Page 86 of Hold Fast

“M’laird! The scouts have a report!”

He stiffened in her arms, all of his ease and good humor gone like the flame of snuffed candle. He shifted her off of his lap and stood, bending down to pull her to her feet.

“Come,” he said. “We must return. It isnae safe out here like this.”

“I dinnae want to go back just yet,” she protested.

“It wasnae a request, Una. Come. We’re going home.”

He was ordering her. Commanding her. She didn’t like it.

“Nae until you tell me what’s happening”

Ewan clenched his jaw and squeezed his eyes shut as he took a deep breath. “What is happening is that I told you it isnae safe out here. That is all you need to know. I can protect you, but only if you listen. Come, we can ride back to the keep together.”

He wasn’t going to give her a real answer. She could see that. And there was no use arguing with him because he’d only hoist her into his arms and carry her back if she protested too much.

She lifted her shin and strode past him. “I’ll walk.”

Greer followed close at her heels, the puppies gamboling behind her. She heard Calman and Ewan following after her, walking briskly until they had caught up. He took her hand in his. She was angry, and a very large part of her wanted to yank her hand away and storm off ahead, to stew in her anger and make him feel it. She didn’t like being kept in the dark, and heknewthat. Surely he had to know it. But the way he gripped her hand gave her pause. He held her hand as if he was clinging to the side of a boat in an angry sea, as if she was the only thing keeping him afloat. And so she wrapped her fingers around his and allowed it.

When they reached the courtyard, he drew her close, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her forehead gently before letting his hand drop to the swell of her belly.

“Una, I am asking you to trust me,” he said, his forehead resting against hers. “Please. There is naught that you need worry about. I will keep you safe. I swear it.”

She didn’t believe him. His eyes were too strained, his jaw too tight, his pulse too fast in his throat. But she nodded, knowing that he wouldn’t tell her then, no matter how much she protested. She climbed the steps to the keep, but before she disappeared inside, she looked into the bailey, where Ewan was listening to a report from a cluster of his men. Judging by the way his eyebrows had slammed together and his fists clenched at his side, there was much for her to worry about.

CHAPTER36

Months passed. More Cameron scouts had been seen too close for comfort and each time, Ewan’s men had not engaged. Not because they weren’t capable, but because Ewan believed that making Malcolm Cameron believe that he was complacent and unworried, open to attack, would encourage Cameron to take bolder action. The MacDonalds would be ready.

There were many preparations being quietly made, weapons and armor forged, increased training that took place now in the bailey instead of the grassy spread outside the wall, away from spying eyes. The men faced the looming threat with a grim determination that made Ewan proud at the same time it made panic a permanent fixture in his chest.

He was hardly sleeping now, not catching more than a few hours a night, though he had begun going to bed at more regular hours to appease Una. She did not believe him when he told her nothing was wrong. Why would she? If nothing was truly wrong, he wouldn’t have placed so many restrictions on the keep and its occupants, but especially Una.

He had mandated that she bring Joan or Cat with her wherever she went, and now they were to be accompanied at all times by at least three guards. No matter what. If she went to take a nap, the three guards waited outside. If she was tending a wounded MacDonald, the three guards would stand close at hand. If she attended a birth outside the keep, he sent ten men to surround the cottage.

His men followed her everywhere, not only for protection from Cameron, but also because his anxiety plagued him. All night, as he lay next to her sleeping body, he battled visions of her falling down the stairs or meeting some other dreadful harm. Earlier that day, he’d forbidden her from going to the stables. She hadn’t ridden in months, but she liked to visit Calman and the other horses and bring them apples and carrots. But he’d had a dream of her being kicked by a horse and had been nearly sick in the bed upon waking. Enough danger lurked outside his control; he would mitigate whatever threats he could within his sphere.

He knew that he should tell her about Cameron’s scouts. But the last thing he wanted to do was frighten her. Because she didn’t have to worry. He would protect her. With his dying breath, he would protect her. And so long as she continued to follow his rules, she would be safe.

But it had been months of balancing Una’s growing frustration with Cameron’s continued threat. Ewan felt the tension rising around him, like the sparking heaviness in the air just before a summer storm. Something would happen soon.

As autumn began, he began to feel as if he would snap. Every groan, every sharp intake of breath, every contortion of Una’s face as she learned to navigate her new body made him jump to attention. She was more ungainly than she’d been, which made sense, as her belly was big enough to make Fiona speculate that she was carrying twins.

“All women carrying at this stage are clumsy,” Fiona had reassured him. “I couldnae keep hold of anything without dropping it when I neared birthing my bairns.”

She’d said it cheerfully, as if it were a simple fact, easily shrugged off. As if the thought of Una tripping or losing her balance and falling down the stairs wasn’t enough to send him spiraling. And so he also ordered two servants to follow her in addition to the guards and Joan, to ensure that she did not fall.

He knew she resented it, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself. They had fought daily. Una was as mad as a cat in a sack, and he couldn’t blame her.

It was a blustery day, and Ewan had missed supper in the Great Hall because he’d been called to settle a dispute between two neighbors in the village over who had rights to the litter of piglets that had been born late, as one owned the sow and one owned the sire. He was bone-weary and irritable as he entered the keep. A guard named John met him at the door and took his cloak.

“Tell Fiona I’ll be taking supper in my chamber,” he said, his tone far sharper than he intended.

“M’laird,” the man said, “I am to tell you that my lady has already ordered you a supper and that it is waiting upstairs.”

Ewan nodded his head. “You have my thanks, John.”