Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
Nandag had barely reached the shade of the garden wall, one hand trailing along a row of clipped hedges, when voices drifted through an open kitchen window just ahead of her.
"...Father Lennox came and went nae an hour past," one servant was saying, low, gossip-quick. "Summoned quiet as ye like. Ye ken what that means."
"The wedding," a second voice answered. "Tomorrow, I heard. The laird himself told Cook to prepare a proper feast again, that dasnae end in half the hall in splinters."
"Poor lass. Married off twice in as many days both her sister and now herself, and nobody thought tae ask either of them a single word about it."
"That's how it's done, though, isnae it. Lairds decide. Priests bless it. The rest of us just show up fer the ale."
Nandag stood frozen against the hedge, one hand still resting on a clipped branch she no longer felt beneath her fingers.
Tomorrow.
The word settled into her chest like a stone dropped down a well, and for a long moment she simply stood there, listening to the servants move on to some argument about how many barrels of ale the cellar could spare, as though her entire future hadn't just been decided somewhere behind a closed door while she was out walking a garden path for a moment's peace.
The hurt came first, quick and cold. Then, close behind it, something hotter.
She was moving before she'd fully decided to, skirts gathered in one fist, back through the garden gate and into the castle at a pace that had two passing maids flattening themselves against the wall to let her through.
She made it as far as the corridor outside her father's solar before her steps slowed.
She could already hear how it would go. He'd remind her of duty.
He'd remind her of Robert, of Mòrag, of the King's decree, and he'd be right about every single point of it, and she'd stand there with no argument left that could survive being said out loud to a man who'd buried a wife and now nearly lost a daughter in the space of a single day.
She turned instead.
Fearchar's chamber was two floors up, at the end of a corridor she'd never really had reason to walk before, and she was still deciding what she meant to say when she reached his door and knocked before she could think better of it.
The door opened, and her prepared words scattered entirely.
He stood there without a shirt again, one hand still damp from whatever basin he'd been washing at, his hair pushed back off his forehead, and for a moment Nandag simply stared at the width of his shoulders and forgot, briefly and thoroughly, why she'd come.
"Dae ye own a single shirt," she managed, "or have ye simply decided the entire castle should suffer fer it?"
Fearchar's mouth curved, unhurried, and he reached behind him for the tunic draped over a chair, pulling it on with the same lack of urgency he seemed to bring to everything. "I own several. I simply dinnae expect visitors."
"Ye arranged our wedding without a single word tae me."
That got his attention properly. He stopped adjusting his sleeve, and something in his face settled, steady and unsurprised, as though he'd been waiting for this particular conversation since the moment Father Lennox left.
"I take it ye heard, then."
"I heard it from a kitchen window, Fearchar. From servants gossiping over ale barrels. Nae from ye. Nae from me own faither. From a window."
"That wasnae how I meant fer ye tae learn it."
"How did ye mean fer me tae learn it? A note slipped under me door?
A public announcement at supper, so I could smile prettily and pretend I'd been consulted?
" She stepped further into the room, too angry now to mind that she'd crossed the threshold of a man's private chamber uninvited.
"I told ye last night I needed time. I stood in that corridor and said the words plainly, and ye told me ye understood. "
"I did understand." He didn't retreat from her, didn't soften his voice to placate her, only stood there and let her anger land without flinching from it.
"And I still went tae yer faither this morning and asked fer the wedding tae happen tomorrow, because understanding what ye need and being able tae give it tae ye arenae always the same thing, lass, and I'll nae pretend otherwise tae make this easier tae hear. "
"That's nae an answer. That's an excuse dressed up as honesty."
"It's the truth, whether ye like the taste of it or nae."
He crossed his arms, and something harder crept into his voice, though it never quite lost the steadiness underneath.
"Ye think I chose this path fer meself, Nandag?
A stranger in Edinburgh decided me future fer me the moment I signed that parchment, seven years before either of us kent yer face would be the one waiting at the end of it.
I didnae choose the timing of a war, or the day Robert dragged yer sister out a side door, or any of the dozen circumstances that brought us tae this exact room.
None of us chose any of it. I'm simply the one willing tae say plainly what needs daeing, instead of letting ye discover it secondhand through someone else's gossip. "
"Ye could have told me yerself."
"Aye. I should have. That much I'll own.
" He held her gaze, unflinching. "But dinnae mistake me apology fer an apology fer the wedding itself, because I'll nae give ye one.
I cannae believe, looking at ye right now, that ye truly want nay part of this.
I can hear yer own heart from here, lass, going twice its usual pace, and it isnae fear that's doing that tae it. "
"Ye ken naething of what I want."
"I ken exactly what I saw in that gallery yesterday. I ken what happened under yer own bed, and in that corridor the night before, and I'll wager if I stepped close enough right now, yer breath would catch the same way it did then."
His voice dropped, low and certain, no trace of doubt in it at all.
"Ye can stand there and tell me ye want nay part in this marriage all ye like, Nandag Farquharson.
I'll nae argue the point with ye today. But I promise ye this.
There will come a night, nae so far off, when ye're the one begging tae share me bed, and I intend tae remember every word ye're saying tae me right now when that night comes. "
"Ye arrogant, insufferable…" She was already turning for the door, too furious to finish the thought, her hand finding the latch with more force than it required. "Ye're a brute, Fearchar Chisholm."
"The wedding is tomorrow," he called after her, entirely unbothered, as the door swung shut hard enough to rattle in its frame.
Fearchar stood at the front of the chapel in his father's plaid, freshly cleaned of the courtyard's blood and grime, and found his hands wouldn't settle no matter what he did with them. He smoothed the fabric across his chest, then adjusted his belt, only to flex his fingers again at his sides.
He'd fought pitched battles with steadier hands than this.
He had promised her time. Promised her in the corridor outside her room that he wouldn't force this upon her and then let Laird Alasdair deliver the decree like an execution sentence before he could even speak to her himself.
Father Lennox fussed with his stole beside the altar, murmuring through the order of the rite under his breath one final time. Duncan stood at Fearchar's shoulder in his own good plaid, arms crossed, watching the chapel doors.
"Ye look like a man about tae be sentenced," Duncan murmured.
"I gave her me word I'd nae rush her," Fearchar muttered under his breath, his jaw tightening as his gaze remained fixed on the heavy oak doors. "And then she learned of her own wedding from some servants’ gossip, Duncan. Nae from me."
"The Council moved, Fearchar. Ye had nay choice."
"I had a choice tae get tae her first." Fearchar’s throat worked as he swallowed down the bitterness. "She’s walking down this aisle believing I dragged her here against her will."
"Then ye have the rest of yer life tae prove otherwise, or at least that ye did it fer a good reason," Duncan said quietly. "Look sharp."
Fearchar didn't answer that, because the doors were opening.
The gathered clan rose as one, a low rustle of plaid and boots against stone, and Fearchar's breath went clean out of him the moment Nandag stepped through.
She wore ivory and pale gold, her chestnut hair loose beneath a simple circlet, no grand jewels, no elaborate finery, only herself dressed plain and lovely in a way that made every other woman he'd ever stood across from at a formal occasion fade into something forgettable by comparison.
Laird Alasdair walked beside her, one hand steady beneath her arm, and Nandag's eyes found Fearchar's the moment she crossed the threshold and held there the entire slow walk up the aisle, chin lifted, back straight, every inch the woman who'd put a wall sconce through a man's jaw two nights past.
Fearchar didn't remember deciding to smile. He only became aware somewhere around the third pew that he was doing it, and that he couldn't seem to stop.
Alasdair placed her hand in Fearchar's at the altar, his grip lingering a moment longer than the gesture required, a silent weight passed between them that needed no words to carry it.
Fearchar closed his fingers around hers, felt them cold and not quite steady, and ran his thumb once across her knuckles before either of them turned to face the priest.
"We are gathered," Father Lennox began, his voice carrying easy through the stone chapel, "before God and this clan, tae witness the union of Fearchar, Laird of Clan Chisholm, and Nandag, daughter of Clan Farquharson , in the bond of holy marriage."
Nandag's hand tightened in his. Fearchar tightened his back, just slightly, just enough to answer it.
"Fearchar Chisholm," the priest said, "will ye take this woman as yer wife, tae protect her, honor her, and stand beside her through whatever comes, forsaking all others, so long as ye both shall live?"
"I will." He said it steady, said it looking straight at her, and watched something flicker across her face at the certainty in it, quick and unguarded, before she caught it back.
"Nandag Farquharson." Father Lennox turned to her. "Will ye take this man as yer husband, tae stand beside him, honor him, and share in whatever this union brings, forsaking all others, so long as ye both shall live?"
She was quiet a beat longer than Fearchar had, her eyes searching his face for something he hoped to God she found there, and then she lifted her chin, the same defiant tilt she'd worn in a garden seven years gone, and said it clear enough for the whole chapel to hear.
"I will."
Father Lennox produced a length of plain cord, Chisholm blue twisted through Farquharson green, and bound their joined hands with it, murmuring the old words over the knot as he worked, words older than either clan, older than the King's Accord that had first tangled their lives together without either of them choosing it.
"By the authority given me," Father Lennox said, at last, "and before God and this gathered clan, I now pronounce ye laird and lady, husband and wife. Ye may seal this union."
Fearchar didn't wait to be told twice.
He drew her in with the hand still bound to hers, his free hand finding the curve of her jaw and kissed her.
The chapel erupted around them, a roar of approval, boots stamping against stone, someone striking up a drum somewhere near the back.
But Fearchar heard none of it clearly, he was too caught up in the warmth of her mouth against his, in the way her free hand had come up to the front of his tunic, holding on rather than pulling away.
When he finally drew back, just enough to breathe, he kept his forehead close to hers, close enough that his next words reached no ear but her own beneath the noise of the celebrating hall.
"I remember our other kiss being a good deal more passionate than that."
Nandag's eyes flew open, and color flooded up her throat and into her cheeks.
"Fearchar."
"I'm simply making an observation, wife."
"Ye're making a spectacle, is what ye're daeing, and half this hall is watching ye dae it."
"Let them watch." He straightened, though he kept her hand firm in his, the cord still looped loose around their joined wrists before Father Lennox stepped forward to untie it.
"I've waited seven years tae kiss ye and now I get tae dae it properly in front of witnesses. I'll nae apologize fer enjoying it."
"Ye could at least pretend tae have some decorum."
"I could." His mouth curved, unrepentant. "But then I'd have nothing tae hold over ye."
Nandag's mouth twitched, caught somewhere between a scowl and the smile she was clearly fighting to keep off her face.
She turned quickly toward her father before Fearchar could enjoy the sight of it winning out, accepting Alasdair's embrace and the old man's murmured blessing against her temple, her cheeks still flushed pink beneath the circlet.
Around them, the hall surged into motion, clansmen and Farquharsons alike crowding forward with congratulations.
Duncan clapping Fearchar hard across the shoulder with a grin too wide for the solemn occasion, Mairi appearing at Nandag's elbow already dabbing at her own eyes with the corner of her sleeve, and somewhere beneath all of it, Fearchar caught Nandag glancing back at him once, quickly, her color still high, before she was swept away into the crush of well-wishers.
He let her go, watching her disappear into the crowd of green and blue plaid, and found his own chest doing something he hadn't planned for and wasn't entirely certain how to name, watching his wife laugh at something Mairi said to her, watching her steal one more glance back toward him across the crowded chapel floor.
Near the doors, half-lost in the shadow of a pillar, Malcolm stood apart from the celebration entirely, arms crossed, his face carved from the same stone as the walls around him, watching the newly wed pair with an expression that held nothing of joy in it at all.