Chapter Three
Mine
Neave, June 2–28, 1564, Ulster, Ireland · Siena, June 2, 2011, Washington, D.C.
“Christ, my Neave...” Aedan approached the bed with Ronan at his side, their unblinking gazes trained on the wee candle-lit bundle in my arms.
Golden hair, sky-blue eyes, chubby pink cheeks. Were it not for her diminutive size and delicate features, our daughter would have been the spitting image of the child I cradled here four years past. How big Ronan seemed now, yet their resemblance was uncanny.
“The babe is strong and healthy, m’lord.” The midwife flicked her helper a look toward the door. “Beannacht Dé girthy.”
Aedan’s eyes shimmered ocean blue, his voice low and strained. “I’d have returned sooner had I known.”
He dipped his head in silent prayer, but I read it on his lips. I thank you, Lord, with all my heart.
“She’s lovelier than I could have dreamt. Like you...” he said aloud. “Like...our son.”
Two words to end all doubt. Two words to set us free.
We peered at each other for a long moment before he scrubbed a rough hand over his face and bent to Ronan. The little boy, who’d been surveying the babe with the most somber expression, didn’t stir.
“Meet your sister, then, lad. Have you a name for her, a rún?”
“Aine,” I said without hesitation. “Aine ingen Aedan O’Neal,” I added, each name a thrush’s song trilling in our bedchamber. “Say hello, Ronan. Isn’t she lovely?”
My son looked from the babe to me, fists tightening and nostrils flaring. “Put her back in your belly, mama!” His wail was like the first roar of a bear cub. “I do not want her!”
I clasped a hand to my mouth, startled by the change I hadn’t dared admit hitherto. His eyes had grown a few shades darker and a shade cooler. His nose was no longer a button, but a straight wee blade. And while his jaw held the soft outline of a small child, it showed clear beginnings of a square shape.
My heart swelled with so much warmth, it would have overflowed if not for the unbidden flashback of Ida’s waning-moon brew on my night table five years past.
“It’s no easy feat to share mama—I know, lad.” Aedan shot me a glance. “But your sister is here to stay, so you’d better welcome the notion.”
“I do not wish for her to stay!” Ronan’s tears, hot and unrestrained, streamed down his round cheeks. “I do not! My mama! Mine! Mine!”
Aedan tossed me another look and placed his hands on Ronan’s shoulders. “Come now, lad. Rein it in.”
Since wrenching from his father’s iron grip proved futile, Ronan only wailed harder.
“You’re my firstborn, a leanbh,” I reached for his golden head, but he jerked away. “I’ll love you always, my wee love. Always-always and forever.”
“I loathe her!” He stomped his feet with all his might, small fists clenched at his sides. “And I loathe you, mama! And da!” He yanked at the hem of Aedan’s léine. “Both of you! And her! Put her back, mama!”
“Christ.” Aedan turned to Ronan’s nursemaid, Siobhan, who stood a distance behind.
“I’ll take him for a stroll.” She took the screaming child firmly by the hand. “Come, Lord Ronan. I’ve honeyed blackberries waiting for you, I do.”
As the door closed, Aedan raked a hand through his hair and released a long breath. Through the window, the full moon shone bright in the cloudless summer sky, illuminating his eyes—a mere shade darker than Ronan’s.
“I never credited my nursemaid when she said I had to be dragged away, kicking and screaming, after Kian’s birth.” He shook his head. “I do now, my Neave.”
“I had no notion of his ill temper.” I pushed away tears, along with the absurdity of weeping with joy at my child’s hideous display of poor humor.
Aedan sat on his haunches, his gaze on me sure and steady. “I’d expect nothing less from a son of mine.”
“A son of yours.” I smiled through the blur in my eyes.
Wee Aine made a squeaking noise and began to root.
“Six weeks, is it?” Aedan eyed my breast as I settled the babe on the pillow before me.
I gave him a stern look. “Go to your son, my Aedan. He’ll have need of you more than ever henceforth.”
***
Austin’s wailing cutthrough the vision, sharp and loud. I checked my phone: 2:30 AM—his usual waking time. That single night he’d slept through was a definite fluke. Still, I closed my eyes in near bliss, settling with him in the nursing chair—his warm little body tucked into my arms, our perfect silence disturbed only by the sound of his rhythmic suckling.
Was he wee Ronan reincarnated? Ronan, who from his steel-blue eyes to his terrible temper was Aedan’s son through and through? Aedan’s. My eyes prickled with tears. Worgen had always been a liar. And his bizarre claim of the O’Neal’s visit to the English queen—another lie. Aedan had laughed at her letters even as she steadily increased her concession for his trip’s expenses. He amused himself with outrageous demands and thinly veiled taunts. He’d never go.
After Austin had finished, I returned to bed and took a deep, cleansing breath. I need my rest—I’m going to sleep now.
But the universe was already propelling me, unwilling, into the vision.
***
Aine’s fussing hadonce again delayed my arrival to supper, so I was the last to enter the great hall. The rich scent of the steaming venison stew made my mouth water, and I closed my eyes at the first taste—an explosion of tender meat, fresh herbs, and delicate spices.
“And how would you make it known to her, brother?” Kian’s troubled voice cut through my bliss.
Aedan’s gaze swept the gathering. “I’m thinking on it.”
A commotion at the door revealed the captain of the house guard with an apologetic look on his face and a sealed parchment in his hand.
“A messenger from Dublin, m’lord.” He dipped his head. “An urgent missive from London, for your eyes only.”
My appetite vanished. Each missive from the Tudor queen was urgent and for the Prince of Ulster’s eyes only.
“Speaking of the devil.” Aedan lifted a brow, breaking the loathsome bronze seal.
He pursed his lips in mock concentration, as he always did when he read her letters. But when he raised his head, his playful expression was gone.
I forced down the bit of stew that got wedged in my throat.
“Nine thousand pounds.” He tossed the parchment to Kian. “One thousand over asking. The queen is near begging me to come.”
I stopped breathing. For four long years, the threat of this madness was an axe waiting to fall—this abhorrent notion of his visit to the English court. Yet it’d been only a game Aedan and the queen played together. He lavished her with blandishments while raising the stakes for his safe passage while she displayed eagerness to meet the conqueror of Ulster, but at a smaller cost. Until now.
“She yearns for peace.” He pointed his chin at the perfumed parchment in Kian’s hands. “We await the unconquerable O’Neal at our court... We shall confer a favor of comity upon him, commensurate with his submission.”
I pushed away my plate. It stopped short of knocking over my cup as it crashed into it with a resounding clack.
“The Tudor bitch is after your submission, is she?” Kian’s curled lip brought on an unexpected resemblance between the brothers.
“Ulster is mine and will remain mine. No gall can touch it while I live, queen or no.” Aedan pierced a hefty chunk of meat with his scian. “But I could tell her about Rykeworth myself. She’ll not doubt the truth of it then. And a sure hanging or beheading for him after—mayhap even quartering—for plundering her coffers while she can scarce make ends meet. It is well past time he answered for all the evil he’d done to us.”
I stared from man to man, heart pounding. My alarm was written in everyone’s tight jaw and furrowed brow.
“But what of your safety, brother? A thousand Rykeworths aren’t worth it.” Fillan gave it voice.
“You’d be walking into a lion’s den to parley with a gang of murderers and poisoners.” Tomas shook his head. “The Tudor court is famed for perfidy.”
Aedan chased his stew with a long draught of whiskey. “I’d not endanger myself—if I go. But let us not get ahead of ourselves. I’ll have the brehon and the dean weigh in on this. A delicate matter, but it could change the course of Ireland’s history.”
I grabbed my cup with a trembling hand and drained it. For four years, I swallowed Ida’s bitter tincture to keep from swelling with a child. I took it faithfully, for despite Aedan’s jesting and banter, a small voice told me to be ready to accompany him if it came to it. But he’d wished for another child—a child that was, without doubt, his. And I wished for one, too—mayhap for the same reason—so I stopped drinking the tincture.
I dug my fingernails into my sweaty palms. I couldn’t come with him and leave a suckling babe behind, and neither would I bring her to London to imperil her.
At the dawn of the next day, Aedan awoke me with a soft kiss on my lips and a resolute word at my ear. “Rise, a rún. We’re to ride across Tyrone today.”
If his aim was to clear the air of my grim muteness the night before, he’d failed. Not a word had passed between us after we left Benburb, for I kept my eyes on the path, affecting not to hear him. I’d not credit the talk of going to London by giving it heed.
His guard stayed a respectful distance behind when we spotted a small house half-concealed in the lush grasses. Upon a closer inspection, it proved to be an abandoned hunter’s hut wearing away with disuse: a gnarled door with rusted hinges, walls and chimney crumbling with neglect, the northern side of the roof sprouted with moss.
“It was in use when I passed here as a lad.” Aedan reached to touch my arm. “Let us have a look inside.”
In its best days, the dwelling had been a humble one. The hearth—meager and cracked—contained a small, rusted cauldron. The furnishings consisted of a coarse wooden table with a bench and a narrow bed shoved into a corner. Its modesty notwithstanding, the hut must have offered a welcome shelter for a weary hunter—a fire to cook a stew and a roof to pass the night. But it stood cold and dank now, the gloom of abandonment seeping through every derelict crack and clouding two broken windows. The hay, too, had long vanished from the dirt floor.
I shivered, stepping over a small muddy puddle—and nearly slipped.
Aedan caught me in his arms, traced my jaw with the back of his hand. “Still fuming, a rún?”
I shook my head. “I’d not call it fuming.”
“Good.” He lifted a wry brow. “I’d be hard pressed to find a place less ladylike.”
I pursed my lips at the too-familiar mischievous blue twinkle.
He locked me against his rigid contours. “I shall take my leave now. Await me here, my Neave, unclothed and with your hair spilling about your shoulders and trailing down your breasts to your honeyed slit.”
I gulped despite myself, my body flooding with warmth.
He bent to my ear, his breath warming my skin. “An illicit tryst of star-crossed lovers—”
“Aedan—” My voice emerged too breathy for my liking.
“I’ll not be long.” A crooked grin touched his lips. “Or I might be.”
My heart skipped a beat. Our love games had grown wide and varied, but this rang more unsettling than thrilling. Or was it both?
“And if I refuse?” I whispered as he placed a featherlight kiss on my jaw.
He untied my laces and skimmed his tongue over each nipple. “Then, you shall find yourself lonely and malcontent.” He shot me a wink before stepping out and closing the creaky door.
For a long while, I waited unclothed near the rough wall, trembling with equal parts chill, desire, and unease. The moss had made its way to the ceiling beams and crept into the gaps amid the stones. Pitiful remnants of a tallow candle lay discarded on the rotted table. The bed stood strewn with tattered homespun and moldy straw. I hugged myself against a sudden gust that penetrated every crack—where had he gone?
“So help me, Brigid,” I muttered into the chill, “how long am I to await my doomed lover?”
I yelped as a large, booted foot kicked open the door, making it groan and smack into the crumbling wall.
Without uttering a word, Aedan pushed me against the wall and took me hard and fast, my hair wound about his wrist, my legs circled round his waist, his hands cupping my behind to shield it from the ragged stone.
“You fancied it, ready as you were...” he murmured when our breaths slowed in unison. He drew back when I didn’t reply. “Did it give you a thrill, my Neave?”
He never failed to thrill me, but I said nothing. And neither did I speak of the queen’s last missive as he held me in his arms, a small groove creasing his brow. I’d no need to, for he could always read my thoughts.
“You heard me, a rún.” He smoothed an errant strand behind my ear, his fingers sure and warm. “I’d not put myself in danger. If I go, I’ll have every conceivable guarantee of safe conduct—and every inconceivable. The queen is clever, but I’m no fool, my Neave.”
If I go.
I pressed myself into his broad, hard chest, wishing to fuse with him, so he could never be ripped from me. For he would go, and he would not be safe. I knew it when I daydreamed the sharp, metallic laughter, delighting in obscene victory.