Page 55 of The Highlander's Runaway Nun
“God help me, but I could never raise a hand to a child. Never… but what if I daenae have a choice, if the blood makes me as cruel as he was?”
He sank onto a fallen log, burying his face in his hands. For all the strength and authority he showed as Laird, here he felt like a frightened boy again, cornered and uncertain.
The rustle of fabric caught his attention, and he lifted his head. A woman in a brown wool cloak was bending over a patch of damp earth, her basket half-filled with mushrooms and herbs.
“Eidith,” he muttered, recognizing her. The old healer straightened slowly, her sharp eyes settling on him.
“Aye, Laird McCormack,” she said, wiping her hands on her apron. “I thought it might be ye. Ye walk like a man with too many thoughts and nay peace to carry them.”
“Is that what I look like then?” he said.
She tilted her head, studying him. “Aye. The forest has a way of showin’ what’s inside a man. It listens to those who doesnae ken how to speak their worries out loud.”
He looked away toward the brook, his jaw tight. “And what if those worries are too dark to say aloud?”
Eidith stepped closer, her basket creaking softly in her hands. “Then ye whisper them to the wind, lad. Or ye bring them to me.”
Bradley’s brow furrowed. “Why would ye think I’d have somethin’ to bring to ye?”
A knowing smile curved her weathered lips. “Because I ken what troubles yer heart. The Lady Laura carries yer bairn.”
He flinched at the words, his jaw tightening. “Aye,” he said at last, his voice low. “And I daenae ken if I should be glad or terrified.”
Eidith crouched to pluck a mushroom, placing it carefully in her basket. “It’s both for most men worth their salt,” she said. “Ye think a poor faither frets? Nay, lad. It’s the good ones that do. It’s the ones who fear hurtin’ what they love that make the finest fathers.”
Bradley shook his head. “Ye ken me blood, Eidith. Me faither was a monster. He beat me, nearly broke me, and worse, he made me think I deserved it. That’s the man who raised me. How can I nae turn into him when that’s what I was born from?”
She looked him squarely in the eye. “Blood isnae destiny, Laird. Ye may carry his name, but ye daenae carry his soul. The choices ye make are what shape ye, not the sins of the man who sired ye.”
Bradley’s voice broke with the force of his emotion. “He tried to make me like him, Eidith! He said I’d grow cruel one day, that the McCormack line was cursed with it. What if he was right? What if I raise me hand one day without even thinkin’? I could never forgive meself if I…”
Eidith reached out and placed a hand over his clenched fist. “Stop that talk,” she said sharply. “Ye’re nae cursed. Ye’re haunted. There’s a difference.”
He looked at her in confusion. “Haunted?”
“Aye,” she said softly. “By the fear that he still controls ye, even from the grave. But listen to me, Laird McCormack, every man has a shadow, but the ones who see it are the ones who daenae become it. Ye fear what’s in yer blood, but that fear is proof enough that ye’ll never be like him.”
Bradley exhaled slowly, his shoulders sagging. “Ye make it sound so simple.”
Eidith chuckled. “It isnae simple, lad. It’s a lifetime’s work. But it’s work worth doing. Ye’ve been given a gift, a wife who loves ye, a bairn on the way, a clan that trusts ye. Daenae throw that away because of ghosts that cannae touch ye anymore.”
He stared down at the ground, her words sinking deep into him. “Ye think I was meant to be a faither?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
She smiled faintly. “I think it’s written in the stars, lad. Some are born to lead, some to heal, and some to build somethin’ better than what came before. Ye were born to break a cycle. To raise a child that’ll never ken the fear ye did. That’s what the McCormack name can mean from this moment on, if ye let it.”
Bradley’s throat tightened. He rose slowly from the log, the forest seeming somehow brighter now, less suffocating, more alive. “Ye ken, Eidith,” he said after a long pause, “ye’ve a way with words when the rest of the world feels mad.”
She smirked, picking up her basket again. “That’s because I live with the earth, not against it. Ye might try it sometime. The trees have a kinder voice than yer own thoughts.”
“Aye, maybe I will in time.”
As he turned back toward the path that led home, Eidith called out after him. “Laird McCormack!”
He paused and looked over his shoulder.
“Tell the Lady she’s carryin’ the future of a better clan,” Eidith said. “And tell yerself the same. Ye’ve earned yer peace, lad, now daenae be too proud to keep it.”
Bradley gave a small nod, then continued back to the castle, the sound of the water rushing beneath him. The weight on his chest felt lighter, but it was not gone. He took Eidith’s words to heart, but he didn’t believe them. He knew that he was the only one who understood the darkness in his mind. Others had no clue.
