the boy she’d once remembered. “So it is yerself. Ye’ve grown up.”
“So have ye.”
“But not so much that ye dinna recognize me.”
He clasped his hands behind his back. “Yer hair,” he said. “I recognized yer hair. I saw it once in the vale, and when I saw ye again in town, I knew it right away.”
“Red hair is nothing in the Highlands.”
“But yours looks like molten metal.”
Her brow furrowed as she pulled up a strand, looking at it. “It does?”
He nodded. “I see such things every day.”
“Ye do?”
“Aye.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m a blacksmith. ’Tis my trade.”
“I thought it was stealing birds’ eggs.”
His grin was back. “Nay,” he said. “’Twas an interest and nothing more.”
“Does yer grandfather still have his birdhouse?”
“Aye.”
“I still want mine.”
He lifted his broad shoulders. “Mayhap ye’ll have one someday,” he said. Then he gestured to the basket in her arms. “I saw ye come in tae town with the pelts. Yer far from the Vale of Morning today.”
She nodded, looking down at the lovely gray pelts. “I came tae sell them,” she said. “I come as often as I can, as often as the traps will allow.”
He reached into the basket, picking up one of the very nice pelts. “Ye’ve skinned them well,” he said, putting it back. But his interest in the pelts was simply a cover for his interest in her. His gaze returned to her face. “Do ye remember my name?”
“Lor.”
His teeth flashed, flattered she should recall it so quickly. “I dunna know yers.”
“Isabail.”
“Isabail,” he repeated softly, rolling it over his tongue as if it were a fine wine. “A lovely name for a lovely lass. But I know ye’re not from the Vale of Morning.”
“Nay.”
“Where are ye from?”
She hesitated. “Ye told me ye’re from Careston,” she said. “Why are ye here in Brechin?”
Lor wasn’t oblivious to the fact that she was changing the subject to avoid giving him an answer. Since he’d stopped traveling through the Vale of Morning, he hadn’t thought of the demons that trolled the vale in many a year. He remembered being told that the demons were part of Clan Ruthven, or even Clan Keith.
It occurred to him that in telling Isabail his name and village, she knew where he was from and that meant she knew his loyalties. Clearly, she didn’t want him to know the same of her. He suspected the stories of the origins of the demons were perhaps more truth than rumor.
He couldn’t think of any other reason why she wouldn’t be forthcoming.
But it didn’t matter. He had no sense of hatred toward clans that weren’t allied with Clan Lindsay; his loyalty was to his family and friends, no matter their clan. That had never been a big factor to him. But he knew that the world at large felt differently.
Perhaps the lass felt differently, too.
“I’m in Brechin because I’m doing business with a friend of my grandfather’s,” he said finally, having the courtesy not to demand an answer to his question. “I also trained with the man for some years. In fact, I lived in Brechin for a numbers of years, but I dunna recall ever seeing ye come tae town with yer pelts.”
She looked down at her pelts as if considering her answer. “There are other villages where I can get a fine price.”
“Is that where ye’re going now?”
She nodded. “The merchant here… I dinna want tae agree tae his price. I’ll go elsewhere.”
Lor knew what she meant by not paying the man’s price because he’d seen it. What had happened had been unfair, and Lor wasn’t a man who tolerated injustice. He never had been. Reaching out, he took the basket from her as she tried to snatch it back.
“Wait here,” he told her, holding the basket away as she grabbed at it. “I’ll get yer price for ye. What did ye want?”
She was confused, and a little miffed that he’d taken her pelts again, but she at least considered his question.
“A shilling a pelt,” she said. “I’ll take nothing less. Where are ye going?”
With a sly smile, he reached out and took one of her grabbing hands.
“Come with me.”
Isabail did. She let him hold her hand as he took her back toward the village before leaving her in the small alley next to the merchant who had pinched her on the cheek. As she peered around the corner of the stall, she watched as Lor presented the basket of pelts to the merchant, who was busy eating something and getting bread and sauce