Chapter 7 #3
Allia watched him go, then turned her gaze to her uncle, expecting him to be angry.
Instead he was watching her with narrowed eyes, as if gauging her reaction.
She looked away and quickly stabbed her knife into a bite of turnip and tried to act as if Eian’s abrupt departure didn’t really bother her.
"I can't imagine what his problem was, I only asked how he hurt his hand.
I might have offered to bandage it for him.
" As a lady of the castle, such things would have easily fallen within her duties. Perhaps she had only imagined it, but she could have sworn her uncle was stifling a smile as he turned to speak with the man on his left. And why hadn’t he redressed Eian Mac Coinnach for publicly insulting her with his rude behavior?
She really had no idea what was going on.
Eian slammed back another dram of whiskey, hoping for a temporary reprieve from the thoughts plaguing his mind.
Och, this was exactly why he'd always made it his policy to just live life to the fullest, and not think too much about it.
Thinking too much now was only making him miserable.
He poured more whiskey into his cup from the jug on the table, and raised it to the group of men who were cheering him on.
He had never lost a drinking contest, and tonight was the perfect night for one.
He couldn't bring himself to look at Allia with another man, and he couldn't bring himself to leave Lochain tonight, either. And he certainly wasn’t going to admit to himself that all signs were pointing to the lass being his mate.
The only thing left to do, it seemed, was to get really, really drunk.
The only problem was, as usually happens when one mixes a group of high-strung warriors with too much whiskey, eventually a brawl broke out.
And Eian was soon in the thick of it, with the crowd cheering them all on.
Already well into his cups, he took nearly as many blows as he landed, until he eventually stumbled, or maybe he was shoved, out of the hall and into the night.
Weaving across the yard, he eventually came to the stable and slumped down against an outside wall.
He could already feel his eye swelling, and something dripped down his face that he suspected might be his own blood, but he didn't really care.
The whiskey had numbed the pain, but to his considerable irritation, it hadn't taken away the conflicting feelings that were threatening to drive him mad. Bloody hell. What if she is my mate? No… can’t be… want her so badly…
He was just blissfully slipping out of consciousness when he heard someone calling his name. Oh sweet mercy…
Allia had rolled her eyes at the ridiculous show of male testosterone erupting in the hall.
Men were exactly the same, no matter where or when.
She could have been witnessing any number of identical bar room brawls in the 21st century.
Not that she had seen all that many in person, but she had watched enough of them on TV.
She had seen Eian laughing and carousing with the rest of them, and then she had seen him join the fight that seemed to start up out of nowhere.
The men who were fighting probably had no idea why they were pummeling each other, especially considering how drunk they all were.
Some seemed barely able to stand, let alone throw a punch.
Even drunk, Eian had been fairly impressive.
He had some serious fighting skills. Had he been sober, she was pretty sure none of the others would have stood a chance against him.
As the fighting drew to a close, mostly because a large number of the participants had either been knocked out or had passed out on their own, she watched Eian stumble out the door, blood dripping down his face and onto his clothes.
At first she was determined to ignore the whole juvenile display, but as she sat there and each minute seemed to grow longer than the last, she found she couldn't take her eyes off the door, wondering where he went and whether he was alright.
What if he fell into the loch and drowned?
Ok, so in the state he was in he probably wouldn't make it as far as the lake, but still, what if he did?
Or what if he was more seriously injured than he looked and he bled to death?
Or had a concussion? She found that she cared much more than she wanted to.
Finally, she gave up torturing herself and made an excuse to step out for some fresh air. Her uncle nodded, letting her go a bit too easily and without insisting on guards, but she would think about the implications of that later.
She soon found Eian sitting propped against the stable, and even in the dim light of the newly risen moon she could see his swollen eye and bloodied nose.
With a resigned sigh, she shook him gently and called his name.
She had to do so twice more before he finally opened his eyes and relief flooded through her. He was alright.
"Ah Lass, have ye come to put me out of my misery?" He made a grab for her arm, but missed.
"No”, she said curtly. “I've come to make sure you're still alive. Now that I see you are, I'm going back inside."
He smiled drunkenly. "Ye care for me."
"No, I..."
He reached out again and this time successfully grabbed her by the waist, pulling her roughly down onto his lap. "This is the best dream I've ever had..."
She tried to pull away but he clutched her tighter. "You're not dreaming, you oaf, you consumed your weight in whiskey and..."
He put his fingers clumsily over her lips. "Shhh. No talking. I have to tell ye… I think I'm falling in love with ye lass... I've been with lots of women, do ye ken how many women I've been with?"
"No! And I don't want to know..." Falling in love? Oh Allia, stop with the fantasies, it's only the whiskey talking and you know it. Even so, those words coming from his lips had melted her insides to a dangerous, molten degree.
"I dinna ken either. Lots. I ne’er kept count. Some men do ye ken... keep count. I ne’er did, though."
"Well, I imagine it would have taken up far too much of your time", she said tartly.
"Aye. But I dinna want any more women, and I dinna want any more whiskey, I only want ye… And I'm going to kill him!"
"Kill who?" She certainly didn’t want Eian killing anyone, especially when he wasn’t in his right mind.
"Any man... that ever touches ye. But me. Ye frighten me, lass."
"You can't just kill..." She trailed off because his eyes had slipped shut and he was fast asleep.
She looked at his face in the moonlight, his long, dark lashes sweeping his high cheekbones, his full lips slightly parted in sleep.
His unruly hair fell in waves across his shoulders, and because she had wanted to for so long, she ran her fingers gently through it, smoothing in back from his face.
He was beautiful, sensuous, wild, and far too dangerous.
Far, far too desirable. Every woman's darkest fantasy; little wonder he had been with so many.
With a sigh, she started disentangling herself from his arms. She needed to get away before she gave into her next impulse and kissed his lips while he slept.
That sinfully gorgeous wide mouth framed with a square jaw and a dimpled chin.
But his arms tightened around her again, his brow creasing as he frowned in his sleep.
"Stay..." he mumbled. “I need ye…”
But she didn't stay, as much as she might want to. Now that she knew he would live, she carefully slipped free from his grasp and, with one last look, she turned and went back into the keep. Leon glanced up when she came in, and she could have sworn he looked slightly surprised to see her. She didn’t go back to the table.
Instead she climbed the stairs to her room and went straight to the window, which was wide open to the night.
She couldn’t bear to be closed inside for long, never could.
The moon was higher in the sky now and she could see the outline of the hills in the distance, and the long squat building that was the stable.
Had he been with those women in there? Shaking her head in a poor attempt to rid herself of unwelcome thoughts of Eian naked and straining over another woman, she started to undress for bed with sharp, jerky movements that told her just how frustrated she was with this whole crazy situation.
She hadn’t really belonged in the 21st century, and she didn’t really belong here, either.
And now she wanted a man that she couldn’t have because he was no good for her.
She pulled a night rail over her head, and sat down on the feather bed that she still hadn’t quite gotten used to.
She missed her own bed. There were a lot of things she missed.
Hot showers, microwave ovens… radios. Her kitten.
She still felt confused and frightened and all tied up in knots, and it didn’t seem to be getting any better as the days went by.
She needed to go home, where everything had made sense.
Hadn’t it? More sense than things were making here, anyway.
She was pretty sure she could figure out how to get there…
she knew the spell, and she could reverse it easily enough.
She plopped back onto the pillow. All right, it was settled.
No more craziness. No more uncertainty. She would run.
She was going to go home, back to the 21st century.
Allia sighed and pulled the coverlet higher around her chin, feeling like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.
Now if only she could only get rid of the annoying ache in her chest at the thought of leaving Eian Mac Coinnach behind for good.