergus appeared in the doorway, blinking in the flickering candlelight. He eyed Leah uncertainly, his gaze sliding around the messy room.
“No fire, me Laird?” he asked, glancing at the empty hearth. “I can make ye one, if ye like. It’s a cold, wet night tonight.”
“Nay, thank ye, Fergus. What is it that ye want?”
He cleared his throat. “The preparations have been made. A litter is ready to take Lady Bryden and her maither home, and I’ve picked out a good group of soldiers to guard them on their way.”
Leah stiffened, glancing wide-eyed between the two men. “Wait, Lady Bryden is leaving?”
“Aye, she is,” Evander responded crisply, turning to stare out the window. “And she’s nae coming back.”
Of course, he couldn’t see anything out the window. With the darkness outside and the shivering candlelight inside, all he could see was his own heavy-eyed reflection. Half-closed eyes blinked slowly in a tight-jawed face.
I look angry. I look like a man who has lost everything. Well, have I nae?
No, he couldn’t think like that. This was best for everyone, and especially best for Skye. She might not think so straight away, but soon she’d come to understand that he’d made the right decision for her. She’d be happier.
He heard shifting behind him and imagined Fergus and Leah exchanging long, wary looks.
“What about Mason?” Fergus asked. “Shall I let him go? What will we do with him?”
“Daenae let him go just yet,” Evander responded tightly. “Once Skye is gone, I’ll finish this once and for all.”
“And then she will return?” Leah hazarded.
He turned, glaring at them both. “Are ye nae listening? She’s never coming back. Never. This is the end.”
“Will ye be coming down to say goodbye when she leaves at dawn?” Fergus managed.
Evander shook his head tightly. “It’s better that I daenae.”