Chapter 28
Oscar read the same line for the third time without retaining its meaning.
A blanket lay poorly folded on the study floor, where he had slept every night for a month. The whisky beside his elbow had stood unfinished since the previous evening. He pushed it aside.
The thud of boots and the swish of skirts sounded in the passage. Doors opened and closed, but no laughter followed.
“Who last touched me keys?” Mairi called from somewhere below.
A young guard entered with the morning watch report. Lennan hovered near the door while the man recited the posts and changes, then lost his place over the name of the sentry assigned to the northern wall.
“Ye daenae ken which man held the post?” Oscar asked.
“I ken him, me Laird. The roster has his name as…” The guard searched the sheet.
“A nameless sentry is unaccounted for. If ye cannae report yer watch properly, ye have failed it.”
The guard’s shoulders tensed. When Oscar demanded the name of the man who had relieved him, his gaze shifted toward Lennan before he answered.
Mairi appeared in the doorway. “Me key ring has been gone since dawn, me Laird, and the pantry and grain stores are locked. Tommy was seen near the hooks before breakfast. Now, two village women are waiting for their grain, but I cannae help them if stores remain locked.”
Oscar rose at once. He found Paisley outside the schoolroom with the heavy ring clasped against her chest. He didn’t need to ask anything for him to know that this was one of his son’s pranks that had grown even more rampant the past month.
“I found them, Faither.” Paisley’s lesson book lay on the window seat. “I should have stopped him sooner.”
“Tommy chose to take them. That was his decision.” His sharp tone made her draw the keys closer. “Return to yer lesson.”
Inside the schoolroom, Tommy sat at the table with the small blue stone clenched in his fist.
“Did ye take Mairi’s keys?” Oscar asked.
“Aye,” Tommy responded, keeping his eyes on the stone.
“Why?”
His thumb rubbed the faded mark. “Nobody would follow a treasure hunt unless the missin’ thing mattered. Keys matter.”
“For one week, ye will remain in the nursery,” Oscar decided. “Ye will take yer meals there. Ness stays in the stable yard, and ye will miss both trainin’ and games.”
At the goat’s name, Tommy’s grip loosened. “Are ye sendin’ Ness away too?”
“Nay.”
“Ceana took the map with her,” he said and looked down at the stone. “This was all I kept.”
The map lay inside Ceana’s traveling chest at Morrag. Tommy had saved the final piece from their last hunt, then organized another game that forced the household to join him.
His antics warranted punishment. A week cut off from supper and the goat would teach him that more comforts could be withheld.
“Paisley, give him the keys,” Oscar ordered.
Paisley placed the ring in Tommy’s hand.
“Ye will return those to Mairi and apologize. Then ye will help restore every task ye delayed. Games and ridin’ resume when Mairi says the work is finished. Do ye understand me?”
Tommy slid down from the chair. “Aye, Faither.” He carried the keys into the passage.
“I will help him,” Paisley said. She picked up her lesson book and held it against her waist.
“Ye will go back to yer lesson,” Mairi countered.
Paisley squared her narrow shoulders. “Someone must see that the stores open in the proper order and that the village women receive their grain.”
“I will see to it,” Mairi said. “Yer work is waitin’ for ye.”
After both children had gone, she rounded on Oscar. “We can manage the lad’s tricks, but we cannae manage a laird whose answer changes with his temper, me Laird. The servants are beginnin’ to fear ye again.”
The young guard’s tight face flashed before him. “That cannae be true.”
“The kitchen maids send every report through me, and half yer guards wait for Lennan to speak first.” Mairi lifted the papers tucked beneath her arm. “We are still usin’ this because the work proceeds cleanly.”
Ceana’s handwriting covered the household schedule, assigning petition hours and provisions alongside linen work and village requests.
A new request for seed sat beneath Thursday’s duties, but its margin remained blank.
Ceana would have added a quantity and the responsible servant’s name before she left the hall.
Mairi tucked the schedule beneath her arm and walked to the grain store.
Lennan found Oscar a while later in the passage. “Border patrol confirmed the peace treaty is holdin’, and all stock named in the agreement has been returned. Also, Angus’s guards have withdrawn from the crossin’, and travelers passed safely this mornin’. Our men verified each report.”
The report required Oscar’s seal. Increasing patrols would serve no purpose other than giving him another order to issue.
“Bring the mornin’ guard back to me.”
The young man returned several minutes later and stood at attention.
“I accused ye of failin’ the watch over a missin’ name,” Oscar began. “The watch was sound. I was wrong.”
“Aye, me Laird.” The guard’s shoulders remained stiff as he bowed and left.
Later that afternoon, Muriel came to the study carrying an open letter. Oscar recognized Ceana’s handwriting on the outer leaf as soon as he saw it.
“Is she safe?” he asked. “How is her pregnancy progressin’?”
“She is keepin’ more food down and resting. The healer attendin’ her sees no cause for concern at present. That is all anyone can promise.” Muriel refolded the page. “She asked after the children.”
Oscar watched as she tucked the letter in her pocket.
“The rest are just comments from the healer.”
Oscar pressed his palm against the desk. “Perhaps carryin’ the bairn frightened her. She may have judged MacKane unsafe.”
“Ceana didnae leave because she carries yer bairn, Braither.” Muriel walked out with the letter before he could speak again.
Oscar exhaled and walked to the chamber he and Ceana had shared for a while. A gust of fresh air drifted in through the open shutters. The fireplace had been swept, and the bed remained unused because when he laid his hand on the linen, only cold met his palm.
Only a faint trace of Ceana’s scent remained on the pillow.
He remembered her writhing beneath him on their wedding night, their fingers intertwined as he thrust into her. As he planted his seed inside her. He also remembered her asleep beneath the blanket, with Paisley against her side and Tommy sprawled across her legs.
He left before he could reach for the green ribbon she had left behind. It was one of the few things she had left behind in her room before she left, and he had brought it to his. Back in the study, he drew a clean sheet toward him and wrote, Wife, come home.
His hand stopped. Even alone, he had begun by telling her what to do.
He fed the page to the fireplace and began again. The second letter told her of the blood he saw whenever he thought of childbirth. It described what losing her would do to him.
He read it back. Six sentences began with I.
Good God, ye arenae really good at this.
All he did was give her another account of himself. He didn’t think for long after that before he tore the sheet and threw it into the fire. A third page lay before him, and he set the quill right beside it. The page remained blank.
After supper, two candles and the low fire provided enough light for him to stare at the blank sheet before him. A knock sounded at the door.
“May I enter, Faither?”
Oscar straightened. Paisley seldom waited for permission at this hour, and her careful words concerned him more than an interruption would have.
“Aye, come in.”
She opened the door but did not step inside. Her night rail showed beneath her robe, and her loose hair fell over one shoulder. She kept both hands clasped before her.
“Why are ye still awake?” he asked.
“I have been thinkin’ about the promise I asked ye to make before ye married Ceana.”
Oscar rose from the desk. When Paisley still did not approach, he rounded his desk and lowered himself so she no longer had to speak to him across a broad stretch of oak.
“I daenae think Ceana would have let us go,” she said. “I shouldnae have made ye promise that there wouldnae be other bairns.”
“Come here, lass.”
She crossed the study slowly and stopped within his reach. Oscar took her cold hand between both of his.
“Ceana didnae leave because of ye.”
“I asked for the promise.”
“Ye were frightened. The promise was mine to make, and the harm was mine to cause.”
Paisley studied their joined hands. “I thought if she had a baby of her own, she would love it more and send Tommy and me away.”
Oscar squeezed her hand. “Ceana loves ye both. She has shown ye that often enough.”
“I ken that now.”
“She protected yer place in this family from the day she joined it. The bairn wouldnae change what ye are to her.”
Paisley looked toward the empty chair near the fire. “Will she come back?”
“I daenae ken.”
Her fingers shifted within his. Oscar could have offered reassurance. A promise from him would give Paisley comfort for the night, yet Ceana’s future no longer belonged among the things he could pledge.
“I willnae answer for her,” he said. “That choice belongs to her.”
Paisley’s eyebrows drew together. “Why did ye want her to leave?”
Oscar exhaled. “I never wanted her to leave.”
“Then what are ye afraid of?”
He looked down at his daughter. She had already taken his wrongdoing upon herself because he had hidden the cause behind orders and anger. Protecting her from the truth had left her to invent one that condemned her.
“I am afraid somethin’ will happen to her,” he admitted. “I am afraid we will lose her now that we have found her.”
Paisley did not move.
“I have seen childbirth end in death,” he continued. “When Muriel told us about the bairn, I saw that danger before I saw Ceana’s joy. I let me fear govern what I said to her.”
Her gaze moved to the blanket on the floor. “But Faither, I think we have already lost her.”
Oscar closed one hand around the edge of the chair beside him until the wood creaked. “Ye may be right.”
Suddenly, the door swung open, and Tommy entered with a folded notice held above his head. His sleeves were still rolled up from helping Mairi, and flour marked one cuff.
“Mairi says every sack has been given out, the linen is stored, and I have finished me work.”
“That is good to hear,” Oscar said.
“I found this beneath a pile of papers.” Tommy walked over to him and opened the notice across his knee. “The fire festival is next week.”
Paisley came closer to read it. “What can the festival change?”
“Ceana promised the village women she would attend.” Tommy tapped the notice. “Lady MacKane must judge the jumps.”
The thought sparked hope in Oscar’s chest. The fire festival gave him a place where Ceana would stand among people she trusted. Her parents could accompany her, and the villagers would surround her. She could hear him without setting foot in the castle or meeting him alone.
Alas, she could also refuse him and depart under her father’s protection.
He would wait until she had finished her duty before requesting a word.
The thought of making even the slightest thing about himself troubled him more than he had expected.
If she granted him permission, he would tell her that he wanted their child.
He would tell her that he believed her. He would admit that the accusation had been his failure, not hers, and that fear had made him wound her when she had trusted him with something precious.
If Ceana chose to remain at Morrag, he would accept it.
He had taken enough choices from her already.
“If Ceana attends, ye may both greet her,” he said. “Ye willnae ask her to return for yer sake.”
Tommy’s smile faded. “Why?”
“Because I drove her away. I will speak for meself, and she may give whatever answer she chooses.”
The children could offer Ceana their affection, but for now, they would carry none of his argument. That was the most important one.
“She promised,” Tommy said. “Ceana keeps her promises.”
Oscar exhaled as low as he could. “Aye. We will go.” He looked from Tommy to Paisley. “And this time, I will ask.”