Page 114 of The Speed of Lightning
Justice from his fangs is meted
Place of honor the Wolfhound seated
Legend whispered on the wind.”
Stunned, Calum gripped the table, chest bursting with love, feeling as if he had just been enshrined in the halls of legend. Even if he never regained his clan, to Freya he would always be chieftain—and that was all he would ever need. She was the one he had loved since first holding her, the one he thought of each night before sleep. His treasure. The fairest woman to walk the Isles. With her words she could stir kingdoms, with her voice she could call him back from death, with her kiss she could calm the tempests in his soul.
The crowd burst into applause, and she nodded, offering the Juran salute. Laird Tioram rose, weaving through the crowd to settle beside Hector.
He was whispering something, gesturing to Freya, his face creased with inquisition. Calum leaned toward Birdy.
“What is he saying?”
Birdy’s brows drew together as she read his lips, a flicker of worry crossing her face.He is asking Hector where John Mór has found her.
Calum’s eyes kept drifting to Freya as she introduced herself to the audience, her voice smooth but her hands slightly trembling. A subtle tension in her shoulders, the tight line of her jaw—something was off. He noticed the faint pallor to her cheeks, a hint of sweat along her temple, the way her eyes darted to Hector.
Laird Tioram is saying she is the exact image of someone he knows.Birdy signed quietly, concern etched in every gesture.
Straightening, Calum motioned to Angus across the room. Angus’s eyes followed Laird Tioram and then Freya, as he skirted along the edge of the wall, ready to intervene.
Birdy’s face softened slightly.It’s all right. He’s mistaken her for someone else—someone from the MacRuari clan.
Downy flakes prancedupon the night breeze, turning slow revolutions through the air before clinging to Freya’s dark lashes as they made their way back to Moor Leathann cottage. His ink-stained fingers wrapped around her delicate warmth, the touch sending a quiet heat through his body that no winter’s chill could dim.
She had been magnificent. In that great hall, she had held the mighty MacDonald clan in the palm of her hand. She had read the room as only she could—choosing not fire or fury, but gentleness, supplication, a weaving of beauty that left even hardened men spellbound. The evening had been a tapestry of song, tale, and dance… until the end, when her voice lifted in the ballad of Bonnie Morven. By the trick of echoed voice she had cast it as flawlessly as she had the tale of the Wolfhound.
And now she walked at his side, this fae-born creature of the crystalline north, snow and starlight clinging to her as though she belonged to them.
Something else clung to her still, like the snowflakes that swirled in the night air, and he wished with all his heart he had been born as deft of thought as Angus, or as deft of tongue as Léo, so he could determine what it was that weighed on her.
“It is a relief to be away from home tonight,” he said softly. “To walk with you without worrying who might be watching.”
At that, she paled, though he could not fathom why.
“Aye,” she murmured, eyes lowered.
Silence closed around them again, and he tried once more. “I’ve never had you all to myself.”
At this she looked up, uncertain. “You have me to yourself each night.”
He shook his head. “Not in courtship like this. When I first went to Mull, I would think of what might have been, had you sailed away with me. I would imagine you at my side, your hand in mine… your heart learning to belong to me.”
She stilled, looking up at him, suspicion glinting over her features. “You only say that to be kind.”
Her words pierced him, and he stared at her in astonishment, a sting catching in his chest. “I assure you, I’m no’.”
She turned away, her voice dropping. “You needn’t pretend things were different then. I know what I was. I know how my father railed against yours, at every chance. How could you ever have wanted me?”
He caught her chin, turning her face toward his. “Because I asked you to accept me on the skiff, and you did.”
Confusion swept over her features. “Aye, I remember…I meant I accepted everything you were—the man you were becoming. There was nothing in you I wished to change. I was only answering your question.”
The words struck him like a blow. For more than ten years he had believed she was accepting him as her husband. That hope had carried him through exile, through battle, through every lonely night. But now…heat tightened his throat. She had meant something else entirely. She had been answering a different question. All these years, he had been wrong.
“I wasnae asking if you accepted the man I was.”
She blinked. “What were you asking?”
