Chapter Fifty
L iadan gazed into the eyes of the man she loved. They appeared over-bright, as if he did in fact harbor a fever. And well he might. He’d returned to her covered in wounds, had Ardahl, more than she could readily count.
He had returned to her.
She could scarcely believe it, still. Her heart sang with wonder, a glorious sort of tune that flowed through her even as she worried for the state of his mind.
“Ardahl, dear one, ye could no’ have seen Conall. He is away to Tír na nóg .”
“He is not. At least, not yet.” He shook his head decisively. “He has stayed, Liadan, mayhap to help us. And he has told me the truth.”
He clutched at her now with both hands, one seeping blood where a slash across his knuckles had broken open.
“Tell me. Tell me, then.” Truth or imagining, or fevered, waking dream, he needed to unburden himself.
“’Twas Brasha, as we thought. Brasha and Cathair. She was always Cathair’s from the start. She played at wanting Conall. Bedded him, by all the gods. Drew him under. Then she fed him lies—that I had tried to seduce her away from him.”
“What? But ye would never—”
“I would never.” Absently, he caressed her shoulder. “I did know his manner of late had changed, sharpened. And that morning—well, he grew angry wi’ me as never before. I laid it down to the coming battles. The hard work o’ training.”
“There is anger, and anger .”
“Aye. They wanted him angry enough to kill me. I believe Brasha would ha’ harped at him and harped at him when they were together, until she poisoned his mind so he would strike against me. As he did.”
Liadan hissed out her anger. She longed to take up Ardahl’s sword, to march out and face the wretched, black-hearted wench who had so betrayed her brother.
But not yet.
“He wanted ye out o’ his way,” she breathed. “Cathair did. So he could be assured the place of first among Fearghal’s warriors. I knew that, on some level I did.”
“Aye, as did I. I just could no’ reason out how. But it did not work the way they planned. In the end, when Conall and I struggled together, he could no’ bring himself to kill me. The dagger ended up in his own heart instead o’ mine.”
“Despite her lies,” Liadan whispered. “He loved ye too well, despite the hate she tried to foster.”
“Aye, so. Liadan, I believe—I must believe—that love is always stronger than hate. And I do love ye, my beautiful lass.”
He kissed her then, the kind of kiss for which her heart had longed all the while he was away. A long, slow kiss it was, lips parting lips, the one of them drinking from the other. Giving and taking in equal measures as it would always, always be between them.
He kissed her until his breath became her own. Until she could no longer tell where her lips ended and his began. Until their very spirits melded and found depthless peace.
Only then did he withdraw far enough to drop small kisses into the palms of her hands, at each corner of her mouth, her cheeks. Her forehead.
“We must bring this to the druids,” she told him then. “Brasha and Cathair must pay for the terrible thing they ha’ done.”
“Aye, so they must.”
“I admit, I would rather exact justice myself.”
“As would I,” he agreed. “But that will not serve us well. Liadan, I have been thinking all the way home. If we can persuade the druids to withdraw Aodh’s sentence upon me—”
“We might be together.” She lit up at the very idea, her spirit soaring. “Och, Ardahl, d’ye think we can?”
“I do not know whether the druids will believe such a tale as I ha’ to tell.”
“If anyone will, it should be men who speak wi’ the gods, and interpret their signs.”
“Mayhap. If ’tis meant for us.”
She gazed once more into his eyes. “It has to be.”
“But, Liadan”—he gathered her hands into his—“there will be trouble coming. Battles, fierce ones. Dacha will no’ take the rescue of Brihan’s lad, nor Brihan turning away from him, lightly. Brihan has vowed to set up a defense, and we will join him on our own border, but—”
“The battle may come here,” she finished for him. “Again.”
“Aye. Just so ye know, should I fall, I will find ye. Somehow. In the next life.”
“Ye have promised it, and I believe it.”
He dropped more kisses into the palms of her hands, one after the other.
“And now, let us get your wounds cleaned. Your mam will be coming soon with the healer.” And Liadan would have to behave as if he meant no more to her than a foster brother.
She could do so. Surely she was strong enough, for she carried his promise in her heart.
*
The healer arrived, and a painful session followed. Liadan did not stay for it—it would not be proper for her to see Ardahl stripped down as good as naked, but his mam remained with him. Liadan stood out front of the hut in the thin sunshine and uttered a prayer of gratitude to Brigid.
Thank ye, great goddess, for bringing him back to me.
Far to the west, she could see rain clouds gathering. Aye, it would be from there the trouble came. The heartache. The death.
Away from the direction of the training field, someone shouted what sounded like orders. Dornach, setting the defense? Assigning his men?
Ardahl would have to fight again. He was strong, aye, this man she adored. A fine warrior. But blood and bone and sinew could endure only so much. She had witnessed the death of too many. Seen those she loved die.
If Ardahl was right, and love proved stronger than hate, should it not overcome greed also? The harm that came of a man wanting more and more land. Desiring to lord it over others. To be first among his fellows.
Would ever there come a time when such desires were laid aside and men reached instead for peace?
There in the watery sunlight, she shook her head. Men were men. And men such as Dacha or indeed Cathair cared little for whom they destroyed.
A flame of anger flared within her when she thought on Cathair.
Please, Brigid, great goddess. Help me as ye will. Let Cathair meet justice for the harm he has caused and the harm he would do .
A soft breeze stirred the hair at her cheek. An answer? Another promise?
Ardahl slept away the rest of that day. Liadan checked on him many times where he lay on the sleeping bench they had twice shared. His mam also remained nearby, her worry visible in her eyes. They spoke little, reluctant to disturb his sleep, but they shared their worry silently.
Outside, the settlement bustled with unaccustomed activity. Fearghal understood full well the outcome of what he had wrought. Dacha would exact a price for last night’s work—first from Brihan. Then from this clan.
She shivered over it as she stepped out to fetch water. Men hurried everywhere, all of them armed. Women wore fearful, distracted expressions on their faces. When she reached the spring, she beheld a sight. Cathair, who must also have taken his rest, was up on his feet, armed like the other men. In deep conversation with Brasha.
Indeed, so intent was their exchange, they did not notice Liadan across the way. Cathair, his white-blond head bent, held his face just above Brasha’s. She had laid her hand upon his wrist in a gesture of claiming.
No one seeing them so could ever deem them anything but lovers. But of what did they speak?
Liadan trembled. With all her being she wanted to approach and confront them. To charge them with what they had done, the shame and dishonor of it, that had cost her beloved brother’s life.
She could not. Because they would meet her accusations with feigned hurt and denial. Ardahl was right. They would have to speak first with the druids.
Yet a combination of hate and superstitious fear caused her skin to prickle all over as she passed by them to fill her ewer. An awareness—almost a premonition—of harm to come.
When she straightened from filling her ewer, she caught Brasha looking at her, eyes narrowed as if she too felt the discord between them, approaching like a storm.