“No, he hasn’t, which does lend credence to the perpetrator being one of our own,” Sidra said. “But maybe there is a trade happening that we don’t know of. Perhaps the culprit is secretly receiving flowers from the west.”
Adaira bit her lip. Sidra could sense how conflicted she was, and yet her eyes were bright. Feverish. Now that Adaira had entertained Sidra’s thoughts, she couldn’t unsee them.
“What is the best way for me to receive this information?” Adaira asked.
Sidra set the glass vial in her palm. “I think you go to meet Moray Breccan on the clan line in three days’ time, as he has requested. Generously bring him the best of the Tamerlaine oats, barley, honey, and wine. Whatever he offers you in return, accept with gratitude, but then ask him about this flower. Say you would like to trade for its blooms. If he says he doesn’t recognize it, then he might be speaking truth or he might be lying. If he does recognize the flower, then we know the west is involved, even if it’s something as simple as passing flowers over the clan line. Either way, you have a chance to discover it for yourself by participating in the trade, and I think you have the right to take someone with you.”
Adaira was silent, regarding the flower.
Sidra glanced down at her hands, where her golden wedding band gleamed on her finger. She and Torin had had no qualms about exchanging a blood vow at their wedding. They spoke the ancient words and cut their palms. Their hands were bound together, wound to wound. Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, blood of my blood. It was a vow not easily broken, although Sidra was beginning to wonder how long it would last without Maisie.
“The Breccans may deny you a guard,” Sidra said, watching Adaira. “Or your father. Or even a handmaiden. But they can’t deny you a husband.”
Adaira flushed, as if her mind had already gravitated toward such thoughts. She had been in no rush to marry in the past, which Sidra thought wise. But it was time for the future Laird of the East to take a partner. If she was going to forge a difficult and potentially bloody peace, she needed someone to carry her through it. To walk at her side. To confide in. To comfort her on long, lonely nights.
Sidra didn’t have to ask who Adaira was considering.
She already knew.
Adaira gave herself the rest of the day to think about it. A day she spent roaming the hills, searching for a sign. A day that produced no answers from Torin and the guard, despite their interviews and observations. When Adaira realized she wasn’t going to waver and that time was against her, she decided to move forward with her plans.
She waited until the moon rose, thinking she would be braver at night, and dressed simply in a dark dress and cloak. She rode to Mirin’s croft, following the stars.
She dismounted at the road and left her horse hobbled by a tree. Quietly walking through the yard, she located Jack’s bedroom window. He was still awake, as she hoped he would be. The candlelight seeped through his shutters, and she walked to them, a moth drawn to the fire.
Even so determined, she hesitated when she reached her destination. She stood at the window and debated with herself.
I can’t believe I’m doing this, she thought and finally knocked.
She was tempted to turn and run when she heard him cautiously unlatch his shutters. They swung open, at last revealing Jack. His scowl melted into disbelief when he saw it was her.
“Adaira?”
“I need to have a word with you, Jack.”
He glanced about his room before returning his gaze to her, standing in the moonlight. “Now?”
“Aye. It can’t wait.”
“Well, come in then. But be quiet. I don’t want you to wake my mum.” He extended his hand to her, and Adaira accepted it, shocked by how warm his fingers were as they entwined with her cold ones.
She lifted her hem and let Jack haul her up through the window. Her boots clunked on the top of his desk, which was strewn with all manner of oddities. Twigs, rocks, clumps of moss, braids of grass, wilted wildflowers. Adaira stepped down to the floor, still holding his hand, and she turned to gaze at the strange collection.
“What is all of this?” she asked.
“Preparation,” he replied. “I should be ready to play for the earth by tomorrow afternoon.”
“Good.” Adaira felt his fingers unwind from hers. He flexed his hand, and she wondered if he disliked touching her. Or maybe there was another reason he disengaged his hand. She watched as he walked to his bed, where Lorna’s music was scattered. He gathered up the loose sheets and attempted to straighten the wrinkled blanket, to offer her a place to sit.
“I prefer to stand,” she said when he turned to her. “But you should sit.”
Jack’s brows lowered with suspicion. “Why?”
“Trust me.”
To her surprise, he did. He sat on the edge of his bed and carefully set her mother’s composition beside his pillow. “Now then. Are you going to tell me why you’ve come to my room like a thief in the night?”
She smiled but delayed answering him while she meandered around his chamber, studying it. Jack was quiet, suffering through her examination of his things. She expected him to protest or rush her along—he was such an impatient man—but he was silent, and when she at last came to a stop before him, his eyes, inscrutable and deliciously dark, were fixed on hers. Almost as if he knew why she had come.
She shivered.
Her heart quickened as she knelt on one knee before him, a position she would take for no other man save her father.
Jack watched her intently. She didn’t know how exactly she had expected him to react—whether he would laugh, curse, frown, or scorn her. He did none of those things. As his eyes remained on her, she knew he realized the magnitude of her bending a knee to him.
Her hair flowed down her shoulders like a shield, and yet her courage wavered. He will never agree to this, she thought, but it was too late now. He must know her intentions, and she was too proud to alter her course.
“John Tamerlaine,” she began to say.
“Jack.”
Adaira blinked, astounded he had just interrupted her proposal. “Your given and legal name is John.”
“But I answer only to Jack.”
“Very well then,” Adaira said through her teeth, and she could feel the color rising in her face. “Jack Tamerlaine. Handfast yourself to me. Give me your vow and be my husband for a year and a day, and thereafter should we both desire it.”
Jack was silent, as if he expected her to say more. Adaira keenly felt the pain in her knee as she held her position. The prickling dread of waiting for his answer. When his silence dragged on, she let out a huff of air.
“What do you say, Jack? Give me an answer, so I may rise.”
He dragged his hand through his hair, leaving it more tousled than it had been before. His expression was solemn, conflicted, as he continued to regard her. “Why, Adaira? Why are you asking me? Is it because you need someone to go with you into the west?”
“Yes,” she said. She didn’t tell him the whole of it. She didn’t tell him that she was lonely, that she was overwhelmed some days with all the responsibilities that were set before her. That she sometimes wanted to be held and listened to and touched, that she wanted to be with someone who challenged her, sharpened her, made her laugh. Someone she could trust.