“Did Mum send you to me, little sister?” he asked with a grin.
That was what she liked most about him. Almost as much as his music. Frae loved his smile, because it made her own rise, every time.
“Yes. Can I help?”
“Please do.”
She knelt beside him and watched as he worked.
“I feel like you have always been here with us,” she said. “It’s hard to remember what it was like before you came home.”
She hoped he never left.
“I’m glad to hear it, Frae. Here, why don’t you help me bundle the straw?”
Together, they measured out golden heaps, which Jack would carry up the ladder to the roof, where he thatched the straw with sticks.
“I was so nervous,” Frae blurted.
“What were you nervous about, sister?”
She wiped the dust from her hands and squinted up at him. “That you wouldn’t like me.”
Jack blinked. He looked stunned, as if she had just smacked him. Perhaps she shouldn’t have said that, and Frae glanced down at her fingers, twirling a thread of straw. He reached over to affectionately tap her chin up.
“Impossible. You’re the sister I always wanted.”
Frae grinned. She was about to say something else when the back door of the cottage slammed, startling them both. Mirin never slammed doors. Their mother appeared in the yard, blazing a trail through the garden toward them.
“Uh-oh,” Frae whispered, shooting to her feet.
Jack steadied her with a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“John Tamerlaine!” Mirin shouted and slammed the yard gate next, so roughly that it bounced back open, creaking in protest. She was almost to the byre, and Jack slowly stood.
“Are you in trouble?” Frae asked him, anxiously twiddling the end of her braid.
“I think so,” Jack replied.
Mirin came to a halt before them, but her glare was for Jack alone.
“When were you going to tell me, hmm?” she cried. “After you wed her?”
Frae’s mouth fell open, and she turned to stare up at her brother.
Jack held Mirin’s flinty stare, but he squeezed Frae’s shoulder, as if silently begging her to remain at his side. Frae stepped closer to him.
“Of course not, Mum. She only just asked me.”
“When is it? When is the wedding?”
“It’s not a wedding. It’s a handfast—”
Mirin tossed up her hands, her frustration palpable. “It’ll be a wedding, son. You’re marrying the heiress.”
Frae gasped, her eyes round as saucers. She clapped her hand over her lips when Mirin and Jack both glanced at her.
Her brother was marrying Adaira.
Frae loved Adaira. She wanted to grow up to become Adaira. And now the heiress was going to be her sister.
Her heart began to pound with excitement. She could hardly keep still, and she felt like dancing.
“Marriage isn’t a game, Jack,” Mirin continued in a voice Frae rarely heard. A sharp, pointed cadence.
Jack shifted his weight. Frae could sense his anger. “I know what marriage is, and I don’t step into it lightly, Mum.”
“Do you love her?”
Jack was silent.
Frae laced her fingers together and gazed up at him, waiting to hear him say that he did.
“I care for her,” he eventually said. “She has asked this of me, and I’m doing it because she wants it, and it’s for the good of the clan.”
Mirin’s eyes thawed at last—Frae knew the worst of her temper was gone now. Her mother laid a hand over her throat, as if to calm her pulse. “What about your university, Jack?”
Frae winced, waiting for his reply. Would he take Adaira away with him?
“I’m done with teaching.” The words slipped out of him in a growl. “I don’t want to go back.”
Frae almost jumped, a cheer rising in her throat. But she held it in, gazing up at her brother. Did that mean he was staying forever?
“And what do you plan to do here?” Mirin asked. “Other than be Adaira’s partner?”
“She has asked me to become Bard of the East.”
This time Frae couldn’t hold in her excitement. She squealed and threw her arms around him. Sometimes Jack still felt stiff when she embraced him. But not that day. He hugged her back.
“This is a great honor she’s giving you,” Mirin said. “When is the wedding then?”
Jack hesitated before speaking in a very low voice. So deep Frae almost didn’t catch his reply. “Tomorrow.”