The stool at the top of the first landing was on its side. Anthony stepped over it, his breath beginning to hitch in his chest.
A kitchen maid flattened herself against the wall as he passed. He nodded once. She stared. He saw her eyes go wide, her mouth dropping open as the Laird of the keep charged past her after a fox.
He did not slow down.
A flicker of red at the far end of the upper corridor, moving fast, low to the ground, the dispatch still clamped in its mouth like a prize. The fox's ears were back, its body a low, sleek line of focused intent.
The herb room door was ajar.
Anthony put his hand on it and pushed. The wood slammed against the interior wall with a loud, ringing crack.
Fox was already there, sitting beside Catriona's worktable with the dispatch in his mouth. Tail curled neatly around his paws,looking up at her with the expression of a creature delivering something important to the correct person.
Of course. Of course he'd brought it to her.
Catriona looked at the dispatch. Then at Fox. Then at Anthony in the doorway, one hand on the frame, breathing slightly harder than he intended.
Her eyes swept over him, noting the disarray with a slow, rising amusement. Mud from the courtyard still on his left boot, and a fine coating of plaster dust on his right shoulder from the service passage wall.
She pressed her lips together. A small, telltale dimple appeared at the corner of her mouth as she fought a smile.
"He has somethin' of mine," Anthony said. He tried to sound authoritative, but his voice was thin from the run.
"Aye." She looked at Fox. "Drop it." Her voice was soft, a calm contrast to Anthony's frantic arrival.
Fox set the dispatch down on the floor beside her feet with the care of an animal placing an offering at a shrine. He looked up at her. His tail moved once, a single sweep, a creature satisfied with his morning's work. The animal then looked toward Anthony, its eyes gleaming.
She picked up the dispatch, checked the seal, and it was intact. Turned it over, checked the other side, and held it out toward Anthony. Her fingers were steady, the pale skin of her hand catching the light from the brazier.
"He prefers important rooms," she said. She tilted her head, her gaze searching his. "And important documents, apparently."
Anthony crossed the room and took it. He looked at Fox. Fox looked at the worktable. His ears were forward. His expression was open, interested, entirely without guilt. Anthony felt the heat of embarrassment rising in his neck.
"He's a menace," Anthony said. “Daenae make me see him again.” He clutched the dispatch, his knuckles white.
"He's thorough." She turned back to the worktable. "Close the door on yer way out." She dismissed him with a casual flick of her hand, her focus already returning to her herbs.
"I wasnae leavin'." He stopped. He felt his feet root to the floor, the sudden quiet of the room wrapping around him.
Fergus appeared in the doorway behind him, red-faced, entertained, doing a poor job of concealing the second. Fergus's eyes were dancing, his mouth twitching behind his hand.
Catriona did not look up from whatever she was grinding. "Ye're lettin' the cold in," she said. The rhythmic scrape of the pestle filled the space. "Both of ye."
Fergus stepped inside. Anthony didn't move. The smell of the room—earthy, sharp, and strangely sweet—made Anthony's senses swirl.
He looked at the room. The worktable with its rows of jars and its worn pestle and the precise arrangement of everything that had been someone else's chaos before she'd reorganized it the first week. He saw the order she had brought to the mess, a quiet reflection of her own mind.
The small brazier with Fox now positioned directly in front of it. The narrow window with its two-finger gap letting in the thread of outside air she kept insisting on. The thread of cold air brushed against his heated skin, a sharp contrast to the warmth of the brazier.
The dispatch in his hand was a routine supply report from the southern farmstead. Three days' ride to steal and return it. He felt the absurdity of it all pressing down on him.
"This keep," Anthony said, his voice gaining its usual depth, "is nae a route for that animal to run dispatches through."
"Tell him that." She tilted her head toward Fox without looking up. "He's a good listener." She gave a small, dry chuckle that made Anthony's pulse quicken.
"He listens to nothin'." He stepped further into the room, his shadow stretching across her table.
"He listens to me." She looked up then, her green eyes bright and challenging.
