Page 82 of Highlander’s Hope

Marjorie really didn’t want Isbeil to lecture her or point at any more painful spots in her soul. Marjorie was happy to help her, but the main reason for the walk wouldn’t be herbs.

“Mother, may I come?” Colin said.

He suddenly appeared by Marjorie’s side. The lad used every opportunity to go outside the castle walls.

Isbeil turned and walked towards the gates. “Come, Colin. Ye can help me, too.”

Marjorie looked at the old woman’s back helplessly. How was it possible that such a small creature had so much power? She sighed, nodded to Colin, and they followed her.

Passing by the gates, Marjorie marveled at how easy it had become for her to walk out of the castle on her own. Ever since the battle, she’d gone hunting and taken long walks in the woods by herself. All she needed was her sword and her bow. She felt safe in her own company.

They walked in silence for a while, as fast as Isbeil’s aching knees allowed. Colin went to the side a bit, happily beating trees with a stick, as boys did. He leaned down from time to time and picked wild strawberries, bringing some to Isbeil and Marjorie. They crossed the flat meadow and walked into the woods, following the creek in the crevice that had the ruin that had taken Konnor away. Marjorie’s stomach knotted painfully at the thought, and she took a lungful of the fresh scent of the woods and exhaled it to release the ache.

It was quiet here. Birds chirped, the stream murmured gently, and leaves rustled in the wind. From both sides, steep, rocky slopes descended into ravine. Ferns and wildflowers grew around bushes and trees. Rocks and boulders lay scattered. Isbeil stopped and bent over.

“Ah, thistle.” She carefully cut a violet floret with experienced fingers so that the needles didn’t hurt her and studied it briefly. “For Malcolm’s heart. Although ‘tis yer heart that concerns me now.”

“Found them, too!” called Colin from about twenty feet away.

Marjorie sank to her knees by another gathering of thistle and cut a floret with her dagger. She hissed when the thorns prickled her. “My heart? I’m healthy and strong. Dinna fash yerself about me, Isbeil.”

“Hmm.”

“Truly.”

“‘Tis nae yer physical heart I speak of. Dinna pretend like ye dinna catch my meaning.”

Marjorie stood up and dropped the florets into Isbeil’s basket. The old woman looked at her with reproach.

“What do ye want me to say?” Marjorie threw up her hands. “That I miss him? I do. That he broke my heart? He did. All that is true enough. And so?”

“And so?” Isbeil straightened up with a fleeting expression of pain. “Ye’ve lived as a shadow of yerself ever since ye came back from Dunollie. After Konnor came, I saw ye flourish and heal and come back into yer true self. And now that he’s gone, ye’re nae yerself again.”

Marjorie turned away, her face flushed, something stabbing between her ribs. “It’ll pass. I’ll forget him.”

Even she heard the false tone in her voice. She’d never forget him. Konnor’s name was branded on her heart, his presence on her soul, his touch on her skin. Forever. If she was supposed to be happy with anyone, it was him. She wanted no one else’s hands on her, no one else’s lips, and no one else’s body.

“Hmm,” Isbeil hemmed again and came to kneel by a big gathering of thistle near Marjorie.

“I’ll try,” Marjorie added.

“Ye will try. But ye will fail. How do ye imagine yer life from now on?”

Marjorie shrugged. “I’d go to war with my clan, but I canna leave Colin. Sooner or later, my da and Uncle Neil and my brothers will come back. Perhaps we’ll travel. I’d like go see Ireland with him… Mayhap, France. Mayhap, Flanders…”

“Flanders,” Isbeil muttered, her hands working efficiently on the thistle. “Ye want to travel all right. Only nae to Flanders. Were ye nae like an excited wee lass when he told ye all about the future? I dinna remember ye ever being as joyful about my Highland tales as ye were about Konnor’s.”

Marjorie stilled with the thistle in her hands. Travel to the future? “Of course, I’m curious. Who wouldna be?”

“I am nae curious. I am perfectly fine where I am.”

“But I’d never go.”

Isbeil scoffed. “And what keeps ye here?”

“Everything! My life is here. Colin’s life is. My father, my brothers, my whole clan…”

“I dinna think they struggle up north without ye.”