Page 74 of A Highland Healer Captured
Zander moved through it all with that particular ease he wore when the clan watched him and felt safe for it. He stopped for an old woman’s gossip, for a child’s tug and question, for a crofter’s worry about the weather—laying a hand, giving a word, setting the clumsy to rights with a nod. Skylar walked a pace behind at first, then beside, then forgot to be careful and let herself belong in the picture as people nodded to her with honest faces.
“Lady Skylar!” a girl called, running up with a posy of cornflowers and late daisies like a summer refusing sense. “For yer hair, miss—please?”
“Saints bless ye,” Skylar said, and bent so the lass could tuck the stems into the ribbon. “Ye’ve hands for plaits. The hedges’ll weep to lose ye.”
The girl giggled and went spinning back to the ring of dancers. Skylar felt the weight of Zander’s look and pretended not to, turned to the table where women sliced bannocks and argued the correct thickness as if treaties depended on it.
“Ye’ll eat,” one of them ordered, pressing a wedge into Skylar’s hand. “Ye’re half a ghost most days, runnin’ yon’ stairs. Get it down ye.”
“Aye,” Skylar said, obedient as a child, and bit. Butter, salt, heat—simple mercies, and she had not known she’d been starving for them.
A story circle formed near the lower wall; old men straightened spines and cleared throats, claiming the hour as if they’d wrestled it from younger hands. A narrow-shouldered fellow with a face like kindling began with a tale about a king who dressed as a beggar to test the hearts of his people; a bigger man interrupted to say the king had been a fool; the first conceded only what the piper’s tune would allow. Skylar found herself smiling until her cheeks ached.
And everywhere was Grayson’s name. Whispers at first, then open speculation.
The boy’s color’s back.
Did ye hear him laugh earlier?
Katie says the cough eased with the new draught.
Folk’s eyes flicked to Skylar with something like reverence and she shook it away when she could, took it when she must.
Near mid-day Zander’s voice carried above the hum. “Bring the sheaf.” He didn’t thunder. He didn’t need to. The yard arranged itself like a flock taking a curve in wind. A pair of lads carried the last sheaf bound tight and proud—tall barley and oats wreathed with late poppy, a crown of wheat braided clever by hands that loved work.
“Who’ll keep the luck this year?” an old wife called, cupping her mouth.
A dozen voices answered, and then more, and then, too many for Skylar’s peace, her own person rose up, “The healer! The lass who’s kept the laird’s boy alive!”
She stepped back, startled. Zander’s gaze found hers across the space—intense, but soft at the edges, like heat held in a stone. He did not look proud as a laird; he looked grateful as a man. That nearly unmade her.
“Nae, I—” she began, hands up.
“Oh, hush,” said a woman with good sense and stronger wrists, and set the wheat crown gently on Skylar’s head. “Ye’ll be our Harvest Queen, then. It’s a thank ye. Nay more, nay less.”
Laughter rippled because the crown slouched crooked over her braid; someone fixed it with two hairpins like sword strokes. Skylar laughed despite herself, cheeks hot, eyes prickling in a way she refused to name. A pipe trilled a flourish as if to seal the business. The circle tightened, faces open as doors in summer.
“Speech!” a boy demanded, drunk on cider and courage.
Skylar looked at Zander again because sense failed her. His mouth tipped. Not rescue, but permission. His features conveying so very clearly,Say what ye like, or say nothing. Ye owe nobody aught.
She swallowed and lifted her chin. “I’ve only gentle hands from me maither and me faither’s stubbornness,” she said, and the yard quieted a notch, surprised by the honesty. “Ye brought me both—work for me hands, a house that can bear a headstrong lass under its roof, and trust to care for the lad. If the lad’s on the men, then it iswewho mended him.We. All of us!”
A murmur, like fields nodding. Someone shouted “Aye!” and a cheer rolled.
“Now eat,” Skylar finished, practical as any cook, and set the crown askew on purpose.
They roared at that, pleased to be told to be themselves. The fiddlers struck up; the piper answered; Katie appeared at Skylar’s elbow with a cup and a look that meantI see ye, and I’ll scold ye later for forgetting to drink.Skylar sipped. Honeyed ale slid warm into her belly. Zander drifted near without making a scene of it.
“It suits ye,” he said low, eyeing the crown.
“It pinches,” she muttered.
“Then it’s honest,” he returned, and his glance flicked to her mouth as if he were memorizing what it did when she pretended not to be pleased.
The day unfolded like a generous cloth. Games were shouted into being—sack races that turned into tumbling, tug-o-war that turned into laughter, a stone-put that made all the young men attempt aching feats they’d pay for tomorrow.
Stories lengthened and deepened until listeners wept and would deny it. A tiny lad proudly held up the ugliest turnip anyone had ever coaxed from the earth and was cheered like a king. Girls wove little corn-dollies and tucked them in sleeves for luck. Katie taught Grayson’s favorite bird-call to a ring of children, trilling like a wren until even the shy ones tried it.
