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Kathryn turned immediately Lhilidh touched her shoulder and realised something was wrong the moment she saw her maid’s expression. The girl’s eyes were filled with unshed tears on the verge of spilling. “Lhilidh, lass, what is the matter?” Her thoughts immediately leapt to the dozens of strange men new to the Dun, Gavyn’s mercenaries. “Has someone hurt you, touched you?” She finished on a note of dread.
Head bowed, Lhilidh’s body curved toward her and her hands covered her face. Kathryn could see they were shaking. “No more, Lhilidh.” She stood and pulled Lhilidh into her arms, aware that Gavyn was watching when he swivelled around in the Laird’s carved chair.
His voice a low murmur that rode below the rising noise in the hall, he demanded, “What are the tears for?”
“My … Maw’s dead.” A shudder went through the slim body that Kathryn held, and her tears flowed in earnest. “I … I went to take her some supper from the feast and couldn’t wake her, then I realised she was dead. What can I do? I don’t ken what to do…”
“Hush now, Lhilidh, hush… We both knew this would happen one day soon,” she patted her back as she spoke, comforting Lhilidh as much as she was able in a room filled with warriors to whom death was hardly worth a second glance. “There was no way we could tell that it would happen today.” Much as she loved the lass, she knew that Geala’s death was but another of the problems that had piled upon her that day.
And mayhap it was the solution to one of them for a little while, a way to avoid the Chieftain’s bed, the Chieftain’s arms for one more night. “I’ll go with ye and see that she is washed and seen to afore she is buried.”
“No.”
Gavyn’s command was like a blow to her nerves. Had he realised her intent?
Her resolve to avoid him for another night?
“Someone else can take care of her mother, send some of the maids to help.”
Kathryn turned to her husband, eyes ablaze. “It is my duty. Geala has been ill and I have tended her every day. It’s only fitting I see her made ready.”
“Abelard can arrange it. As seneschal, he is in charge of the household.” Gavyn looked into her eyes, his gaze as fierce as the fire in her own, and she knew that no matter how much she protested it was her duty as lady of the hall, he would not be gainsaid.
“Abelard is an old man. His eyes aren’t as good as they once were, but he can order the maids to go with Lhilidh. I know someone who will accompany her and make sure all Geala’s needs are taken care of.”
Gavyn frowned, his black brows meeting in an arch above his eyes and his scar pulling in one corner. “It’s either bit late or a bit early for a priest.”
“Geala believed in the auld gods, so she wouldn’t thank you for a priest early or late.”
Abelard had already risen to stand beside her and Lhilidh, so she passed the lass over to him to give support then looked down to the end of the high board. “Nhaimeth,” she called with a wave of her hand, “come see to your sister.”
The irony wasn’t lost on Nhaimeth. Lhilidh wasn’t his sister, and Kathryn was ignorant of the truth. However, he’d known the young lass since she’d been born, so obeyed Kathryn’s summons and asked, “What’s wrong with her?”
“Geala’s dead, and someone with a bit of sense has to supervise the maids. Make sure they treat her kindly. Tomorrow we’ll find a dry, shady place to bury her. Until then, look after Lhilidh. She is grieving.”
The news came as a shock, and for once he didn’t ken how to feel. It wasn’t grief that curled in his innards, but an absence. Geala had been the only living person knowing the full and true circumstances of his birth. Not that it should matter, he was safer if folk had nae notion he was the eldest living Comlyn. Geala’s death still came as a shock, as if his existence was diminished by it. He had meant to visit the woman who had looked after him as a child. She had never loved him, but she had seen that he was clothed and fed, and Erik had supported her and the rest of her family because of that.
He took Lhilidh’s hand and led her toward the big doors, though because of the difference in their size it probably looked as though Lhilidh was leading him. “Where is she?”
“She’s still in her wee house, naught much has changed since you left. I found her on the floor, but I’m not strong enough to lift her,” she said, finishing on a sob.
The strength of her sorrow made him feel guilty. The only person he had ever mourned for was Astrid, but through her death, he had found Morag Farquhar and Rob—the first folk who treated him as if they didn’t notice his short legs and bent back, as if he was as normal as anyone else.
“I’ll lift her for ye. I’m stronger than I look since I gave up playing the Fool.”
“I had noticed that ye walk differently, as if ye were as much a warrior as yer friends.”
“We train together. The McArthur has taught me how to defend ma’self. I may be small but I’m wily.”
“I’m happy for ye, Nhaimeth, glad you went to Cragenlaw. It’s been the making of ye.”
“Ach, the truth of that is hard to deny, yet ye stayed here and have still done well—maid to the Lady of the Hall. It’s not a position to be sneezed at. Is she kind to ye?”
“Very. And to Maw as well. Only this morning we went down to take Maw something for the awfu’ pain she was in. Once it worked, she was quite chatty, telling ma lady Kathryn and me secrets. Did ye ken that Murdoch and Kathryn were half-brother and -sister.”
“No. That is a surprise, for Murdoch was big and bulky and Kathryn is but a strip of a lass.” His mind buzzed, what if he wasn’t as safe as he had thought. “Did she say anything about me?”
“Nae, she got too tired to finish her stories.” Lhilidh hiccupped. “We were going back in the morn and mayhap she would have told us about ye then. All she said was that you and me weren’t related.”
It would seem that the gods were on his side and his secret was safe with the few friends who knew the truth. Mayhap the Green Lady who had helped Morag Farquhar and been happy when they buried the afterbirth for Astrid’s bairn under a tree inside the Bailey at Cragenlaw. Aye, for once it would seem fate had been on his side, he thought, as he entered the wee stone building, just one dark room where Nhaimeth had been brought up while his sire lorded over the High Hall.