“Perhaps you are right.” She pressed her mouth to his again, licked him deeply. Her hand took a decided turn downward and warmth spread through him in the wake of the bliss, followed by sharp desire.
He wanted—but he possessed no words at all.
Her fingers encountered the laces on his leggings, paused, and wiggled beneath. His whole body leaped to attention—wounds, aches, and even sorrow forgotten. She curled her fingers around the part of him she sought, and he stiffened. Feelings, raw and hot—so different from those of a hound—poured through him. He wanted to mate with her. Would she be receptive?
As a hound, he’d never had any doubt, could tell by scent as well as behavior when a bitch would accept him. This baffled him—emotions and impulses all tangled together, and his need to protect her at all cost. Even from his desires?
She murmured and began to caress him with her hand. Enflamed, he contemplated flipping her over and completing the act that should be so simple but was not. Confusing him further, she showered his face with little kisses and began to whisper in the darkness.
“True, tell me everything will come right—lie to me if you have to. Say that we will heal, that we’ll defeat the westerners, that Tally will awaken and you and I will never lose each other.”
His throat closed beneath the lash of his emotions; her hand remained inside his leggings, closed around him in a caress. He had no words.
“Because of all things, I could not bear to lose you too.” As she spoke, he tasted her tears on his tongue. “Not after my parents, so many of our friends…and Loyal.”
“Loyal,” he struggled to tell her, “would not want you to mourn him so deeply.” Of this at least he was certain. “There is nothing he would not have done for you, given for you.”
“How can you say that? You did not know him.”
“He was your hound. He could feel no anger. And he loves you still.”
She began to weep in earnest.
“No,” he bade her. Using his fingers, he wiped the tears from her cheeks, captured her lips with his, and slid his tongue into her mouth again.
He needed to make her feel how completely they remained bound to one another—that nothing could ever truly part them even if his body perished again. Or if hers did. That thought caused such pain in his heart he could scarcely breathe, and he felt for the first time the truth of what she’d felt when she lost Loyal. When she lost him.
Desire it as he may, the Lady had not promised to leave him with her forever. Their only “forever” consisted of the shimmering cord that bound them spiritually.
But for now, they lay close enough to make one flesh. The last time they had come this close to mating, the Gaels had attacked. Did she want him now? Would it bring her the comfort she craved?
She moaned; True thought he heard the sound echo in the still night. With his senses and emotions both overloaded, it took him a moment to grasp the truth. He tumbled to it a moment after Barta stiffened in his arms and pulled away from him.
“Tally!” she breathed. “Thank the good lady—he wakes.”
Chapter Twenty
Barta knelt on the damp ground, afraid to take her eyes from her young brother’s face. Tally had come around, groaning with the ache in his head and with his thoughts foggy. The true pain found him when his memory of the fight in the hut returned. He threw himself into Barta’s arms then and howled like a young child, while the other tribe members gathered around, silent. Barta had wept with him.
Now dawn crept through the trees like cold mist, and she felt a different woman from the one she’d been just yesterday—transformed like metal when it passes through the fire. Once, she’d believed the loss of Loyal the worst thing she could bear, then the loss of her parents. Tally had returned to her miraculously, but now she must watch as Wick said goodbye to both of them.
Tally, still impossibly pale and with dark smudges for eyes, clutched her hand and stared at his older brother with raw disbelief. Barta tore her gaze from him at last and focused on Wick also. He wore a slender pack on his back and weapons on his shoulder. Even as she watched, he hunkered down at Tally’s other side and touched the boy’s arm.
Wick’s eyes might still be blank, as they’d been since the death of their parents, but Tally’s held enough agony for all of them to share. He struggled to sit up, and Wick steadied him with careful hands. Behind Barta stood True, utterly silent, and beside True a heavily bandaged Gant, his face twisted with distress. Barta had no doubt other tribe members listened. She no longer cared if they did.
She—and Tally—had only moments to change Wick’s mind and persuade him to stay. The matter seemed so simple to her, despite—or perhaps because of—all the changes.
She spoke impulsively. “Wick, you cannot go.”
“Cannot.” Tally repeated the word, his voice still raw from weeping. He and Wick had always been close. Surely, surely Barta told herself, he could change Wick’s mind.
Wick moved his hand from Tally’s shoulder to his hair, which he stroked the way Barta used to stroke Loyal, with visible love. “I must. Now that I know you have awakened and will recover, Tally, I can.”
“But what of Father’s place? He is…gone. But he left you behind, and that is what he would want.”
Wick glanced at Barta once before returning his gaze to Tally’s face. “That place can be filled by another—has already been filled by another. Did Barta not tell you?”
Confusion washed over Tally’s face. “She has told me much. I don’t believe it—I don’t care what Brude thinks he might do. Stand up to him. Challenge him. Father would.”
For the first time, pain wracked Wick’s features, a crack in his stoic emotionlessness. “I am not Father. That is something no one ever understood.”
Tally argued it, and Barta heard her mother’s words in his mouth. “You are the son he loved and raised. Do him honor now.”
Wick contemplated it, head bowed, and Barta dared to hope he might stay after all. But he shook his head again. “I wish I did not have to disappoint you, Brother. I must have time to think, to regain myself.”
From beside Barta, Gant spoke. “Do you say you may return?”
Wick’s eyes found him. “I may.”
Gant scowled. “It will be too late by then. Already Brude takes the chief’s cloak upon his shoulders. Whether you do or do not return, he will ruin us.”
“Ah, Gant my good friend, we are already ruined. Do you not see that?”
“So,” Barta said bitterly, “it will be you and not the Gaels who thrusts the final dirk in our backs. What would Father say to that, I ask you?”
“He would be ashamed of me. I am ashamed of myself. Perhaps, Sister, you were right after all with your rash intentions and daring heart. You should have been the heir to the place instead of me.”
“No, Wick. No.” Leaning across Tally, Barta embraced Wick, squeezed him tight enough to hurt, thinking maybe if she held on he wouldn’t go from them. For an instant their pain, with Tally’s, twisted together. Then he set her from him gently and rose to his feet in the misty dawn.
“I am not worthy of the tribe, not as I am. Take care of yourself, Sister. Take care of Tally.” He bent again to embrace the boy and clasped arms with Gant, who stepped forward. Barta, feeling hollow, rose to her feet and stood swaying. True took her arm and steadied her.
“This is a mistake,” Gant said. “Wick, will you put yourself ahead of the tribe?”
“Gant, I have not thought of myself in longer than I can remember. Ever since Father’s injury it has been harder and harder. Have you any idea how it feels trying to live up to something—someone—you know you can never match?”
“You need not match your father,” Gant grumbled. “Few could. Only be the man you are, and that will be good enough for those of us who value you.”
Again, Wick shook his head. “I am sorry. I wish you all the best; I pray to the Lord and Lady you find a safe place under their protection.”
&n
bsp; Gant grunted. “Much good that may do us now!”
From the corner of her eye, Barta saw Brude walk up. To be sure, she hadn’t expected him to stay clear of this scene. But she saw only sorrow and no gloating in his face.
To Wick she said, “Where will you go?”
He shrugged. “North, as I said. As far away from the wretched invaders as I can get.” His features writhed. “I hate them. I know Mother taught us not to hate, but my feelings have gotten beyond me. If I do not leave now, do not breathe free air, I will lose myself.”
Disregarding the listening Brude, Barta said, “You will return when you can?”
“I will. But I am hoping to find a place away from all this death and pain.” His eyes lit for the first time. “Come with me, Barta—you and Tally.”
Barta considered it even as the others watched and listened. A tempting offer—to flee all the heartache and sorrow. But Wick said nothing of True, and she would go nowhere without him. Sadly, she shook her head.
“I will not abandon Father’s fight.”
Wick took a measured look at Brude, not ten paces away. “Then stand and make a challenge for the place of chief. It is what you’ve always wanted, in your heart.”
Barta, too, shot a look at Brude, whose expression had become stormy as the sky overhead. “All I ever truly wanted was respect. I seem to have achieved just the opposite.”
Wick clasped her arm again. “Sister, your race is not run.”
He pushed past her then and paused by Brude, his life-long companion. “Look after them in my stead. And the goddess help you if you fail them.”
“As you fail them?” Brude jabbed. Suddenly he relented. “Wick, stay. You need not serve as chief—I will accept that place. You still have much to offer: a good right arm, a sound heart, and strength of belief.”
Wick gave a rough laugh. “You think my heart still sound? With such poor judgment, you are all doomed.” He looked at Barta again. “I’m sorry.”
The last words she would ever hear from him? She feared so, and felt another crack join those already threading through her heart, making of it a poor and leaky vessel.
Impulsively, she leaped forward and embraced him again. For an instant he hesitated, then clasped her painfully tight.
“Stay, please,” she begged in his ear.
“Forgive me. I cannot.”
He released her and, all in one movement, turned and walked away. Within moments he had dissolved into the mist between the trees, like nothing more than a dream.
****
“Barta, we must speak together—reasonably, if we can manage it.”
Barta, the emptiness in her heart like a living presence, made no response. Following Wick’s departure, Brude had stomped off across the camp, leaving her to comfort Tally as best she might. Not until now, sometime later, did he return and pause above Tally’s pallet to regard her.
True, sitting beside her, shoved to his feet as if prepared to intervene, but Barta held up a restraining hand. Brude appeared changed, and not just because of the wounds he bore. He looked older, honed and exhausted. A different man from the confident, cocksure one she’d come to know.
Yes, well, they had all been altered, had they not? Her mind flinched from the darkness in her spirit even as she used True’s hand to scramble to her feet. She strove to answer Brude in kind.
“And without hostility?”
That brought Brude’s dark gaze to hers. “Without hostility.” He waved an arm, encompassing both Tally and the forest around them. “There is no room left for it.”
“Barely room left,” she pronounced, “for living.”
“We agree then—for once.”
Barta nodded and shivered. When she began agreeing with this man, she must indeed worry. She glanced at True, who stood with concern bright in his hazel eyes, and nodded. “Stay with Tally, please. I will be but a few moments.”
She stepped away with Brude, who cupped her elbow in his hand. Barta wanted to pull away but had not the strength. She could not recall when she had been so tired.
Brude searched her face before he spoke in a low, steady tone. “I will be as brief and as honest as I can. I want the place of chief. After all that’s happened, I scarcely know why, save that I have always wanted it.”
Barta drew breath against the despair that filled her heart. “It should be easy for you—has not Wick just placed it in your hands?”
Brude scowled bitterly. “Easy? Nothing about this is easy.” He shook his shaggy head, and she saw that a hairline cut along his forehead still oozed blood. He looked nearly as beaten as she. “I need to know, Barta, that you will not obstruct me.”
“Me? How?”
“By challenging me for the place, as Wick suggested.”
She gave a wild laugh. “That was nonsense. How would I do so? I have no sons.”
“Not yet.” Brude shot a glance back to where True still stood with his gaze resting on them. “But I know what you are—unpredictable and obstructive just for the sake of it. This, Barta, is no time to play games. We are driven down…very nearly defeated. Our people need guidance, strength and hope, if they are to survive.”
Barta blinked at him in surprise. It had never occurred to her that Brude, with all his bluster, might have the makings of a good chief, yet his words made sense.
He went on softly, “I know you. Proving yourself has always been at the back of your mind. Why else did you challenge so many of your father’s and Wick’s decisions? Why undertake that disastrous raid behind everyone’s back unless you wanted to prove something? Your own father stood in the way—and your brother. No more.” He lifted his chin. “Now I stand in your way.”
She shook her head, thinking the past but a dream. “I wanted only respect—and to prove I might fight as well as any man of this tribe.”
Brude did not look convinced.
“Brude, if I did challenge you for the place of chief, do you suppose the tribe would take me seriously?”
“I do not know. Folk are shattered, and the majority of them are women. They followed your father a long time.”
“I don’t want the place.” Once, perhaps—if only as he said, at the back of her mind. Now? No.
“What of your companion?”
“Who? True?”
“An absurd name—better suited to a hound than a man. I do not trust him, but I can see you do and thought you might be grooming him for your consort—a strong spear at your side to persuade the tribesfolk of your might.”
“That is not uppermost in my mind.”
Brude grunted. “I may not trust him, but by the goddess, he’s fearless in a fight, and at the moment that counts for something. If you do not mean to take him for husband, then hear me out—and patiently. I say again, it is time for us to put the welfare of this tribe first and make choices to benefit them—not ourselves.” His gaze narrowed upon her. “I still think you and I should wed.”
Barta drew breath to speak but he forestalled her. “Nay—we agreed to speak honestly, so listen. I do not want you—I am certainly not attracted to you. I think but of the tribe. Our folk need healing, and they need to believe in those who lead them. If we wed, they will see you—a member of your father’s house—giving me your backing. And our children would still carry that bloodline.”
“Children?” she gasped in horror.
“I think of the future, Barta, nothing more. I know you for a selfish wretch, right down to your toes. But will you not for once join me in acting on behalf of someone besides yourself?”
Dismay washed over Barta in a wave; she felt far too weary to experience affront. Again she drew a breath. “This is not the time for such decisions. We have far greater worries—no food, no fire, many injured and bereaved, and winter coming on.”
“Leadership comes first, always.”
She crossed her arms on her breast. “Very well—as chief, what is the first thing you would do?”
“Move us east.”
&nbs
p; “But are you not the man who decried Wick’s decision to fall back, who branded us cowards if we ran?”
Brude blinked. “Much has changed since then. Many whom we loved have gone into the ground. I am not sure we have warriors enough to stand, should the Gaels pursue us.”
“So you would move us east. Why not north, where we might find some allies?”
“The tribes due north of us are fighting their own battles. And your erstwhile champion will not cough up the name or location of his folk.” Brude’s nostrils flared.
“He cannot remember. He suffered a life-changing event…”
“So you keep saying. Yet he remembered he was supposed to come and place himself in your service.”
“Mother said there was great magic in it.”
“No doubt. And it no longer matters. Wed with me and you can keep him on the side.”
“Eh?”
“I mean to speak with Avinda about a similar arrangement.”
Barta stared. “Do you truly suppose Avinda will accept you without the title of wife?”
“She will do what is best for the tribe.”
Barta doubted that. “But…would she not want your children?” Heat stained Barta’s skin. She hated speaking of such things with Brude and did not want to imagine lying down with him.
“She must be made to understand—as must you—that the only issue that matters would be our children, yours and mine. Is that not the whole point of us marrying? Which means,” he jerked his head toward where True still stood, watching, “should you take him to your bed, your children cannot be his.” Brude’s gaze raked her. “Even a poor excuse for a woman such as you must know of other ways you can pleasure him, and he you. Or are you entirely the warrior lad?”
Barta’s cheeks now burned, but she tipped up her head. “I do not wish to wed with you—not for any reason.”
“Nor I you. Sacrifices must be made, especially now. Just say you will consider on it—and that you will support me in the meantime as chief.”
Barta narrowed her eyes and tried to see into a future that appeared to contain only darkness. She sighed. “Very well, Brude. I will consider on it, no more.”
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