“Do you like it more or less than this one?” she asked, and held up a gown of pale blue silk with tiny seed pearls sewed along the hem and sleeves.

“Bonny, the both of them, aye,” he agreed.

Margot’s brow creased. She stood studying the wardrobe. She pulled out another gown that, quite honestly, looked like the others. The only difference was that it was a forest green. She looked at Arran, then at the gown. “What do you think?”

He thought she ought to choose a color and be done with it. They were all the same to his undiscerning eye. He shrugged. “Bonny,” he said again.

Margot sighed with irritation. “Will you not help me? I haven’t the least idea which to wear. Which one suits? And please, for God’s sake, don’t say bonny.”

“What will you have me say, then?” he asked, confused. “All of them are...boidheach.”

Big green eyes blinked back at him. “I don’t know what that means!”

“It means...bonny,” he said helplessly.

Margot groaned to the ceiling. “Will you please choose one?”

“All right. I choose the red one,” he said, pointing to the first one she had discarded across her daybed.

Margot looked at the scarlet one. She frowned. She looked at the forest green one she held. “Not this one?”

“Ach, I canna help you,” Arran said, and stood up, striding across her dressing room. “Wear what you like, Margot. They’re all bloody well bonny!” He strode out the door, frustrated that he’d walked all the way here to be tormented in such a way. He was a laird, for God’s sake. He had no business choosing gowns.

But the excitement in and around Balhaire was infectious, all the same. Mackenzies were suddenly taking airs, concerned about ghillie brogues and sporrans and the like. On the night of the ball, Arran dressed in the tradition of plaids and formal coats. He went to Margot’s dressing room and entered without knocking. She’d complained of that, too, by the by, and thought he ought to be announced in his own bloody house before he entered. He maintained if he would be made to march halfway across the Highlands to see her, he’d enter as he pleased.

This time, though, he was instantly brought to a halt. His wife, his beautiful wife, was dressed in the dark green silk gown with seed pearls interspersed between red crystals in a display of spirals and curls across the stomacher. Her hair was styled in a towering pile of auburn, with more seed pearls threaded into her hair. She looked regal and beautiful, and he was overwhelmed with a rush of prideful affection that made him feel warm in his coat. “Margot,” he said. “Diah, but you are bonny, aye? You bring to mind a noble queen.”