Wild Angel

by Miriam Minger

  "Why should I stop?" Caitlin objected, showing a hint of the spirit that Triona had always suspected she possessed. "You should know how pretty you look, Triona. The O’Byrne might not mind you wearing trousers, but you’ll surely turn his head tonight. Now if you had some ornaments. . ."

  "I’ve these." Triona carefully lifted a small silk-wrapped bundle from the chest. As she drew forth the jeweled arm-ring and the lustrous strand of pink pearls Taig O’Nolan had brought her from Carlow, Caitlin gasped.

  "Oh, they’re beautiful. Put them on! Put them on!"

  Caitlin’s excitement matched Triona’s, wearing such baubles truly a new thing to her. And she found she liked the effect very much, though she hoped Ronan wouldn’t mind that she’d donned gifts given to her by another man, albeit a friend.

  "Now let me brush out your hair for you, Triona, and you’ll be ready," said Caitlin, but Triona firmly shook her head.

  "You’re not here to wait upon me." She went herself to the low table by the bed and got her brush.

  "I don’t see it as that at all," Caitlin countered, looking hurt. "You’ve done so much for me, Triona. If there’s at least some small way I can repay you. . ."

  Triona relented at once, anything to bring the light back to Caitlin’s eyes. "Very well, but my hair’s a fine mess. Always has been."

  "I think it’s lovely," Caitlin said as Triona handed her the brush and then sank onto the edge of the bed, preparing herself for the sharp tugging that would be involved. But to her relief, Caitlin’s touch was deft and gentle.

  "I used to brush my grandmother’s hair before she died. It was wild with curls just like yours, though it had long since gone gray. But my father told me her hair had once been as fiery red as can be."

  "Is his hair red, too?" Triona asked absently, the soft swish of the brush lulling her.

  "Aye, but with lots of gold in it, like yours. Funny, isn’t it?"

  Triona nodded, realizing, too, that Ronan would be wondering what was keeping her if she didn’t appear soon at the feasting-hall. With a long contented sigh she rose, smiling at Caitlin.

  "Any more of that and I’ll surely fall asleep."

  "I was finished anyway. Do you have a mirror?"

  Triona laughed. "I hardly need to look at myself after all the fine compliments you’ve given me, Caitlin MacMurrough!" She hurried to the clothes chest and swept up her cloak, looking down when a dull thud sounded near her foot.

  "You dropped something, Triona. Here, I’ll get it."

  Caitlin had retrieved her dagger before Triona could bend down herself, but the young woman didn’t readily hand it to her. Instead Caitlin stared at the weapon as if stunned, her face gone strangely pale.

  "Where . . . where did you get this?"

  "It was my father’s," Triona murmured, surprised as well by Caitlin’s odd behavior. Especially when the young woman glanced up at her, staring at Triona, at her face, at her hair as if she couldn’t believe her eyes.

  "Caitlin . . ."

  "I thought I saw a resemblance from the very first," said the young woman almost to herself, her expression incredulous. "But it never occurred to me—I never thought. . ."

  "Thought what?" Triona demanded, a strange chill coursing through her. But Caitlin was gazing down again at the dagger, turning it over and over in her palm.

  "My father has one exactly like this—he always wears it in his belt. Only it’s much bigger to fit his hand but he told me that a matching one"—Caitlin held out the glittering weapon—"a smaller one, was fashioned especially for his younger sister, Eva, when she so admired his."

  "Eva?" Triona asked, feeling the blood creep from her face.

  "Aye, he presented it to her on the eve of her wedding to Richard de Roche of Naas."

  A wedding between Irish and Norman, Triona found herself thinking, Caitlin’s words suddenly bringing to mind the story Ronan had told her on her first night at Glenmalure about his cook Seamus toiling at such an occasion. And Seamus had called her Lady Eva just before he died, gaping at her in terror as if she were a ghostly phantom come back to haunt the living. . ..

  "This has nothing to do with me!" she lashed out, willing away her heart-stopping niggling of intuition. "The dagger belonged to my father, it’s as simple as that." She snatched the weapon from Caitlin and stuffed it back inside her cloak. "There could have been more than two that looked like this—"

  "Did your father give it to you?"

  "No, I found it hidden—" Triona didn’t say anything more, clamping her mouth shut as she fled across the room. But Caitlin flew after her, catching her by the arm to stop her.

  "You said you never knew your true mother, Triona. You said that she must have had lots of copper hair. But what if I told you that your mother looked much like me—or so I’ve been told. I never knew my father’s sister because she was killed by a wild boar four years before I was born. But she was blond—"

  "I told you this has nothing to do with me!" Triona cut in, desperation seizing her as she yanked her arm free and bolted for the door.

  "This has everything to do with you, Triona, don’t you see?" Caitlin cried, running after her. "Eva had an infant daughter who was thought to have died in the forest as well—carried off by wolves. At least that’s what Maurice de Roche later told my father. He was the one who found my aunt’s body and brought her back to Kildare."

  Triona had halted her flight and spun, her eyes riveted to Caitlin’s. "Maurice de Roche?"

  "Aye. Richard’s younger brother. A foul evil man, too. My father never found proof, but he’s always suspected that Maurice murdered Richard for his rich barony, then sought to make Eva his wife. But she ran away with her daughter, Juliana—my father is certain that she feared for her young babe. Maurice de Roche could never have made the barony his own with an heiress in the way."

  "No more," Triona said almost in a whisper, sickened. But Caitlin pressed her all the same.

  "How did your father say he found you?"

  "In the forest," Triona murmured numbly. "He was hunting and found me crying, my parents dead beside me. Killed by wolves. He brought me home to Imaal and adopted me into the clan as his daughter."

  "It was Eva he found dead beside you, Triona. He must have found the dagger, too, then hid it just as you said."

  "Aye, in that small coffer," she admitted without thinking, tears blurring her eyes as she glanced beyond Caitlin to the furnishings still stacked against the wall. "Behind a false bottom."

  "Mayhap your father had planned to keep the dagger there until he could rid himself of it, but forgot—"

  "Enough, Caitlin! I will hear no more!"

  "But you must listen! This makes us cousins, you and I, and your name isn’t Triona. You’re Juliana Margaret de Roche, heiress to one of the richest baronies in Eire if you only lay claim to it. And you must, for your true parents’ sake! You owe that to them—"

  "I owe them nothing!" Triona broke in, tears tumbling down her face. "My father was Fineen, chieftain of the Imaal O’Tooles, my mother the Lady Alice. I would die before I ever called myself a de Roche!"

  She fled to the door and this time, Caitlin made no move to stop her. The last thing Triona saw before she dashed from the room was Caitlin’s stricken face, then she slammed the door shut, her fingers shaking so badly she could barely turn the key in the lock. But somehow she managed, swiping the tears from her face as she rushed past the hearth. She noticed at once that Conn was gone, imagining the wolfhound had tagged along with Ronan.

  Ronan.

  Dear God, what was she going to do now? If he ever found out that she was everything he hated—

  "Triona?"

  She started, her gaze flying to Aud as her maid entered the dwelling-house carrying a covered platter.

  "I just saw the O’Byrne—I mean Ronan, in the hall. He’s beginning to pace a bit, sweeting, so I suggest you hurry—"

  "Tell me what you know about this dagger," Triona demanded, racing up to her and ya
nking the weapon from her pocket. Her spirits sank even lower when Aud blanched, but her maid quickly recovered herself, shrugging as she walked past her.

  "You found it with your father’s things. Inside a brass-fitted chest, as I recall."

  "Aye, and you know well enough why he put it there," Triona accused, following her. "You were shocked when I first showed you the dagger, Aud, and I thought it strange. But you said it was only because you were tired, snapping at me as you’ve never done before."

  "A body can become weary now and again, but if you’re holding a grudge against me for being short with you that day, then I’m sorry."

  "Aye, but you acted just as strangely when I told you about Seamus, Aud. Remember? When I said the poor man seemed to know me, calling me Lady Eva?"

  "I thought it was queer, is all," Aud said stiffly, though her determined step had faltered a little. That was enough to bring fresh tears to Triona’s eyes, her voice gone hoarse.

  "Aud, you can’t hide the truth from me any longer. You can’t! I know about my true parents."

  The older woman stopped, her face gone deathly pale. But she nonetheless made a brave attempt to change the subject. "Ronan is waiting for you, sweeting. Shouldn’t you go to him? And . . . and Caitlin’s supper is growing cold—"

  "Please, Aud," Triona broke in, smudging away tears with the back of her hand. "My father told me that my parents were killed by wolves, but that’s not the truth, is it?"

  For a long moment Aud simply stared at her, but finally she shook her head. "No, it wasn’t the truth."

  "And my real mother’s name was Eva."

  Aud nodded, tears clouding her eyes. "Saints helps us, sweeting, how could you have discovered—"

  "Caitlin told me."

  "Caitlin?" Aud looked stunned, but she seemed confused as well. "No, that couldn’t be—"

  "She recognized my dagger, Aud, just a few moments ago. Her father, Donal, has one just like it, matching exactly the weapon that once belonged to my mother. Eva MacMurrough."

  "MacMurrough?" Aud blurted. "But I’ve always thought your mother was Norman. And I’d never have known that if I hadn’t come into the house of a sudden and overheard the O’Toole telling the pitiful tale to Lady Alice shortly after he brought you home. He made me swear on a crucifix right there and then that I’d never say a word to anyone, and I did so gladly. You were my sweeting from the first moment I laid eyes upon you, no matter your Norman blood."

  "Half Norman, Aud. And half MacMurrough. I don’t know what could be worse." Triona thought again of Ronan, despair filling her. But she couldn’t allow herself to succumb to it. The last thing she needed was for him to sense that something was wrong. "I must go, Aud. Ronan is waiting."

  "But your true father, Triona. The O’Toole never mentioned any names and if he ever found out the identity of the Norman baron who wanted to see you dead, he said nothing of it to me."

  "So the spawn did try to hunt me down," Triona murmured, Caitlin’s words coming back to her.

  "Oh aye, and he might have found you, too, if the O’Toole hadn’t come along when he did, saving you from a pack of wolves as well. The O’Toole heard you crying, and it’s a good thing you were so young that you don’t remember what happened to your brave mother. She died protecting you from a wild boar, sweeting. The O’Toole found that dagger sticking from the beast’s throat."

  Triona stared at the bloodred rubies studding the hilt, for the first time pitying the mother she had never known.

  "It was when the O’Toole was about to bury the poor soul that the Normans came upon him," Aud rushed on. "He hid behind a tree and heard everything—the baron saying how he’d planned upon murdering you if the wolves hadn’t found you first."

  "But how would he ever have thought that wolves—"

  "The O’Toole had thrown your bloodied swaddling blanket to the wild creatures to flush them from the trees. The baron’s men found what shreds were left. Then they took up your mother’s body and rode away, but not before the O’Toole heard the baron say he’d murdered your true father to make Eva his bride."

  "Richard de Roche," Triona said under her breath although Aud had heard her well enough, her maid’s eyes growing very wide. "Baron of Naas—at least until his younger brother saw fit to slay his own blood for the land and title."

  "His brother?"

  "Maurice de Roche."

  Aud gasped, her eyes nearly popping from her head. "So the O’Toole was warning you in that dream, sweeting! Warning you to stay well away from that monster! Saints preserve us, you’re in terrible danger just as I thought."

  "Aye, of losing the man I love." Her throat was so tight that she thought she might choke. Triona pocketed the dagger and then whirled the cloak around her shoulders, walking on wooden legs to the door only to have it suddenly open in front of her.

  "By God, woman, what surprise could keep you this long from my side?"

  Chapter 38

  "RONAN!" HEARING AUD echo her, Triona practically pushed him back outside, fearful that her distraught maid might say something they’d all regret. But she was quickly able to cover her action, spouting with feigned lightness as she looped her arm through his, "Black O’Byrne, you’ve no patience at all!"

  "Not when it comes to you," he countered with a roguish smile, clearly finding no fault with her odd behavior. "Now where’s my surprise?"

  "You’ll see at supper," she tossed back although she was finding it very difficult to talk. But she couldn’t allow him to think that something was wrong. She couldn’t! She began to tug him playfully in the direction of the feasting-hall only to have him sweep her into his arms.

  "If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’re wearing a maiden’s soft slippers," he said, kissing the sensitive shell of her ear. "And if that’s the case, we can’t have you ruining them in the mud. The rains might have stopped, but the yard looks as wet as a bog."

  With a start, Triona realized that it was no longer raining; she felt so distracted that she hadn’t even noticed. Somehow she managed again to keep her voice light, though she felt inside as if her heart were breaking.

  "Ronan, just pretend you didn’t see any slippers or you’ll spoil my surprise. Now are we just going to stand here or . . ."

  She fell silent as a clansman suddenly came around the corner of the dwelling-house, the night so dark that she didn’t realize it was Fiach O’Byrne until he was almost upon them. The man looked so grim that Triona went tense, swept by another terrible niggling of intuition.

  Jesu, Mary and Joseph, if Fiach had been standing guard just outside Caitlin’s windows, then he must have overheard everything! He knew!

  "By God, Fiach, you’ve been guarding that wench all day," Ronan said with easy good humor before the clansman could speak, setting off with Triona toward the hall. "I’ll send replacements at once so you and the other two guards can join us for supper. The cook has outdone himself tonight. I’ve already tasted a bit of roast mutton."

  "But, Lord—"

  "Later, man! My bride-to-be has a special surprise for me that cannot wait."

  Triona’s heart was pounding so fiercely at that close call she was certain Ronan could hear it. But he seemed oblivious to her distress, and thankfully so. Wiping her hand over her cheeks as swiftly as possible to rid herself of any last traces of tears, she masked her purpose by saying, "I think I just felt a bit of rain."

  "Then we’ll have to hurry, won’t we?" He pressed another warm kiss against her ear. "Don’t think I’ve forgotten our plan, Triona. A bite of supper and it’s back to our room."

  Triona didn’t reply, the husky promise in his voice only filling her with dread.

  Realizing now that she would have to tell him before someone else did what she still found so hard to believe herself, she prayed when the moment came she would find the right words. But would Ronan be willing to listen to anything further after he heard that she was both MacMurrough and Norman? The heiress to vast lands that had been stolen fro
m the O’Byrnes?

  "Smile, Triona, so my people can see that all is well."

  Somehow she did, blinking at the brilliant torchlight as Ronan carried her into the feasting-hall. He didn’t set her down straightaway but conveyed her to the head table amid rousing shouts of approval.

  To her surprise Niall was there, reclining in a makeshift litter drawn to the table, his wide grin telling her that he must already know Caitlin was faring better. Maire was there, too, the most curious smile on her lips, her gray eyes alight and her cheeks flushed bright pink with color. Triona wondered fleetingly what they both might say if they knew she and Caitlin were cousins, then she thrust the thought away as Ronan gently put her down.

  "Is my surprise underneath your cloak?" he whispered in her ear, his teasing expression leading her to believe that he had guessed she wore a gown. When she nodded, her smile pasted upon her face, he chuckled and drew the garment from her shoulders.

  Triona almost burst into tears at the look he gave her, his eyes so full of love that she couldn’t bear to think of the contempt that would soon replace it. "You’re pleased?" she asked brokenly, the emotion between them so palpable that she reasoned he wouldn’t think anything was amiss if she looked about to cry.

  "In all ways, Triona," he murmured, bending his head to kiss her soundly in front of everyone. Cheers were rocking the hall when he finally lifted his mouth from hers to whisper against her ear, "What became of all those little presents I gave you when you were a child? The ribbons, the gold trinkets—"

  "I—I threw them in a bog," Triona stammered, his question taking her entirely by surprise. "After Conor—"

  "Aye, and you had every right," Ronan murmured, pulling away to stare into her eyes. But Triona saw no pain in his eyes, only love, and again, she came very close to tears. Then she felt his large strong hands capture hers and bring them up to his chest, a small silk-wrapped package pressed into her palm.

  "What . . . ?"

  "A gift, Triona." He gave her a wry smile. "I only hope this one doesn’t end up in a bog. It belonged to my mother."