“I’m sorry,” Jonah called after her, his face creasing with regret.
“Is it the heat that makes you so peevish, brother?” Esme enquired, liberally replenishing her goblet of wine from the pitcher.
“Steady with that,” Frida spoke up.
“I am not a child.” Esme took a long, pointed drink and plonked her bare feet onto the chair recently vacated by Mirrie. “In fact, I am near enough the age you were when you married Callum.”
Frida and Callum exchanged another dreamy-eyed smile, which had Tristan swinging up from the table to stride towards the large, mercifully empty fireplace. He half thought of walking after Mirrie, but for the first time he was unsure of what welcome he might receive from her.
It was not true that she always waited upon him.
Was it?
Tristan pursed his lips as he gazed unseeingly into the dark grate, one hand shading his eyes from the glare of the stubbornly bright evening sunlight pouring through the tall windows.
Mirrie possessed a kind and generous spirit. Surely that was the only reason why she so often brought him refreshments and enquired after his wellbeing. They had grown up so closely, with Mirrie as his father’s ward, raised alongside them, that it would have been stranger if shehadn’tbeen solicitous of him.
“Methinks the heat is making fools of us all,” Callum observed as he ushered his family away from the trestle table and towards the tapestried chairs spread out by the fireplace.“Let us sit more comfortably and remember that we are all friends here.”
“This year, at least.” Jonah shrugged his shoulders as he limped down from the dais, oblivious to—or mayhap even enjoying—the stifled gasps of the ladies.
“Why must you always be so awful?” Esme snatched Flora’s fan from her brother and swiped at him.
Tristan spoke up over the hubbub, his resonant voice easily carrying around the vast hall. “Callum and I have put all of that behind us now.” He raised his eyebrows questioningly at his brother-in-law, and received a firm nod in reply.
“Aye. What’s past is past,” Callum said, good-naturedly. He leaned with one hand against a stone pillar as he waited for the de Nevilles to promenade from the table.
For a moment, their gazes clashed across the room. Callum was dark while Tristan was fair, but both were equally matched for height and strength. To say nothing of their shared experience in feats of arms. As young men, they had trained together at Lindum. But then, five years earlier, whilst working in the service of Robert the Bruce, Sir Callum Baine, a warrior from the Scottish highlands, had received orders to assassinate Lord Tristan de Neville.
What no one could have anticipated was that this quest would bring Callum back to Tristan’s sister, Frida, who he had fallen headlong in love with years earlier.
Thus, Callum ne’er made any move on Tristan. However, when Tristan found him living at Ember Hall under false pretences, his retaliation had been swift and severe.
Tristan still felt a twinge of guilt at the memory of Callum, feet and hands bound, laying in a bloodied heap upon this very wooden floor.
He deliberately turned his gaze upwards, to the vaulted ceiling and smoke-blackened beams. They had all come a longway since then. In truth, Tristan couldn’t be happier with Frida’s match. Callum was a loyal husband and an attentive father. And his long past as a warrior of the highest calibre meant that Tristan could sleep easy without worrying of his sister’s wellbeing up here, in a fortified manor so close to the Scottish border.
Still, an awkwardness hung over the assembled party at the memories Jonah had so carelessly evoked. Even little Flora pouted, whilst the usually frivolous Esme had turned away from them all and was talking gently to a panting hound.
Tristan cast around for a change of subject, and landed back on the complaint that had been on his lips for nigh three days now.
“Will none of you support me against Father’s new dictates? E’en you, Callum? I would have thought you and Frida would be first to speak out in defence of love.” He rolled his eyes good-naturedly. “Are you not living proof of the theory that love conquers all?”
Callum guffawed before looking deferentially towards his wife. “I will not interfere in a family matter.” He put an arm on Frida’s waist to help her to a chair.
Like Jonah, Frida walked with a limp, although hers was due to a riding accident some years past rather than a defect at birth. Right now, she was further hampered by pregnancy, the swell of her belly visible beneath her deep blue gown.
Tristan felt for a moment the foolishness of raising his grievances in a busy household, to which he had just added the burden of responsibility for his high-spirited sister, Esme. But his ire could not be so easily dampened down.
“You are family,” he declared.
“And you are Father’s heir, the next Earl of Wolvesley,” Frida said, her voice surprisingly gentle. “He asks little of you, considering the import of your inheritance.”
“Little of me?” Tristan scuffed his boots on the polished floor, annoyance swirling in his veins. “Only a contract that perchance will last the rest of my days.” His pulse picked up speed as outrage took hold. “Only my freedom to live and love as I please. Only my heart and very soul.”
Frida’s expression passed through disappointment into scolding. She heaved Christopher into her arms, staggering slightly under his weight, and held out a hand towards Flora. “I see you are not to be reasoned with. I’m taking these two up to bed.”
Tristan knew he had spoken harshly and good manners demanded an apology, but he couldn’t seem to summon it. He took a deep breath and fixed his gaze on the tall window to the side of the fireplace. Beyond these walls, birdsong still filled the blue skies and he itched to be out there, striding over the rolling hills. A brisk walk would burn off this frustration.
