Chapter 19 #3
Aniera hugged her slender waist, as if remembering that precious time.
"Ronan had his duty to fulfill at Glenfluirse.
I knew it was true. I tried to hold on to that.
Counted the days until we could leave the brash gaiety and return to the warm embrace of Castle Daire.
Then one night, while I struggled to calm Fiona, Niall escaped me, bold wanderer that he was.
Ever a warrior's son, he disappeared and, unknown to me, found his way into the armory.
I was crazed with worry, searching everywhere for him.
Just when I was certain I would run mad, Conn himself came to find me.
He returned Niall. The boy I feared would be dead bloomed rosy and laughing, playing with a toy sword belonging to one of the chieftain's sons. "
It was all too easy to imagine Niall, intrepid, determined, stubbornly finding his way to where all those delicious swords gleamed. A dark-curled, resolute-chinned outlaw, already issuing challenges to anyone who dared try to deter him.
"Conn was most... kind," Aniera continued, a troubled crease between her brow. "But his eyes snapped with a strange anger. The kind my father and brother had displayed when anyone had treated me carelessly. Conn said..." Even after so many years, she seemed to stumble over the words.
"He said Ronan should be carving a wooden blade for his own son and keeping watch over his own wife instead of wasting every moment trying to best Lorcan's bride on the practice field.
" Aniera sucked in a shaky breath. "Was that where Ronan had been rushing off to all this time?
To another woman's side? I cannot tell you how the question raked me.
I did not want to believe it was true, but the seed had been planted.
The tiniest flicker of Ronan's eyes toward Scota at the banquet table in the nights that followed became torture.
His smiles at her, his jests, were like blades in my heart. "
Caitlin slipped her hand over Aniera's cold one in comfort, imagining all too vividly how this quiet woman must have suffered.
How Caitlin herself would have suffered—after she flayed Niall alive!
But to admit such vulnerability, to ask your beloved if he had been bewitched by another woman…
how could any woman dare that? Just giving it voice might make it real.
And if it were real... Caitlin's heart wrenched.
Aniera laced her fingers with Caitlin's, her eyes glistening with gratitude. How long had she suffered in silence? Bearing the pain alone?
"I was in agony whenever they were together," she went on, "and they were always together.
It seemed Conn contrived a myriad of ways to keep them near him.
A kindness? I still wonder. He was a gallant man, a subtle one.
In so many ways, he hinted to me that he was trying to keep the two of them occupied with him so they could not steal off and betray all of us—Niall and Fiona, Lorcan and me, Conn, Ronan's own honor and Scota's virtue. Seven betrayals..."
She could not continue. She seemed to grope for words, at last settled on some she could bear.
"I suppose Conn was trying to protect me and shield Lorcan's pride.
Lorcan was fired of the same mettle as my Ronan, fiercely proud, brimming with honor and a fiery temper aimed at any who dared challenge it. "
A mist veiled her eyes. "That was what terrified me, what was most damning of all—the fury in Lorcan's eyes, building and building.
A rage too fierce for anyone to control.
It burst free at last as I feared it would.
Late one night, Ronan returned to our chamber, his eye bruised, his lip split.
The next morning, Lorcan and Scota were gone, away to Dunsearcha, Lorcan's distant land to the south. "
"You must have thanked God," Caitlin said, knowing she would have, most heartily.
Aniera's mouth twisted, bitter. "Aye, I was thankful.
Overjoyed they were gone. But a shadow fell over the festival from that morning, a thunderous, seething tension.
When night fell, Conn stood before the whole banquet table and cautioned Ronan that no woman was worth severing loyalties between foster brothers. "
Caitlin winced. If Niall was indeed like his father, she could imagine the effect such an announcement must have had upon proud Ronan of Daire.
To have his honor questioned would be infuriating enough, but to be scolded like a wayward lad by his chieftain in front of all the other warriors—to be humiliated thus—would rake his soul raw.
"Ronan was furious," Aniera said. "I remember his rage, aye, and his hurt. He saw the doubt in my eyes.
All the warriors of Glenfluirse saw it, too.
He scarce spoke during the days he took me and the babes back to Daire, then he rode away.
By the new moon, I heard what had happened after Ronan left me.
Lorcan was dead. Whoever had killed him had tried to claim Scota.
Scota was dead, the dagger that never left her side buried in her breast. No one knew for certain how she died, but I always believed she had killed herself rather than surrender to her husband's murderer.
Only one man could be guilty, it was rumored through all of Ireland. Ronan of Daire."
Bile rose in Caitlin's throat. "How—how could you bear it?"
"You do not understand, child. That accusation was my salvation.
Perhaps I did not believe in the strength of Ronan's love for me, but Lorcan and Ronan had grown up together—anam cara,—soul friends—from the time they were boys.
No mere lust of the flesh would make Ronan draw his sword against his brother. "
"But if Lorcan struck first—"
"That is what happened the night Ronan's eye was bruised. Lorcan struck, and Ronan would not fight against him. Even more certain than that truth was another I knew about my husband. Ronan of Daire would sever his own hand before he forced himself on any woman."
As his son would, Caitlin realized with stark certainty. Nothing could make her believe Niall capable of such a hideous act.
"When Ronan returned to Daire, I was shamed by the joy I felt. I rejoiced in the chance to tell him I believed in him. I doubted him no longer."
"But even though you believed in him, all Ireland judged Ronan guilty. Were you not afraid?"
"Ronan swore there was nothing to fear. We were in no danger.
Soon after Ronan arrived at Lorcan's fortress, a hunting party from Glenfluirse arrived, seeking shelter.
Conn was among them. They found Ronan there, devastated amidst the carnage.
Conn ordered Ronan to return to me, to his children.
The chieftain vowed that he would discover whoever was guilty of such a treacherous act. When he did, they would be punished."
More mercy from this chieftain Fiona hated, Caitlin feared. To send a man all but condemned home to his family, promising to search out the truth rather than rushing in with brutal judgment, that was an act of wisdom and kindness, was it not?
"I can scarce believe Ronan did not stay at Dunsearcha—lend his own sword to the chase,” Caitlin said.
"Conn insisted Ronan's presence there would only make things more difficult to unravel.
Besides, he claimed the children and I had suffered enough.
Ronan owed it to us to come to Daire, ease our fears.
The chieftain said he knew Ronan was incapable of such cowardice and betrayal.
He would find proof of who had done this heinous thing.
Ronan himself could name the punishment.
"Ronan named it, then: death to whoever had murdered his foster brother. Eternal shame cast down upon anyone who carried the blood of the betrayer, so no one would ever forget..."
Caitlin winced, sick inside. "Then it was Niall's own father who condemned him to carry that awful name? One whose shame he never earned?"
Aniera nodded. "When Ronan returned, we both grieved for Lorcan and Scota, but our own love, our own future, had come so close to being snatched away that we were determined not to waste another moment in misery.
We would celebrate Lorcan's boldness in our son, aye, and tell of Scota's courage to our tiny daughter one day.
We drank in every moment we shared like honeyed mead, as if we could not get enough.
Ronan carved the wooden sword Niall had longed for, and in the darkness, he forgave me so generously for ever doubting him that at last I forgave myself. "
"But did you not fear what might happen? Everyone who had been at the festival suspected Ronan of the evil deed. Why did you not flee?"
"Because we believed heroes do not die in shame. He was innocent. We both knew it. We believed our chieftain knew it as well. Justice was ours for the taking."
"Then how... why did Conn's warriors come to Daire?"
Pain raked lines deep into Aniera's face, her eyes bewildered. "Witnesses who had seen Lorcan's murderer came forward. More damning still, they found a message Scota had scribed in her own blood before she died. Ronan, it said, then farther along the wall, kill."
"Merciful God!"
"Is God merciful, Caitlin?" Aniera asked, tears flowing down her cheeks. "Where was He that day? They dragged Ronan away from me. They took my son. Fiona... I can still hear her screaming. All I could do was cling to Ronan, crying that I believed... believed in him."
She fell silent for a moment, the pain of that tearing apart somehow new.
"I left Fiona with servants, took Keefe, Daire's most trusted man, and tried to follow Ronan to Glenfluirse, but the new babe in my womb made it difficult. I had just told Ronan about the babe that day by the standing stone. His joy had been so fierce. We would name the child
Lorcan if a boy. Scota if a girl. I agreed. Jealousy banished, I mourned them both as much as he did."