Chapter 43 #2
He nodded, fingers tightening on hers, a wordless acknowledgment.
“The Lia Fáil will roar for you,” he said after a moment.
“I have no doubts about that. I recognized that power in you from the first moment I ever saw you. It will roar for you, send its magic rippling across the field of battle, and drive our enemies back into the sea from whence they came.” He raised his head to meet her gaze, moss-green glowing like two twin emeralds in the darkness.
“You will do what no one else in this world can do – what you alone were born to do.”
She pressed her lips together. “And you? Will you be able to do what no one else other than you yourself can do?”
He looked away at that, jaw tightening. “I don’t know.”
Rory studied him, the shadow of the sleek black beard partially blurring his features from view.
“I was too afraid,” she said, “in the realm of Magh Meall, to face my brother. Too afraid of what he might say – that the memories I have left of him would be forever sullied by whatever harsh words or reprimands he might have given me.” She paused, staring down at the pale outline of her fingers, splayed out in the grass beneath her.
“I think that it was a mistake, Finn. I think that perhaps – perhaps I should have –”
“Rory,” he interrupted softly. “Now is no time at all for regrets. Let your actions on the field of battle tomorrow speak for all the grief in your heart. It will suffice.” He let out a long, deep breath.
“You should rest,” he said presently. “It grows late, and you will need your full strength in the morning.”
She nodded, then rose to her feet, gently tugging her fingers free of his. “Good night, then,” she said, and turned away, back towards the encampment and her tent.
“Don’t let MacMurchada keep you awake for too long,” he said, and she glanced back, a surprised laugh bursting from her.
“What makes you think I’m returning to him?”
“You’d be a fool not to,” he said. “Both of you would be.” He met her gaze with a tired smile. “It’s a fearful thing, to sleep alone on the eve of war.”
She swallowed the sudden lump in her throat. “Dil would no doubt be willing to keep you warm, if you asked. Gareth, too – or perhaps all three of you together. I do not see either of them resisting such a prospect.”
He grinned at that, a flash of mirth gleaming in his eyes. “It has been a while,” he said. “A few centuries, by my count.”
“You are well overdue for a proper tumbling, then.”
“Well,” he said with an amused shrug, “Perhaps I shall seek them out, then. All a man can do is ask, a bhréone.”
“You won’t be calling me that after tomorrow,” she said dryly. “I doubt after I call forth the shadows and the ice for all to see, no one will ever be able to look at me and think of the light – only of darkness.”
Finn also rose to his feet to stand looming over her, arms folded over his chest. “I have never thought of shadows when I look at you. The first I ever saw of you, that is what I saw – a streak of red burning its way across the sky, a deathless flame, born to burn all on its own.” He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to the top of her head.
“Go to MacMurchada,” he said. “Let him lull you into a dreamless slumber. The morning will bring nightmares enough.”
“I know.”
“Rory,” he said, “there will be plenty of time for us to face our ghosts. Tonight, you must rest.”
She nodded. “Good night, Finn,” and she left him there by the river, passing as silently through the camp as she had come, pulse racing as she paused outside her tent, taking a moment to stroke Murph’s feathered head where he sat snoozing on his perch.
“Look at you,” she whispered. “Lost in dreams, no worries or fears.” He opened one orange eye a mere slit and made a grumbling sound of discontent at being stirred from his slumber, and in spite of herself, a smile tugged at her lips.
“All right,” she said. “I suppose I’ll seek my own sleep, in whatever way that I can. ”
Locke lay sprawled on the furs and linens of her makeshift bed, arms folded behind his head, eyes shut.
She hesitated in the doorway, remembering Finn’s words, wondering if it were worth to risk awakening him only to hear those lips hurl more cruelties her way, or –
“I’m not asleep.” Locke spoke without opening his eyes, without moving a muscle. “Merely waiting for you, my lady. I thought you would be gone longer.”
“We said all that needed to be said to one another.”
He looked at her at that, hazel eyes intense. “And us, my lady? Have we said all that we need to say to each other?”
“No,” she said, moving towards him, and he sat up, his gaze latched on her with unwavering concentration. “But I don’t care. I can’t bear it any longer. I feel that I shall die if I don’t have your hands on me, Locke, right now, I shall die –”
He had her in his arms before she could finish speaking, pulling her down and underneath him, his mouth and his hands moving with equal urgency over her, tugging at the laces of her gown, nipping at her lips.
She rose up to meet him, arms winding around his neck, fingers threading through his hair, aching with an unbearable need, an insatiable, eternal wanting –
“Locke,” she said against his searching lips. “Wait. I changed my mind.” A strangled whimper, but he pulled back immediately, chest heaving. “Not about that,” she said breathlessly. “I still do want that, very much, but…I do have to tell you something first.”
He dipped his head again, his mouth wandering down to explore her throat, her shoulder as he tugged the sleeve of her gown down her arm.
“If it’s that I’m the best lover you’ve ever known,” he murmured, “then I accept the honor, and also request that you hold all compliments until the end of the performance.”
She laughed in spite of herself, through the tears inexplicably forming in her eyes.
“Locke,” she said again, and he looked up at that, flushed cheeks and bright eyes.
“I lied to you.” She tried to pull away, but he made a harsh sound of protest and tightened his grip, his gaze searching her face.
“I mean when I spoke to you and Finn in the council room a fortnight ago and told you that I knew what to do to win this battle tomorrow.” She forced herself to take a deep, steadying breath, looking away from him.
“I lied. I didn’t know – don’t know – if we will win.
It was too vague, my vision, and I couldn’t make sense of it, but I couldn’t bear to tell you that, to tell Finn, so I lied. I’m sorry, but I –”
He cut her off, kissing her thorough and deep.
“My lady,” he said, nose nuzzling against hers.
“What manner of fool do you take me for?” He cupped her cheek in his palm, caressing her face with the tips of his fingers.
“Of course you lied. It was terribly obvious. I told you before – you’re an awful liar. ”
“I’m sorry,” she said again, and he ran his thumb along the curve of her cheek.
“I think,” he said, “we are both sorry enough, for sins that are, for the most part, not of our own making.” He smoothed away her hair from her face, his gaze roving over her, hungry yet soft, feral yet infinitely kind.
“Perhaps we might stop doing that, then – the apologizing – and focus on other ways to put our tongues to use.”
“If you insist,” she said, and then his lips came back to hers, and both of their hands began working with renewed urgency, stripping away all the layers that kept them apart, kept them separate from the feel of their skin warming and cooling the other, moving together in that effortless, world-ending rhythm that came so naturally to them, a single bright light in two lifetimes filled with fearful shadows and long-endured sufferings.
“Imagine what magic we might make,” Locke whispered a long while later, when they both lay entwined around one another, damp with sweat and well-sated, sleep creeping in over their heavy-lidded eyes, “if we ever found ourselves in a real bed together, my lady.”
Two blue-veined hands, she remembered drowsily, clasped loosely in one another, sitting quiet and content by a familiar hearth-fire.
“Soon,” she whispered back, but he was already asleep, and she nestled her head onto his bare shoulder and followed him, quick and painless, into the deep and dreamless slumber that Finn had wished for her.
When she awoke, it was still dark, but she was alone, and Locke was dressed by the door of the tent, battle-mail strapped to his chest, sword hanging by his side. “Locke?”
“It is almost the morning,” he said without looking at her. “It is time for war.”