"Her name," he said. His voice came out rough. He had not intended that. "Does it say her name?"
The maid shook her head, her chin trembling. "Nae in the note, me Laird. Only that she's to be kept safe."
Fergus looked at the child. She was red-faced and furious, completely unaware that the two people standing over her had no idea what they were doing. Her fists were clenched against the rough, undyed cloth of her wrapping, and her whole body was stiff with the effort of her protest. He guessed she was around six or seven months old, though he had no solid basis for this estimate. He knew very little about babies, having carefully arranged his life to keep it that way.
"Where is Mrs. O'Halloran?" he asked.
"I've sent for her, me Laird. She'll be?—"
"Get her. Now. And stop cryin', lass, it willnae help anyone."
The maid nodded, tearfully, and held out the bairn.
Fergus looked at his own hands. They were the hands of a man who had spent thirty years causing damage with them. They were large enough that the bairn's entire head would fit in onepalm, and he did not know if that was useful information or just a disturbing one.
"Me Laird," the maid said, still holding the bairn out. "I cannae fetch Mrs. O'Halloran and hold the bairn at the same time."
This was factually correct.
Fergus took the bairn.
He held her as if she were something he was afraid of breaking, which meant poorly, with both arms and too much stiffness, lacking any natural sense of her. The bairn sensed the change immediately. The screaming briefly intensified, reached a pitch that Fergus was fairly sure could shatter glass, and then, without warning, stopped.
She looked at him.
She had stopped crying with the sudden finality of someone who was distracted by something more interesting. Her eyes, which were very dark and very large for such a small face, traveled over his face with the honest, unfiltered curiosity of a creature that had not yet learned to hide its interest. Whatever she found in his face seemed to meet some initial expectation. Her brow relaxed, just slightly.
Fergus did not move. He was afraid that if he moved, the screaming would resume, and he would have to think about what to do about it.
By the time Mrs. O'Halloran arrived, he was still standing in the corridor in the gray morning light, holding the bairn with careful stillness.
The housekeeper took in the scene without showing any surprise. She was a sixty-year-old woman with the posture of someone half her age and the eyes of someone who had seen everything a Highland castle could offer and had stored it all away calmly. She looked at the parchment he still held in one hand.
"The Calloways," she said.
"Aye."
She bowed her head briefly, her lips moving in a silent prayer. Then she straightened. "I'll take her, me Laird."
"Good." Fergus held out the bairn.
Mrs. O'Halloran handled her with the skill of a woman who had rocked a thousand babies, settled her on one shoulder, and looked at Fergus with an expression that had not yet reached the difficult part of the conversation but was clearly on its way there.
"I'll need to speak with ye," she said. "About what's to be done."
"I've told ye what's to be done. Care for her. Find her a nurse. Use whatever resources are needed."
"Me Laird." Mrs. O'Halloran's voice was patient in the specific way of women who were being patient because the alternative would be impolite. "We have four maids and a cook and a kitchen girl, Maisie, who is currently cryin' in the corridor because she's sixteen and has never seen a bairn left at a door before. We have half the linen we need, none of the specific things a bairn of this age requires, and the nearest woman who is nursin' her own bairn lives two hours' ride south. I can stretch what we have, and I will, because that is what I do. But I want ye to understand what stretchin' it means."
Fergus looked at her in question.
"It means Maisie willnae sleep," Mrs. O'Halloran continued. "It means the kitchen runs short-handed. It means we manage, me Laird, but only barely, and only for so long."
"Then say plainly what ye're sayin'," Fergus said. "Ye've never had trouble with plain speakin' before."
"This castle needs a mistress," Mrs. O'Halloran said. "It needed one before today. Today it is simply more obvious."
Fergus examined the parchment in his hand. He folded it once, then again, and slipped it into his pocket.
