Page 54 of The Laird's Secret Bairn

Skye bit back a sigh. “I nearly collided with a maid earlier.”

“Ye really are distracted this morning, are ye nae?”

She paled. “Lady Kenna, I think I hear Lily calling me. It was lovely to talk to ye this morning, but I must get going. We both ken Lily doesnae like to be kept waiting!”

Kenna’s laughter followed her downstairs.

It seemed fate had it out for Skye today because no sooner had she stepped off the stairs than Lily came barreling around the corner and tangled with her skirts.

“Lily!” she cried, catching the girl before either of them could topple over.

She looked her over, noticing the usual grin on her face and Blossom tucked under her arm. Then, suddenly, she heard the faint bleating of a goat.

“Isnae the goat supposed to be kept outside?”

Lily nodded her head. “Da did say he had to sleep outside, but we’re playing chase right now!”

“And yer da does prefer it when ye play inside because it’s safer.”

She giggled. “Exactly why we’re playing chase in the castle. Surely Da will understand.”

“I’ll talk with him if he refuses to see reason,” Skye assured her.

At that, the girl took off.

Skye barely took a step when the goat came barreling down the hall, nearly colliding with her. She pressed herself against thewall with a gasp, wondering if she was going to end up running right into Dougal if she wasn’t careful enough.

The last person she wanted to run into right now was him. The mere sight of him would make her blush even harder than she already was.

Later that night, Skye decided to try to write. She had felt a burst of inspiration earlier but wasn’t sure if it was fleeting. So she waited, and the inspiration grew.

It seemed she had gotten over her writer’s block, or so she hoped. She wasn’t sure if anything would come out once she sat down and started writing, but it was worth a try after going on too long without finishing the latest chapter of the story.

She lit a candle and pulled the pages toward her, dipping her quill before she’d even decided what she meant to write. The words came slower than usual, careful, like she was picking her way across unfamiliar ground.

It wasn’t the same as not being able to write, which had plagued her for so long. She wanted to be careful with her words, to ensure that she would be able to write down all the words that were forming in her mind.

The Lion did not roar at the child. He knelt before her instead, cutting her meat into pieces small enough for her tiny hands, patient in a way no story had ever painted him.

She stopped, staring at the lines, unsettled by how easily they had come to her. This was not the Lion people whispered about. This was not even the Lion she had imagined, cold and solitary, answerable to no one. This was something else entirely, something she wasn’t certain she was allowed to put to paper.

She had not intended to write this when she sat down, but it seemed her mind had different ideas. Freya had once told her to let inspiration flow and never fight it, that sometimes the best writing could come when one pushed forth without much of a plan.

So she wrote on, deciding to take her sister’s advice to heart.

He was gentle with his captive, too, though he’d never call her that. Gentle in ways that frightened her more than his temper ever could, because temper she understood. Gentleness from a man like him, she did not know what to do with.

She set down her quill and pressed her palms flat against the desk, trying to steady the thoughts crowding too fast behind her eyes. It was only a story. It had always been a story. Until it wasn’t. Until the man behind the mask had become someone she thought of long after the candle burned down, someone whose voice she heard in the quiet moments between waking and sleep.

She thought of Freya’s warning.

“Guard yer heart, Skye. Even if he’s nae the monster they say he is.”

Perhaps that was the problem. Dougal wasn’t the monster people said he was. He was something far more dangerous, a man who could be cruel and kind in the same breath, who locked his daughter behind stone walls out of love rather than malice, who touched Skye like she mattered and pulled away the moment she asked for more than he was willing to give.

She was leaving in less than a month. It was such a short time, but it felt longer the more she thought about it. How was she going to last a few more weeks under this roof and guard her heart?

Skye reminded herself of that fact the way she’d reminded herself every night since arriving, though it felt flimsier each time she said it, like a rope fraying thread by thread beneath her grip.