Alastair’s voice lowered as he asked, “Did my daughter see the effects that playing had on you?”
“No, laird.”
“You were able to hide the pain and the blood from her?”
Jack nodded. “Should I have—?”
“She doesn’t know of the cost,” Alastair gently interrupted. “I never told her, and Lorna kept the side effects of wielding such magic a secret.”
“You say Lorna only played twice a year for the spirits?” Jack tentatively asked.
“Indeed. She would play for the sea in autumn, and the earth in spring. It was part of her role as Bard of the East, although the clan never knew of it.” He didn’t mention Lorna playing for the fire or the wind, and Jack assumed that she had a reason not to. “It’s why I believed the spirits were at fault for snatching the lasses. So much time has passed since a bard sang for them, and I thought they were angry at us.”
Jack glanced down at the book on his lap, where Lorna’s notes hid within the pages. He felt the creeping sensation of unworthiness, and he wished that he had been given the chance to see her again. To speak to her as one musician to another.
“Adaira doesn’t know what playing for the folk will do to you, Jack,” the laird said, breaking Jack’s reveries. “But she will soon discover it, if you choose to become Bard of the East. It is a position of great honor, but this decision is one you should not make lightly.”
“I will consider all that you have shared with me, laird,” Jack replied. “And I thank you for telling me, for trusting me with Lorna’s music.”
“She would want it this way,” Alastair said. “She would be pleased to know you’re playing her songs. And she would want to see you compose your own.”
Jack was humbled. All his life, he had convinced himself that no one had ever seen anything worthy in him. But Lorna had. Even in her death, she was granting him a rare opportunity.
“Now then,” Alastair said, reaching for the whiskey decanter, “I’ve kept you long enough.”
Jack rose and left the laird in the library with a second knuckle’s worth of whiskey, having promised not to tell Sidra.
He emerged into the courtyard, where a breeze was blowing in from the sea, and came to a stop on the mossy flagstones to steady his heart. He didn’t know how long he stood there, but he soon remembered the book in his hand. Curious, he opened it to skim Lorna’s composition, “The Ballad for the Earth.”
She had written page after page of music far more complex than the ballad for the tides. Jack noticed her instruction at the bottom of the very last page. A warning that gave him pause.
Play with the utmost caution.
CHAPTER 12
Sidra didn’t want to deceive Graeme, but neither could she remain in his house another minute. At midday, she convinced him to let her return home to change her clothes and gather herbs and materials so she could at least work while she waited for Torin to bring news.
She avoided the hill, choosing to walk by road to her front door.
Covered dishes were piled on the cottage’s stoop. Pies, loaves of bannocks, creamy parritch, stews, cakes, pickled vegetables and fruits. Sidra stared at the jumbled assortment a full three breaths before she realized they were for her, because Maisie was missing.
The food only made it more visceral, and she wiped tears from her face as she struggled to carry everything inside to the kitchen. At Graeme’s, she had sipped whiskey and eaten one oatcake, all that her stomach would permit. Everything within her was wound tight, and she wished Torin would understand that she needed to walk the hills. To sit and wait was agony. She needed to search for Maisie.
By the time she had all the food inside and had shut the front door, it was midday. Sidra stared into the silent chamber. At the patches of light on the floor. At the dust motes that spun in the air.
It was quiet without Maisie. It felt as if the croft had lost its heart, and Sidra sat at the kitchen table, overcome.
She rested her face in her hands, reliving the events, wondering what she could have done differently. She remembered Donella’s warning. The ghost had seen the perpetrator’s path. She had known he was coming for Maisie.
Sidra lifted her head and whispered, “Donella? Can you meet with me?”
She waited.
The ghost rarely visited twice a season, and she never materialized upon command. But Sidra believed Donella might find a way, given what had happened to her daughter.
Sidra’s hope faltered as the silence stretched on. She heard someone knock on her door. She didn’t answer it as she waited patiently for the ghost.
But Donella never came.
Soon, Graeme would call for her, and Sidra sighed. She began to gather her herbs, and that was when she saw them. The two red flowers. Orenna blossoms.
She took one in her hands and studied its small, fierce petals. The legend claimed that to eat one was to gain a spirit’s secrets.
Without hesitation, Sidra placed a flower in her mouth and swallowed.
She felt nothing at first. The flower tasted like frosted grass and a hint of remorse. But then a sigh tugged on her mouth. Once, twice. As if she were breathing in a cold enchantment.
Sidra rose. She flexed her hands, her fingertips tingling. She blinked and saw a world lined with faint traces of gold. At first, she thought she was hallucinating, until she walked out the back door and beheld her garden.
She could see the life of the plants. The faint glow of their essence. She could see the lines running deep in the soil—roots that fed into a catacomb of intricate passages. Overhead, she could see the streaks in the clouds. The routes the wind blew.
She stood in the splendor, soaking it in.
My eyes are open, she thought. I’m seeing both realms.
She was straddling the mortal world and the domain of the spirits and could see how they overlapped. Sidra began to walk. Her bare feet met the ground with a whisper. She could feel the depth of the earth every time she stepped. She was weightless, as if nothing could hold her down.
She turned and looked behind. Her feet had left no tracks in the soil or the grass.
This is how he did it, her mind raced. This is how he leaves no trace. He eats a flower and steals our girls.
Sidra’s breath caught. She returned to the hill, even though it made her shudder. Perspiration glistened on her skin as she studied the crushed heather. She could see how a spirit had wept when she fell and tumbled, its tears beading gold in the grass. She searched the area again now that her eyes were sharper, and she could see where Torin and his guards had marked the beginnings of a blood trail. It looked like the kidnapper had carried Maisie to the south, but Sidra wasn’t certain.
After a few steps, the blood dried and there was no trace of where he had gone.
She followed the stakes the guard had set to mark a potential path, hoping she didn’t run into Torin. She had washed the dirt from her hands and tended to her bruises earlier that morning. She had even found a looser chemise of Emma’s that fit her and had wrapped herself in one of Graeme’s woolen cloaks to ward off chills, but she knew she still looked half dressed and wild.
Sidra didn’t care.
She realized as she walked the hills that her steps had quickened. She could move thrice as fast as normal, and she almost laughed as she felt the magic rush through her. She could also sense how close other people were. There were four guards to her right, two kilometers away. There was a croft to her left, five kilometers away. She could feel the distance in her bones, and it enabled her to travel, undisturbed by others.