Page 85 of Here in Your Arms
He’d left within minutes of receiving Emmy’s message.
As Dunmara came into view, Tiernan pushed his horse to a brutal pace, barely slowing as he crossed beneath the gatehouse. He rode straight through and was already dismounting before there came the startled shout of a guard who only just began to announce his name. He hit the ground hard, boots thudding against damp earth, while his men arrived and crowded the bailey behind him.
The great hall doors stood open and within, Brody stood near the head table, several of his men gathered loosely around him, the remnants of a morning meal pushed to the edges of the table. Maps and scraps of parchment littered the center, weighed downwith cups and a dagger half-buried in a hunk of bread. Emmy was there too, worry etched into every line of her face, worry that seemed only minimally lessened by his arrival. She was seated at the table, small and anxious in the midst of Brody and his stalwart men, but she rose to her feet when she saw Tiernan.
He marched straight to the table, the sound of his boots echoing sharply against the stone floor.
“Have ye found her?” he demanded with steel in his voice, not bothering with a greeting.
Brody looked up, clearly surprised. “Tiernan. What—?” He stopped himself, his gaze flicking to his wife, sharp and accusatory.
Emmy lifted her chin and stared down her husband. Clearly, she’d not told her husband that she had notified Tiernan of Rose’s disappearance. “More eyes and people searching can only help.”
Tiernan had the distinct impression that he was not only an extra body, but that Emmy knew the he cared, and that there wasn’t a power in this world or the next that would stop him from finding her.
“What the hell happened?” Tiernan’s voice was low and tight, all control and no patience.
“She was last seen two days ago,” Brody began, removing his gaze from his wife. “Walking past the lower fields. Alice saw her from the stillroom window.”
“Alone?” Tiernan asked.
“Aye, at that moment,” Brody answered. “But then another saw her talking to someone in the fields, a young woman, but nae can say who she is, that other lass.”
“What’s been done?” His voice cracked out like a whip.
“We’ve been searching,” Brody said tersely. “Every field, every wood trail within two miles. She didn’t say anything toanyone about leaving. Her clothes are still in her chamber. This was nae...deliberate.”
Tiernan cursed under his breath, his eyes dragging over the table strewn with maps of Dunmara, meaningless scraps. “And ye’ve had riders out?”
“Aye, since first light today, south and east. And we’re aiming to go now, north and west again.”
“She didn’t leave of her own accord,” Emmy said quietly. “Unless...Tiernan, might she have been going to Druimlach?”
“Nae,” Tiernan replied, his voice dark, threaded with certainty. “She was nae coming to me.”
Emmy’s eyes filled, a single tear slipping down her cheek as she returned his gaze. “Then she might be... gone.”
His jaw tightened. “Gone?” he growled. “Meaning what?”
She hesitated, clearly torn, her hand lifting in a helpless, open gesture. “I mean... gone back. To where she came from—as I once did.”
Tiernan stared at her, his chest tightening. He understood what she was suggesting, and the weight of it landed hard. He hadn’t believed the stories—the impossible talk of time bending and people slipping through it—but the look on Emmy’s face gave him pause. Whether it was true or not almost didn’t matter.Shebelieved it. And the fear carved into her expression suggested that, if she was right, Rose wasn’t just missing, she was beyond reach. Beyond his reach, at least. There would be no finding her, not by any means he possessed.
Tiernan refused to surrender. “I want everyone questioned. Every villager, every merchant, even the bairns. Someone must have seen her. And let’s ride. Now. There must be some trace of her.”
He pivoted on his heel and left the hall. There was no time to waste. Rose had been missing for two days—toolong—and Emmy’s knowledge suggested this was no ordinary disappearance, but possibly something unnatural.
But until he knew that for sure, he would tear Scotland apart to find her.
He only prayed to God she was stillinScotland, still inthis time.
***
Maella sat cross-legged in the tall grass just beyond the edge of the forest, chewing absently on the end of a stem of wood sorrel, her knees bouncing, fingers twitching in her lap. She’d screwed up. Badly. Not the kind of mistake where you forget to boil the lavender before adding it to a salve, but the kind that fractures fates. The kind that bends the lines of the world where they were never meant to curve. This wasn’t a botched spell or a clumsy incantation. This was real. Dangerous. The kind of mistake that could unmake someone’s life.
She hadn’t meant to move Rose.
Truly, she hadn’t. She liked Rose. Liked her spirit, her stormy eyes, her too-honest way of speaking. There was something about her that glowed brighter than the rest of the dull humans around here, like she vibrated slightly out of phase with this century and even the one she’d come from, and Maella, for all her inexperience, hadfeltit. It had made her curious, but dangerously so.
