Isobel lifted the latch with care and eased the door open. The hall lay quiet and in darkness. The hearth at the other end was the only thing giving off light to guide her path. She gathered her hair and tied it with a strip of leather and then inhaled a deep breath. Letting it out slowly, she took the first steps across the stone floor. As she grew closer, she saw a small table and two chairs arranged in front of the fire. Athdar stood, leaning his arm against the mantel of the hearth, staring up at the tapestry above it.
‘Did you help to repair that?’ he asked quietly. He had not acknowledged her arrival, so his words surprised her. Pleased that he had waited, she moved closer.
‘Aye. I worked with my mother, your sister and the others to fix it. It was unravelling there near this edge,’ she said, walking up next to him and pointing to the lower, closest corner of the large woven and embroidered piece. ‘Lady Jocelyn fixed the fraying bear and deer there.’
‘They were her favourites.’ He reached up and touched the edge of the tapestry before turning to face her. ‘She would tell tales about each of the animals after our mother finished them.’ He held out his hand and guided her to sit, still smiling at what must be pleasant memories.
Once they were seated, he held out a cup to her, one he had on a tray next to the board. She accepted it and sipped the watered ale.
The light of the low flames flashed to life for a moment and illuminated his face to her. For once, he lost the pain that she could see in his gaze and took on the look of the younger man she remembered from her childhood. She could imagine for a moment the adolescent who vexed his sister and his parents. The man before he...
Lost so much.
She lifted her cup and leaned forwards to look at the board. If she continued to think about the many tragedies he’d faced, she would cry.
‘So, are you better than your father at this?’ he asked, as he settled in his chair.
‘He will never admit it, but, aye, I am,’ she confessed quietly. ‘Though I cannot win over Duncan’s wife on a regular basis.’ Duncan’s wife Marian was a formidable opponent in this game. Even her father had given up trying to beat her.
‘But you have tried?’ he asked, as he moved the black pieces to his side. She scooped up the red ones and began to put them in their places.
‘She taught me the game.’
His swallow was audible and she laughed at his reaction. ‘Mayhap I should seek my bed after all?’
‘Nay. I will not surrender this early. Let us test our abilities before calling for a retreat.’ His eyes sparkled then and she found herself lost in them for a moment longer than it took for him to notice.
‘Very well, if that is what you want,’ she teased.
They fell into a comfortable silence as she made the first move and then studied the one he made. She neither rushed nor delayed, but took her time and learned his method and strategies. He was skilled, though he played discreetly. Several times he surprised her with a riskier choice, but each risk taken was rewarded with success. In the end, Isobel struggled to make her loss appear real and not to lose in earnest.
‘You are a dangerous opponent, Isobel Ruriksdottir.’
‘But you won, Athdar,’ she said. Lifting the cup to her lips, she drank before she said anything more.
‘You let me win. You should have claimed several of my pieces when I put them in jeopardy.’
She had learned long ago that men did not particularly care for women who could best them so she had no intention of admitting he was right. But, when she met his gaze, she decided differently.
‘Are you insulted?’ she asked, watching his response.
‘Aye. Insulted that you think I need to be coddled like a bairn.’ The sparkling was back in his eyes, so she doubted he was truly insulted.
‘We could play again...’
‘An honest game?’
‘If that is what you want?’
They launched into the game without another word, the play going back and forth between them and the outcome was never a certainty for either of them. Finally, Isobel made her last move and won. She placed all the pieces she’d collected in the wooden box next to the board before raising her eyes and looking at Athdar.
Would he truly accept defeat well? Or would he be angry in spite of his words?
‘Well played, Isobel,’ he said. ‘I thought I might be the victor until you made those last three moves. More than skilful, lass. You have a real talent for this.’
His compliment and his appreciation of her skills brought a blush to her cheeks. The warmth of it spread through her.
Athdar stood, gathered the rest of the pieces in the box and closed it. He lifted the board and tucked it under his arm. She waited for him to put it up in its place on the mantel.
Isobel had no idea of how much time had passed while they played. She looked at the hearth and realised it had burned down quite low. A few lamps around the hall still threw some light down its length and shadows into its dark corners. No one had entered since they’d been there—most likely all were in their beds asleep as they should be.
‘Athdar, I...’
‘Isobel...’
She laughed softly and waited for him to speak first. Just as he opened his mouth to begin, a cough echoed through the emptiness. They both turned to find her mother standing outside their chamber’s door.
‘I should go,’ she whispered.
‘Aye. Go on then,’ he said. ‘If you need me to speak to her, I will.’
‘Goodnight, Athdar,’ she said, taking the first step away from him.
‘Goodnight to you.’
She’d taken a few steps towards her chamber when his voice came as a whisper from behind her.
‘Isobel.’
She shivered at what her name sounded like when whispered so.
Isobel quickened her steps when in fact she had no wish to face her mother’s ire too soon. She wanted to savour the pleasure of being with Athdar, alone, as a man and woman. She let his words of praise repeat in her thoughts until she was but a few paces from her mother.
‘Who won?’
The words were not the ones she had expected to hear when she’d clearly misled her mother and Jocelyn. At the least, she expected a warning about such behaviour. Instead her mother surprised her by asking about the game.
‘I did,’ Isobel whispered as she followed her mother back inside the chamber. Lady Jocelyn sat up in the bed, watching her enter.
‘How did he take the loss?’ she asked, smoothing the bedcovers over her lap and pushing her long sleep braid over her shoulder. Isobel’s mother sat on the edge of the bed and listened.
‘He complimented me on my playing.’
The two older women exchanged some glance she could not read. Then they looked back to her.
‘’Tis now the middle of the night, child,’ her mother said softly. ‘Seek your bed.’
When she had expected a reprimand for ignoring the lady’s words and for sneaking out of her chamber in the dark of night to meet with Athdar alone, all she received instead was an enigmatic expression. Isobel sensed that both women supported her exploring the possibility of a relationship with Lady Jocelyn’s brother. Though separated in age by almost a score of years and though her parents must have some