Tavish could tell he looked fit in the suit he’d picked out for himself. The journalist seated across from him had given him the eye twice, and Portia wouldn’t meet his gaze as she sat in a chair off to the side. He’d had his hair cut the day before, something the stylist had called “classic but modern” and he’d thought showed too much of his gray; he’d changed his mind when Portia had barely been able to tear her gaze from him as he’d fielded practice questions from her and Jamie and Cheryl.
She was only a few feet away from him as he used that practice in his real interview, but the distance between them had grown over the last few days. Even now, the day before he was due to make his debut before the peerage, he hadn’t figured out how to close the ever-widening gulf.
This is what happens when you don’t check for cracks, he thought miserably. He’d been so busy trying to pretend he didn’t care about longevity that he’d allowed himself to create a flawed product, and now he’d nicked himself hard on it.
“After having toured your armory and the neighborhood you grew up in, it’s abundantly clear that you’ve lived a very different life from most of your fellow peers,” the journalist said in her meticulously smooth voice. It was soothing, familiar; Tav had watched Effie Wilson on telly for years, but now she sat across from him, as if he was someone interesting. There was a twinkle in her eyes, likely caused by the ratings dancing in her head, but she was good at her job and highly professional. Johan had brokered the interview—Tav had never thought about being paid to talk about inheriting money.
“Aye, but I wouldn’t say that’s a bad thing. I practice European martial arts and make Scottish weaponry for a living—I obviously understand the appeal of tradition. But sometimes you need to change things up a wee bit. If you base everything on how things worked in the past, then we’d have no innovation and no change.” Christ, I sound like a pretentious git, he thought, but he couldn’t very well get up and walk out of the interview. “I won’t presume to know what Scotland needs, but I can’t possibly do worse than these blue bloods who don’t even know what the average meal is, let alone the average median income.”
He resisted the urge to glance at Portia and focused on Effie, who was wearing the same ambivalent semi-smile she had for most of the interview. He couldn’t tell if he was spouting the most ridiculous tripe she’d ever heard, or she thought him brilliant.
“From what I gather, you aren’t happy with the stance of some of these ‘blue bloods,’ particularly when it comes to immigration. By all appearances, you’re a bit of a crusader for the migrants,” Effie said. Again, he couldn’t tell if she thought this was good or bad.
“I wouldn’t call myself a crusader,” Tav said. “Though if you want to talk about people invading countries and destroying cultures, the Crusades are a good point of conversation. Except no one likes to talk about that because the people doing the invading that time weren’t brown.”
The interviewer smiled tightly. “Ah, quite. But is the migrant question not your cause?”
Tav almost ran his hand over his stubble, now trimmed to acceptable rakish length, but then crossed his hands in his lap and drew his shoulders back instead.
“Well, all right. You know what? I will say I’m a crusader. For basic human rights, and human dignity. But instead of asking me why I’m fighting for people to have access to safety and education and affordable housing, maybe you should be talking to the knobs who don’t want people to have those things.” Tav remembered David, sitting on as close to a throne as he could get and unable to hide his disgust for people running from war and famine and terror. “I mean, honestly what kind of wanker is fine with turning away people in need, or looks down on those they should be lifting up? What an utter fucking tosser must you be to see someone crying out for help and think ‘Right, I’ll kick them in the face with my fancy loafer instead of giving them a hand’?”
Tav’s face was warm and he realized he was bent forward in his seat. He leaned back and took a calming breath before speaking. “I just don’t understand why people hold on to power as hard as the peerage have if not to do something bloody useful with it.”
“Thank you, Your Grace,” the journalist said. She turned toward the camera designated for her with a warm smile on her face. “And thank you for joining us to meet Tavish Arredondo McKenzie, Duke of Edinburgh, Scotland’s newest duke.”
As soon as the camera’s stopped rolling, actual human emotion suffused Effie’s face, and when she spoke she lost a bit of her posh accent. “Oh, that was fantastic. That last bit? Going to make the perfect teaser.”
Tav felt a mix of pride and embarrassment.
“Ta, I guess.”
“I should be thanking you. I grew up in a neighborhood like Bodotria, you know. Working class, down on its luck. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for the kids to find out their neighbor was a duke. To know that potential was amongst them.”
“I haven’t done anything, though,” Tav said.
“That’s the beautiful thing. Like the rest of the peerage, you’re not expected to work. But unlike them, your existence alone might make a difference for someone.”
Effie and her crew packed up and left, and Tav glanced over at Portia.
Portia smiled up at him. It was a reserved smile, but there was pride in her eyes. “You did great.”
“That was weird,” he said. He tried to shove his fingers through his hair but it was sticky with hair gel. He sighed. “The cameras and the makeup and the smoke she was blowing about my existence making a difference.”
Portia dropped her head back on the sofa so she was looking up at him. “You’ve read Arthurian legend. You get the appeal. Arthur was the chosen one, the one who could pull the sword from the stone. But every kid who’s heard that story from the middle ages until today has thought ‘That could be me.’ And now you’re Arthur. These kids might not want to become a duke, but they know it’s possible.”
Tavish sat beside her on the sofa, leaving a space between them. “Aye. No one ever talks about how Arthur felt holding that sword, though. And I’m not complaining, but it’s a mite heavy at times.”
“Heavy is the hand that wields Caledfwich,” she joked. Tav tried not to remember Pantscalibur. Oddly, it wasn’t the sex he missed the most. That was grand, of course, but he missed the weight of her in his arms. He missed the banter and the openness.
“Portia—”
“My parents offered me a job,” she said. It was like she’d sensed he was about to make an arse of himself. “A few weeks ago, but I have something lined up for me once the apprenticeship ends.”
About ten different emotions collided in Tavish’s chest but he tried not to show it. “Aye? I was hoping . . .”
Her head whipped in his direction. Her usually expressive brows rested in their natural place, and her deep brown eyes revealed nothing.
“I was hoping we’d have more time to make swords after this mess died down. You only got to make the one.”
She looked down, and though her body didn’t move, Tav felt as if a shield had just been thrown up between them.
“It’s okay,” she said calmly. “You can teach your next apprentice. I’m sure things will be less exciting the second time around, unless you have any other wild family secrets.”
“I fucking hope we don’t,” he said, trying to lighten the mood. “And I wasn’t planning on finding another apprentice.”
“You need to. Who’s going to make the swords while you’re off crusading?”
There was melancholy in her voice, and in the space between them on the sofa, and Tav didn’t know how to dispel it. He couldn’t really ask her to stay, could he? She had a job lined up and who in their right mind would give that up to be stuck with a grumpy Scotsman flailing about as he pretended to be something he wasn’t. If she stayed, she’d break from him leaning on her too hard. Worse, she’d grow to resent him and whatever it was between them would slip away.
No.
It was better for things to end like this: fast, easy, and with his heart only marginally battered. He’d get over it soon enough.
“Are you sure, though?” She gave him that inscrutable look again. “About not making any more weapons? I was thinking we could fire up the forge tomorrow morning. I know how important that was to you.”
She shrugged and stood, looking down at him. A faint smile graced her lips. “No, I was just being silly. Besides, it’s not like it’s a skill I’ll need while doing real estate investment.”
She emphasized the last three words, and seemed to be waiting for some response from him.
“Is that the family business then?” he asked.
“Yup. Just some rich assholes buying property in emerging neighborhoods and making a profit by selling at a higher cost.”
Ah. He saw what she was doing now. She looked calm, apart from the challenge in her eyes, but this was a berserker’s move; she was swinging her weapon wildly to keep him away from her. He hadn’t known what her family did. He didn’t know if it was the same as the gentrifying companies ravening through Bodotria. But he did know that she was pushing him away and he needed to respect that, even if he didn’t agree.
“Sounds like loads of fun,” he said with a shrug. “Maybe not what I’d imagined you doing with your life, though.”
“And what did you imagine exactly?”
Tav hadn’t really allowed himself to explore those unlikely paths because given the least leeway, his imagination was off and running. Breakfast in bed, cycling along the docks, sharing dinners and dreams and a shared hope for the future. Tav couldn’t lay that on her. Not when she’d already decided to go.
“Nothing,” he said. “I’m sure the job will be grand.”
“I’m going dress shopping with Cheryl. Later.”
“Later,” he mumbled as she walked off.
There was no promise in the word for him any longer because she’d be gone, and soon.