Alastair was quiet. He blinked, a crease of confusion in his brow, and in that swell of silence, Jack was overcome with dread.
“I wasn’t expecting you, Jack. I didn’t ask you to return.”
The harp in Jack’s arms became a millstone. He continued to kneel, gazing blankly up at the laird, his thoughts scattering.
It hadn’t been Alastair, although his signet ring had been used in the letter.
Who summoned me?
As tempted as he was to shout his frustrations into the hall, he remained silent. But a glimmer of movement answered him.
From the corner of his eye, he saw someone emerge onto the dais, as if she had come from the moonlit mountains of the tapestry. Tall and slender, she wore a dress the color of storm clouds, and a red plaid shawl framed her shoulders. Her raiment whispered as she moved, drawing closer to where he knelt.
Jack’s gaze was riveted to her.
Her face, freckled and angular, with high cheeks that carved into a sharp jaw, evoked not beauty but reverence. She was flushed, as though she had been walking among the parapets, challenging the wind. Her hair was the color of the moon, bound in an array of braids that were pinned together as a crown. Tucked within them were small thistle blooms, as if stars had fallen upon her. As if she held no fear of their sting.
He saw a shadow of the girl she had once been. The lass he had chased over the hills one chaotic spring night and challenged for a handful of thistles.
Adaira.
She stared at him, still on his knee, as he stared at her. His shock burned away, replaced by indignation that blazed so fiercely he couldn’t breathe when he thought about what he had surrendered to come home. His title, his reputation, the culmination of years of dedication and hard work. Gone like smoke in the breeze. All this he had given up not for his laird, which he could justify, but for her and her whims.
She sensed it in him—the heart of the wild boy who had chased her, now older and harder. His mounting ire.
Adaira responded with a cold, victorious smile.
CHAPTER 3
Jack Tamerlaine,” Adaira greeted him. Her voice was nothing like he remembered; if he had heard it in the dark, he would have assumed she was a stranger. “What a surprise to see you here.”
Jack said nothing. He didn’t trust himself to speak, but he refused to break their gaze, as she seemed eager to make him do.
“Ah, I forget the two of you are old friends,” Alastair said, pleased. He held his arm out to his daughter, and she drew even closer, so close that her shadow almost spilled over Jack in his obedient stance.
“Indeed,” said Adaira, breaking her stare with Jack to bestow a softer, genuine smile upon her father. “I should reacquaint him with the isle, since he has been away for so long.”
“I don’t think—” Jack began to protest, defiant, until Alastair looked at him with an arched brow.
“I think that is a wonderful plan,” the laird said. “Unless you oppose it, Jack?”
Jack did oppose it. But he shook his head, swallowing his words, which caught like thorns in his throat.
“Excellent.” Adaira turned that sharp smile upon him again. She had noticed the twist in his voice—the discomfort she had inspired. She didn’t seem to care. No, she seemed to welcome it, and she motioned for Jack to rise, as if she held the power to command him. And yet, didn’t she? She had made him break his prior commitments to rush home.
He might have been on the mainland for the past decade, forming himself into the mold of a bard and forgetting his ties to Cadence. But in that instant, looking at Adaira, he remembered his upbringing. He felt the last name he wore like a cloak—the only name that would claim him, even at his very worst—and he knew that his deepest allegiance was to her and her family.
He stood.
“I hope you can grace my hall with your music soon, Jack,” Alastair said, stifling a deep, wet cough.
“It would be an honor,” Jack replied. His concern heightened when Alastair pressed a knuckle to his lips, his eyes shut as if his chest ached.
“Go and rest, Da,” Adaira said, touching his arm.
Alastair regained his composure and lowered his hand, smiling at his daughter. But it was a weary smile, a façade, and he kissed Adaira’s brow before he departed.
“Come with me, Jack.” Adaira turned and strode through a secret door, one he would have never noticed. Incensed, he had no choice but to chase after her through branching corridors, his eyes boring into those fair braids of hers and the thistles she wore like jewels.
I should have known it was her.
He almost let out a scathing laugh but stifled it just as Adaira led him into the inner garden. He came to a sudden halt on the moss-spangled flagstones, nearly bumping into her. Once, she had been taller than him. He was pleased to discover he had a full hand width of height on her now.
He watched with heavy-lidded eyes as she faced him. They were silent, the air fraught between them.
“You didn’t know it was me,” she said at last, amused.
“You didn’t even cross my mind,” he replied in a clipped tone. “Although I should have known you would have no shame in forging your father’s signature. I take it you also stole the signet ring from his hand? Did you do it while your father slept? Or did you drug him? You were very thorough with your crime, I must say, or else I wouldn’t be standing here.”
“Then what a relief that I went to such lengths,” she said, so calmly it threw him off balance. He realized she was bringing out the worst in him; he was acting as if he were eleven again, and the shock of that made him fall into a furious silence, worried he would say something he would regret. That is, until she added, “I wouldn’t have called you home if I didn’t have a purpose for you.”
“You speak of purpose?” he countered, stepping closer to her. He could smell the faint trace of lavender on her skin. He could see the ring of hazel in her blue eyes. “How dare you say such a thing to me, when you’ve dragged me away from my obligations and my duties? When you have interrupted my life without remorse? What do you want with me, Adaira? What do you want? Tell me so I can do it and be gone from here.”
She held her composure, intently staring at him. It almost felt as if she could see through him, beyond flesh and bones and veins, down to his very essence. As if she was measuring his worth. Jack shifted away, uncomfortable with her attentiveness and her silence. How cold and placid she was in the face of his smoldering wrath, as if his reaction was unfolding as she planned.
“I have much to tell you, Jack. But none can be spoken in the open, where the wind might steal the words from my lips,” she said, inviting him to keep pace with her as she began to walk the winding garden path. “It’s been a while since I last saw you.”
He didn’t want to reflect on that final moment between them, but it was inevitable, because she was looking at him, daring him to dredge it back up. And she had brought him here, to the garden, where it had happened.
The last time he had seen Adaira had been the night before he left Cadence. Mirin was speaking with Alastair and Lorna at the castle, and Jack had wandered, morose and angry, into the starlit garden. Adaira had also been there, of course, and Jack had reveled in hurling pebbles at her through the roses, startling and then irritating her until she had found his hiding place.