Her home was still standing.
She did not see any redcoats in the low cast light of early evening, but then they could be beyond her sight. “Lean on me when we get out. We'll pretend ye're drunk if anyone asks questions.”
Ewan's eyes had started to drift closed again but snapped open when she spoke.
She exited the carriage first, then helped guide him through the small door. Her muscles strained beneath the heft of him. God, but the man was heavy. He tossed a massive arm over her shoulder and practically dragged her to the ground with this weight.
Freya gritted her teeth and threw her strength into her back until she managed to heave them both upright. Her stomach swam with nerves as she approached the home she'd entered so many times before, too few of them recent. The door flew open before she could even touch the knob.
A red coat blazed before her eyes, gilt buttons glinting with a ridiculous shine in the waning sunlight. She lifted her gaze to find a tall man staring down at her from a short snub of a nose.
“May I help you?” His voice was the drawl of well-mannered English - the kind which would make any London parent proud.
“I might ask ye the same,” Freya said. “Being as ye're in my house.”
“Ach, she's fine to come in.” Her mother's familiar voice sounded in the background and she appeared beside the soldier.
But Freya didn't move. She might be smothering beneath Ewan's bulk, but that did not stop her from glaring up at the Englishman. “What the hell are ye doing in my home?”
“Freya!” Her mother's hand fluttered over her breast with uneasy shock.
“Forgive me.” The Englishman presented her with a stiff bow. “I'm Captain ThomasCrosby. I'll be billeting here for several days.”
“The hell ye will,” Freya scoffed.
Her mother shoved herself between Freya and the officer. “Freya Marie Campbell! Ye will apologize at once. And then ye'll tell me who that man is ye're propping up.” Her mother eyed Ewan warily. “He's no' dead, is he?”
“Sorry,” Freya muttered without looking over her mother's shoulder to where the unwanted stranger stood patiently. “And he's alive, he's...”
She scrambled through a million thoughts in the flash of a second. He couldn't be her brother, the officer would know there had never been a son. Nor could he be a cousin - why would a cousin be staying with them randomly and without notice? He couldn't be a friend, for why would she not be bringing him to his own home instead, especially with such an intimate closeness between them.
An intimate closeness...
Of course!
What else would better explain her having Lily there as well as Ewan?
“He’s Lily’s son, Ewan.” Freya straightened. “My husband.”
***
Married? The fog surrounding Ewan's brain had started to lift. Still, what Freya had said made no sense.
They were married?
He didn't remember getting married. He remembered... His side ached. He remembered getting shot. Running.
His mother.
A woman's face peered into his, her skin crinkled with age. Not his mother.
“Yer husband?” the woman said. She frowned and the wrinkles around her mouth puckered. “What's wrong with him?”
There was a moment of hesitation, enough for Ewan to shift his gaze to Freya. She cast him an apologetic look.
“He had a bit too much whisky earlier,” she said slowly.
It was his turn to frown. He hated whisky, and rum, and all other strong spirits. He didn't like his senses dulled and his wits scattered. His balance teetered and he swayed.
This.
He didn't like this.
Freya moved underneath him, shifting his weight to put him back in a steadier position.
The older woman tsked.
“My mother has a recipe for helping when someone is too far gone with drink.” An English voice spoke, his accent sharp with authority. Ewan looked up at the man whose body was slight beneath the heavy uniform and whose look condemned him at first glance.
Hate filled Ewan, the burn of it cutting through the fog in his mind and straight into his heart.
The Englishman regarded him with just as much contempt. “Though I'd caution you against a drunkard for a husband.”
“My son isna a drunkard.” A familiar feminine voice spoke. One he'd heard for a lifetime and kept in his heart through nights slept in mud and through battles with men dying around him.
His mother.
“Ma?”
“My son.” Then she was there. Her white hair pulled back in a soft bun, her sweet honeysuckle scent surrounding him. Tears shone in her blue eyes and she threw her arms around him, almost knocking all three of them to the ground.
Freya grunted at his side. “Help me get him,” she ground out. “He's no' exactly a wee man.”
“Of course,” his mother said. Her arm came around him and dug hard into his injury. He clenched his teeth but could not manage to bite back the groan of pain. His mother removed her arm immediately, and he almost fell forward were it not for Freya's body braced against his.
She was a good wife. Even if he didn’t remember marrying her. Which made him a bad husband.
His mother stared at him, her face incredulous. “Lad, what have ye done to yerself?”
“Let me do this.” A firm arm came around Ewan's shoulders and hooked his weight under his armpit.
The English officer was helping him.
“Which room is he in?” the redcoat asked in his prim tone.
“This way,” Freya's mother said. “It's the only room left with a bed large enough for two. Now that they're married.” She said the last word slowly and gave a worried glance back at him.
Ewan forced his feet to work, putting one foot in front of the other - a slow, gradual progression up a set of impossibly long stairs and down a hall which seemed to go on for an hour before finally a door opened to a room. With a bed. How he longed for the cradle of a soft mattress beneath him.
His face was damp with perspiration and his side ached terribly.
The man helped him to the bed where Freya eagerly pulled back the blanket. Bed. Ewan's eyes were closing with the very idea of letting his body rest against the pillowed softness, the cool sheets against his hot skin. With Freya's small hand guiding him, he sank onto the mattress.
“His cloak is still on,” the Englishman said.
“It's fine - he'll be the one wrapped in it in the morning and it'll be his own fault,” Freya said with reproach. “Go on, I'll handle the rest.”
Clipped steps rang out on the hard floor and Ewan knew the officer was leaving. The door closed with a click and his mother was immediately at his side.
“Ewan, what is the meaning of this?” She shook her head. Disappointment showed in the crinkle of her brow, and it sliced into him.
“It isna drink at all,” Freya whispered. “I needed a distraction. He's been shot. The medicine I gave him was too strong. He's no' drunk, he's drugged.”
“Shot?” his mother's voice was so small, as if she were frightened.