Page 16 of The Hawk Laird
“I know,” she whispered. But she did not want to watch her home burn before her eyes.
“You can return later,” Geordie said. “Repairs can be made. The stone will not burn, just the thatch and the wood, enough to keep the Southrons from taking the castle.”
“I know.” Tears stung her eyes.
Fiery patches blazed on the thatched roofs of several buildings now. An apple tree in the orchard near the small stone chapel began to burn, its branches bedecked in glowing necklaces. When flames ran along the gate to the garden, Isobel caught back a sob.
“We must leave, my lady.” Geordie put an arm around her shoulders and tugged. “Come, Lady Isobel. Jamie wants you down in the bailey. He means for us to escape now.”
She allowed Geordie to lead her to the stairs. Searing pain shot through her arm and her ankle, and she put an arm around his waist as he helped her down the steps.
As they emerged from the keep and stepped into the bailey, Isobel stood still, staring at the awful beauty of the raging fire. Sparks flew around her like stars. The bailey was full of hot, brilliant light. She moved toward the garden, pausing some distance from the blazing gate.
She felt a hand on her arm. “Lady Isobel. Come away.”
That quiet voice was already familiar, like the voice of a friend. But he could not be a friend to do this so thoroughly, denying her the chance to bid her home farewell.
“Leave me be.” She shook off his hand.
James Lindsay’s face was lean and hard in the golden light. “Come away,” he said firmly, reaching out again.
“Nay.” She limped forward, despite the pain in her foot, despite the danger. The garden had been the heart of Aberlady; her mother had designed it years ago. Memories and need drew her there. She moved toward the gate that now gaped wide, its wooden struts flaming.
Chapter Five
The girl glidedthrough the blazing gate like an angel crossing the threshold of hell. James strode after her. “Are you mad?” he called. “Come away from there!”
She ignored him, limping along the path, her head and shoulders held proud. James knew that it must cost her considerable pain to advance like that. He followed her.
Flames lingered on the gate, and a few vines blazed nearby, but so far, the fire had touched a small part of the garden. Striding along the path after Isobel, James saw the careful arrangement of paths and plant beds—but he also noticed the garden had been ravaged even before the fire reached it. Stalks and vines were plucked clean; beds had been dug up and not replanted.
Isobel Seton went toward a side wall, where a wooden trellis sagged against the stone. Bare vines clung to it, empty of flowers but for a few ragged blossoms. James was close enough to overtake her in one or two strides, but he paused, ready to snatch her away from there if need be. Behind them, the gate and some dry vines crackled as they burned, and smoke and sparks drifted overhead. But the fire had not yet reached this corner.
A white rose clung to the highest part of the vine, a swirl of pale petals in the light of the fire and the moon. The girl stretched her hand upward to reach it.
James stepped forward and plucked the rose for her, laying it in her open hand. Despite the heavy odor of burning wood, he caught a drift of the rose’s delicate fragrance.
Isobel lifted the bloom to her face to breathe in its scent. “My mother treasured these roses,” she said. Her voice was soft and hoarse, and tears glistened in her eyes. James waited, expecting angry accusations from her. But she seemed calm as she ran a fingertip along the edge of the rose. “The garden was all that we had left of her,” she said.
“I am sorry,” he murmured. “I did not know.”
She gave a hollow, hoarse little laugh, surprising him. “The siege destroyed this garden before you set your fire.” She glanced around. “We stripped everything edible, even the flowers. This rose bloomed days ago. Eustace wanted me to add it to the soup, but I refused.” She gazed at the pale blossom, and her lower lip trembled.
She puzzled him, so gentle and sad when he had expected anger from her. But they did not have time to pluck roses, with a fire raging beyond, and a hundred English at the gates.
“Isobel, we must go,” he said, quiet but firm.
“You did not give me time to say farewell,” she murmured, “before you loosed that fire arrow. Let me have the chance now.”
James sighed and shoved his fingers through his hair in a gesture of regret. He had been quick to act on his decision to fire the castle; perhaps too quick, but they had little time to spare. He had not meant to cause her this sort of grief.
He remembered his own mother’s garden, a haven of scent and color that had provided hiding places for James and his older brother, and created pleasant memories. But it was gone now, burned, as this garden would be soon.
“When I was small, my father brought back the first of these rose bushes from a Crusade,” Isobel said. “He said my mother had sweet magic in her fingers for making roses.” She smiled.“The garden was always full of roses—white, pink, and red—from spring until fall. When she died, he buried her in our chapel, so that she could be near her roses, and us, always.” She pointed beyond the garden wall, where a small chapel roof jutted up, its clay tiles bright in the firelight. “Dear God, if the fire reaches the chapel—” she said.
“I have already told my men to soak the chapel roof with water to protect it,” he said. “I do not burn churches.”
She nodded. A tear pooled in her eye and hovered there.
