by Lucy Monroe
Mayhap he was right.
But in that moment, she could be glad the decision was not hers to make.
“We will go into the forest. Vegar, you go to the keep and fetch more of the Sinclair’s soldiers.”
“And some coverings for the men. They are naked,” Audrey pointed out as if no one else had realized yet.
So, she still had the modesty Shona had always thought such a deep part of the younger woman. She’d simply…what? Accepted Vegar seeing her naked because they were mates?
This mating business had a lot to answer for.
“Take the children with you,” Shona implored Vegar. “Please.”
“No, Mummy. We need to stay with you and Da,” Eadan immediately denied, reaching for his father with the first sign of true fear Shona had seen in her son this whole time.
Caelis lifted the boy without hesitation, saying something in a low voice that brought a relieved smile to Eadan’s features and a nod of agreement.
Marjory latched onto the conriocht’s leg, her thumb tucked into her mouth. Caelis’s giant hand rested carefully on her head, the gesture both gentle and clearly protective. Neither child showed signs of being overly upset by what they had witnessed, though both very obviously did not want to be separated from their savior.
Considering her son had barely survived his stepbrother’s machinations and Marjory had spent two sennights on the run with her mother and friends, they might well consider this day less upsetting than Shona did.
“The big dog keep us safe,” Marjory said around her thumb.
Shona found herself laughing and was glad to see that Caelis did as well. It was a strange, more guttural sound coming from his conriocht throat, but amusement glittered in his eyes. He was clearly not offended by being referred to as a dog.
Eadan frowned. “He’s not a dog, Margie. He’s our da.”
Marjory did not look overly concerned by her brother’s chastisement.
There was no joviality in Caelis’s expression when he fixed his gaze on the MacLeod Chrechte. “We will go into the forest and await the other soldiers.”
“Why? You’re just going to kill us anyway.” It was Maon, of course.
Incredibly, Caelis laughed again. “Do not presume to speak for your fellow Faol. They have already kneeled to me. All that is left is for them to speak their vows. You are no longer their leader and you were never their alpha. They were taught lies like you but recognize the truth when they see it.”
Maon shut up then.
At Vegar’s insistence, Audrey agreed to leave with him. He would see her wounds tended to immediately. The young Sinclair soldier also took his departure, his fervent praying finally ceasing, an expression of pain twisting his untried features.
Caelis laid his hand on the soldier’s shoulder and the Sinclair man earned even more of Shona’s respect when he barely winced at the contact. “Tell the Sinclair I owe a debt of gratitude and honor to this man.”
The soldier looked up at the massive conriocht with shock.
Caelis met his gaze. “You put yourself between my mate and danger. ’Tis not a debt that will ever be fully repaid.”
“Teach me to fight the wolves,” the young soldier said.
“Why?”
“To better defend my laird and our clan.”
“In time, you will train with the Chrechte, just as all his soldiers do.”
“’Tis not the same. We don’t know their true natures when training.”
“You believe you can learn to best a Chrechte warrior in his beast form in battle?”
“If you teach me, I do.”
“You have the heart for it. I will train you.”
“You cannot do that!” Maon exclaimed.
Caelis spun around and glared at the man, his hand clenched at his side. “Do not challenge me. My patience with you is at its limit.”
Maon fell silent, his expression mutinous.
Shona could not help admiring the stubborn determination of the other man, even if he was more wrongheaded than her stepson, Percival, and his father combined.
Shona took Audrey’s hand and led her toward the forest, surprised and yet not when the others followed her, Caelis at the rear with Eadan still perched on his arm.
Despite the men’s apparent submission, Shona kept Marjory well away from the MacLeods who had been willing to kill them.
Her head was too filled with her own thoughts to listen to Caelis as he spoke in that strange guttural voice to the men he used to call friends. She was peripherally aware that he talked about things like sacred Chrechte law, the Fearghall and something he referred to as the Cahir.
The three who had already shown Caelis submission in their wolf forms listened with a great deal more attention than Shona. Maon argued and insulted and yet, Shona began to realize he wanted to believe.
And that is when she put her own worries aside and started listening, too.
“A time is coming—’twill not be in our lifetime, but that of our children’s children—when a great blight is coming up on the people of our nations. An illness so great it will wipe out entire packs as though they’d never been. Without our sacred stone and the help of healers, the Chrechte will cease to be.”
Maon frowned. “We have healers among the Faol.”
“Not enough. We will need the Éan and the Paindeal.”
“The Paindeal,” Maon scoffed. “They are legend and nothing else.”
“That is what most of the clans believed about the Éan before they learned the truth,” Caelis said.
“What do you mean?” Shona couldn’t help asking.
“Until a year ago, the Éan lived like ghosts in the remote forest.”
“Why?”
“Because of the Fearghall,” Maon answered, though he did not sound as proud of that fact as she would have expected.
“Aren’t they safe, now that they are among the clans?”
“The Éan are only safe when the Fearghall cease to exist.”
“That will never happen,” Maon scoffed.
“You think not?” Caelis challenged.
“He is right.” Shona moved cautiously around the Chrechte men so she and Marjory could sit on the other side of Caelis. “As long as there is hatred among men, people like the Fearghall will exist.”
Caelis gave an unhappy rumble of agreement. “But we will do our best to expose them among the Chrechte and help those who have been taught the lies to know the truth.”
It was a laudable goal, but she did not think every Fearghall was just misguided. Uven was a prime example.
That man got entirely too much joy out of believing himself superior to others. He would have been a terrible laird even if he’d been entirely human.
“The Paindeal disappeared before the Éan stole our sacred stone and the Fearghall was created to find it and return it to the Faol.”
“The Fearghall spend too much time hunting Éan to be hunting the Faolchú Chridhe.”
“The Éan destroyed it.” But even Maon did not sound convinced by his own argument.
Of course, according to the man, Caelis could not be conriocht without it. So, his very existence was proof this sacred stone still existed and was indeed accessible to the Faol.
“Both the Paindeal and the Faolchú Chridhe exist.” There could be no doubt that Caelis believed what he was saying. “Just like the Éan.”
“But we have always known the Éan exist.”
“And the Éan have never forgotten the Paindeal, nor have some of the Faol.”
“So, what? We are to chase after a myth?” Maon demanded.
“Aye, and find them if we hope to save our children’s children.”
“You say Uven held you back from your true mate?” Sean asked.
Maon glared at the forest floor. “He says you were just too stubborn to do your duty by our people.”
“How can I, a Chrechte man, do this duty once I have mated and forged the sacred bond?” Caelis asked.
> “You could not,” one of the other men said. “And Uven knew this.”
Apparently, from the man’s tone, this was a well-known fact among the Chrechte.
This proof that Caelis had not lied to her about his last six years of celibacy was something she set aside to contemplate later.
“’Tis why he ordered me not to couple with Shona, but it was already too late.” Caelis huge arm settled across her shoulder.
“You lied to him,” Sean said in a tone that Shona did not understand.
It was almost as if he admired Caelis for doing so.
“Aye. And he never knew my deceit.”
“That is impossible,” Maon asserted. “Our alpha could smell your deceit no matter how you tried to mask it.”
“He is no longer your alpha.”
And Shona began to understand Caelis’s intentions and his need to return to the MacLeod clan. He was not going back to merely exact vengeance on a laird who had lied and put his people’s needs last. Caelis wanted to save others from the same fate. He wanted to lead the MacLeod people with the strength and courage and selflessness that Uven should have shown.
“So you claim.” Maon’s words were defiant, but his conviction lessened with every utterance.
Shona could almost find it in her heart to feel sorry for him. Until she remembered he’d threatened to kill her children.
“Do you really think he will survive my challenge?” Caelis asked with more humor than Shona felt.
“According to your words, you will allow us to live.”
“Uven is more treacherous. He has earned his death, when it comes.” There was no mercy in Caelis’s tone now.
Apparently the Chrechte law of mercy did not extend to despot alphas.
“Because he withheld your mate from you?” Maon asked.
“Because he has killed mates, not just withheld them. Because he has murdered Éan, humans and Faol indiscriminately whenever they have gotten in his way. My own parents were victims of his treachery and he dared put himself in my life as substitute father. Because he lies and teaches lies as truth, knowing they are lies.”
She did not think the others heard the pain in the conriocht’s gravelly tones, but it reached out to the heart she’d tried so hard to protect these past six years. She did not want to feel compassion for him, did not want to feel his pain.
But she could no more help herself than when Eadan scraped his knee and her own ached in sympathy.
“Uven believes what he teaches,” Sean claimed.
Maon paled and looked ready to lose whatever he’d eaten to break his fast that day.
“Nay. He knows the truth. We are only as strong as our weakest link. And without our sacred stone, the Faol were the weakest link in the family of Chrechte for centuries.”
Maon shook his head. “No.”
“Aye.”
Maon did not argue again. He shut up, his expression turning thoughtful. In a thoroughly surly way. If he was acknowledging his wrongheadedness, even if only in his own mind, he certainly wasn’t happy about it.
Was that required response for Chrechte men, she wondered. To be cranky and out of sorts most of the time? Shona found herself laughing at the not-so-absurd notion.
Caelis looked down at her with concern and a yearning she did not understand. “What has you amused?”
“The nature of the Chrechte.”
“You mean our wolves?” Sean asked, sounding puzzled.
“I mean the fact you all seem overly surly, or at least the men do.” Audrey was not so cantankerous.
Caelis shrugged, his massive shoulders making even that small movement impressive and nearly knocking her sideways in the process. “We share our natures with a wolf.”
“You share yours with more.” And he had not told her. Again.
Again he seemed to read her thoughts. “You are not afraid of me like this.”
“No. You are still Caelis.”
“I thought you would be.”
So he had not shown her the wondrous monster. Out of fear? She could not imagine this magical being having such concerns.
Or mayhap, he simply could not show her as he had the wolf. “Can you shift to conriocht at will?”
“Aye, though shifting back cannot happen as quickly.”
“Why?”
“I dinna ken. It could be that when our race was created, a conriocht was meant to spend his time in this form, to better protect our people.”
“Can you shift back now?” she wanted to know.
“Not while threat still exists.”
“We’ve submitted to you,” Sean said. “We would not harm your mate or child.”
“Both Eadan and Marjory are mine,” Caelis growled.
Sean nodded quickly. “As it should be.”
Maon made a scoffing sound.
“You do not agree?” Shona asked, ready to defend her children against even a man who shifted into a wolf.
His beast was nothing compared to the beast who claimed loyalty to her. And as with his wolf, Shona found it all too easy to trust Caelis’s conriocht, even if she could not yet bring herself to trust the man.
“The Fearghall are taught that there is no value in humanity,” Maon said. “A human child would not be claimed by a Chrechte warrior under his authority.”
“Uven’s own daughter was human,” Caelis said.
“Was?” Sean asked.
Caelis gave the other Chrechte a measureing look. “She shifts now, thanks to her Éan mate and our sacred stone.”
“How could her mate have drawn on the power of our stone?” the warrior Shona did not know asked.
“He did not.”
“Then why say thanks to him?” Maon asked, for once sounding more curious than antagonistic.
“He saved her life after her father and Ualraig, the blackguard her father meant her to mate, beat her and left her for dead.”
Shona noted that not one of the men looked surprised by the news, but neither did they look particularly comfortable with it.
“Is he the one who killed Ualraig?” Maon asked.
“You are so sure Ualraig is dead and not a deserter like me?”
“There was naught but ashes left of our warriors, but we know the difference between human ash and dirt.”
“Aye, Laith killed him.”
“Ualraig was the most powerful of Uven soldiers.”
“Nay, he was not.”
“You bested him many times in training but Uven never promoted you to his second,” Maon observed, again without the overt anger.
“Aye. I would not mate with another Chrechte, much less the man’s poor daughter.”
“You couldn’t.”
“He did not know that.”
“He would have killed you if he had.” There was no doubt in Maon’s voice, or the faces of the other three.
Shona shivered. This world was new to her and there were many things about it she still did not understand, but she was struck with the certain knowledge that Uven would have killed her mate if the laird had known of the bonding between Caelis and Shona.
“He could no kill my da,” Eadan said resolutely.
“Nay, he cannot now and the past does not matter,” Caelis agreed.
Maon nodded, shocking Shona.
“Are you Uven’s new second?” Caelis asked of Maon.
“No.”
“Why not?” Shona could not help herself asking.
Curiosity often drove her when she should leave well enough alone.
“I refused the assignment to go after his daughter.”
“What?” Even in his not-quite-human voice, Caelis’s shock was palpable.
“He was not a good father to his human daughter.”
“Yet you would have killed my children,” Shona said with more confusion than anger.
She was doubting her own words even as she spoke them.
“Chrechte do not kill children.”
“You said—”
“What I believed would undermine my opponent with emotion.”
“Oh.”
“Jon did not kill the woman.”
“Audrey.”
“He could have.” Shona had thought so at the time.
“Aye.”
“Vegar would not take the risk he might.”
“A man protects his mate.” Maon’s shrug should have been casual, but there was an air of grief about him.
And Shona remembered something from her old clan. “Jon was your younger brother.”
“Too young to come on this quest.”
“But Uven sent him anyway. And you defend the man.” Shona could not understand it.
“He was my alpha. It was not my place to question him.”
“You said was.”
Maon looked at Caelis and then away.
“A Chrechte of honor values all life. An alpha worthy of loyalty extends both his protection and his consideration to those who swear fealty to him.” Caelis spoke gutterly, but never had Shona heard him say words more humane.
“Members of our clan starve while Uven fills his belly with prey.”
Caelis growled, but made no other reply to that claim.
Maon looked at him. “To be conriocht, the stone had to find you worthy.”
“Maker of the stone, aye. The stone is but a way for us to connect to our Creator.”
“You used to be Fearghall.”
“I accepted truth when I heard it.”
Maon nodded. “Taking over the clan will not be easy. Some must die.”
“Fewer than if the clan stays in the hands of an unscrupulous man.”
“This is what you were talking about earlier, isn’t it?” Shona asked Caelis, certain in her heart she was right.
“Aye.”
“Da is alpha,” Eadan said.
“You’re sure of that, are you, boy?” Sean asked with a smile.
Caelis growled, though Shona did not understand why.
Sean flinched but smiled. “I wasn’t questioning your alpha status, conriocht.”
Suddenly, Shona found herself sitting alone with both children, her snarling mate towering over them all. “I warned you: I can smell a lie.”
Sean jumped up, shifting into wolf form between one blink of her eyes and the next. He didn’t attack Caelis, but ran in the other direction.
Caelis looked after him; she could see his entire body tense with the need to follow.