Page 8 of A Land So Wide

T he gambit began with a whispered lie, caught and carried on the ever-howling wind.

There were once a boy and girl, close in age, closer even in acquaintance.

Their fathers shared ownership of the log mill, splitting sections of the business in two, as neat as a line drawn across a map.

Mackenzie oversaw the yard, the cutting and slicing, the grinding and seasoning.

McIntyre hunted the trees, venturing past the marked borders of town, felling the giants, and hauling them back with triumphant swagger.

The boy and girl grew up together. They were playmates and school chums, constant companions and friendly confidants. As they grew older, the boy even fancied he’d fallen in love. By the time they turned eighteen, the year of their Hunt, he was most certain of it.

The girl was not.

The girl had regarded the boy as a close friend, more family than romantic partner.

The girl, you see, had noticed another.

Like a rabbit caught in a poacher’s trap, John Beaufort, son of the blacksmith and a member of the town’s most reviled family, had become ensnared in her thoughts and heart.

The Beauforts had been pariahs in Mistaken since their patriarch, Resolution, had died, impaled upon the very tree he’d set out to harvest. They now lived along the eastern ridge of the cove, as far from town as the Warding Stones would permit.

But the girl, spotting the lanky lad in his father’s shop, had been filled with horrified delight when he, upon catching her open stare, brazenly winked her way.

Weeks later, on a lonely road, they chanced upon each other.

She was on her way to the mill, he on his way home.

He was smudged black from his day at the forge, sweat-stained and smelling of rank solder.

When he smiled at her, gallantly doffing his hat, the girl grinned back, her cheeks as pink as spring petals.

They met again on the road the next day.

And the day after that.

And the day after that, and the day after that, until one of them grew brave enough to suggest they meet in another location, at another time.

As the weeks passed, the pair snatched every stolen moment they could, dizzy with longing and young love.

The other boy knew nothing of it.

So, when the Hunt was finally upon them, when the girl’s pink cheeks had grown red, from the cold as much as from John Beaufort’s kisses, the boy begged for her chosen hiding spot. He, full of dreams bright and rosy, proclaimed himself to be the one who would catch her.

The girl, full of dreams of John Beaufort, leaned in and whispered the first lie she’d ever told.

Meet me at the hollowed tree in the north field, she murmured, her breath hot against his cheek, driving him nearly mad with want. I’ll be there, waiting .

The wind snatched those words and carried them away, past the Stones, past the cove, past all of Mistaken itself.

The morning of the Hunt dawned bright with promise.

The boy greeted the morn, his lips wet with anticipation.

He was ready. And when the Hunters took to the land, roaming and ravaging the bush, the bramble, searching for their prizes like dogs on the scent, Hessel Mackenzie ignored their boyish chuckles, ignored their loud mêlée, and raced instead to the north field.

The tree was a towering, barren shell of a Redcap.

Spotting a flutter of ribbon peeking from the monster’s center, he ran through the tall grasses with all his might.

He reached into the hollowed tree with confident, greedy hands.

His fingers clasped around the wrist of his prize, and he let out a whoop of triumph.

He’d done it. He’d claimed his bride.

But it was not his beloved whom he pulled free.

He stared in confusion at a girl with eyes as gray as an approaching storm, with hair dark as night. He stared at a girl who was not his Mary McIntyre, but a girl with scattered stars across one cheek.

He stared at her.

She stared at him.

And then she smiled.

And Hessel Mackenzie, the boy who should have had a heart most broken, took his bride in his arms and kissed her.