Page 14 of The Highland Laird’s Hellion Bride

He could smell it there, in the middle of his own courtyard.

He looked toward the hall doors. She was in there, navigating a world she did not know. Mrs. McAulay would be walking her through rooms he had paced ten thousand times, rooms he no longer truly saw because they had long since hardened into the routine shape of his days.

She would notice the draughts rattling the north corridor because the winter shutters had warped and he had not yet found a solution. She would inspect a Great Hall that smelled perpetually of woodsmoke and wet staghounds, and a kitchen that Mrs. O’Halloran ruled with a benevolent iron fist and a total lack of patience for outside opinions.

Elspeth possessed an elegance that did not wash off in the dirt. It lived in her spine, in the deliberate set of her hands. And this was his castle. His mud. His livestock. His rough Highlanders who considered a clean coat a grand occasion rather than a basic standard.

Capable.

Magnus stared at the doors for one final moment. Then he turned, strode across the dark courtyard to the kitchen garden, and began aggressively hauling the sheep out of the dirt. They went without their usual stubborn argument, and he chose not to look for any deeper meaning in their compliance. He slammed the wooden gate shut, latched it, and stood with his large hands gripping the frozen post.

He looked up at his castle. At the glowing windows, the grey smoke drifting from the stone chimneys, and the dark, massive bulk of the walls he had physically repaired with his blistered hands before he had men enough to command.

He had brought her here. He had taken her from her world and brought her to this wild, chaotic rock. She had looked at his home with wide, overwhelmed eyes and asked if his goats were happy. She had laughed at a chicken, her perfume was permanently bonded to his clothes, and his own men were already wagering on the day she would abandon him.

Magnus closed his eyes against the wind.

Perhaps I have made a fatal mistake.

Chapter Six

Woodsmoke and wet dog filled the Great Hall, beneath which lingered another, stranger scent. Elspeth could not immediately identify it, but she suspected it was goat.

Mrs. McAulay held her by the arm, already moving.

“As ye can see, we keep the fires banked through the night. The dogs settle better for it, and the Laird prefers the warmth when he comes down before dawn, which is every morning without fail. The man sleeps four hours if we’re lucky.”

She steered Elspeth expertly around a massive dog that was not asleep so much as occupying the corner with great intention. “Mind Brochan, he’s deaf in one ear and willnae hear ye coming. Best to step wide.”

Elspeth stepped wide. Brochan did not stir.

The hall was vast and stone-vaulted, and it would have been deeply impressive if not for the evidence of daily life distributed across every single surface.

A bridle hung haphazardly from a chair back, a stack of ledgers sat on the end of the long table beside what appeared to be someone’s abandoned leather boot, and three separate hounds lay in various stages of horizontal repose. A goat had relocated from the doorway to a spot directly beside the central hearth.

“Is the goat always there?” Elspeth asked.

“Aye, she’s always there. That’s Morag. The Laird tried to move her to the stables twice in autumn, and each time she was back by morning. Third time she knocked the stable door clean off its hinges,” Mrs. McAulay said, her voice rich with fondness. “We daenae try anymore.”

“That seems…” Elspeth watched Morag settle her chin more firmly on the warm hearthstone. “Reasonable.”

“Through here.” Mrs. McAulay drew her through a low archway into a corridor that was slightly better organized than the hall, meaning the items along its walls had been placed there with at least some structural intention.

Heavy wooden pegs held cloaks, rope, and what appeared to be a very large net whose purpose Elspeth decided not to pursue.

“The kitchens are below; Mrs. O’Halloran runs them. She’s been here for twenty years. She’ll feed ye whatever ye ask, and she’ll also tell ye whether what ye’re asking for is worth eating, whether ye want that opinion or nae. Best to want it. She’s usually right.”

“I’ll remember that.”

“The stores are through the kitchen. The Laird checks them himself every Thursday; he kens every number without writing them down. I’ve seen him catch a half-sack discrepancy in barley from forty feet away.” Mrs. McAulay shook her head fondly. “Mind of a trap, that man.”

They came out into a low-ceilinged room that served, as far as Elspeth could tell, for three separate functions: a secondary sitting room, a place to store winter equipment, and apparently somewhere to dry herbs. The plants hung in thick bundles from the dark beams, filling the damp air with something between a garden and a physic.

She liked it instantly, and felt a vague, defensive wave of guilt about that.

“The solar is above.” Mrs. McAulay was already moving toward the stairs. “The Lady’s room, technically speaking, though it’s been nobody’s for, well, long enough. The light’s good in the mornings. I’ve aired it twice this week on the chance…” She stopped, pressing her lips together before starting again. “I hoped he might bring someone home this time.” Her voice turned thick and wet at the edges again. “I lit candles in there Thursday.”

Elspeth looked at the back of the older woman’s head. “Ye kent he was going to the auction?”