Nay, Màiri was determined to see him now. Without a chaperone.
“If your father learns of it . . .”
Màiri leaned forward and kissed the maid on her wrinkled cheek.
Alana frowned. “As if I could not ask Muir to make burrebrede myself,” she muttered.
Knowing it had been a weak plan all along, she wrinkled her nose. “You know I’d never do anything untoward.”
Alana had a way of chastening Màiri with a mere gesture, and she did so now. A slight widening of her eyes reminded Màiri ofthatsummer.
“’Twas one kiss. And I told you straightaway.”
“One kiss”—Alana adjusted her cap—“with a man who will ne’er be yer husband.”
The expression on her face stung more than the words. She clearly meant what she said. She did not believe Màiri’s father would ever allow them to marry.
“Do not look at me so. You know it well, my lady. And you also know what your father would think if he were ever to find out.”
Màiri refrained from chastising her for the formal address. She had spent as many years as she could speak asking Alana to use her given name. She was no maid. In all ways but one, this woman was her mother.
And yet, as in most things, Alana sided with Màiri’s stubborn father. If he decided it was in their clan’s best interest to build ships and sail his entire clan into the North Sea, Alana would think it the wisest plan any laird had ever devised.
“I know my father wishes it not to be so,” Màiri said softly, looking away. “But perhaps he will change his mind.”
She didn’t need Alana’s look of skepticism to know her words rang hollow.
“Go. Be quick about it before your father learns of his presence. He shouldn’t be here.”
Màiri didn’t need to be told twice. She ran from her bedchamber through the halls of the castle where she’d been raised. Although she hadn’t asked Alana, she knew where Ambrose would be: the solar belowstairs. It had been her mother’s preferred place, and her father still avoided it so many years after her death.
Slowing her pace before approaching the open door, she took a moment to compose herself and then stepped inside.
With the winter winds howling outside, the largest window in the entire castle providing evidence that it was, indeed, snowing again, the fire Ambrose stood in front of roared. He was looking at the carved overmantel, the story of Adam and Eve etched into its stone.
“Ambrose?”
He turned, the familiar face of her childhood friend softening as he looked from her to the open door behind her.
“Alana?”
“Has agreed to give us a moment alone.”
Long dark-blond hair capped a slightly long but nevertheless handsome face. Once their friendship had been sanctioned by their fathers. But that had been many years ago, before the men had taken different sides in a fight Màiri wished to forget.
“My apologies for not coming sooner. My father . . .”
His voice trailed off as it always did when he spoke of Laird Dern.
“I’m pleased you came today,” she said honestly. With so few age-mates at Kinross, she’d always sought out Ambrose for company and conversation. He was also the one person who never, ever, stared at her cheek. It was as if he didn’t notice her mark at all.
She gestured to the bench on the other side of the sole wooden table in the room. He sat, and Màiri did the same. On the other side, of course. Though her father was still likely in the hall, where he spent much of his time during the day, it would not do well for them to sit on the same bench together.
Father Abernethy would have much to say about such an arrangement, particularly without a chaperone present.
“I spoke to my father about us,” Ambrose said.
The thudding in her chest had nothing to do with any uncertainty about taking Ambrose as her husband. She wanted that. More than anything. Had wanted it for nigh on a year now, ever since he first suggested it.
