At a loss, Trick let the youth hang on his body, wetting his surcoat with heartfelt tears. Hesitantly he placed a hand on the lad’s back and gave him a couple of awkward pats. His mind swimming in confusion, he looked to Kendra, sending her a silent plea for help.
She tapped Niall on the shoulder. “Who are you?” she asked.
The young man stilled and pulled back a bit, a frown creasing the forehead above his red-rimmed eyes. He looked to Kendra and blinked hard, swiping a hand under his nose. “I’m your husband’s brother,” he said slowly.
Feeling blank-headed, Trick gingerly extricated himself. “I have no brother.”
“Aye, you do.” Niall’s gaze trailed to the center of the chamber. “And our mother is in that coffin.”
THIRTY-THREE
ROBBED OF breath, Trick woodenly followed Niall to the open coffin. He wanted to protest—in his head, he was screaming this couldn’t be his brother, it couldn’t be his mother in that box—but words wouldn’t come. Words were beyond him just now. Stepping closer, he peered inside.
It was she.
She appeared older than he remembered, though her gown looked as though it would befit a younger woman. Her deid-claes, he realized—the first duty of a new Scottish wife was to sew the funeral clothes for herself and her husband. She’d obviously followed the custom. Beneath the gown, her legs were encased in the traditional white woolen stockings, and upon her feet were sturdy shoes, symbolic of the thorny path she was about to journey.
He’d traveled all the way here to make his peace with his mother, but that was never to be. His mother was dead.
It seemed impossible.
Her serene appearance sat at odds with the churning in Trick’s stomach. Why had she written to him? What would have been said between them had he arrived in time? Questions raced in his head, and he wished mightily that she would open her eyes and answer them.
But there were coins on her lids to keep them closed—it was feared that if one looked a corpse in the eye, it would take you as a companion. And he knew that, coins or not, she wouldn’t be answering him, anyway.
His mother was dead, and he seemed rooted to the floor.
“Touch her,” Niall urged, doing so himself, his fingers gentle on their mother’s cheek. “They say it will banish the ghosts of her from your mind.”
Trick reached out, then pulled back. “I cannot.”
It had been too long since he’d touched her in life. Eighteen years of loneliness, eighteen years of resentment. This journey had been a pilgrimage of sorts, his chance to mend old wounds, reconcile his past so he could begin again with his new wife.
But inside him, the wounds seemed to gape open fresh.
His mother had always failed him, and this time was no different.
He turned and gazed into his brother’s golden eyes. His own eyes, it seemed. Niall’s hair was longer, shoulder-length, but the same shining straight blond as Trick’s, and though Niall was younger—seventeen, Trick guessed him at—they were of a height.
His brother. He’d never had a sibling. His heart swelling with sudden emotion, Trick slung an arm around the lad’s shoulders, and Niall clapped him on the back. Then they pulled apart and looked each other over.
“I have a brother,” Trick said, and a small smile ghosted Niall’s grief-ravaged face to match the larger smile on Trick’s. “Who is your father?” Trick asked.
“Hamish Munroe. His wife died—shortly after you left, I believe—and he and Mam…well, they’d always…” The younger man drew a shuddering breath. “I’ll take you to him.”
THIRTY-FOUR
NIALL MOTIONED Trick and Kendra to a turret attached to a corner of the great hall.
They followed him single file up a narrow, twisting stone staircase lit by dangerous, old-fashioned torches set at intervals. The rocks looked ancient, and when Kendra put her hand to the wall for balance, she half-expected it to crumble beneath her fingers. But her hand just came away dirty.
She wiped it on her skirts. “I cannot believe people are playing games down there.”
“It’s the Scots way,” Trick told her.
“Folk were somber early in the week,” Niall explained. “But Mam has been gone six days now. All the tears have been shed, all the stories of her have been told and told again. The feasting, the games and riddles—it’s all in her honor. The wake is a celebration of her life.”
They followed him out into a spacious sitting room that seemed lacking in furniture. Though the windows were small and set back in incredibly thick walls, the stone was whitewashed here and reflected the candlelight, making this chamber much lighter than the one downstairs. A large tapestry hung on one side, looking like it could use a good cleaning, and across from it, four faded red chairs were arranged to face a fireplace.
“Still and all,” Niall continued, “this is nothing like Calum MacKinnon’s wake last year. They propped up the dearly departed and put a pipe in his mouth, then took turns throwing boiled turnips at him to try to knock it from his lips. I didn’t think Mam would appreciate that.”
“I’d expect not!” Kendra exclaimed.
“Da is in here.” Niall pushed open a door. “Come along.”
The room was sizable as bedchambers went, with substantial oak furnishings lining the walls and a large four-poster bed in the center. A tall, gaunt man lay beneath the coverlet, snoring softly, and a middle-aged couple sat nearby on two chairs. They began to rise, but Niall waved at them to stay seated.
“Da.” He reached to jiggle the man’s shoulder. “Someone’s here to see you.”
Hamish Munroe started and opened his eyes, then blinked and looked again. “Patrick? Is that you?”
“Aye, sir, it is.”
To Trick’s apparent dismay, the older
