Page 77 of The Highland Ghost’s Virgin

"What you did to his father was wrong," Grisselle said, looking from Mòr to Alpin, whose broad frame stood motionless on the floor of the hall. "You took a boy who wept in your lap, and you fed him poison wrapped in the memory of his grandfather. You pointed men toward the water, hoping the sea would finish the work your grief started. You tried to drown the sons for the sins of the father."

Grisselle took a quiet breath, her hand coming back up to brace against her ribs, her posture unyielding.

"Both things are true," Grisselle said, her eyes locked firmly on Mòr’s cracking, wet face. "The cruelty done to you was real, and it was monstrous. And the harm you returned to this house was monstrous, too. Both things are true at the very same time."

The statement hung between them. It left no room for Mòr to hide behind her hatred, yet it did not strip her of the dignity of her long-buried pain. It laid her life out on the flagstones—raw, ruined, and completely seen.

Mòr stared at Grisselle for a long, agonizing moment.

Her faded eyes searched the young woman’s pale face, tracing the exhaustion around her dark eyes, the faint tremble in her legs, the honesty in her quiet stance.

The silence in the Great Hall stretched, long and deep. No one spoke. Isobel did not move. Greer held her breath. Dougal remained hunched on his bench, his hands silent over his face. Alpin stood with his chest rising and falling slowly, his dark eyes shifting from the old healer to the woman who had spoken the truth none of them had known how to phrase.

Mòr swallowed hard, the muscles in her neck working violently.

She didn't offer an excuse. She didn't spit another curse. She didn't fall to her knees to beg for mercy. The wild, unhinged fire that had fueled her screams five minutes ago had completely burned out, leaving only the quiet, fragile ash of a woman who was simply, profoundly tired.

Slowly, Mòr turned her body toward the cat at her side.

She bent her stooped back, her joints creaking in the silence of the room, and hooked her thin, calloused arms beneath Sgàil’s chest and hindquarters. The cat, sensing the sudden, absolute shift in its mistress, did not struggle. Mòr hauled Sgàil up onto her narrow shoulders until the cat’s weight settled across her neck.

She did not look at Alpin. She did not look at Isobel or Greer or Dougal.

She looked at Grisselle one last time—a single, fleeting glance that carried no malice, no triumph, and no defiance. Mòr turned on her heel.

Her small, heavy steps echoed against the stone as she walked down the long center aisle of the Great Hall. The guards near the double doors hesitated, their hands lingering near the hilts of their weapons, their eyes darting toward Alpin for an order.

Alpin did not raise his hand. He did not give a command. He stood frozen, his eyes resting on the floor where Mòr had stood, letting the quiet settle into the stone.

The guards stepped back, clearing the path.

Mòr pushed through the heavy oak doors, the cat draped over her shoulders, and stepped out into the cool, dark Highland night. The heavy doors swung shut behind her with a low, hollow thud, cutting off the draft, leaving the Great Hall in complete, unbroken quiet.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

The Great Hall had been emptied of its crowd, but the heavy, suffocating silence of Mòr’s departure lingered like cold smoke.

Grisselle sat in the small alcove off the main hall, wrapped in a thick wool plaid that Isobel had pressed around her shoulders. Her knees still felt weak, the ache in her wounded shoulder throbbing in time with her heart, but she refused to lie down.

Across the hearth, Isobel sat with her head resting in her hands, her shoulders motionless. Greer stood near the narrow window slit, staring out into the dark yard where the heavy oak doors had closed behind Mòr and her cat.

The heavy latch clicked, and Alpin stepped into the alcove.

He didn't carry his broadsword, and his heavy plaid hung loose over one broad shoulder. His face was carved of hard, pale stone, his dark eyes shadowed with an exhaustion that ran deeper than physical fatigue. He stopped near the hearth, looking down at Grisselle first, his gaze sweeping over her pale cheeks before settling on the small wooden bench where Dougal sat hunched over his knees.

"Niall is at the gate," Alpin said, his voice low, gravelly, and flat. "She took the eastern path toward the old hut by the creek. She didn't look back."

Isobel lifted her head, her face pale in the dying firelight. "And Nora?"

The name fell into the quiet room like a dropped blade.

Alpin turned his head slowly toward the fire, watching a red ember crack and split into ash. "Nora is two weeks old," he said quietly. "My grandfather's blood. She will stay with her father’s sister."

"She is family," Isobel whispered, her voice trembling slightly as she looked up at her brother. "Alpin... she will be living on dry oats and discarded wool at the edge of our own land."

"She will not live on dry oats," Grisselle said. “We are keeping her.”

Her voice was thin, but it carried absolute clarity. Alpin turned his dark eyes toward her, stepping closer until his broad shadow fell over her bench.