Page 119 of Promised to the Forbidden Laird

Her mouth curved, and they continued. In the western passage, she directed two servants to raise the MacNicol banner higher. Roy stopped them before they could obey. Donaldina looked at him.

“The MacIver banner hangs lower,” he explained.

She smiled. “A grave injustice.”

“One that may begin a war.”

“Then we had best correct it.”

They stood beneath the banners while the servants fine-tuned both, ensuring the woven edges were even. MacIver's red banner and MacNicol's green banner fluttered together in the draft from the stairwell, neither overshadowing the other. Roy observed them more intently than needed. For years, banners symbolized territory, authority, and the names shouted before conflict. He never thought two banners could hang side by side without one being destroyed.

Donaldina touched his sleeve. “The hall.”

The great hall had been stripped of its usual arrangement. Benches stood in uneven rows before the hearth, while the long tables waited against the walls until the feast. Fresh reeds covered the floor, releasing a clean, grassy scent beneath every footstep. Roy and Donaldina walked between the benches, comparing the seating list with the chalk marks left upon each place.

“The MacIver elders should sit here,” Roy suggested.

Donaldina shook her head. “Then Elder Iain will spend the entire ceremony turning around tae hear.”

“He might enjoy the exercise.”

“He might strike ye with his cane.”

Roy considered the old man’s temper. “Fine. Place him nearer the front.”

They moved one bench together. It scraped heavily across the floor before catching against an uneven stone. Donaldina pushed harder.

“Ye are meant tae lift,” Roy told her.

“Ye are meant tae be stronger.”

“I am carrying most of it.”

“That is a convenient claim made by the man walking backward.”

Roy nearly laughed. The sound rose before he could stop it, low and unfamiliar within his own chest. Donaldina looked at him with brief surprise, followed by unmistakable satisfaction.

Roy set down the bench. She returned to the list as though she had not just achieved something men who knew him for twenty years rarely managed.

He watched her give instructions to the workers. She spoke without raising her voice, yet servants moved quickly when she asked. She remembered which elder required a place near the fire, which MacIver chief distrusted narrow spaces, and which village family should be seated where the children might see the vows.

Her authority did not resemble his. Roy commanded by making uncertainty disappear. Donaldina commanded by noticing what everyone else overlooked.

She looked up and found him staring. “What is it?”

“Naething.”

“That is rarely true when ye become so solemn.”

Roy glanced around the hall. Banners hung evenly above them. MacIver and MacNicol places stood intermingled rather than divided by the central aisle. Even the high table had been shifted so that neither clan occupied the side nearest the hearth alone.

Donaldina followed his gaze.

“It looks different,” she nodded.

“Aye.”

“For years, every room was prepared for Lachlan, or for the MacNicols, or for whatever guest required reminding that Dun Ard belonged tae us.”