Page 57 of A Highland Healer Captured
“The one that sits behind yer eyes when ye look at the boy.” Mason’s grin gentled, which was rare enough to count as weather. “Tell her what happened. The day ye lost yer wife. Nae the battle tale ye give in the hall. The bit ye never said where the room went quiet and ye thought ye’d break yer teeth holdin’ the shout in.”
Zander’s breath went thin and mean. “Och aye. Shall I also pull out me ribs and let her count them?”
“If ye fancy.” Mason slurped from his mug. “Or ye could stand there gruntin’ like a bull at a ditch and hope the lass guesses ye’ve a heart. Women like a tool for their work. Truth’s a fine one.”
A bark of laughter escaped Zander before he could throttle it. “Saints preserve me. When did ye become a wife-mother?”
“I listened to mine before she died,” Mason said simply. “Turns out women justtellye what they need. Men daenae hear it ‘cause they’re busy bein’ men. Men daenae listen to understand, we listen to reply and resolve.”
Zander looked away toward the wall-walk, where a guardsman pretended not to listen.The man has a point.
The wind had a bite, clean and bracin’. “If I tell her, it cannae be the tale for pity.”
“Oh aye, ye great lump.” Mason cuffed his arm. “For kinship. Ye show her the cut, so she kens where ye’re thin. She’s less likely to swing a blade there by accident.”
Zander’s hand went to the bandage on his knuckles, the sting of last night’s temper remindin’ him he wore skin like anyone else. “And the gift?”
Mason’s eyes went sly. “Give her a room.”
“A room.”
“Aye. Nae a cage. A door she has a key for. A place that’s hers—the stillroom off the surgery, the wee window. Put shelves where she points, hooks where she kens they should be. Lay a table strong enough for a bairn or a corpse, ‘cause healers need both.That says, ‘I see yer work and I’m nae afraid of it.’ That’s rarer than gold.”
He squinted.And asks her to stay…
“And buy the lass a decent knife,” Mason continued. “The wee bone-handled one in the stores is a sin.”
Zander pictured it—the stillroom emptied of junk, washed, limed, aired, fitted. The wall knocked a hand’s breadth to catch more morning. A lock she wore at her belt. A door he didn’t touch without knocking. The thought settled into him like a beam set right across stone. “Aye.”
“And the moon,” Mason added offhand, “if ye can nip out for it. Women like a bit of nonsense, too.”
“I’ll fetch ye a midge’s hat,” Zander said dryly, then sobered. “Keep a long eye on the lad.”
Mason’s mouth flattened. “Ye’ll nae have to ask. I’ll sit like a gargoyle on the roof if I must. Anyone touches a cup, I’ll ken whose hand it is.”
“Good.” Zander’s gaze lifted toward the inner arch, mind already leaping to the work. “I’ll go speak with the men about clearin’ the stillroom. We’ll gut it by noon. If Skylar wants a shelf higher or lower, she’ll cut me ears tellin’ me why.”
“That she will,” Mason agreed, chuckling.
Zander turned to go, then paused. The yard hummed with early clatter; a string of bunting tried once more to strangle a cart and got smacked for its trouble. Over it all he thought of a woman’s careful hands binding his bleeding knuckles, the way she’d saidtruth keeps children aliveas if it were a prayer and a law.
“A room…anda blade,” he said again, half to the air, to test the weight of it. “… and truth.”
Gratitude, aye.
Trust, maybe.
And the truth, brutal and clean, when he could shape it without flinging it like a weapon. He started toward the keep, pace lengthening. Behind him Mason called, “I’ll handle the rest of the fools!”
Zander lifted a hand and didn’t look back. Somewhere above, a rook cawed rude benediction.
19
Healers required outdoor hours for any number of reasons, and yet somehow, at Strathcairn, they’ve managed to curb even that need—thanks to Cora. Between her, Mason, and Katie, Skylar never had any reason to go outside.
It's ridiculous, really —she sighed to herself as she looked into the flames.
Her chest betrayed her, fluttering like a sparrow in a snare. Saints, it was only air she wanted. Only air. Still, when Zander’s knuckles rapped the surgery door that afternoon, and his voice came rough through the wood—“Come out with me today. Just us.”—her fingers stalled on the pestle as if he’d struck them still.
