The bells of Naworth rang before dawn, quick and jubilant. Craig woke to the sound of hurrying feet in the corridor, voices lifted with excitement. “A son! A son born to my lady!” The castle quivered with life: women fetched steaming water, boys ran errands, the steward barked orders sharp enough to be heard through the stone. By midmorning the household pressed into the chapel. The air was heavy with incense, the altar bright with candles. Lady Elizabeth Dacre, pale but composed, cradled the newborn in her arms while Lord William stood beside her, his broad shoulders bent in solemnity. Thomas and Dorothy craned forward, their eyes wide at the sight of their brother. The steward, who clearly kept such facts polished for occasions like this, recited her pedigree as though he had swallowed it whole from an almanac of nobility. Lady Elizabeth Talbot—now Lady Dacre—was the daughter of George Talbot, 4th Earl of Shrewsbury: Knight of the Garter, Lord Steward of the King’s Household, and Privy Councillor to Henry VIII. Her mother—he made certain Craig heard this part—was Anne Hastings, formerly lady-in-waiting to Queen Catherine of Aragon before that royal marriage became a kingdom’s scandal. Through her blood, Lady Elizabeth stood within arm’s reach of the Tudor court and all its perilous favors. The steward ended as if delivering the sum of a legal document: “Her ladyship is of the highest connection.” Craig managed a nod, resisting the urge to ask whether the child in her arms mattered less than the names in the steward’s mouth. The chaplain lifted his voice and gave the name: Leonard. At the sound, Thomas flushed with pride at a brother to follow him; Dorothy curtsied so precisely that even the nurses smiled. Craig stood among the household officers, voice steady in the responses. He could not take his eyes from the sight of the family gathered, bound by blood, the line extended into the next generation. The child’s swaddled form seemed to radiate more than life — it was continuity, inheritance, everything his own family had lost at Flodden. After the service, the steward moved briskly, summoning musicians, setting out trestles. Ale flowed, bread and roasted meats filled the hall, and the whole household joined in the rejoicing. Craig accepted a cup, offered congratulations with the others, yet a heaviness lingered in him. He was glad for the child, glad for the house, yet reminded of what he himself had been denied: a father’s hand on his shoulder, a family name carried forward in unbroken line. Time passed quietly within the castle’s walls, a year turning before the sound of laughter again filled the nursery. Later, seeking a quieter corner, Craig drifted toward the nursery. The chamber smelled of milk and wool, its hearth small but glowing. There, amid the bustle of nurses and the soft clatter of wooden toys, a sturdier child was determined to make himself heard. Leonard, just past his toddling years, refused the offered toy horse and instead clutched at Craig’s gown as he knelt beside him. “Nay, lad,” one of the women scolded, trying to pry his fingers free. “The Maister has no time for you.” But Craig laughed, and not as a tutor. He let Leonard tug, then scooped him up with sudden ease. The boy kicked, squirmed, and then erupted in a giggle so loud it startled even himself. Craig spun him once in the air, to the nurse’s alarm and the child’s delight, before setting him down again. Leonard’s eyes shone with a mischief Craig already knew from Thomas in the schoolroom. For a moment the March, the quarrels of kings, and the weight of ancestry slipped away, leaving only the simple joy of a child’s laughter. When at last the nurse reclaimed him, Leonard protested with a cry fierce for his small frame. Craig only smiled, the echo of that laugh lingering in his ears as he stepped back into the dim corridor. He had not come here to play, yet somehow the boy had drawn him in — stubborn, headstrong, irresistible. At Craigfintray, his family’s history was measured in a few stones, a few names spoken at winter hearths. Here at Naworth, memory was carved into walls, painted in likenesses, carried forward in the swaddled child and the mischievous toddler. His father’s likeness was nowhere preserved, his hall long quiet after Flodden. Craig carried only the stories his mother had told him, the name of laird without the land. Among the laughter of children and the line of portraits, he felt suddenly small. That afternoon, Thomas and Dorothy were restless in their lessons. Thomas attempted declensions with more enthusiasm than accuracy, Dorothy corrected him with sharp precision, and both collapsed into laughter at the mention of gladius. Craig let them run on longer than usual. Who could expect stillness on such a day? When the lesson ended, a knock came at the schoolroom door. A young woman entered, carrying a message from Lady Dacre. Craig looked up—and for a moment forgot to speak She was no scullery maid. Her gown was modest but well made, sleeves edged with careful embroidery, her hair bound neatly beneath a coif. She belonged to Lady Dacre’s household, one of the gentlewomen who attended at chamber and table. She moved with a quiet assurance, as though born to neither high nobility nor low servitude but to that space between, trusted and respected. “The children are wanted in my lady’s chamber,” she said softly. Thomas leapt up, Dorothy curtsied in mock ceremony, and together they swept past her. The young woman lingered a breath longer, her eyes resting briefly on Craig. She noted the ink stains across his fingers, the scattered papers on the desk. A smile touched her lips. “You live more with your books than your food, Maister,” she said gently. “You’ll waste away if you’re not careful.” Craig managed a smile in return. “Better to lose weight than learning.” A soft laugh escaped her, quick and musical, before she dipped her head and withdrew. He heard one of the children call her name in the passage beyond: Alyn. He saw her again in the days that followed: carrying linens across the gallery, whispering to a nurse as she passed, setting down a tray in the hall. She did not speak to him each time, yet her presence lingered. Once, she met his gaze across the schoolroom while gathering Dorothy for a visit to her mother. Her eyes were dark, steady, unafraid. Craig found himself thinking of her at odd moments—in the stillness before dawn, at the pause between lessons, kneeling in the chapel. He imagined her smile returning to him, imagined the warmth of a hand in his own. He was nineteen, after all, and no vow bound him. A Maister, the son of a laird, he might one day marry. The thought was not unreasonable. Yet the setting made it dangerous. She belonged to Lady Dacre’s household; he was a Scot, a guest here by grace. Any word of impropriety would end his post, perhaps his prospects. The temptation sharpened when the castle gathered for Vespers. Alyn knelt a row ahead of him, her coif lit by the glow of candles. As the voices lifted in chant, Craig felt his own heart falter. This was not lust but the stirring of possibility—the thought of a hall not unlike Craigfintray’s, laughter of children, evenings by the hearth, the shape of a life that might be his if he chose it. Yet with the thought came unease. He had studied under masters who had urged the service of God above all, who had reminded him that the world was passing. His mother, too, had pressed him toward the Church, whispering that only there might he find safety and purpose. Craig pressed his hands together, whispering a prayer that felt half like pleading: “Lord, what would You have of me?” Later, wandering the gallery, he paused before the beasts: the red bull, the white ram, the black griffin, and the crowned salmon. They stood solemn on their pedestals, banners drooping in the dimness, each creature seeming to breathe in the cold air. Their eyes caught the torchlight and seemed to live — not mocking, but keeping watch. He thought of Hamilton’s burning at St Andrews — the reek of smoke, the murmured proverb, the reek of Master Patrick infects as many as it touches. He thought of the Dacres, whose line stood unbroken. And he thought of the gentlewoman’s smile, warm as firelight against the stone chill. His heart swayed between two paths. Marriage, family, laughter — the life of any Christian man. Or study, discipline, perhaps the cloister. To give up the one for the other would cost him dearly, and he knew it. The newborn Leonard thrived, the household settled back into its rhythm, and Craig kept his lessons with diligence. Outwardly he was the sober tutor, guiding Thomas through his declensions, praising Dorothy’s careful sums. Inwardly he wrestled. Each time he glimpsed the gentlewoman in the hall, he felt both the pull of desire and the weight of renunciation. He did not yet know the path he would choose. That decision would come later, and it would be final. But even then, in those early days at Naworth, he felt the truth of it pressing in: to follow the call of the Church would mean turning away not from shadows, but from a real and beautiful possibility.