3. Chapter Three
Chapter three
The next morning, Aingeal rode through the lands as though speed alone might leave unease behind.
She did not know exactly what she meant to outrun.
Only that stillness had begun to feel dangerous.
It pressed inward, tightening beneath her ribs until even breathing felt like labor.
Motion thinned it. Motion made it bearable.
Bríd surged beneath her, strong and eager, muscle rolling under her sleek chestnut coat. Her hooves beat a steady rhythm into the damp winter earth, and Aingeal let that rhythm pull her breathing into order. Wind tore at her braid and struck cold against her cheeks. She welcomed it.
Riding had always been her remedy. When the world grew too loud, too close, she rode.
Fast.
The fields opened before her in long familiar sweeps, green broken by low gray stone walls and hedgerows gone brittle with winter.
The land rose and dipped in gentle swells she could have crossed blindfolded.
Every hollow, every turn, every narrow track worn by hoof and cartwheel belonged as much to her memory as to the earth itself.
She leaned lower over Bríd’s neck and urged the mare on.
Marriage. Alliance. Necessary. The words struck through her thoughts in the same weary pattern they had for days. Necessary. For peace. For stability. For the people.
Aingeal tightened her grip on the reins until the leather bit her palms. She would do what must be done. She would stand in the hall and smile when expected. She would sign the charters. She would bind her people’s safety to another name if that was the price required of her.
But she would not become ornamental.
Her father had not raised her to be set upon a shelf like some polished thing to be admired and ignored. He had taught her to hold land the way a warrior held a blade, with steadiness, strength, and the knowledge that surrender must never come easily.
At the crest of a rise, she eased Bríd down to a canter. The mare tossed her head, breathing hard, steam lifting from her in pale bursts. Aingeal drew in the scent of winter grass and distant chimney smoke. For a few precious heartbeats, the tightness inside her loosened.
She let herself simply ride. Let herself be foolish enough to enjoy the wind.
Then Bríd snorted sharply and pinned back her ears.
Aingeal looked down.
A man stood in the field below.
He wore a dark cloak that shifted in the breeze, and something in the set of him caught her at once: the squared shoulders, the stillness, the watchful balance of a man who did not waste movement.
A horse grazed a short distance away, reins loose over its neck.
The stranger stood half-turned, his attention fixed on something at his feet.
Aingeal scowled.
The countryside was not a place for wandering men to plant themselves wherever they pleased. She hauled back on the reins. Bríd skidded beneath her, tearing soft clods from the earth.
The man turned.
For one taut instant, the world narrowed to the space between them.
He looked at her directly. Not startled. Not apologetic. His gaze swept over her in one swift, measuring glance, cool, practical, entirely unawed.
Aingeal disliked him at once.
He was not handsome in any soft or courtly way.
He had the lean, compact build of a man accustomed to armor, hardship, and long miles.
His shoulders were broad, but nothing about him was careless.
Dark hair was tied back at his nape. A short, neat beard framed a mouth that looked as though it had forgotten easy smiles.
His eyes were gray, sharp, and watchful.
There was something held tightly in him.
Something dangerous kept under strict command.
They looked at one another across the winter field.
He did not lower his eyes.
Aingeal lifted her chin. She disliked his calmness. Disliked the self-possession. Disliked even more the sharp, unwelcome awareness that he was strong, and that strength sat on him as naturally as his sword belt. “Are you in the habit of standing in the middle of riding paths?” she called.
One dark brow rose. “I was not aware this was a road.”
Her eyes flicked pointedly to the narrow track worn through the grass. “It is.”
He glanced down, then back up, unimpressed. “Barely.”
The answer irritated her more because it was not entirely wrong. Only then did she look past him.
A sheep lay tangled in a clutch of bramble, one hind leg caught badly among the thorns. Its frightened bleating drifted thinly over the wind.
Aingeal exhaled through her nose, annoyed with him and annoyed with herself for having judged too quickly. “You might have chosen a safer place,” she said anyway.
He straightened slowly. “I might have.”
Without another word, she swung down from Bríd and crossed the short distance to the trapped animal. Brambles caught at her skirts as she knelt. She reached in carefully, ignoring the sting as thorns scraped her fingers.
Behind her, the stranger said, “You do not have to…”
“I know.”
She worked the sheep’s leg free with quick, practiced hands. The animal kicked once in panic, then stilled as she murmured under her breath. One final tug, and it came loose. The sheep stumbled upright and bolted clumsily away across the field.
Aingeal rose and brushed the dirt from her hands. When she looked up, he was still watching her. “Where are you headed?” she asked.
“The castle.”
Her chest tightened. “Why?”
The smallest pause. Not long enough to be obvious but long enough to matter. “I seek employment.”
She studied him more carefully. “You are not from here.”
“No.”
“Traveling alone?”
“For the moment.”
The accent confirmed what she had already begun to suspect. English. Faint, but unmistakable. Her spine stiffened. Experience had taught her caution around Englishmen with swords and measured answers. “You are a knight,” she said.
“Yes.”
“You will find no shortage of conflict here.” She let the warning remain plain in her tone.
“I seek usefulness,” he said.
The simplicity of it unsettled her. Not because she wholly believed him. Perhaps because some part of her did. Aingeal took Bríd’s reins and drew the mare nearer. “Announce yourself at the gate. The guards do not welcome surprises.”
The corner of his mouth shifted, not quite a smile, but enough to suggest he heard more in her words than she intended to reveal. “I do not imagine they do.”
She set one foot in the stirrup. “Try not to stand in anyone else’s path.”
“You ride like someone who does not fear falling.”
His voice stopped her before she mounted fully. She turned her head. “I ride like someone who knows how to get back up.”
Their eyes held.
Something passed between them then: brief, sharp, and charged enough to trouble her. She mounted and turned Bríd away without another word.
Long after she had crossed the next rise, she could still feel his gaze between her shoulder blades, and it irritated her that her pulse had not yet settled into its usual steady rhythm.
Castle Ní Néill rose from the land broad, gray, and immovable, its towers rough against a sky the color of old pewter.
Reginald reined in when the gate came fully into view.
Two spearmen stood watch, their posture careless only on the surface.
He had known too many guards in too many places not to recognize alertness disguised as boredom.
He dismounted before either man told him to and kept his hands plainly visible.
“I seek audience with whoever commands here,” he said.
One guard narrowed his eyes. “For what purpose?”
“Employment.”
The guard looked him over, then disappeared inside.
Reginald stood beside his horse and waited, the saddle pressing against his shoulder where he leaned lightly against it. He had learned patience the hard way. First impressions mattered in places like this. A man too eager invited suspicion. A man too proud invited challenge.
After a short while, two men crossed the yard toward him.
One wore a short cloak and a sword and moved with the economical confidence of someone used to command.
His beard was clipped close. His eyes missed little.
The second man held parchment and quill.
The first man greeted, “Ronan, gate captain.”
Reginald inclined his head.
“Were you expected?”
“No.”
Ronan’s gaze sharpened. It lingered on the sword at Reginald’s hip, the marks of travel on his clothes, the horse, the set of his shoulders.
He was weighing usefulness against trouble.
“You will give your particulars to the steward.” He jerked his head at the other man.
“Barracks lodging until the council decides whether there is use for you. If you’re admitted, you’ll see Seamus. ”
“Seamus?”
“Seamus commands the fighting men. I keep the gate from swallowing fools.”
Reginald nodded once. When the steward asked his name, he stated, “Sir Donal O’Raida.”
The steward’s hand paused and looked at Ronan. The name changed the air between them.
Prickles danced along Reginald’s nape, but when the steward continued writing, he brushed it off.
Reginald was assigned a narrow sleeping space in the barracks and told to present himself in the yard before dusk. After he saw to his horse in the stables, he was crossing the courtyard when a man stepped into his path with such quiet certainty that Reginald halted at once.
The newcomer was fit and hard-looking, scarred in the way of men who had spent years proving themselves with steel. Nothing about him was ornamental. His face was weathered, his body all narrow strength and hard habit. “You are an English knight,” he said.
Reginald did not bother denying it. “I have traveled.”
“So I hear.” The man folded his arms. “Most nobles here are Irish-born. The man Lady Aingeal is meant to wed holds lands south of here. His family has been rooted in this soil for generations.”
There was an edge to his explanation. Perhaps he was suspicious of his English accent. Borders were never merely lines on a map. They were memory, blood, resentment, and belonging. Reginald knew that well enough. This knowledge could prove useful, though the timing of it sat badly in his gut.
The man studied him for a long moment.
“I am Seamus of the Western Ridge,” he said. “I know this castle backward and forward. Very little happens here without my knowledge.” He tilted his head slightly. “You crossed paths with a rider today.”
Reginald nodded once. “I did.”
“That was Lady Aingeal.”
He saw her at once in memory: the proud set of her shoulders, the fierce intelligence in her face, the quick temper, the competence.
The way she had gone straight to the trapped sheep without pausing to consider what the brambles might do to her hands.
“She rides like she owns the wind,” he said with a hint of admiration.
Something like approval flickered in Seamus’s face. “She owns more than that. And she is no fool. She has little patience for men who admire themselves too greatly.”
“I stand where I am useful,” Reginald replied.
“We shall see.”
Seamus jerked his head toward the yard. The open area rang with the life of a working castle: smith’s hammer on metal, shouted orders, boots thudding on packed earth. Young squires clustered near the fence. Soldiers sparred with blunted weapons. Several turned openly to study the newcomer.
Seamus called one forward. “A demonstration.”
Reginald stepped into the open space and accepted the practice blade offered to him. It felt wrong after years of real steel, too light, too harmless, but he adjusted his grip without comment.
His opponent came at him hard.
Reginald met the first strike cleanly, turned the second, then stepped inside the man’s reach with quiet precision and no wasted force. He used the man’s momentum against him, sent him off balance, and ended the exchange before it had properly become a contest.
The men watching grew quieter and more attentive.
The second bout lasted longer.
The third, less.
When it was done, Reginald stepped back, breathing evenly.
Seamus gave one short nod. “Good. We have need of men who can hold a line and keep their heads.”
Reginald lowered the blade.
“Your name,” Seamus asked.
“Donal O’Raida.”
Silence settled around Seamus for the space of a breath.
A warning stirred low along Reginald’s spine. Did Seamus know the real Donal O’Raida? Had he heard the name often enough to know the accent sat wrong on it? Something in the man’s stillness suggested the answer was not simple.
Then a cold breeze crossed the yard, carrying woodsmoke, stew, and the smell of wet stone. Reginald glanced up without intending to.
Movement crossed one of the upper windows. The sweep of a woman’s cloak. The turn of a head.
Lady Aingeal.
The field returned to him with surprising force: her fierce mouth, her unflinching gaze, the hard, quick answer she had given him.
I ride like someone who knows how to get back up.
Before he could stop it, the faintest smile touched his mouth.
Seamus noticed. “Welcome to Castle Ní Néill, m’lord,” he said.