Page 13 of Owned by the Scarred Laird

She lay still for a moment, simply feeling that relief and letting the tension drain from her limbs without the need to perform for anyone. It was a brief, stolen moment of peace before the reality of her new life at Castle O’Brien rushed back in.

Then, she sat up.

The fire had burned down to ash overnight. The room was colder than when she fell asleep, and the cream gown felt thin against it. Her clothes from yesterday were gone, though she did not know when they disappeared, and her traveling bag was placed near the wall with a few belongings she had been allowed to bring.

She ignored the chest where the cream gown had emerged from and pulled out her best dress from Jenny’s household. She dressed quickly, pulling the simple seaweed-colored gown over her head and fastening the rope at her chest.

The room looked different in the morning. Larger, somehow. More like a room a laird would own, if she used Jenny and Thomas’s room to compare. She took it in properly for the first time: the heavy, dark wood, the tapestry along the far wall, the narrow window that looked out over the east courtyard, where two grooms were already moving between the stables below.

Her stomach released a deep rumble.

Her eyes went to the bell cord hanging near the door. The laird had used it last night. Dark rope, a brass fitting at the top, positioned at exactly the right height for a woman who had never once had to think about what she needed because someone had always been there to ask.

She crossed the room and stood in front of it.

It would take just one pull. Someone would come. That’s what it was there for. She knew this. She had responded to numerous summons using the same method before.

This is ridiculous.

She had spent fifteen years learning where the kitchens were in every house she had ever set foot in. She was not going to stand in a room and ring a bell, then wait to be brought things like a woman who had forgotten how to feed herself.

She found the shawl from last night, wrapped it around her shoulders, and opened the door.

The corridor was long and completely unfamiliar. She turned left because the light was better that way and moved quietly, listening for the sounds a kitchen made—the low thud of work, the smell of something warm, and the unique noise a household produced before it had fully woken up.

She had begun to walk confidently when the sound of someone clearing their throat caused her to stop. She turned.

“Me Lady.”

A young woman stood at the far end of the corridor, slightly out of breath, her cap slightly crooked. She could not have been more than twenty-five. Small and quick-looking, with large eyes that showed her alarm, even though she tried to keep a calm demeanor.

“Me Lady,” she said again, dropping into a curtsy that wobbled slightly at the bottom. “I am Melodie. I am yer maid. I am so sorry, I should have been there when ye woke. I checked the room, but… I hurried after ye.” She stopped herself. Steadied. “Ye shouldnae be in the corridor alone.”

Chloe blinked. “I was lookin’ for the kitchens.”

Something close to distress flickered across the girl’s face.

“Aye,” Melodie said carefully. “I can take ye. I will always take ye, me Lady, wherever ye need to go. That is what I am here for.” She hesitated, and then, as though she had decided honesty was the only path left to her, she added, “If the Laird were to see ye wanderin’ the corridors alone, he might think I wasnae doin’ me duties properly. And then he might…” She stopped again.

“Dismiss ye,” Chloe said.

Melodie’s hands found her apron and gripped it. She looked at the corridor once, then back at Chloe.

"Aye," she said, so quiet Chloe almost missed it. "It is possible, seeing as ye are the Lady now."

6

The guilt arrived immediately. This girl had done nothing wrong. She had simply woken to find her new lady already halfway down the corridor with no intention of waiting.

“I didnae think of that,” Chloe said. “I do apologize.”

Melodie looked up quickly, surprise written across her face.

“Ye daenae need to,” she stated quietly.

“I do,” Chloe affirmed. “It was thoughtless of me. I am nae accustomed to…” She stopped. It was not the right moment to explain what she was and was not accustomed to. “I will ring for ye in the mornin’. From now on.”

Melodie nodded, her relief visible enough that she did not bother to hide it. She straightened her cap with one quick, self-conscious movement, then gestured down the corridor.