He glanced down at the papers in front of him, awaiting his responses and signatures, and documents that he was having trouble bringing himself to care about. He needed to schedule time to listen to the plights of his people and do his duties.
With a heavy sigh, he reached for the glass of wine on the corner of his desk and drank deeply.
The light knock at the door was almost a welcome distraction.
“Enter,” he called.
The door creaked open, his sister almost hesitant to come into his space.
“Yer wife has arrived,” Freya announced, instead of a greeting.
“Betrothed,” Kaden corrected.
“For only a few more days.” Freya sighed and closed the door behind her. “Daenae tell me that the termwifestill bothers ye.”
“Given that I was the one who proposed marriage to her, I would assume it is safe to say nay.” Kaden started pushing some of the items on his desk around, as if he had been busy doing a lot more than what he had actually been doing.
“Oh, is that what ye would assume?” Freya moved to sit on the worn, padded bench that had to have been in there for longer than he had been alive. She crossed her legs at the ankles and leveled him with a look.
“Ye wanted me to take a wife, and now I will. Daenae tell me that ye’re changing yer mind now,” Kaden huffed.
“Ye have to ken it wasnae so simple as just plucking a lass from a line-up, Braither.”
“Then why daenae ye tell me what it is, because I remember sitting in a council meeting, being told that if I daenae pick a wife, they would attempt to strip me of me title,” Kaden said flatly. He knew that the words came out colder than he would have otherwise intended, but the whole situation was wrong. “What choice did I have if I daenae wish to give up father’s lands and everything that he worked for? What was the point of my—” He broke off, the painful ball of emotion knotting in his throat.
Not something that he would discuss with anyone, let alone his sister.
What was the point of his suffering, of his father’s death—of all of it—if it wasn’t so that he could overcome and take up themantle of Laird? What was the point of enduring all of that torture, of fighting his way to freedom?
“Kaden… ye can talk about it, ye ken?” Freya coaxed, but he couldn’t look at her. The uncomfortable weight in the air between them made her quickly change the subject. “The point of taking a wife was so that ye could have somebody, so that ye wouldnae be so alone all the time…”
“I have nay issue with being alone.”
“Ye ken a laird needs an heir. Even if they didnae strip ye of yer title now, it would still leave our family.”
“Ye and Skye could just as easily have sons that could take me place.”
“Is that what ye truly wanted?” Freya asked.
Though he had never said it out loud or had the conversation, Kaden couldn’t truly picture himself as a father. So many years of his life had been spent unsure if he was going to live to see the next day, let alone plan for a future or anything that was going to happen. He just wanted to do his duties as Laird. He didn’t need all the politics.
“As ye said, I need an heir.” He waved his hand in her direction to imply that she was welcome to take whatever conclusion or meaning that she chose.
“So, this is just a farce, then?”
Kaden’s eyebrow rose. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. What did that matter? It was an arrangement, no different than it would have been had his mother picked Emily or anyone else.
“I cannae imagine that the council would approve of that.”
“Ye daenae need to worry yerself about what the council would or wouldnae like, Sister.”
“Yearegoing to marry her, are ye nae?”
“Of course I am,” Kaden said, his voice growing sharper with irritation at her interrogation.
“Because if the council thinks that ye are trying to trick them, Kaden, then they very well might?—”
Kaden muttered something not meant for a lady’s ears under his breath before looking back at her. “It is none of yer business. I have upheld me end of the bargain and kept me word. Nothing of this should concern ye. Me business is between meself and me soon-to-be wife. That is all.”
