“Thank you,” said Feradach. “They were a gift.”
The remarkable thing had happened, but Merida and Feradach still hadn’t realized it. They didn’t realize it when they ran into Fergus and Hubert and Gille Peter in the armory, where they were all having a loud and boisterous time repairing handles on spears and telling tales round their lantern as the dogs gnawed bones (the castle’s dog was already in the process of vomiting her bone back up to chew it once more, as she always did).
“What can we do for you, my love?” Fergus asked as Merida held the door shut enough to keep the dogs from escaping past her legs (yes, there was a door now! Gone was the chest that had been pushed in front of it for years).
“Er, I,” Merida started.
“Oh, I didn’t see you there,” Fergus said to Feradach. “Your brooch—is that Breadalbane you’re from?”
Feradach followed Fergus’s gaze to his chest, and then his fingers touched the brooch Merida had seen him wear all this time, the circular pin with a tree on it, both its branches and roots visible. He felt it and only she could tell that he was feeling it for the first time, although it was clearly not a specific enough description to tell him whose face he wore. He just said the thing he had said many times: “It was a gift.”
“What’s the weather like outside?” Fergus asked him. “I thought I could hear the wind howling.”
“Weather’s coming fast,” Feradach agreed.
But Merida and Feradach still didn’t realize the remarkable thing that was happening.
They didn’t realize it in the music room either, where Hamish was listening raptly to Cennedig tell a story of his traveling days, both of their harps resting upon their shoulders as if they might play at any moment. They looked up at Merida and Feradach. Hamish had seen Feradach before, of course, in a body with a scar on its face, but he showed no recognition now.
“We’re just passing through on our way up,” Merida said, hoping to draw attention from Feradach and any mismatch the two of them might have in how they saw him. “Don’t let us stop you.”
“I say,” Cennedig said. “Young man, do you have family near Cairnlee? You look like a family I used to know near there, just in the eyes and that wild hair, of course.” He smiled and touched his own wild hair.
“I’ve heard I do,” Feradach said.
“Excuse us,” Merida said, and hurried him through before any more probing questions could be asked. It seemed inevitable that they’d get tangled in conflicting backstories very soon.
It was only when they ran into Elinor again that Merida and Feradach understood the remarkable thing that had been happening. That was still happening. She’d been coming the opposite way down the hall; there was no escape. Merida would have to explain how she had come to have a second visitor on a wild night like this.
But to Merida’s surprise, when Elinor walked up with her girls, Ila in tow behind them now, she just said to Feradach, “The weather has truly turned; you’ll be staying the night, then, surely? Did you say you were from Ardbarrach, or headed there?”
“Neither,” Merida said, slowly. “We met him on the way to Ardbarrach; he gave us directions.”
Elinor was seeing him as the same person she’d seen before.
“Well, unless he’s from the village he’s not going to get far in any direction tonight,” Elinor said. “Have you looked out a window?”
They hadn’t; the tapestries were pulled tight across them. But now they did and discovered that the courtyard had been transformed to a gleaming bright landscape. Snow covered everything, and it was still coming down.
“The Cailleach is washing her robe for sure,” Feradach murmured.
Elinor, to Merida’s surprise, laughed. “I haven’t heard that for ages.”
“What’s it mean?” Merida asked.
Feradach said, “There’s a legend that when the first storm comes in like this, it’s the Cailleach washing her robe in Corryvreckan, and when she’s done, it’s snow white and so is Scotland, and it’s winter.”
Elinor gave Feradach a rather complimentary smile then, pleased with him and his storytelling. “Ila, could you put up a bed for him in the solar?”
“Of course, ma’am,” she replied.
“What’s your name, then, I missed it, I’m sorry, I’m doing three things at once,” Elinor said.
Neither Merida nor Feradach had the faintest idea how to answer.
“It’s Feradach,” Ila said.
Merida looked at her with surprise.
“Feradach, yes?” Ila repeated. “We met before.”
Feradach looked quite undone. Merida had not seen him properly speechless before. Finally he assembled his features and said, “I’m sorry, I’m being rude. I was trying to remember where; I’m sorry.”
“You looked a little different, I think, sir,” Ila said, and she gave Merida that private cat smile. “And I did, too. I wasn’t always this age!”
“Yes, our Ila is ancient,” Elinor said. “And she’ll take care of the solar for you. Merida, I trust you’ll make sure he’s sorted. Feradach! Like the stone; a good name. Sorry, I’ve got to run or I’ll never get to settle tonight. After this we’re all going to gather a nip of whipkull and craic in the common room, Merida, if you’re in the mood. Come on, girls.”
Off they bustled, leaving Merida and Feradach quite confused. They had the shape of the remarkable thing in their head now, and it was only confirmed when they ran once more into Cennedig as he retired to the guests’ quarters off the Great Hall.
“I’m older than I was,” he told them apologetically, from the doorway, “and can’t stay up hobnobbing like I used to. This old man likes his sleep. You know, you really are the spitting image of the MacAuslands of Cairnlee; they had an absolute litter of sons who all looked like you.”
“Did they?” Feradach asked faintly.
“Don’t take it so hard, lad,” Cennedig said, laughing. “It’s a compliment; they were handsome. Good night, you two.”
As he closed the door, Merida and Feradach retreated back to the empty Great Hall and stood before the fire there.
In a hushed voice, Merida said, “They recognized you!”
Feradach shook his head, but it was clear it was shock, not disbelief.
“They saw you the same more than once,” Merida insisted. “And I think they’re all seeing you the same way. The same way as I do.”
“It’s not possible,” Feradach said, but his fingers were on the brooch that Fergus had pointed out in the armory. “It’s never happened before.” He narrowed his eyes at the window. “I wonder if this is the Cailleach’s doing; she is tricky.”
“How could this be a trick?” she asked.
He shook his head again. “How do you see me?”
Differently than she used to.
“I guess DunBroch’s not the only thing changing around here,” she said.
FERADACH stayed.
It snowed and snowed and snowed, and Feradach stayed. Surely the snow wouldn’t have stopped him, but he stayed.
He stayed and stayed and Merida could see his face go still and expressionless every time he heard his name—which he did, again and again, because the magic that had allowed them all to see him the same way before this kept on happening. So it was “Feradach, do you want to play a round of Whips and Hounds with us?” “Feradach, have you ever been to Hoy?” “Feradach, do you need more to eat?” “Feradach, can you play the flute at all? We need someone to do the melody for us.” “Feradach, you probably will be stuck here for days, I hope your business will hold.”