Page 124 of Claimed By a Ruthless Scot
The simplicity of it undid him.
“Aye,” he said at once. “Aye, me love. We shall go home and nay one will ever dare tae take ye away from me.”
He did not ask her to walk.
Instead, he gathered her into his arms as though she weighed nothing at all, and she went willingly, with one arm slipping around his neck. Her face rested for a moment against his shoulder. Duncan carried her out of the tent and into the cold night air.
The camp was nearly secured now. His men moved through it with torches and drawn blades, but they stepped aside at once when they saw him, and no one spoke. Iain appeared through the clearing, with blood on his sleeve and relief plain upon his face when he saw Elaina alive in Duncan’s arms. Duncan needed no words from him. One look was enough.
“Bring the horses,” he gave the order.
A mount was led forward quickly, Duncan’s own, dark and restless from the smell of battle. He settled Elaina into the saddle with the utmost care, then mounted behind her. He still had one arm strong around her waist, holding her close against him as though he would never again permit the world to place distance between them.
The forest lay before them, black and deep, but it no longer felt endless. Home waited beyond it.
Duncan turned the horse toward the path, and together, with the night wind cold against them and the worst at last behind them, they rode back toward Castle Grant.
EPILOGUE
Castle Grant, two weeks later
Elaina’s chamber had never seemed so full of life. From the first pale hours of morning, quiet had been impossible, not while Catriona was in attendance, and certainly not while she had taken it upon herself to oversee every ribbon, pin, fold, and fastening with all the solemn enthusiasm of a general preparing for battle.
The fire burned brightly on the hearth, softening the coolness of the day, and the room smelled faintly of lavender, warmed linen, and the fresh rushes that had been newly laid. Sunlight fell in narrow gold bands through the windows, catching upon polished wood, brushed hair, and the pale fabric of Elaina’s gown, which seemed to hold the morning light within it.
Catriona had not been still for more than half a minute at any one time.
“Nay, nay, hold there,” she said, stepping back only to dart forward again and smooth some imagined imperfection fromElaina’s sleeve. “Though perhaps it was perfect already and I only wished tae touch it once more.”
Elaina, seated before the small table while the last details of her hair were arranged, could not help but smile at her reflection.
Catriona bent nearer, adjusting a strand with tenderness, then stood back again with her hands clasped beneath her chin. Her green eyes were shining so brightly that Elaina thought she looked near tears already, though the day had scarcely begun.
“It is such a rare thing,” Catriona sighed in a manner that was so heartfelt that it bordered on theatrical and yet was too sincere to mock, “tae marry for love, tae stand beside the man one truly wants, and tae ken he looks at nay one else in the world as he looks at ye. There is naething more important, I think. Or if there is, I dinnae care tae hear of it.”
Elaina couldn’t help but chuckle. There was something so earnest in Catriona’s happiness, so wholly untouched by envy or self-pity, that it moved her more than she could easily say. Catriona had rejoiced in every step of this day as though it were her own heart being fulfilled, and Elaina, who had once imagined herself destined only for fear, found the generosity of such affection almost too much to bear.
She rose at last when the maids had finished, and for a moment simply stood there while Catriona looked at her in satisfaction.
“Well?” Elaina asked softly.
Catriona pressed a hand to her chest. “I think me braither shall forget his own name.”
That made Elaina laugh again, though there was a tremor of feeling beneath it. For one brief moment, she allowed herself to feel the whole of it. It was not merely the excitement, though that was there. It was the full, astonishing truth of what that day meant.
No one had chosen it for her. No father had arranged it. No bargain had secured it. No fear had driven it into being. It washers. This life, this man, this future, they were all hers, because she had chosen them freely.
The thought settled so deeply within her that it was almost prayer.
Catriona, watching her face, came to stand beside her. “Ye are quiet.”
“I was only thinking,” Elaina whispered tenderly.
“And are yer thoughts all happy ones?”
Elaina turned, meeting her gaze with affection. “Entirely.”
Catriona gave a soft, pleased sigh. “As they ought tae be.”
