by Lucy Monroe
“Why didn’t Talorc tell me?” Why would he not use their ability to talk in such a special way? How could he deprive her of the sound of his voice when her entire world was silent without it?
“I don’t know. He never told me either, when I was here as his intended. Lachlan wasn’t the one that told me about the Chrechte’s true nature either. Cait did.”
“But why hide it?”
Emily gave her a pointed look. “You of all people should know the answer to that.”
“Because differences are often seen as threatening.”
“Exactly. If their secrets were to be discovered, it is likely the Chrechte would be hunted and destroyed like animals. You know what could have happened to you if people had known of your deafness; how much worse if they discovered someone was capable of turning into a wolf? The Chrechte are mighty warriors but small in number in comparison to their full-human counterparts.”
“That does not explain Talorc not telling me.”
“No, it doesn’t. I do know that the Chrechte protect the secrets of their people very closely. If they are discovered to have betrayed the secret, or someone they tell is found doing so, the sentence is death.”
“But you told me,” Abigail said, worried for her sister.
“Of course I did. You are my sister and you are mated to a Chrechte warrior. You are no security risk to the people.”
“Clearly Talorc disagrees.”
“He’s not an easily trusting man.”
If he loved her, he would trust her, but that wasn’t something Abigail was going to mention to her sister. “And I deceived him.”
“Yes. Though just as you should understand the Chrechte’s need to keep their secrets, he should have understood your need to hide your affliction and not judged you untrustworthy because of it.”
“He gets very angry when I call my deafness an affliction,” Abigail said, realizing that if she did not change the subject soon, she would break down in grief over the implications of what she had just learned.
“He does?”
“Yes. He says it is not an affliction, just an infirmity and not much of one the way I compensate for it.”
“He can be a smart man.”
“Yes.” It was all Abigail could do to maintain her façade of normalcy for her sister. Her heart was shriveling in her chest at all the conclusions to be drawn from Talorc keeping the secret of the Chrechte from her.
Why was she delivered such demeaning blows each time she thought she had found happiness?
“Are you all right, sister?”
For the first time in her life, Abigail lied to Emily. “Yes. Of course.”
“I would like to be a fly on the wall when you break the news to your husband you know all about his wolf.”
Abigail could not prevent a grimace from twisting her features.
“He’ll be relieved, believe me. Lachlan’s wolf needs my acceptance and love as much as his human side. He adores being scratched behind his ears; I bet Talorc does, too.”
Abigail forced a laugh and a smile that would even fool her sister. She maintained the façade through her sister’s final evening meal among the Sinclairs and leave-taking the next day.
That night for the first time, Abigail begged off making love with Talorc using the excuse of tiredness. Silent tears tracked down her cheeks in the darkness as her husband slept beside her on the furs.
He had deceived her just as she had done him, but still he had cruelly condemned her for keeping her own secrets. He doubted her love for him, but more important, it was clear now that he would never love her.
Not only was she not a Highlander by birth, but she was not a Chrechte. Emily had shared the role her humanity had played in Lachlan’s difficulty accepting his feelings for her. And that man was as besotted as any man had ever been in the history of the world.
What chance did Abigail have of overcoming a prejudice so noticeably more ingrained in Talorc?
He had no desire to share his special heritage with her in any way. The wolf, who according to Emily, needed Abigail’s love and approval, was withheld from her. Even though they could share the intimate bond of speaking in each other’s mind, Talorc held back from doing so with her.
And that was perhaps what hurt the most. Talorc must realize the devastation Abigail had experienced losing sound from her life. To have the chance to hear again, especially her husband’s voice, was the most amazing miracle possible.
But he denied it to her because sharing it with her meant sharing his secrets as well. It meant trusting her. Something he would never do for a woman born and raised in the country he reviled. The agony of that knowledge battered at Abigail’s already abused heart.
Emily had expressed the wish to be there when Abigail confronted Talorc with her knowledge of the truth.
Only Abigail wasn’t sure she had any intention of doing so. She had no desire to have him tell her to her face why he did not believe her worthy to know the truth. Nor did she want to risk Emily getting in trouble with the other Chrechte. No doubt Lachlan would protect her, after all Lachlan of the Balmoral loved his wife, but Abigail did not want to risk causing her sister even the slightest grief.
Emily had never done aught but protect and encourage her. She deserved the same in return.
The next day, Abigail left their “bed” before Talorc woke, having no desire to speak to her husband while her mind and emotions were in such turmoil.
She did not know if she could forgive him for withholding the sound of his voice from her when he had the power to gift her with it.
Her thoughts in a jumbled mess, she was not paying as close attention as usual traversing the narrow stairway. Her foot landed against the step, but something rolled under her shoe. Losing her footing, she tripped forward. She grabbed desperately for the wall, but the smooth stone did not give her purchase.
Terror gripped her. She was going to fall. Unable to stop her forward momentum, she did her best to throw her weight toward the wall, rather than the empty air, and tuck her head down. She wrapped her arms around it in hopes of preventing a fatal hit as she continued to try to halt her bumping tumble.
She screamed Talorc’s name in her head as she landed with a heavy thump at the bottom of the steps that caused her arms to flail involuntarily. Her head knocked against the wall and that was the last she knew.
Abigail awoke on the furs in her bedchamber to an insistent voice demanding her attention. Talorc was leaning over her, his expression fiercely concerned. Or so it seemed. She ignored the voice in her head, knowing it was him calling to her. She turned her head away.
He touched her ear, telling her he wanted to say something.
She refused to look at him. “I fell down the stairs.”
He tugged her chin, oh so gently, so she had to meet his gaze. “Do not worry. I am not angry for you walking down the steps alone.”
She did not need his assurances. “It was not my fault. There was something on the steps. It rolled under my shoes and I lost my footing.”
“Do not feel you have to make excuses.” Talorc shook his head. “Lachlan was right, though it pains me to admit it. The stairs are not safe for a family. I will have a rail installed.”
She ignored his reassurance for the important issue at hand. “There was something on the stairs. I felt it under my shoe.”
“There wasn’t. I found you moments after you fell and nothing was there.”
“You found me?”
“Osgard did at first, perhaps a second or two before me, and for all his bluster, he was most concerned.”
Talorc frowned and turned his head to glare at someone behind him.
Guaire returned his laird’s frown with equanimity. “Osgard has proven time and again that he does not accept our new lady. He knows of her habit to come down the stairs before anyone else in the morning. He is usually the first in the great hall. He could easily have put pebbles on the steps and cleaned them up before you arrived to discover
your wife’s fallen body.”
Abigail did not like the possibility that someone in their clan had tried to hurt her, but she knew something had been on the stairs. Before she could say anything, Niall made his presence known.
His glower was twice as ferocious as Talorc’s as he stared at Guaire. “You dare accuse our laird’s advisor of an act that amounts to treason? He is a loyal Chrechte.”
“And because he is Chrechte, he is above reproach, but because I am merely human, my opinion counts for nothing? Even though I am seneschal to the holding and care deeply for the safety of my lady?”
The dangerous stillness that came over Talorc and Niall indicated something Guaire had said made them more than angry. It made them dangerous.
Abigail played her friend’s words back through her mind and understanding dawned. Guaire had referred to himself as human, not a Highlander, which implied he knew the true difference between the Chrechte and the rest of their clan. And neither Niall nor Talorc had known he was aware of their true nature.
The glare he turned on the two bigger warriors was sulfuric. “Do you think I am blind? I live here with you all.”
“That is enough,” Talorc bit out with a sideways glance at Abigail.
Guaire’s look turned to one of contempt. “By all means, keep your wife, your sacred mate, in the dark.”
“Leave,” Talorc ordered.
“No!” Abigail cried. “He is my friend.”
“You countermand my order?” Talorc asked dangerously.
“You withhold enough from me; you will not keep my dearest friend.”
“What do I keep from you?” he asked, so clearly certain his secret was safe he was genuinely confused.
That only made her angrier. And as Emily knew, when Abigail got angry, she went silent, not louder. “It is not worth discussing.”
He stared at her, clearly nonplussed. “Abigail …”
She glared back at him, as mute as she was deaf.
“I have duties to attend to,” Guaire said in an obvious bid to end the stalemate between laird and lady. “You need your rest.”
Abigail smiled her thanks for his concern. Then she gave Talorc and Niall her meanest look. “You will not hurt him.”
Niall jerked back as if hit. “I would not. He is my … fellow soldier. I would protect him always.”
Guaire looked about as convinced of that as she was of Talorc’s love, which was to say, not at all.
“Abigail, what the hell is going on with you?” her husband demanded.
“Mayhap my fall addled my brains,” she said with unadulterated sarcasm.
Talorc actually looked relieved by the explanation.
She and Guaire shared a look of pure understanding before the redheaded soldier left the room.
“I would rest,” Abigail said, looking at neither her husband nor his loyal soldier.
He brushed her cheek as Emily often did to get her attention. She let her gaze rest on him only because she knew she would not get rid of him if she did not.
“First you will drink some tea I had Una prepare from the recipes in my mother’s healing journal.”
With her luck, the tea would be poisoned. “No.”
“I insist.”
“Una hates me.” Someone had left pebbles, or something, on the stairs. If not Osgard, then maybe the widow.
“I will not drink or eat anything she makes. And don’t bother lying to me and pretending someone else did the preparations if it is her. I can read a face as well as lips and I’ll know you aren’t being honest.”
“I would not lie,” Talorc said, anger finally kindling in his gaze.
Abigail refused to dignify his ridiculous assertion with an answer. Of course he would lie. Or at least withhold the truth.
When she did not break the silence between them, Talorc turned to Niall and instructed, “Have one of the undercooks prepare the tisane.”
Niall returned ten minutes later with a steaming cup. Abigail had not spoken and had managed to ignore her husband by the simple expedient of closing her eyes and shutting him out.
Talorc was patient with her ill humor and solicitous over that day and the next, but Abigail kept him at a distance. The fact that she had the worst headache of her life made maintaining her cranky attitude easy. Even Sybil’s constant harping had never made Abigail’s head pound so.
Guaire came to visit Abigail twice a day, but they were never left alone, which propriety might dictate, but she didn’t like because it wasn’t her virtue Talorc, Niall and Barr were protecting. It was their secrets.
The third morning, Abigail insisted on going to the great hall to break her fast with Talorc and the other soldiers.
Una expressed her concern for Abigail’s health, but Abigail was in no mood to play happy families with the widow after her cold treatment and attempts to undermine Abigail’s authority with the other clan members who served in the tower. She simply pretended not to notice the woman speaking to her.
The red that covered Una’s cheeks said she knew Abigail had not answered on purpose, but she did not attempt to speak to her laird’s wife again.
“What was that all about?” Guaire asked while Talorc and Barr were busy planning their day with the soldiers. “I thought you were trying to win her over.”
“I’ve given up.” For now anyway. “I just don’t have the good humor to deal with her right now.”
“She had her hopes of ending her widowed status with Talorc before the king’s edict.”
That might explain Una’s initial coldness, but it did not excuse it. “She said she had been housekeeper for three years. If Talorc had been interested, he would have shown it before now.”
“No doubt.” Guaire frowned, looking sad and defeated. “She’s set her sights on a different warrior now.”
“Niall?” Abigail asked intuitively.
“Yes.”
Abigail squeezed his hand in silent commiseration.
Guaire’s eyes widened and then he mouthed a thank-you before squeezing her hand back.
Niall crossed his arms, drawing Abigail’s attention. “If you two are finished holding hands, perhaps you would care to see to your duties, Seneschal.”
It looked like she wasn’t the only grumpy one around here this morning.
Guaire’s expression turned dourer. “I am going to the blacksmith’s to check the progress on the tools our clan will take for trade to the gathering. Would you like to come?”
“Yes. I want to tell Magnus thank you for the gardening tool he made for me.”
Talorc touched her ear and the familiar gesture combined with the distance she created between them made her wish for something different. She turned her head to face him.
He slid a concerned glance between her and Guaire. “Perhaps you should rest another day.” Obviously, he was still worried the seneschal would tell her Talorc’s secrets.
If his concern had been for her health, she would have listened, but as it was, his worry about Guaire telling her what she already knew only made her more determined to accompany him. “I am bruised, not broken. The walk will do me good.”
“Do you think he will tell her?” Talorc asked Niall.
“He said he wouldn’t. I have never known Guaire to break his word.”
“Nor have I.” But he couldn’t help worrying. Talorc needed to be the one to tell Abigail of his true Chrechte nature, but he had realized when it became clear Guaire was aware of the Chrechte’s biggest secret, that if Talorc did not do so soon, she might find out another way.
“Would her sister have told her, do you think?” Barr asked.
“That is far more likely, but if she had done so, I think Abigail would have confronted me with the truth.”
Niall snorted. “Or Emily would have when she realized you’d kept her beloved sister in the dark about your wolf.”
“She has never been shy about speaking her mind.”
“I remember,” Barr said with a grin.
&nbs
p; “The whole clan remembers her likening me to a goat.”
On the way to the lower bailey, Abigail made sure no one else was around before asking Guaire, “You love him, don’t you?”
Guaire did not ask who she meant or try to pretend he did not know what she was talking about. He simply gave a defeated sigh and said, “Yes.”
“I thought as much.”
“I have loved him all my life. I do not remember when I realized I wanted to kiss him, to touch him as a lover. I only know that I have never wanted another.”
“You’ve never found another man or woman attractive?”
Guaire blushed. “I find many warriors attractive, but the only one who makes me wish to act on those feelings is Niall. I want him so much, I tremble with it. One day, he is bound to notice. And then he will probably kill me.”
“Because you are a man?”
“Nay, matings within the Chrechte can be between two men or two women. It does not happen often, but enough that they recognize God’s blessing on such love. Niall would be furious to find out how much I love him because I am not Chrechte. He thinks I am weak because—” Abruptly, Guaire stopped talking.
“Because you do not have a wolf nature like he does,” she finished for him. “Emily told me the truth of the Chrechte when she was here.”
“Talorc believes you are still ignorant.”
“I know.” It was her turn to feel defeated.
“He is slow to trust, but it will come one day.”
“When I am old and gray, perhaps.” Abigail sighed. “Tell me more about Niall.”
“You do not find my love an abomination?” Guaire asked with a puzzled frown.
“Of course not.”
“But the Church teaches it is so. We are not so worried about Rome’s edicts here, but I have always been led to believe the English follow her religious edicts without question.”
“Some do, some don’t.” Abigail shrugged. “The Church also teaches that women are last in God’s love, even after animals of burden.”
Guaire’s eyes widened in surprise. “Our priest would never be foolish enough to say such a thing.”