15 TRUST, ONCE BROKEN
MIRREN WAS UNUSUALLY quiet while she readied Lara for supper—her movements jerky as she took out the High Queen’s braids and brushed her hair.
“Ouch.” Lara winced as the hog bristle brush caught. “What’s up with you this evening?”
“Nothing,” Mirren replied quickly. “Sorry, My Queen!”
Lara swiveled on the stool where she perched before the hearth in her alcove, her attention settling on her handmaid.
Mirren wasn’t herself. Her face was pinched, and her blue eyes were slightly red.
Lara frowned. “Have you been crying?”
Mirren waved her concern away, a little of her usual spirit returning. “No.”
Lara fixed her with a level look. “You’d tell me if you were in any bother, wouldn’t you?” She didn’t want Mirren to keep her worries to herself. Guilt stabbed at her then. She’d been so caught up in her own problems of late, she hadn’t given anyone else much thought.
Mirren gave a wan smile in response.
“I’m sorry if I haven’t been myself recently,” Lara said with a grimace. “I hope I haven’t been overly demanding with you?”
“Of course not.”
“Well then.” Lara folded her arms across her chest. “What is it?”
Her handmaid swallowed. Clearing her throat, she lowered her gaze to the hairbrush she still gripped. She then began turning it over and over in her hands. “Tonight is the blood-letting.”
Lara nodded. “Aye … and what of it?”
“Torran has asked me to partner with him.”
The words were whispered, as if she were revealing a terrible thing, and Lara stilled.
Torran mac Rab was Cailean’s second-in-command.
While they’d been on campaign, he’d held the fort in Lara’s stead.
She trusted his loyalty as much as she did Cailean’s.
Nonetheless, Mirren now trembled at the thought of taking part in the blood-letting with him.
Rising from her stool near the sleeping alcove, Lara took a step closer to Mirren and laid a hand on her shoulder. “Hey … it’s all right.”
But she knew it wasn’t.
Over three years earlier, two enforcers had cornered Mirren outside the broch and brutally raped her.
Overnight, she’d gone from a light-hearted lass who saw the best in others, to a cynical one who feared men—warrior druids especially.
She’d also insisted that Bree teach her how to fight and wield knives.
She’d even asked one of the Guard to tutor her in knife throwing—a skill that had come in handy when Lara and her mother had been attacked in the North, for Mirren had thrown the blade that brought down the queen’s killer.
“Are you afraid of him?” Lara asked softly.
Mirren grimaced. “I’m not sure. I find it hard to see the good in any enforcer these days.”
“Even Cailean?”
“Aye … even him.”
A pause followed, while Lara considered how to respond.
Once, she would have been at a loss for how to speak of such things, having had little worldly experience.
But now, after her marriage to Dunchadh of Braewall, she knew what it was to fear a man—what it was to hate one.
Nevertheless, she’d tread carefully here.
“You know that I partnered with Cailean at the blood-letting … twice?”
Mirren’s blue eyes widened. “You did?”
“Aye … it was before you came to live in the broch.” Lara flashed Mirren a sheepish smile. “Just between you and me, I was smitten with him at the time … so when he asked me to partner with him, I fell over myself to accept.”
Mirren’s eyebrows rose, her lips curving. “What was it like … to bond with someone in that way?”
“Exciting … intimate. You share more than blood … it’s as if your life forces entwine for a short while. Afterward, you feel … close.”
“You weren’t jealous when he ordered himself a bride then?”
Lara sighed. “No, I always knew my father would arrange a match for me … for the good of Albia.”
“I can’t believe you weren’t bitter about that.” Mirren was watching her closely, as if trying to catch her out.
“I wasn’t,” she replied honestly. Bitterness had come later. “I was told of my duty from an early age … and accepted it.” She halted then, studying Mirren’s pale face. “Torran is a decent man … but you don’t have to partner with him, if you don’t want to. You have freewill, Mirren.”
The lass stiffened then, and Lara wondered if she’d overstepped. Despite their differences in rank, they were friends—but they both had held back certain things. Mirren had never learned about what had happened on Lara’s wedding night or the morning after.
Lara wouldn’t confide in her now either. Some things were best left unspoken.
Her handmaid lowered her gaze. “I wanted Torran once.” A blush rose to her cheeks then. “I watched him like an adoring puppy … and dreamed that one day he’d actually notice that I breathed. It’s ironic that he finally has … although I don’t understand why he’d choose me.”
Lara watched her for a few moments before giving a soft snort. “Well, I’d say it proves he has good taste.”
During supper, Lara picked at her venison stew and dumplings, letting conversation swirl around her.
It had been an exhausting day, and concern about her overkings gnawed at her.
Not only that, but the days were passing with frightening swiftness.
They were doing their best to prepare themselves for their upcoming campaign, but it didn’t feel like enough.
After her meeting with Artair and Niall, she worried she wouldn’t have enough spears, blades, arrowheads, and fighters ready in time.
Their losses in Doure had to be replaced.
Just another reason why they needed the Circines to partner with them.
The less reliant they were on the wulvers, the better.
And soon, the Half-blood would arrive.
Despite that she was impatient to strike north, she wasn’t ready to see him again. And she definitely wasn’t ready for their handfasting. He’d share her alcove, her furs. He’d do what Dunchadh had—
No! She swiftly cut herself off. She couldn’t let herself think about such things, or she’d claw Alar’s face off if he tried to touch her.
Pushing aside her stew, she picked up her goblet of wine and took a large gulp.
Her gaze then traveled along the table, and she surveyed those who’d joined her on the high seat.
Bree’s brother, Gil, was deep in discussion with Cailean and Torran.
The chief-enforcer looked exhausted. His chiseled features were drawn, and he had dark smudges under his eyes.
He’d worked tirelessly since his return to Duncrag, but that wasn’t the reason for his fatigue.
He needed tonight’s blood-letting. In contrast. Gil’s lean face was animated.
It pleased Lara to see her archivist happier here these days.
When he’d first come to live at Duncrag, he’d been traumatized—ripped from his old form and reluctantly living amongst the Marav.
Unlike his sister, Gil hadn’t chosen Albia as his home.
Instead, the Raven Queen had cast him out when she’d discovered his sister had left Sheehallion.
Her attention shifted then to Torran.
Tall, lanky, and covered in woad tattoos, with close-cropped dark-blond hair and grey eyes, the enforcer was undoubtedly attractive. She could see why Mirren had been drawn to him.
Worry tightened her belly as she took another sip of wine. Maybe it was best Mirren kept her distance from the warrior druid. Torran had always seemed decent; however, the earth magic that flowed through enforcers’ veins made them aggressive, unpredictable.
She was pondering this when Cailean and Torran excused themselves from the table.
It was time for the blood-letting.
Flanked by two of the Fort Guard, Lara climbed the steps to the walls. Usually, Bree would accompany her, but this evening, she was with Cailean.
Inhaling the frosty air, Lara pulled her fur cloak tighter about her to ward off the chill. Above, the sky was a glittering carpet of stars. There was no veil between the world and the Gods tonight. Perfect weather for the ritual that would take place on the hill northwest of the fort.
As she stepped up to the ramparts, the glow of torches below caught her eye.
There they were walking in pairs down The Thoroughfare—enforcers and the women they’d chosen to partner them.
Only women partnered with the warrior druids for the blood-letting, for they were closer to earth magic and provided a better channel during the ritual.
Cailean led them, Bree at his side. As always, they made a striking couple.
Cailean was brawny and raven-haired, and although Bree had taken Marav form, she still walked with the posture and smooth stride of one of the Shee.
Of course, not all the enforcers were men. Thalia strode among them. Tall and proud, her long dark hair plaited in thin braids, the female enforcer walked alongside the woman who’d partner her for the ceremony.
And toward the end of the procession, Lara caught sight of a small woman with curly dark hair, walking next to a tall, blond, tattooed enforcer.
Mirren and Torran.
Lara was sitting by the fire in her alcove when Mirren returned.
Florie and the twins were downstairs, helping clean up after supper, and so she’d enjoyed a rare moment of solitude.
She nursed a cup of warm wine. Earlier, she’d even risked whispering to the flame burning on the low table beside the hearth—and had made it dance for her.
Playing with fire helped relax her. It was a welcome distraction from her worries.
However, the flame now flickered sedately once more as the curtain swished open and Mirren hurried inside.
Her blue eyes were bright, her cheeks flushed. She’d never looked prettier.
“Sorry for keeping you waiting,” she greeted Lara breathlessly. “As soon as the ritual was done, I—”
“Don’t worry about that.” Lara waved her apology away. “You went in the end then?”
“Aye.” The blush upon Mirren’s cheeks deepened. “You were right … it’s quite an experience.”
“And Torran … he was respectful?”
Mirren nodded, hurrying past her to start preparations so her queen could retire to the furs. Swiveling on her chair, Lara noted how flighty she was, how she deliberately avoided her eye as she poured water into an earthen bowl and fetched a drying sheet.
“So, you’re more comfortable around him now?” Lara pressed.
Mirren cast her a sidelong glance. “I suppose so,” she answered, wary now. There was a skittishness in her gaze that warned Lara she should leave this be, but she couldn’t. Part of her wanted to know if it was possible to heal a deep distrust of men.
“And if he shows interest in other ways … will you encourage him?”
Her handmaid’s face stiffened. She turned away then, busying herself in folding some washing that Florie had brought up from the laundry earlier.
“Probably not,” she said huskily, the excitement she’d entered the alcove with fading like a doused candle.
“He’s an enforcer, after all … and I won’t let one of them near me … ever again.”
Lara watched the rigid line of her handmaid’s back as she worked, her movements jerky. She was upset now. “Apologies, Mirren,” she said softly. “I shouldn’t have asked you that.”
“It’s fine.” Mirren still didn’t look her way.
No, clearly, it wasn’t.
“I guess I hoped that if you could let the past go, so could I,” Lara whispered.
Mirren stilled then before glancing over her shoulder. Their gazes met and held, and as the moments slid by, her handmaid’s blue eyes widened, understanding dawning.
“Aye,” Lara added. “I know what it’s like to dread a man’s touch.”