Chapter Ten
Ailith
Ailith and Dyna had spent a long time speaking with her parents. Her father resisted the journey. Her mother did not.
Alasdair rose from his chair in the solar and began to pace. “Emmalin, I’m not interested in sending our daughter into some strange land where we have no allies. We’re asking for trouble. Ailith, forgive me, but your mother and I must speak this through.”
Ailith sat with her hands folded in her lap. She’d always been the quiet one in her family, more like her mother than the others of the clan. Emmalin MacLintock held strength without ever needing to prove it, strength that did not shout, yet bent others to listen without a bow strapped to her back.
She thought of the others in her clan who didn’t use a bow.
Aunt Kyla, Aunt Gracie, Aunt Maeve, and the only one she would ever call quiet and reserved was Aunt Maeve, until she’d had her son Grant.
Then everything had changed. Maeve was now more like a wolf who’d just borne ten cubs, daring anyone to get near them.
Was her father acting like that over her? If so, she had to say something.
Emmalin said, “Alasdair, she has some strength we know little of. She’s gained the power of sight, and we have to allow her to develop that strength. It could be of such use to her as she grows older.”
She would not allow this to go on without having a say in what she was to do, of what she was to become.
“Da, I’m here. Please don’t act as if I’m not.
This sight, this new skill is part of me.
I don’t know how to explain it, but I cannot turn away from it.
” Her father stilled, studying her more closely than before.
Her thoughts drifted, unbidden, to a man carrying grief without letting it break him. To a truth she didn’t understand yet. This man named Edan called to her, yet she knew not why. This truth she could not share with either her mother or father yet.
Dyna whispered, “Alasdair. Your daughter has a voice in this. Do not deny her.”
“I won’t. I’ll see what she thinks after her mother and I discuss it.
” He moved over and patted Ailith’s shoulder, kissing her forehead before facing her mother again.
“Emmalin, we need horses, allies. We’d be walking into the area blind.
That didn’t happen when we came to Mull.
Dyna and Maitland were already here. Eli and Alaric had made allies with the MacVey’s and MacQuaries.
We know no one on Islay. We have no idea what we’re walking into there.
We have no ready access to a line of Grant warriors, and that makes me a wee bit unsettled. ”
Dyna said, “Actually, my brother is there with Magni. They own the shipping fleet with Cormac MacLean, who is a cousin to Tristan MacClane, who is married to Mora MacQuarie. Tristan’s sister is married to Broc Grant, and they live with Tristan, so they aren’t far away. There are many ties.”
“How long is the voyage to Islay from MacClane’s?” Alasdair asked.
Nearly a day’s travel,” Ailith answered.
Her father spun around. “How do you know?”
She held his gaze. “I know. That’s all I can tell you.”
He turned back to Emmalin and Dyna. “So we can’t call any allies up quickly. She should not go on this journey without many to support her, and we’ll need horses too.”
Emmalin crossed her arms and said, “Then we all go.”
“Why?” Alasdair asked.
Ailith had listened to enough of the argument. “Am I allowed to have any part in this conversation?”
Alasdair turned around and nodded. “Go ahead. Tell us your thoughts and we’ll consider them.”
She knew this wasn’t going to go over well, but she gritted her teeth, took a deep breath, and spoke her mind.
“I’m going, Da, whether you want me to or not.
I’m six and twenty. John went to battle when he was three and ten and you thought little of it.
I’m old enough to make my own decisions.
I’ll go with Dyna. Everyone does not have to go with us.
” She caught the smirks and looks of approval from her mother and her aunt before her father began to speak, but she held the palm of her hand up to him. “Please allow me to finish.”
Her father crossed his arms and said, “Please do.”
“This is about bairns being taken by some evil soul.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do, Da. I do know that. I’ve seen it, and I can feel it to the verra depth of my soul.
If harm comes to them and I did nothing, it will break me.
” And beneath the truth, she knew she would not leave Edan to face that loss alone.
“I will help him find his daughter and his nephew. I hope you will come along, but I’ll understand if you don’t. ”
For a long moment, her father did not answer. He stood with his arms crossed, his jaw set in the way that meant he was no longer arguing. He was looking. At her. As if he had not seen her in years and was only now catching up.
Emmalin’s hand found his.
The door opened and Uncle Connor broke in with a grin. “Well said, Ailith. You’re going to Islay, Alasdair.”
John snuck in behind his uncle. “Grant and I both wish to go with you, Ailith. Even if Da does not. We’ll escort you.”
“My family is going, Alasdair. What say you?” Dyna asked.
He glanced over at Emmalin who was now wearing a grin the size of a crescent moon. “I’m coming with you, daughter.”
“I guess I am too. Uncle Connor? Since you stuck your nose in, I’d say you’re coming as well.”
“We’ve already discussed it, and Sela told me I have to go along.
She’s staying back here with Eli, Astra, and Alaric to watch over Logan.
Halli is staying back with Grandmama. It’s your decision about Daran, but I’ve wanted to see Morgan.
We’ll stop and see Hagen and Brynja at MacClane Castle before we board the ship for Islay. ”
The decision made, everyone filed out of the solar, though Emmalin pushed Alasdair back inside when he tried to leave.
“Nay, you need to speak with your daughter. And you need to stop thinking of her as a child, Alasdair. She’s a woman grown, and she’s found her purpose. She needs your support too.”
Ailith stood and folded her hands in front because she didn’t know what else to do with them. Her mother left and closed the door.
Her father waited until they were alone. He turned to her and said, “You are my only true daughter, lass. My apologies if I’ve protected you too much, but you know it’s out of love.”
“I know, Da. But I can’t sleep at night. I couldn’t sleep on Grant land, and I cannot sleep here. I have to go.” Tears teased her eyes, but she did her best to control them.
“Does MacRuari mean something to you? Did I miss something?”
“Nay,” she said, perhaps too quickly. “I barely know him. I only… feel for him.” How does one deal with losing a bairn out of her cradle?
Her father stared at the floor for a few moments, then said, “Your mother is right, and I’ve been looking at this all wrong. Sela and Emmalin both tried to tell me something a long time ago, but I ignored them.”
“What?” She crossed her arms, preparing to argue with him more.
He took two steps closer, his finger lifting her chin. “Those blue eyes of yours look at everything through the eyes of your great-grandmother.”
“Grandmama Maddie?”
She hadn’t seen her father cry in a long, long time, but it nearly undid her when the tears slid down his cheeks.
“I loved Grandmama Maddie, her storybooks and her voices were part of my greatest memories of my childhood. Sela suggested it first because your mother never met Grandmama. But you have the same heart as your great grandmother, and nothing could make me more proud of you than that. She was soft-hearted, especially when it came to bairns, but she also had a strong will. The story of Grandmama facing Hord, the spider man, to save a wee lass is one of the best in all the land. She had a contingent of soldiers there to do whatever she commanded.”
“Da, I’ve heard that story before. I’m sure they were there to do what Grandda Alex commanded.”
“Nay. Ask Aunt Sela. She will tell you it was Maddie; all the warriors were there to do as she bid them to do. Oh, Grandda might give orders too, but there was something about the strength of Madeline Grant’s conviction that had every guard vowing to do what she asked.
They respected her that much.” He dropped his head and wiped at his tears.
“She had a heart of sheer gold, Ailith. If you need to go to help the people of Islay find their bairns, then I support you completely.”
“Will you come along?”
“Do you want your stubborn father along?”
Ailith adored her father, so she could only say what was in her heart. “Of course I need your help, Da. I don’t have much experience with these situations, especially in a new land.”
“It would be my pleasure to go along with you. Grandmama Maddie was the protector of bairns. I think she’s passed the torch to you.” He wrapped his arms around her and whispered, “You’ll be wonderful because you have the intelligence and the compassion of your grandmother.”
Ailith had never considered herself in that way, but she liked the idea. The protector of bairns. Lia had been called that too, and she’d thought it a wonderful title at the time. Someone had to stand up for those who could not protect themselves.
It was her new purpose.