Page 11 of A Highland Healer Captured (Scottish Daddies #3)

T he door opened just as the first strands of daylight spilled into her chamber.

Skylar blinked away the remnants of a restless night.

The memories of Zander’s steel-grey eyes and a rough, and his calloused hand gripping her chin had plagued her dreams. She heard the latch and wrenched her body from the bed, standing stiffly awaiting the stranger at the door.

Cora stood there, slim and tidy as a church candle, her dark hair in a neat braid. Her hands folded politely in front of her skirt, but there was a brightness in her gaze that made Skylar think of someone with too many thoughts bubbling at once.

“Come with me,” Cora said softly. “The laird asked that I show ye the keep.”

Skylar hesitated. “And if I say nay?”

Cora’s lips quirked. “Then ye’d be next to young Grayson or just sit here all day and stare at the same stones ye stared at yesterday. I prefer the walk.”

There was no malice in the words, only a wry humor that caught Skylar by surprise. She stood, slipping her satchel over her shoulder, and nodded. “Fine. But if ye lead me to the gallows, I’ll haunt ye.”

Cora only tilted her head. “I’ve worse company already.”

They started through the corridor, Cora’s steps light, Skylar’s a touch slower as she studied every turn. Mason lingered at a distance behind them, arms crossed, pretending to be disinterested though his eyes missed nothing.

Cora began pointing things out in her calm, lilting voice.

“That stair, steep as hell’s teeth, leads to the east wall walk.

Ye can see the river bend from there, if the mist isnae sulking.

That door hides the stores. The barrels are stacked like soldiers.

Daenae open it unless ye want flour dust in yer hair for a week. ”

Skylar found herself smiling despite herself. Cora’s manner was twisty. She never answered anything straight on but instead danced around with observations that, in the end, made their meaning clearer. It was endearing.

“And here,” Cora continued, guiding Skylar down a turn where the light dimmed, “is the hall where the laird’s council likes to bicker. Loud as crows at harvest, they are. Sometimes I sit outside the door just to listen. Better than any minstrel’s tale, though less tuneful.”

Skylar snorted. “I can imagine.”

They walked through the kitchens next, where a few cooks were already kneading dough, their arms dusted white. The warmth and smell of bread wrapped around Skylar, nearly dizzying her with memories of home.

Cora kept up her commentary, gesturing toward the hearth, the hanging herbs, the way Katie bullied the cooks into feeding the laird when he forgot himself.

“Does he often forget?” Skylar asked before she could stop herself.

Cora’s lips twitched again. “He remembers battles more easily than meals. Mason says it’s because food cannae kill him, but men can. Mason’s wrong. Hunger’s sharper than a sword.”

They passed the stables, the smithy, the inner yard where boys sparred with wooden blades.

Skylar’s eyes never stopped roaming, noting where the walls leaned, where guards loitered, where escape seemed impossible.

Mason trailed behind, never intervening, but the weight of his watch sat heavy on her neck all the same.

At last, after a slow climb up a narrow stair and through a corridor that smelled faintly of dried thyme, Cora opened a heavy oak door and swept her hand inward.

“Back in surgery. Ye ken this place well.”

Skylar stepped in and breathed deep, “Aye.”

This place, at least, makes sense.

“Ye keep it well,” Skylar murmured, running a hand over a shelf.

Cora smiled faintly. “I do me best. Katie says I maither the jars too much. But if I daenae, who will?”

Skylar turned to her then, truly studying her. She looked so young, yet there was an old weight in her eyes. Something held back, something folded neat but not forgotten.

“How long have ye lived here at Strathcairn?” Skylar asked.

Cora glanced at her hands, twisting them together for a moment. “Long enough to forget some things, but nae long enough to forget all.”

“Twisty words again,” Skylar teased gently.

But Cora lifted her gaze and answered this time, clear and unflinching. “Since me clan was broken. Zander destroyed them, and he took me in.”

Skylar froze, the jars around her blurring. She had expected any number of answers, anything else made sense, but not that.

Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth.

Cora only tilted her head slightly, as if waiting for the next question.

Skylar’s heart thudded. “D— Destroyed?” she repeated softly.

Cora nodded. Her voice remained calm, though her hands tightened together. “Aye. Me clan was… nae kind. Nae to its own, and nae to its neighbors. Me faither ruled like a whip, and his men were worse. Zander came with fire and sword. He ended it.”

Skylar’s breath caught. “And ye?”

“I was twelve,” Cora said simply. “Old enough to understand cruelty, young enough not to have learned to wield it yet. He spared me. Said I’d seen enough of one kind of laird, and might as well learn another.”

Skylar sank onto a stool, jar forgotten in her hand. Images spun through her mind. Blood on stone, a keep razed, children clinging to each other. The very thing she had accused Zander of, whispered in horror around Highland firesides, here sitting calm before her in the form of this girl.

“I’m so sorry, Cora,” Skylar said quietly, meaning it.

But Cora shook her head, surprising her again. “Daenae be. I’m grateful. Me faither would have sold me to the highest bidder before I was of age. Zander gave me work. A bed. A name worth speaking. I’d rather scrub his floors than sit at me faither’s table again.”

The bluntness of it cut through Skylar. She tried to see cruelty in Cora’s eyes, bitterness, anything, but there was only a steady truth. Gratitude, even.

“Still,” Skylar murmured, unsettled, “to lose so much…”

“To lose rot is to gain breath,” Cora said. “It’s strange, but it’s true.”

Skylar had no answer. She looked down at her hands, at the lines of dirt still caught beneath her nails despite washing, and thought of her own family.

Her father’s gentleness, her mother’s stern care, Scarlett and Mabel, all of them living and fierce.

The thought of losing them all in one night made her chest seize.

Yet here sat this girl, straight-backed and even-voiced, speaking gratitude for the man who had swung the blade.

When Katie bustled in a few minutes later, cheer bright as ever, Skylar nearly leapt with relief at the interruption.

“Good mornin’, mistress healer!” Katie chirped, arms full of linens. “The bairn’s been waiting on ye. He asked twice already if ye’d come.”

Skylar nodded, gathering her satchel and steadying herself. She left Cora in the surgery and followed Katie to the solar.

“I see ye’ve found a new way to keep and call me by me airs instead of me name.”

Katie just scoffed as if the notion of continuing to actually call a lady by her first name was unfathomable.

Grayson was propped in his bed when she entered. His dark lashes lifted, but his smile faltered when he saw her instead of his father.

“Ye came back,” he whispered, voice thin.

“Aye,” Skylar said softly, kneeling at his side. She touched his wrist, his brow, listened to his lungs with her ear against his chest. The rattle lingered, faint but stubborn.

But what struck her more was the disappointed look in his eyes. It was clear that she was not the intended visitor. The boy wanted his father.

Katie filled the silence with gentle chatter, smoothing pillows, telling Skylar about the herbs that eased him a little, the foods he could keep down. Skylar listened with half an ear, her heart tugging painfully at the boy’s faint sighs.

Zander’s absence was a shadow over the room.

So, Skylar busied herself with getting to work.

The council was already snapping at one another’s throats before Zander took his seat. As expected, Skylar’s presence at Strathcairn Keep was the bone they couldn’t stop gnawing.

“She’s a MacLennan ,” Fergus barked, fist striking the table. “And ye let her write to them? We might as well start getting the guard ready for an attack presently!”

Tamas chimed in, his voice sharp. “It’s nae just her presence. It’s the manner of it. Kidnapping, me Laird. Word spreads fast. If they send men demanding her back —”

Zander held up one hand, his gaze cool enough to still the squabble. “Then they’ll be answered. Until then, I’ll hear nay more argument.”

They muttered, shifting uneasily. He let them. Better they waste their energy on whispers than stand against him. Still, he could feel the tension crawling up his spine, the old fury sparking at the thought of anyone daring to tell him what he could and couldn’t do when it came to Grayson.

So, he did what any laird with sense would. He turned the talk.

“The Kirn is in a fortnight,” Zander said, voice cutting through the room.

“If ye’ve enough breath to complain, ye’ve enough to plan.

I want the outer yard swept, the stalls cleared, and the grain blessed without mishap.

Mason will oversee the ale stores, and Fergus, ye’ll see the cattle are fattened before slaughter.

Speak of healers again, and I’ll have ye sing the harvest songs yerselves.

Who will help ready the keep and who will take to the villages? ”

That, at least, shifted their scowls to grins. The Kirn meant food, music, ale. Celebration. Even the most stubborn of his men knew better than to waste the laird’s patience when such things were at stake. By the time the meeting broke, the air was lighter.

Zander left the hall with a plan, but it was well past sunset. With his jaw tight, but his temper checked, he rounded the corridor purposefully.

It didn’t last.

Across the corridor, he caught sight of her. Her hair braided neatly, skirts brushing the stones, her satchel clutched against her hip. Katie walked beside her, voice bright and cheery as ever, leading her back to her chamber.

A cage, he thought grimly. No matter how softly lined, a cage was still a cage.

“Katie,” he said, striding toward them.

The maid startled slightly and dipped her head. “Aye, me Laird?”

“Go back to Grayson,” Zander ordered, his tone leaving no room for discussion.

Katie hesitated only long enough to glance at Skylar, then bobbed and hurried off, her steps quick as a bird’s.

That left him alone with the lass, and her expression was already sharpening into a glare. “Do ye always dismiss women like that?”

Zander ignored her barb. “Walk with me.”

She blinked, then narrowed her eyes. “What if I say nay?”

“Then I’ll walk, and ye’ll follow,” he said simply, starting down the corridor. He didn’t look back, but her boots clicked reluctantly after his.

They moved through a side passage where torchlight flickered low, shadows stretching long across the walls. Zander waited until the quiet settled around them before he spoke.

“How does he fare?”

Skylar faltered mid-step, turning her head sharply toward him. “Grayson?”

“Aye. Who else?” Zander asked, his jaw tightening on the words. “What do ye see in him? What do ye think?”

She stared at him, clearly startled.

Shite.

He had let his armor crack. Showing her the desperate father-side of him that he kept hidden.

Her lips parted, then pressed tight. Finally, she said, “I havenae found much yet. His pulse runs quick, his chest labors, but there’s nay sign of a lingering fever or infection. It’s… elusive.”

Her voice dipped, frustration edging every word. “I hate elusive.”

Zander studied her profile. The way her brow knit together as she thought of the right words to say, the fire in her eyes anytime they flashed up to meet his, the tension in the corners of her mouth.

She wasn’t indifferent. The weight of not knowing gnawed at her as well. And oddly, that eased something in him.

“Ye’ll find it,” he said firmly.

Her gaze snapped back up to him, startled again, then softened. But then she turned away, lips pressed in a stubborn line.

He asked the next question before she could retreat too far. “How does a lass come to be spoken of across Scotland for her healing? What made ye this way?”

Her shoulders stiffened. “That’s a story I’ve nay wish to share with the likes of ye.”

The walls were back, high and riddled with thorns. Zander almost pressed further, but he caught himself. She was still pacing in a cage. Pressing her now would only tighten the bars.

Fine then. Stubborn as a damned mule.

Silence stretched between them as they walked. The flicker of torches marked their steps until they reached the corridor that led to her chamber.

He stopped outside her door, turning to face her. She looked at him warily, her arms crossing as if to shield herself from whatever he might demand next.

“Ye’ll keep at it,” he said quietly. “Ye’ll nae stop until ye ken what weakens him. That’s all I ask.”

Her chin lifted high. “I never stop until I ken. Nae for ye . Nae for anyone but Grayson.”

A muscle ticked in his jaw. He wanted to argue, wanted to tell her that whatever reason she gave, it still meant she was his son’s only chance. Instead, he inclined his head.

“Good,” he said. “Rest now. Tomorrow, Cora will show ye more of what we have outside these walls.”

He reached for the door, opened it, and gestured her inside.

She hesitated, glaring at him one last time before sweeping past. The scent of her hair brushed him as she passed, faint rosemary and smoke.

Zander shut the door firmly behind her, locking the heat of her presence out of the hall. But it lingered all the same, tightening in his chest as he turned away.