Chapter 18
Fiona was crying, fierce, silent tears that tore at Niall's heart. She would have been horrified to realize he knew her guilty secrets. He’d detected her weeping despite the cold rain that dampened her cheeks, aye, and knew that she clutched a fistful of Daire's black earth in her hand as if to cling to a piece of the land she loved forever.
Even as a boy, he had always known when she cried, no matter how hard she tried to hide it. He had sensed it like a cold fist in his gut, been willing to attempt anything from wild jests to dangerous feats of daring to playing at fairy king in his efforts to cajole her from her sadness.
But as the bedraggled, rain-soaked band of travelers trudged away from Castle Daire forever, there was no comfort Niall could offer.
He was taking his sister and bewildered mother away from the place they called home. He was forcing Caitlin to trudge farther and farther from the dreams they had both shared. He was marching them all toward a future none of them could imagine.
Niall glanced up to the two figures who sat upon his horse, Fiona's young arms keeping their mother balanced astride it as Aniera's eyes strained backward in confusion, a wilting flower crown on her rain-soaked hair.
Did she really understand that she would never be able to return to the castle where Ronan had made her his bride?
Did she guess how terribly Niall regretted it?
Aye, regretted it, Niall thought in aching surprise.
In a few short weeks, the castle that had haunted his nightmares had been transformed into the cradle of his dreams. Dreams so precious, so new, they still left him awestruck.
He wanted to tell Fiona that he forgave her now for her desperate bid to keep the only home she had ever known.
He understood why she had stolen the cow.
Fought so hard. For Niall remembered at last—not just the one, terrible day that had cleaved their family but treasured moments without number: pulling silvery salmon from the streams, building fortresses behind fallen trees, the forays they had made into the woods fairy hunting, using Fiona's fresh-picked berries as bait.
He had wished for a lifetime at Daire to remember it all. Had imagined sharing those adventures with a brood of his own babes. Sisters and brothers he prayed would share the fierce loyalty, the gruff affection, he and Fiona had known before it was stolen away from them.
I would have slain every dragon in Ireland to please you, my wee sister, Niall thought, a lump in his throat. I would slay the dragon that threatens you now, if I could. Find some other way, any other way, to keep you safe.
He would have given his sword arm for the strength to say those words aloud. But what difference would it make? How could he expect Fiona to believe he had rediscovered his love of Daire when he scarce believed it himself?
Maybe one day he would tell her, but for now, Fiona had no room in her heart for anyone's pain but her own.
Defeated in her lifelong struggle to hold on to Daire, she had still not surrendered the land she so loved.
Her fingers clenched tight around a clump of soil she had scraped from the garden she and Caitlin had sown with such high hopes.
Niall swallowed hard, his own eyes burning. Perhaps his mother's misty confusion was a blessing this day. Aniera carried with her the shadow figure of her husband, always young and strong and invincible beside her.
The rest of them traveled this road alone. Oceans stretched between them, leaving them solitary even though they had only to reach out their hands to touch one another.
Only Caitlin had had the courage to try to bridge that impossible chasm. She walked close by his side, and twice she had tried to take his hand. He had avoided her touch, busying himself with checking the horse's girth or the reins he used to lead it. He did not want to be comforted now.
He deserved to feel the anger and loss, the guilt and futility.
He had created this disaster. Deserted his mother and sister because he had not had the courage to face his own pain, then intended to use Daire as a haven when he was in peril.
He had brought the threat of Conn's vengeance to their door.
Aye, they had been scarce scraping along, in poverty that had alarmed him—or had it jabbed at his pride? The sister of the champion of Glenfluirse scrabbling for food like a wild dog?
Yet Fiona had felt rich enough. Niall understood that now, when it was too late.
She had been rich in the land and the secrets it kept.
Her treasure the bones it cradled and the stories the white wind told.
She was unique and rare, a creation carved from Daire's soil by the fingers of wind and rain.
Her soul drew strength from the castle walls her ancestors had raised, her remarkable courage pulsing into her spirit from Daire's green turf, life force pounding inside her in the ancient, earthy rhythm of the bodhran.
In that instant, he envied his sister. No honor won in battle, no quest he had triumphed over, no feat of daring or courage he ever performed had given him the wealth Fiona possessed.
She belonged to Daire the way sea cliffs belonged to waves.
She understood what the old ones and the land expected of her.
And she had fought for them more valiantly than any warrior Niall had ever battled.
Would Daire have granted such a gift to him if he had possessed the courage to return to it?
Or was it possible that he had not squandered that inheritance after all?
In spite of his determination to turn his back upon Daire and everything it stood for, had that primitive bond to the land only been sleeping inside him, waiting patiently to awaken?
Daring him to risk, to prove himself worthy...
It is too late, he charged the voices in his head. Can you not see that?
Too late for him. Too late for Fiona and his mother. Too late for the woman who walked beside him, sorrow and resignation in her soulful blue eyes.
Fingertips drifted onto Niall's arm, and he stiffened, unhappy that he had been too distracted to avoid Caitlin's touch. He angled a glance at her, his eyes filled with anger and loss, the tempests he was feeling. She winced, and he cursed himself for letting her see.
"Niall," she said softly. "Someone is coming."
Every battle-honed nerve sizzled to awareness. He swung to face the horse, reining the animal to a halt. "Fiona, you and Caitlin take Mother, hide in the underbrush. Make haste!"
He knew Fiona would not have cared if Conn's whole army were descending upon them at that moment. Only her devotion to their mother made her swing down, then reach up to help Aniera slide from the animal's back to the muddy earth.
Aniera stumbled just a little, and Niall knew she was already weary and numb from the hours spent riding. How would she ever withstand this grueling journey?
Caitlin pulled at his sleeve. "Niall, the footprints in the mud are there for anyone to see. And they end here. Would it not make whoever is approaching more suspicious if they found you alone?"
“Aye, curse it! You are right," Niall admitted.
By instinct, he maneuvered Fiona and his mother behind him, intending to shield them from whoever was coming.
Stalking to Caitlin, he yanked her hood closer about her damp cheeks.
She would all but suffocate in the clinging wet folds, but at least no one would see that unforgettable face which could prove the ruin of them all.
"Say nothing," Niall warned the three women.
"If anyone asks, we are traveling to a wedding feast. Your sister is to be wed," he said, jerking his head at Caitlin.
He scowled as she fidgeted with the hood, doubtless dying to gain a bit more space to breathe.
"And for the love of your blasted God, woman, keep your face out of sight this time, or—"
"—who knows what disaster will befall us?" She finished the sentence for him. Niall winced. "It may be your chieftain was right when he called me a curse," she said, meeting his gaze. "I have been one to you. To your family."
"Do not ever say that!" Niall berated her, savage. "It is not true."
"Is it not?" she demanded in quiet misery. "Castle Daire is lost because of me. Your sense of honor will never let you return to your chieftain, even if he believes I am dead. And if he discovers I am alive, you will be hunted, maybe even killed, for your kindness to me."
He wanted to rage at her, shake her until he drove such damning thoughts from her mind. But there was no time for another word. A lone rider bore down on them like a denizen from the otherworld, half concealed by billows of mist and the cold, gray veil of rain.
Niall's gut clenched as the figure neared, and he fingered the hilt of his sword. He would do whatever he had to in order to protect his family.
His family.
Caitlin, with the healing fire in her eyes, defiant Fiona, so young, so impossibly valiant, and the gentle, dazed mother he had tried to forget.
Panic churned in his gut, shaking his confidence in the sword arm that had served him so well.
Was this how his father had felt the day Conn's men had ridden into the castle yard?
This fearsome vulnerability, this earth-shattering love, this ice-cold terror far greater than his own paltry death could ever hold?
Niall's hands clenched until his nails dug deep into his palms, awareness jolting through him, lightning clear, illuminating everything. Suddenly, he knew why he had spent his life running—into battle, into danger. He had not been chasing honor or glory or a name made eternal by bard song.
He had been running away from anyone he could love. Because if you loved no one, not even yourself, you had nothing to lose. But it was too late to run again now. He loved these three women with every fiber of his body and soul.