Riona

by Linda Windsor

  It was well into the evening before Kieran and Riona were escorted to the guest cottage by their friends. As Kieran closed the door—shutting out the good wishes for health, long life, many children, and much pleasure in achieving all—Riona stared in disbelief at the nuptial bed. She was nervous enough as it was, but someone had draped it with mistletoe, enough to celebrate the Yule season rather than summer.

  “Faith, someone has high expectations.” Kieran slipped up behind her. “I’d like an heir, not a litter.”

  Riona laughed. It helped ease the apprehension that had increased with each step toward the lodge.

  “You grab that side,” he told her.

  Riona helped him remove the garland from the headboard of the bed. He gathered it up and tossed it in a corner with a wicked curl of his lips.

  “ ’Tis only my bride I care about this night.” He walked around the bed and took her hands, lifting them to his lips. After kissing each one, he wrapped her arms around him. “Tonight we begin the loving and cherishing.”

  Riona expected him to lay claim to her mouth as he lowered his face to hers but instead, he pressed his forehead against hers, peering into her eyes.

  “There’s no need to be frightened, milady. I would never cause you harm.” He backed her against the bed and, hands on her shoulders, had her sit on the freshly fluffed mattress. It protested softly beneath the crush of her weight. Her heart leaped into double time.

  Again she was fooled as Kieran placed a kiss on his finger and pressed it to her lips with a husky “Stay here.”

  What went on in the wedding chamber had been left mostly to Riona’s imagination. Even though the physical act itself sounded disgusting, she’d learned with a keen ear that men enjoyed it. And given the smile Riona’s mother, Ethna, wore when her father, Murtagh, was home, Riona assumed it was possible for women to take pleasure in it, too. But Ethna of Dromin hadn’t been given to talking about it like the servants, any more than had Queen Lorna, Riona’s foster mother at Gleannmara. Aside from ancient love stories and romantic eloquence of the Song of Songs on the subject, Riona had been left to her own devices to discern this most confusing aspect of life.

  She wiped her hands on her skirt—blue for purity—painfully aware how her new linen shift clung to her like a second skin despite the pleasant coolness of the summer evening. This night she wished she’d not been quite as devoted to purity of thought. She simply hadn’t prepared to become a wife. She’d prepared to wed the church.

  Anxiety gave way to impatience as she heard Kieran moving about in the other imda. What on earth was he doing? Heavenly Father, if he came in mother-naked, she’d faint. Riona had nursed men before, Kieran included, but this was different. This time Kieran was not just an extraordinary man, he was her husband.

  From out of nowhere a loud hiccup—half gasp and half squeal—seized her breath. She grabbed at the sharp pain in her chest. Oh joy, this was just what she needed.

  A rush of footsteps preceded Kieran into the small enclosure. “Are you ill?”

  To her relief, he was still fully dressed … and carrying a basin of water. She shook her head and pointed to his burden. “What—hic—is that?”

  His smile nearly overstretched the square of his jaw, he was so proud. “A foot bath,” he announced. The exotic scent of the water drifted up to her nostrils as he put the basin on the floor and reached for her slippered feet. Instinct bade her draw them away—Kieran of Gleannmara knew how sensitive her feet were and had tickled her breathless too many times to count. He chuckled as he caught them, his mind obviously drifting along the same path as hers. With an irascible twinkle in his eye, he mouthed the words, “Trust me.”

  She’d promised to love, honor, and cherish. The trust part must have been implied.

  The wary look on Riona’s face brought back memories, precious ones of a time Kieran often longed for, when their parents were the responsible ones and he, Heber, and Riona were free to game and frolic with unencumbered minds. Not everything had changed though. Riona was still as sweet and innocent as she’d been then, except now she was a woman. No longer was she his playmate, but his life mate. Her childlike spirit was tempered with a wisdom beyond her years and in some respects—such as faith—beyond his.

  Kieran wanted to pinch himself to be sure that this was real, that Riona was his. He wanted this night to be perfect. Marcus had reminded him that somewhere in Scripture feet washing was a sign of love. Having had more experience with the gentler sex than Kieran, the self-proclaimed Tristan thought this might impress a devout lady and put her at ease. The gleeman had sought to teach Kieran an appropriate poem to recite as well, but it sounded so ridiculous that Kieran had abandoned it—and his chortling advisor. If Marcus laughed at him, Riona surely would.

  “I did—hic—take a bath,” she reminded him as he put the slippers aside.

  “This is a declaration of my love, milady.”

  She cocked her head to the side, clearly bemused. Kieran hid a scowl. At least she hadn’t laughed. Kieran knew the game of seduction well when he dealt with a saucy wench whose appetite matched his own. But Riona’s fire had not been kindled in that manner. Those sparks he had seen beyond the glow of her joy made his blood simmer.

  “You know, lass,” he explained, “just like one of the disciples did for his wife.”

  The slender, dainty feet in his hand were cold, yet at the feel of them he reacted as though he’d been scalded. With a splash, he dropped them in the water before he was tempted by the cute clench of her toes to kiss each one into relaxing. He couldn’t recite his own name now, much less a poem.

  “Hic—my skirts!” With a jerk, Riona hiked up her hem in dismay. “And I know of no disciple’s wedding in the Scripture—hic.”

  “Well, somebody washed somebody’s feet, I know that much.” Annoyance sharpened Kieran’s voice. He should have known better than to listen to a fool. Marcus was a poor substitute for Heber or Bran. They’d paid far more attention to their scriptural studies.

  “Jesus washed His disciples feet at the last supper,” she suggested.

  Her legs were the perfect match for her feet, decidedly shapely and fem—

  “And Mary washed Jesus’ feet and—hic—anointed them with spikenard. She dried them with her hair.”

  The base heat warming Kieran’s blood deteriorated his humor by the heartbeat. “I don’t mean his mother,” he said, exasperated, “And I’ve no idea what’s in this oil Finella made. But whatever and whoever was involved, they did it for love, confound it!”

  He shook his wet hands. The towel. He’d left the towel in the other room.

  Face burning like a cook’s over a hot fire, Kieran pushed to his feet and stormed away. His plan was unraveling faster than he. He was warmer than Sheol’s coals, he thought, shirking off his brat. He’d waited so long for Riona, but the time wasn’t right yet. His bride’s mind was fixed on his vague knowledge of Scripture and her hem instead of on her husband’s love for her. The wind of his frustration hissing through his teeth, he headed for the door.

  “Kie—hic—Kieran, where are you go—hic—ing?” Riona called after him.

  “Soaking your feet has accomplished naught, so I’m after soaking my head!” He stepped into the night. At the corner of the cottage was a rain barrel where water was collected for the guests use. Flipping off the lid, he stuck his head in the cold water. He held his breath under the surface while his pulse pounded fit to separate his skull from his neck.

  The worst of it was that it wasn’t his head that needed cooling. Coming up for air, he wiped his soaked hair back from his face and took the dipper from its hook over the barrel.

  “Have you lost your—hic—mind?” Riona asked from the door, looking at him as if the question were merely a formality.

  She was so beautiful, leaning out, her raven hair cascading like a silken mantle, framing her small, oval face and eyes a man could get lost in.

  Groaning inwardly, Kieran filled the dipper an
d, pulling the neckline of his tunic out, he poured the contents down the front of him. “No, milady, I’m well aware of what I’m doing.” He was so certain that he helped himself to another dip.

  “Is this some warrior ritual?” She lifted the delicate black line of her brow skeptically. Suddenly, it dropped and wonder filled her face. “Kieran of Gleannmara! Don’t be tellin’ me you’re nervous.”

  “It’s not me standing there hiccuping like a newborn calf on sour milk.”

  Riona threw back her head and laughed. The mischief spanned the distance between them, drawing a smile from the bloodless press of his lips.

  “ ’Twould make this easier if you carried a battle axe or sword, but Aedh banned decent weapons at the fair.”

  Pulling a straight face, Riona leaned out a little farther, and curled her finger at him with a look that ran him through like a blade fresh off the smith’s fire. “Come back inside, milord, lest we both become the laughingstock of the fairground.”

  Kieran dropped the ladle where he stood. In three steps, he was at the door and Riona was in his arms.

  “Faith, but you’re wet and cold,” she laughed in halfhearted protest.

  He felt it as much as heard it, the vibration of her laughter against his chest. Little did she know that he felt like a simmering kettle about to lift its own lid. The height of madness to which Riona of Dromin could drive him left him breathless.

  “And you’re warm and I hope willing, lass, for I’m at my rope’s end. I wanted this to be perfect for you, and the harder I try, the more of a fool I become.”

  “But such a—hic—lovable one.” She held his face between her hands, fingers pressing gently to his temples as if to relieve the misery drumming there.

  “If I frighten you, sweetling, then stop me, for—”

  She silenced him with a short kiss. “You’d never hurt me. You said so, and I trust you, Kieran of Gleannmara, with my heart, my body, and my soul.”

  Kieran kissed her as if to explore and commit all three to his memory, not just for now, but for eternity. In that silent declaration where lips met, he endeavored to show her all that he was, all that she made him. She was his breath; he was hers. Breaking away just long enough to scoop her in his arms, he stepped inside, kicked the door shut, and carried her into the imda where he’d spent recent nights in torture. “I’ve learned something just now that I never dreamed,” he whispered in her ear as he placed her gently on the bed.

  Riona gazed up into his eyes. Reaching up, she brushed his hair over his ear, an innocent gesture with untold impact upon his crumbling defenses.

  “That a heartfelt kiss will cure the hiccups, and …”

  “And?” she prompted dreamily.

  “And never leave the bathwater next to the bed.” The basin was pressed against his leg where he’d stepped on its edge, and his feet were soaked by the deluge it spilled in revenge.

  With a tinkling laugh, she rolled over and patted the spot on the mattress beside her. “The water we can clean in the morning. As for the hiccups—” the lazy stretch of her lips tightened his insides—“best you join me and make every effort to see they don’t return.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  A child’s crying invaded Riona’s sweet slumber. She blinked open her eyes in an attempt to separate reality and dream. The dark hollow of the thatched roof overhead was still there, as it had been since they first arrived at Drumceatt. Soft against her neck, the rumble of Kieran’s snore told her that the joy and wonder of the night before had not been a heavenly dream, but real—as real as the warm sanctuary of the strong arms surrounding her. It would have been easy to close her eyes once more and revel in this newfound intimacy, but she heard the sound again.

  It was more of a whimper than a cry. Riona dragged herself up on one elbow to listen more keenly, disturbing her sleeping husband.

  With a grunt, he brushed her hair from his face. “What is it?”

  Her own senses sharper now, Riona threw off the sheet and bounded from the bed. In a few hasty steps, she slipped her shift over her head and opened the door. The sudden invasion of morning sun blinded her momentarily before she recognized the small figure standing there.

  “Leila!”

  The child’s face was tear streaked, her eyes swollen with dismay. Clinging to her shoulder and chewing affectionately on her mussed hair was Lady Gray.

  “Darling, what is wrong?” Riona drew the little girl to her.

  Brokenly, Leila told her in that unintelligible dialect the twins spoke. Meanwhile, Riona examined her dress. She didn’t appear to have been molested. Still, it wasn’t like her to set off on her own without her brothers, and they were nowhere in sight.

  “Is she all right?” Kieran asked, drawing them both inside. He picked Leila up and hugged her. “What brings you here this hour of the morning? Did you miss me?”

  A halfhearted smile touched the child’s lips before she planted a kiss on Kieran’s unshaven cheek. Startled and intrigued by its roughness, she ran a finger over it.

  “That’s it, isn’t it? I knew it. You missed me.” At that moment, Lady Gray decided Kieran’s broad shoulder was fair ground. “Ach,” he exclaimed, never one particularly fond of cats. He lifted the kitten away and handed it back to the girl. “Keep to your mistress, you four-legged hairball.”

  Leila giggled.

  Riona warmed at the sight of the two. What a picture they made, the giant with the shirt he’d hastily donned hanging too far to one side and the sprite perched on one arm, their disheveled blond heads pressed together. The blessing so overwhelmed Riona that she had to blink away the happy glaze in her eyes.

  Leila kept saying something and tugging at her shapeless waist, but to both Kieran and Riona’s frustration, they had to wait until her brothers joined them later at the hall for morning meal before they understood what had happened.

  The little girl had awakened before everyone else and decided to pay a visit to her new parents. Along the way, a man snatched the bag of her meager belongings, which she kept tucked in her sash.

  Kieran growled in outrage. “I grow more tired of this place by the hour. Beneath the surface of games and court all manner of lowlife prey upon the innocent.”

  Riona brightened. “Do you mean it?”

  She, too, had grown weary of all the pomp and people. To sleep in her own bed in her own house—in her husband’s bed and house, she corrected with a whimsical smile—would be the answer to her prayers. She longed to go to her new home and establish a routine. If she never had another day’s excitement, it would not dismay her.

  Kieran leaned over and cupped her chin. “Aye, lass, more than anything. I want to take my wife home. To Gleannmara.”

  “And us,” Liex reminded him, his face smeared ear-to-ear with honey and crumbs from the scone he’d demolished.

  “Aye,” Kieran laughed, “most certainly with our children.”

  Our children … to love and to cherish … I pledge thee my troth … sweetling … beloved wife …

  Of all the words of the last twenty-four hours, Riona hardly knew which she cherished most. And she’d never forget Kieran’s well-intentioned footbath. Surely no new husband tried harder or more awkwardly to impress and calm his bride.

  “I was in Gleannmara only one day before leaving to find you,” he told her somberly. “In truth, I haven’t wanted to live there since my parents died. My foster home was more home to me. I’d lived there since I was seven or so.”

  Fynn looked up from scraping the last of his porridge from a bowl. “Then I’m glad we’re your foster children. Otherwise you’d be sending us away.” Fosterage was an accepted way of life, especially among the nobility.

  Liex digested his brother’s comment with a look of relief before carrying it a step further. “Does that mean if you have babies, you’ll send them away when they get to be seven?”

  Kieran exchanged a disconcerted look with Riona. “Well,” he said, clearing his throat, “it’s the custom. It
keeps a prince from becoming spoiled. ’Tis part of his education, and it allies good families. I was raised by the clan champion, Riona’s father. He taught me how to fight. That’s how I met her and have loved her since she was a toddle-legged waif, all braids, blue eyes, and cherry cheeks.”

  The orphans laughed at the picture he painted.

  “And I spent many years at Gleannmara with Kieran’s mother,” she informed them, “learning how to run a household, as well as skills with the needle.”

  “Tell us about Gleannmara,” Fynn implored.

  “Aye, please tells us,” Liex chimed in. Leila nodded anxiously.

  Their eager faces told more than they’d admit to or perhaps even realized. They longed for a home and a family.

  Kieran rose, signaling the time to leave. There were other guests who needed the table and the benches surrounding it. Riona felt the children’s disappointment. How long had it been since she had heard Kieran speak from the heart she knew to be noble and sincere? Not since his parents died, and he’d grudgingly become king at a costly consequence. And when he’d reached out to her to join him as his bride at Gleannmara, she’d rejected him. How horribly she must have hurt him, despite his façade of arrogance and indifference.

  “Milady, I promise we’ll talk about Gleannmara later,” he assured her, obviously misinterpreting her troubled expression. “For now, let us make preparations to return with all haste so that we can show these ragmullions our new home,” he added with a twinkle in his eye. “But the first order of our day is to replace Lady Leila’s purse and find a suitable travel basket for that undersized mewling.”

  Like miniature soldiers reporting for duty, the children lined up and followed Gleannmara’s king toward the door, leaving Riona to cover the flank. Her vision marred with emotion, she bumped into a hastily abandoned bench. If she were any happier, she’d need a towel hung round her neck.

  The next morning, the fairground began to stir at the peep of the sun over the eastern horizon. Bells sounded from the monastery at Derry in the distance as if to ring in the day. Delicious scents of breakfast wafted in the air, blending with the smoke of the cookfires as if to hail everyone from bed to table. In the bruden yard, Gleannmara’s party pulled together, preparing to depart and reluctant to say good-bye.