He swiftly took in the surroundings: stone walls that smelled damp, one narrow window with latched shutters that rattled as the storm broke, a host of candles burning, melting wax onto a wooden table. Hamish lying on the bed, dressed in his best garments, his hands laced over his chest. Trista sitting beside him, wiping her eyes with a plaid shawl. Sidra standing nearby with a solemn aura, sand coating the hem of her dress.
James shut the door, leaving just the four of them and the boy’s body in the room. Torin stared at Sidra, his heart quickening when she said, “We need you to see something, Torin.”
“Show me then.”
Sidra stepped to the bedside. She murmured something to Trista, who smothered a sob into the plaid as she rose. James wrapped an arm around his wife’s shoulders, and they moved back so Torin could watch as Sidra removed Hamish’s right boot.
He didn’t know what he was expecting, but it wasn’t a leg that reminded him of the orchard’s blight. The same color, the same mesmerizing flicker of gold.
“I’m not certain what this ailment is,” Sidra said. Her voice was soft, but she bit her lip, and Torin knew that meant she was anxious. “James and Trista weren’t aware of it, so there’s no way to know how long Hamish was suffering, or what caused it. There’s no wound, no break in his skin. I have no name for what this might be.”
Torin had a suspicion. Panic began to bubble in his chest, climbing up his throat, rattling his teeth. But he held it down. Drew three deep breaths. Released them through his parted lips. Calm. He needed to be calm. And he needed to be certain of his suspicions before such news broke and wove through the wind, spreading fear and worry amongst the clan.
“I’m sorry to see this,” Torin said, glancing at James and Trista. “And I’m sorry this has happened to you and your son. I don’t have answers yet, but I hope to soon.”
James bowed his head as Trista continued to weep into his shoulder.
Torin’s eyes returned to Sidra, and it seemed she read his mind. She gave him a slight nod before she began to refasten the tethers of Hamish’s boot, hiding the mottled skin.
Ever since Torin had taken up the lairdship, Sidra had come to learn that if she wanted a moment alone with her husband, it would have to be at night, in their bedroom, often whispering and maneuvering around their daughter, who was determined to sleep between them.
Sidra sat at her desk, writing down in her healing records everything she had observed that day. Her quill scratched across the parchment, filling the pages with every detail she could remember about Hamish’s leg. Color, odor, texture, weight, temperature. She didn’t know how helpful these details would truly be, as it was all part of a postmortem examination, and she paused, realizing that her hand was quivering.
It had been a long day, one that had drained her. She listened to Torin as he read a story to Maisie in bed.
The three of them should have been living in the castle. They should have been inhabiting the laird’s quarters, with its spacious chambers and tapestry-clad walls and mullioned windows that broke light into prisms, with servants to tend to their fires and sheets and cleaning. But the truth was that this little croft on the hill was their home, and none of them wished to depart from it. Not even if the lairdship clung to them like cobwebs.
Sidra glanced up from her work, catching a reflection of Torin and Maisie in the speckled mirror hanging on the wall before her. She watched as their daughter’s eyes became heavier and heavier, the girl gradually lulled into sleep by her father’s deep voice.
Maisie had just turned six. It was hard to believe so much time had passed since Sidra first held her, and she sometimes thought back on what her life had been like before she met Torin and Maisie. Sidra had been young, secretly restless. A healer learning her grandmother’s craft, tending to sheep and her father’s kail yard, and believing her life was predictable, already written out before her, despite the fact that she was hungry for something else. Something that had led her here, to this moment.
Maisie began to snore, and Torin shut the storybook.
“Should I move her to her bed?” he asked, his left arm trapped beneath his daughter’s sleeping form. He indicated the little cot they had placed in the corner of their room. For days now, they had been trying to coax Maisie to sleep in her own bed, to no avail. She wanted to wedge herself between them, and in the beginning that had been comforting to Sidra. To have both Maisie and Torin with her at night. But she had often caught Torin gazing at her in the moonlight, over Maisie’s sprawled figure.
The two of them had to be creative these days, stealing quick moments in corners and in dusty storerooms and even on the kitchen table when Maisie was napping.
“No, let her sleep with us tonight,” Sidra said.
She inevitably thought about James and Trista, and how their arms must be aching that night. Sidra had felt an echo of that pain not so long ago, and she couldn’t help but gaze at Maisie for a long moment before she corked her ink and set down her quill.
A few minutes passed as Sidra reread her recordings. She suddenly noted how silent the room was; not even the wind blew beyond the walls. It felt eerie, like the quiet before a deadly storm, and Sidra turned in the chair, wondering if Torin had also fallen asleep. He was awake, staring into the shadows of the room, his brow furrowed. He seemed to be far away, lost in troubled thoughts.
“You wanted to speak to me earlier,” Sidra said, pitching her voice low so Maisie wouldn’t wake. “About Hamish.”
Torin’s attention sharpened. “Yes. I didn’t want his parents to hear what I am about to tell you.”
Sidra stood with a shiver. “What is it?”
“Come to bed first. You are too far away from me.”
Despite the dread that weighed her down, she smiled. She began to blow out the candles, one by one, until only a rushlight remained, illuminating the way to her side of the bed.
She slipped beneath the quilts and faced Torin, their daughter dreaming between them.
Torin was quiet for a beat. He caressed Maisie’s hair, as if he needed to feel something soft, something tangible. But then he began to speak of the blighted orchard. The glittering, oozing sap. The rotten, underripe fruit. Fallen from trees that Hamish had cared for.
Sidra’s heart was in her throat. The words felt thick as she stated, “He caught the blight from the trees. From the spirits.”
Torin met her stare. His eyes were bloodshot. There was silver in his beard, in a few strands of his hair. His soul felt ancient and sad in that moment, and Sidra reached out to trace his hand.
“Yes,” Torin whispered. “I think he did as well.”
“Do you think it has anything to do with Jack’s music?”
Torin fell pensive. Sidra could read his mind.