Chapter Twenty-Six
In the moments before Katrin opened her eyes, she struggled to determine where she was. When she was. Not her bed in the keep or anywhere she at once recognized. But that did not matter.
She lay in the arms of the man she loved.
The familiar warmth of him wrapped around her. The well-loved scent of him teased, and satisfied, and lent an inestimable sense of security. Wherever she might be was exactly where she needed to be.
She lay with her cheek against the naked skin of his chest and could hear his heartbeat. Slow and steady as the rhythm of the world. She wondered, with a tentative sort of marveling, in which of Finlay’s stories she had landed now. For surely, in one of those she did lie.
“Darlei,” he whispered, and kissed her.
She opened her eyes to darkness.
They lay outdoors in the forest, for surely those were trees swaying gently above her against a backdrop of eternal stars. And the man in whose arms she lay was not Deathan, but Finlay, the bard.
It came to her then. How she’d towed him up the slope away from the sea and across the graveyard where lay her ancestors, sleeping. Into the trees beyond. They had spread his cloak out on the ground and lain down to make love.
Once had not been enough. Nor twice. He had fallen asleep before she had, and she’d lain there wondering—wondering what he made of her life. Even now, she was only half certain whether this be the truth of that life, or dreaming.
“Finlay. Finlay?”
He stirred. All his movements were beautiful. Those of his hands at her breast. The way his body bowed when he came inside her. Even now, he reached those graceful fingers to her cheek before he opened his eyes.
“Katrin?”
“Call me alanna.”
“Alanna.”
“Am I Katrin, or am I someone else? Someone out of your stories.”
He said nothing, but she could feel him watching her.
“I dreamed I was caught back in one of those stories, I did. Dreamed it while I lay in your arms.”
“Which tale?”
“Ye were Deathan. I, Darlei.”
“The Caledonian princess.”
“With the heart o’ a wild woman, so ye said.”
“Aye. Och, aye.” He stroked the hair back from her temple. She ached for him to kiss her again. But if they kissed, they would make love, and she had something to say first.
“Deathan was wise enough to know better than to try to change his Darlei. Would ye change me, Finlay?”
“Never.”
“Then ye will ha’ to let me go, day after tomorrow.”
“I canna’ stay ye or hold ye. Only your own heart can do that.” Was that grief she heard in his voice?
“Then mak’ love to me again. Just in case we do no’ get the chance tomorrow night.”
She did not have to ask him twice.
*
They garnered no more sleep there in the forest. Instead, once they had again made love, when Finlay had felt the wheel of his life turn beneath him, Katrin rose and caught up his cloak, held it out to him.
“I maun go back. If Da is looking for me, he will be frantic.”
“Aye.” Finlay swirled the cloak around him. It was damp from the ground and smelled of her. Of their lovemaking. The two of them entwined.
She said, “I would no’ cause Da the kind o’ worry ye caused me today.”
“I had no intention to grieve ye.”
She reached up and laid the palms of her hands on either side of his face, kissed him deeply.
For an instant he felt certain she would tell him she loved him.
For surely she did? No such words came. Instead she said, “If ye would no’ cause me grief, then promise ye will wait here at Murtray while I am gone. ”
“Katrin, I canna mak’ that promise.”
“Verra well. It seems that neither o’ us will gi’ the other what he or she wants.”
“It seems no’.”
*
She longed to tell him to remain in her sight. But he had not offered that reassurance. He refused to give her the assurance that if and when she came back from the long march south, she would find him here.
He wanted something from her too.
Katrin could not be sure what, or why her heart knew that. It just did.
A man in ten thousand, was the harper. And she maun leave him.
The following day—that before they were to leave shortly after dawn—flew by.
Katrin wanted a thousand times to seize hold of it, make the spinning of life’s wheel halt for just a few moments so she might catch her breath.
But there were Da’s things to pack up, Angus being far too busy with other matters to tend to it.
There were last-minute arrangements to make.
And people wanting her attention on every hand.
With each passing moment, her grief and her desperation grew.
She did see Finlay throughout that day. He stopped in the hall when she was there at midday to take a meal, standing within her sight while he ate, though she had not the time to talk with him.
She saw him also out in the bailey while she ran errands.
He did not approach her, and she determined—tried to determine—that neither would she approach him this night, much as she wanted their last night together. Desperately, achingly wanted it.
A glimmer of red hair, a flash from the hem of the green cloak—they had lain together upon the softness of that—and little more did she catch of him.
When night began to close in, she retreated to her own chamber to make sure all she would need was packed up for morning.
Very little time would there be to spare, then.
She did not admit to herself that she was waiting. But her ear strained for his step in the chamber next door, a whisper of his movement in the passageway. The sound of notes loosed from his harp if he were there, and had unwrapped Brada for one last session.
She tried to imagine it—the morning with its rush and clamor. His leaving in one direction, and her taking another. What could she say to him? Would there be an opportunity for a leave taking? Would it be better without one?
When she’d packed up everything that she thought she would need, had Geordie’s leather armor ready along with the sword he had given her, all in a pack she should be able to carry on her own, she curled up tight in her bed.
He was not going to come. He would not approach her. She would be cursed if she would go out searching and pull him back with her again. Even if it did half kill her to go without the hours she’d thought to have with him.
There were hundreds of men in the world, besides Finlay. Many and many of them would accompany her away tomorrow, including Reagan O’Hanlon—one of the finest she’d ever known. Why should she lie and ache for Finlay?
She closed her eyes as weariness took her, drowsing.
She dreamed she sailed aboard a long, narrow vessel, a craft built with a high prow in the shape of a dragon’s head that, like a living beast, crested the waves.
She could smell the sea, the salt in her hair, and could feel her own strength as she clung to the dragon’s neck, gazing hard in the direction they sailed.
She returned to her lover, a man named Quarrie MacMurtray. She went with a sword in her hand. And if she had to fight battles for his sake, to win a place beside him, then this thing she would do. For she belonged but one place in the world, and that was at his side.
She awoke to find her chamber dark, and a fire burning within her. She had been caught up in another of Finlay’s stories, the last one he had told. But she’d fallen from the story too soon, before she’d been able to reach the man she loved…
The man she would love eternally.
A creaking told her that the door of her chamber had edged open.
She raised her head from the bolster and peered through the gloom, not at all sure whom she would see.
Ardahl, the Irish warrior? Adair, the prodigal son?
Deathan, who had loved a princess? Quarrie, who’d possessed the strength to love a warrior?
Why should she think it might be any of them?
A figure stood dimly silhouetted in the open doorway. Graceful, with long hair streaming over his shoulders, his body edged in green.
It was none of those men from the glorious stories Finlay had told, but the man himself.
She rose and welcomed him with eager gladness, all her pride forgotten. Closed the door firmly and undressed him with her own hands. Tasted him. Tasted him.
If that night had lasted forever, it would not have been long enough, and it did not last forever. She awoke in the cold dawn to find Finlay already stirring beside her, ready to rise and leave.
But which of them left the other?
“Nay,” she said. “No’ yet.”
She would be late going down to join the company. Already she could hear them out in the bailey, making a clatter. She did not care.
They made love quickly and desperately, just as Deathan and Darlei once had in the tiny alcove behind the great hall. She wanted to remember this, the taste of him on her tongue. All she could think of was his belongings all packed up in the chamber next door, and her heart bled.
She lay upon his chest, for in this, their last lovemaking, she had taken the upper hand. Peering into his beautiful face, she said, “I maun go. I can tarry nae longer.”
“Aye, so.” He raised his head from the bolster. “I will go gather my things.”
Her heart fell like a stone. “Ye mean to leave Murtray at once?”
Emotions flickered through his eyes. A rueful smile touched his lips. Those lips she’d kissed, that had been everywhere on her body.
“I will leave when ye do.”
Disappointment touched her. But nay, she had no right to ask him to stay, if she was not willing also to hold back at his request.
“Where will ye go?” Could she find him, if she returned home?
He slid out from under her and rose from the bed, moving with that wonderful, supple grace. Helpless, she could not keep from following him with her eyes.
He said, “Wherever ye do.”
“What?”
He stood looking at her where she still sprawled, his skin turned golden by the first light spilling through the window.
“I am coming wi’ ye.”
She sat up abruptly. “Wha’—”
“I will join the fighting men. Yer da’s troops.”
“But—nay.” Her heart sank so violently, she thought she would be sick. “Ye canna—”
He cocked an eyebrow at her. “Why no’?”
“Ye are nay a warrior.”
“Troops frequently tak’ pipers and such wi’ them.”
“Pipers. Drummers. Nay—”
“Katrin.” He fixed her with a look like green obsidian. “If ye go, I go also. Given wha’ we ha’ shared these past four nights, ye canna expect me to do otherwise.”
“Och.” Horrified, she tossed her hands into the air. “Ye canna mean it. Ye say this only in a last bid to—to convince me to stay back.”
“I do no’. I ken better.”
“I canna stay back.”
“I ken that fine. And so, neither can I.”
She scrambled out of the bed and laid hold of him. “Finlay, be reasonable.”
“Am I ever unreasonable?”
“I should ha’ said nay.”
“Is there ever aught reasonable in war, when it comes to it?”
“’Tis a thing called up by duty o’ the heart.”
“Ye see that now, do ye?”
On some level she had always seen it, always known it. A man fought to defend what he loved. Geordie had. She felt compelled to. And he? “Aye.”
He shook his head. “Men—as well as women—who go to war know that as there are winners, there must also be losers, and men die.”
“No’ ye.”
“Why no’?”
“I will no’ see ye die.” Her greatest fear, one that had now opened like a bottomless black chasm beneath her heart. It had appeared, that terrible pit, right along with the feelings she seemed to have found for him.
She tightened her grip on his forearms. “I will beg if I ha’ to.” Tears flooded her eyes. “Stay here till I return.”
“Do no’ weep.” He drew her hard against him, her face to his shoulder. “I canna bear seeing ye weep.”
She was too angry to weep, too stunned by dismay. Near paralyzed at the prospect of him risking himself.
A great and visceral fear.
“Please, Finlay.” The same words she’d given to him during the night when she’d needed him inside her. Now she needed to push him away.
He took both her hands in his, lifted them one after the other and dropped kisses into the palms. Gifted either side of her mouth with a soft kiss, and both cheeks, before placing a final kiss on her brow. “Katrin, alanna, go see to your duties. I will gather my things.”
Feeling helpless, she said, “I do no’ ken wha’ my father will say about taking a harper off to war.”
“Nor do I. I am going, all the same.”
Katrin drew away out of his arms and bent to gather her clothing. She would not look at him. Could not look at him.
“Do as ye wish, since ye will no’ stay for any asking o’ mine.”
He donned his clothes swiftly and left the chamber.