“Mirin brought it. I’m sorry, I thought it was for me.”
Torin hated every time she said sorry. Sidra took responsibility for too many things, and he worried it would break her one day. He opened his mouth to speak before remembering his voice was gone, and he realized he would have to express this another way. A way without words.
He needed something to hold the plaid together.
He shuffled into the spare room, where his oaken chest sat against the wall. He searched through his raiment before finding a spare brooch, a golden ring of bracken with a long pin. When he returned to the kitchen, clammy and light-headed, he noticed Sidra had stopped working. Her face was flushed, her eyes staring vacantly at the table.
She looked lost, and then surprised when Torin took her arm, turning her body to face him.
“You should be in bed!” she scolded again, but she sounded like she was about to cry.
Torin began to fold the plaid, in the same way he liked to fold his own. He brought it behind her, then across her chest before cinching it in place at her right shoulder.
Yes, he thought. It was perfect on her.
He stepped back to regard Mirin’s handiwork. Sidra glanced down at it, and she still appeared confused until Torin laid his palm over her chest, where the plaid now granted her protection. He could feel the enchantment within the pattern, holding firm, like steel. He touched the place she had been kicked, where her bruises were slow to heal, as if her heart had shattered beneath her skin and bones.
She understood now.
She gasped and glanced up at him. Again, he wished that he could speak to her. Their last conversation still rattled in his mind, and he didn’t like the distance that had come between them.
Let my secret guard your heart, he thought.
“Thank you,” Sidra whispered, as if she had heard him.
It renewed his hope, and he sat at the table before his knees gave out. His gaze snagged on a pie whose center had been eaten away in a perfect circle, the spoon still in the dish. He pointed to the gaping hole, brow arched.
Sidra smiled. “The middle is the best part.”
No, the crust is. He shook his head, reaching for the spoon to eat the crisp places she had left behind.
He was halfway done when there came a bark, followed by a knock on the open door. Torin turned to see Adaira, and his heart lifted.
“Sit, Yirr,” Sidra said to the dog, and he obeyed, hushing.
Adaira carefully passed the collie and approached Torin, a slight smile on her haggard face.
“Look at you, sitting at the table and eating pie,” she teased. “One would never think you’d been wounded last night.”
She sounded lighthearted, but Torin knew how worried she truly was. He didn’t want to give her any reason to doubt his capability as captain. He drew out the chair next to him, and Adaira sat, her eyes going instantly to the demolished pie.
“You could have saved me a piece,” she said.
Torin pushed the dish toward her, and Adaira took a few bites, closing her eyes as if she had been hungry for days. When she was done, she set down the spoon and studied Torin closely.
“How are you, Torin?”
He lifted his hand to Sidra, asking her to speak for him.
“The wound on his shoulder is healing swiftly,” she replied. “But the one on his forearm is proving to be far more stubborn than I’d like. I’m hoping if he continues to rest today, he will feel much better by tomorrow.”
Adaira’s gaze dropped to his bound forearm, where blood had stained the linen. “Good. The first thing I want to say to you is that I’m giving you time off to rest and heal. In the meantime, I’ve taken command of the guard and have sent the auxiliary force to the clan line, to assist the watchmen. If the Breccans try to cross again, we’ll catch them, so don’t worry about responding if your scar flares. Do you hear me, cousin?”
Torin reluctantly nodded.
“The second thing I need to discuss with you is more complex,” Adaira said. “Is it possible for you to communicate by writing?”
Torin glanced at Sidra. She swiftly went to the cupboard to find a sheet of parchment, an inkwell, and a quill.
“I wrote to Moray Breccan this morning,” Adaira began. “I gave him an ultimatum, to return what his clan stole from the Elliotts, or else face an end to the trade agreement. And I received a response, but it wasn’t from who I was expecting.”
She withdrew a letter from the inner pocket of her cloak and set it in Torin’s hands.
He unfolded the paper and read, the words swimming on the page. His eyesight was watery, and it took him a second to focus and make sense of the elegant scrawl: