He stood beside Godfrey and waited for Innes’s arrival. It felt like a year had come and gone before Jack heard footsteps approaching.
“That will be all for tonight, Godfrey,” Innes said when she appeared around a corner, her eyes never once leaving Jack.
The dungeon keeper bowed and returned to the arena, leaving Jack alone with the laird. They had seen each other three times before. The first was when Innes brought restitution for the raid on the clan line. He saw her again when Adaira had struck a bargain with her mother in Mirin’s house. And finally, on the day Adaira had left the Tamerlaine clan. Innes had looked at Jack then as she did now, as if time hadn’t passed at all and he was a grave problem for her to deal with.
“I apologize for this . . . unfortunate misunderstanding,” said Innes. “I was unaware that you were in the keep, and I hope you will be able to forgive the oversight.”
“Of course, Laird,” Jack said, his voice brittle.
“Come. My daughter has asked me to escort you to her chambers.”
Jack quietly followed the laird through a dizzying labyrinth of corridors. He tried to mark which turns they took, how many flights of stairs they ascended, but his mind felt blurred, fixated only upon one thing: he was about to be with Adaira again.
Innes came to a sudden halt before a carven door.
“You are a welcome guest here, Jack Tamerlaine,” Innes said. “And you may stay however long you would like. But there is one thing I ask of you.”
Jack glanced at her, but he knew the words before she spoke them.
“Please refrain from making music while you are on my lands.” Innes waited until her request was acknowledged before she opened Adaira’s door.
Two servant girls were present, rushing to finish their tasks. One was pouring the last bucket of hot water into a round tub, and the other was arranging a silver tray of dinner on a table before the hearth. They both startled at the sound of the door opening and hastened their pace until they were done, bobbing before Jack and the laird as they slipped into the corridor.
“My daughter will be with you shortly,” Innes said, but Jack could hear the clip of worry in her voice. Even she was uncertain of Adaira’s whereabouts, and Jack didn’t know if that should make him anxious.
He entered Adaira’s chamber, listening to the door latch behind him.
Alone at last, Jack exhaled.
Adaira’s room was spacious and teeming with color. The stone hearth cut through a painted wall, which depicted an array of gilded flora and fauna and moons of various phases. Another wall was devoted to mullioned windows and a plush window seat. A desk was arranged there, as if Adaira liked to sit and write before the glass. She had a wardrobe, bookshelves, a tapestry of a woven chimera, and a canopied bed draped with a blue quilt.
Was this the room she would have always had if her parents had decided to keep her that fateful night? Or was it another, perhaps a guest chamber that had been prepared for her? Jack saw that the room was an inviting one, but he couldn’t feel Adaira’s presence within it.
He stopped before her desk, where his letter sat on the wood. He reached out to trace his words, and that was when he noticed how filthy his hands were. His nails were blackened with grime, and his forearms were smudged. His tunic was disgusting, and he reeked of sweat.
Jack draped Adaira’s plaid over the back of the closest chair and tore off his breastplate. He threw his raiment into the fire to burn.
He approached the tub of steaming water, only to blink down at it.
“Is this some kind of a joke?” he asked. It was tiny, like a barrel for a stable, and he wasn’t sure if he would be able to fit in it. Somehow he was able to fold his long legs after he eased himself into the tub. He kept one eye on the door as he hastily scrubbed with a bristle brush and soap, washing dirt from his skin and hair.
He half expected Adaira to arrive the moment he stood from the blackened water, reaching for the drying cloth. She didn’t, but Jack’s relief was short lived: he discovered that the drying cloth was also very small, almost laughably so. Jack rushed to dry himself with it, snorting as he stood before the warmth of the hearth. Then he realized his tunic was now a heap of ashes, and he had no clothes to change into.
He had no choice but to stride to Adaira’s wardrobe and look for something of hers to don. His hands rushed through the endless collection of garments, eventually finding a dark, fur-lined robe.
“You’ll do,” he said wryly, knowing that Adaira was just as tall and trim as he was. Jack yanked the robe from its hanger and slipped into it. He belted it firmly at his waist and stared down at his bare feet—the robe’s hem brushed the middle of his shins.