Page 104 of Steel & Surrender

As always, it was a hive of activity. Fowl scratched in the dirt. Dogs gnawed at mutton bones near the steps leading into the tower house. The farrier was hard at work shoeing the clan-chief’s horses.

However, her heart betrayed her the moment she saw Greig working alongside the farrier.

He hadn’t yet seen her, but considering that the pair of them were working right in front of the weaponsmith’s forge, she wouldn’t get a reprieve for long.

Curse the man. She’d managed to avoid him for a while now. Aye, she had attended the Sunday Mass, but she’d kept her gaze firmly averted as he walked in with his family.

And then, once Mass was done, she’d been one of the first to slip away, to flee from the castle.

As she approached the open door to the forge, a tall, raw-boned man with thinning brown hair stepped out. Like her, he wore a heavy leather apron, singed at the edges.

Gareth flashed her a grin. “Ye didn’t carry all those up yerself, did ye?”

“Aye,” she panted, coming to an unsteady halt. “Although halfway up the hill, I regretted it.” She halted then, motioning to the heavy basket strapped to her back. “Could ye help me lift this off?”

Gareth moved behind her, hauling up the basket so that she could wriggle out of the straps.

The basket then thudded onto the cobblestones.

“Christ, lass, even I would have struggled with these,” he grunted.

Brìghde smiled. “I did question my sanity not long after I set out.”

She was aware then that both the farrier and Greig had looked up from their work.

Greig had been bent over a horse’s foreleg pinned between his knees as he hammered in nails. He knew what he was doing, she noted, and she considered then how far he’d come on since that day Tàirneanach had thrown a shoe and he’d stopped by the forge.

He hadn’t been able to do that when he’d first come to her forge. His leg had been too weak.

She’d helped him get here.

Irritated that she was letting her thoughts slide toward Maclean, she motioned to the basket. “Come on,” she said briskly. “Let’s carry these inside.”

The weaponsmith nodded, bending over and taking hold of one of the handles. “Ye got them done quicker than I expected.”

“There are two of us working the forge now, remember?” she replied. “I’ve discovered Eòghan’s got a knack for blades.”

“That’s good to hear,” the weaponsmith paused then. “I’ll need arrowheads too … two hundred before Samhuinn.”

Brìghde nodded. They could take on more work these days, as they had two anvils going now, the pair of them working side by side. “We’ll manage it.”

He flashed a relieved smile, and together, they hauled the heavy basket of blades into the forge.

Inside, Gareth carefully picked up one of the folded steel blades that lay on the top of the pile. He then held it up, examining it in the light of his glowing forge. “Good work, this.”

Warmth suffused Brìghde’s chest. Gareth was a talented weaponsmith. Hailing from the Isle of Harris, he’d lived at Duart for over five years now and had impressed all who commissioned work from him. His opinion meant much to her.

“I made that one,” she admitted.

“Ye have a fine eye for detail,” he replied. “Ye are wasted on basic tools and hinges and horseshoes.”

She shrugged. “It keeps my family fed and clothed. That’s more important.”

Gareth met her eye. “I understand … but ye have talent all the same, Brìghde.”

She smiled, the glow in her chest spreading. She’d been in awe of the weaponsmith’s work, so the fact that he complimented her so earnestly meant a lot. And she liked that he spoke to her as an equal, that he didn’t patronize her.

Emerging from the forge, the empty basket strapped to her back once more, she came across one of the grooms wheeling a barrel full of muck across her path.