Pierce seems completely devoted to Molly his intended, and Connor has his mind on another woman, so ’tis sure to be why they resisted her advances, but what of you, Danhoul, what kept you from her bed, when you clearly are a healthy young man and your desires must be great if they have never been sated by a woman’s touch!”
“Sure ’tis not my desire to have my first intimate experience with a woman known to be a fallen woman with little morality, or a witch with a darkness within her. And both her dark intentions and previous injustices toward Alainn keep me from going anywhere near the woman, much less to her bed.”
“You believe she has caused actual harm to Alainn? Why have I not been told of this? If this is truth, why in hell was I not alerted to it?”
“I was asked to keep it entirely secretive, for Alainn could not prove it and still has no proof to speak of. And she reasoned if you heard of her dubious beliefs you would think her simply unwarrantedly suspicious because of her deep jealousy toward the woman.”
“So you tell me then, Danhoul, I demand to know what harm has Ciara possibly caused Alainn?”
“I believe she attempted to—”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
His words were immediately cut short by the dark-haired woman in question mysteriously appearing in the doorway. “Milord, I have brought you hot cider. I noticed you work late this night on your figures and ledgers; perhaps a mixture would calm you and make you more ready for sleep!”
Killian’s green eyes narrowed as the sultry woman approached the two men. “I’ve no desire for cider this night, Ciara! And, tell me, how am I to know it isn’t laced with a potion sure to make me fall into a deep unnatural sleep or fall prey to a purposeful spell?” He spoke in a rude accusatory tone much more cutting than he’d intended.
“As you wish, milord, but I beg you; do not permit whatever falsehoods this man has surely related to you to wrongly color your opinion of me. He is deeply embittered with me since the night I spurned his advances toward me, the night you asked him to take me to my chambers. He thought to take advantage of me in my inebriated state. I was astonished to think he would attempt such blatant indiscretions when I was so recently widowed. Now he seems insistent on causing trouble for me! Though I know not what he has said to you, milord, I am certain it was a vicious falsehood!”
Killian looked from Danhoul to Ciara and he saw she wore an expression of wounded innocence. He could also see the anger on the young man’s face, and he reasoned he’d seen him angry very seldom. Killian noticed Ciara was staring at him as though she hung on his every word, and with an exaggerated trembling lip. In that moment, he knew without question she could not be trusted, though he most certainly did not want her to suspect he had seen through her. He thought he would benefit greatly from her believing he was beguiled by her. If she had tried to harm Alainn, he thought it would be of greater good to him if he appeared to be Ciara’s friend, or if he feigned interest in her once more. He glanced at Danhoul and hoped the man had heard his thoughts for he needed to set a plan in action.
“Danhoul, I am sorely disappointed in your roguish behavior. I thought you to be a man of greater moral character! If you were not so important to my wife, I would have you tossed out of this castle so that I might never be made to deal with you, again. But, I see you are an asset to my wife’s healing, so for now, you may stay. Be warned, keep your distance from Widow McCree or you’ll deal with me and my sword!”
Danhoul convincingly looked at him as though he would actually like to battle with him that very instant, but he backed away from Killian and Ciara.
“Aye, have it your way then, milord, but mark my word as a druid seer I tell you she is not to be trusted. If she comes near me or attempts to harm Alainn I will not be liable to treat her as a pitiable widow, but as a powerful witch!”
As he turned to leave, behind Ciara’s back, he nodded ever so slightly to Killian and then left in an apparent rage.
“Milord, I had no notion he was so entirely untrustworthy. Of course, I knew what he attempted with me was unscrupulous, but now I see his temper is clearly violent as well. Are you certain you want him near your wife in her grievous condition? Sure he might harm her or perhaps attempt unsavory deeds toward her for even in her recent ill health she is not without beauty!”
Not knowing what nefarious crimes Ciara might have committed toward his wife, Killian was most displeased to have the woman dare to mention Alainn, but he reasoned he must keep up the façade so he could learn more about the woman and her misdeeds.
“For now, I’ll watch him closely, you can wager much on that, Ciara. But, let us not speak on the boy any longer, and I’ve no need for cider this night. I’ll be drinkin’ whiskey; would you care to join me then?”
The woman’s dark amber eyes lit up like a candle in a pitch black room. “Aye, milord, if you think it will not appear forward or inappropriate for me to take audience with you while no other is present!”
Bile rose in his throat as he continued on with the unwanted guise of being interested in the woman. “Tis not as if my wife will know for she has not yet left her chambers in so many weeks. And if any other servants might see us, sure they’ll wisely know to keep it to themselves.”
“My stepmother may not, for she seems in thick with your wife, and she’s never taken to me since I was a young girl. I’ve tried to tell my father she is not the woman he thinks she is.”
As she gazed at Killian’s face, he had the sense she had obviously decided it would be best to speak of other subjects surely more advantageous to her than her stepmother. She sat down upon the chair he had pulled out for her and she took the goblet, noticeably delighted he was showing renewed interest in her when she’d thought he was completely devoted to his wife. But the calculating woman was surely aware how little time he and Alainn spent together and she would well know how men were often ruled by their desires. She had indubitably decided to make herself and her bed appealing to him.
Killian did not need to possess the ability of hearing the woman’s lustful thoughts to realize she was now recalling the passion they shared when they been together. By the sensual way she was staring at him, how she’d purposely loosened her laces to allow her cleavage to be seen, he knew Danhoul was right on the mark, and Ciara hoped to become reacquainted with him in that manner as soon as it could be accomplished.
Danhoul knocked upon the chamber door and waited for Alainn to answer and to call him inside. When she did not respond, he quietly turned the key. He and Killian each kept one and they’d had a new one crafted for Eireen, as well. He doubted Alainn even realized the door was kept locked day and night as she’d never attempted to go out.
He saw she was asleep on the bed atop the quilts and bedclothes. She was still clothed in her garments and he thought he should call for Eireen to see her settled more comfortably in bed for the night. But she looked almost peaceful at the moment and by the heavy dark circles beneath her eyes, he knew she seldom slept and if she did it was fitfully. He dared to gently touch his hand to her cheek and he heard a sound escape her lips akin to a whimper.
He felt his heart squeeze for whether he’d wanted it or not, he was falling deeply and irreversibly in love with the woman. Again, he thought to himself. For as he looked toward the sky and thought of the Celtic gods and their part in all of this, he wanted to curse them and flay them for the pain she now felt. Though, for the time being, they were apparently involved in a brutal war raging through the realm of the gods, they had always dictated in part what befell Alainn and Killian, and himself.
It was surely by design she’d lost the child and he could never reveal that to her without telling her the whole of it. And if he did that she would be made to suffer even further to realize she was a part of a great elaborate plan to one day set things right in the world, past and present. She and the woman with the red hair and green eyes, and the other brown haired woman whom he’d met only briefly, but could not recall as vividly.
&
nbsp; Alainn stirred beside him for he’d forgotten his hand still rested lovingly against her cheek. “Killian?” she whispered half asleep in a voice filled with unhidden hope.
“Shh, go back to sleep, Alainn!” he whispered, and he heard her sigh.
“Danhoul, you should not be here!”
“Aye, I know it well, Alainn, but I must speak with you awhile, for ’tis soon to be Samhain. You should converse with your husband. Perhaps you might make arrangements to take him to a fairy glade or to your grandfather’s great Druid celebration. Sure one of you has to make the first move toward the other!”
Alainn wearily sighed once more, patted his hand appreciatively for his concern, but remained with her back to him as she spoke. “I cannot, Danhoul, for Killian still cannot face me, or be in close proximity to me, not yet, and perhaps never, I fear!”
“You don’t know that, Alainn. I would suggest he is simply as unsure as you are as to where to begin to mend what’s broken between you.”
She did not respond to his words and the silence soon became awkward. “Will you make certain the window coverings are fastened tightly, Danhoul, and check the fire for ’tis unbearably cold in here?”
“Aye, I’ll add another peat log to the fire!” He said though the chamber felt quite warm enough to him. “Climb beneath the bedclothes, Alainn and cover up more securely. I shall send Eireen to assist you with donning your night clothes and to spend time with you if you’d like?”
“No, save the woman the trouble, she is oft saddled with me from dawn till nightfall, sure she’s her husband and other tasks to tend to, but if you’d just throw the covers over my shoulders, and maybe sit here with me for a time, I’d be much obliged to you, Danhoul!”
When his clearly desirous thoughts came to her, she turned to face him in disbelief.
“Forgive me, Danhoul! Go now, I would ask you to leave straightaway!”
She’d heard his impassioned thoughts regarding her, and she felt responsible for them as well. She should have realized he was a young man with the typical strong desires men possessed, and he’d never had a woman so surely he must be lusting often. He’d spent considerable time with her in her bedchamber, and she’d just asked him to sit with her on her bed.
As she glanced at his appealing face and masculine form, she felt herself shiver, so perpetually cold was she, and for the briefest time she pondered how it might feel to have him lie down beside her, for him to hold her and warm her, to make her feel alive again.
Chapter Forty
Clearly, he heard her thoughts as well, for he left the room immediately and she listened to him calling for Eireen in a voice that now sounded much more disturbed than aroused. She would now be riddled with guilt over this as well, and it would simply be more subject to add to her growing sum of many.
She heard the key being turned in the lock and then Eireen hurrying into the room.
“Milady, are you well, Danhoul made it sound most urgent, as though you needed something immediately. Tell me what I can do for you!”
“Just talk to me, Eireen and start the fire, for I cannot keep warm for all my attempts.”
“Aye, milady, I can most certainly do that for you, but I suspect young Danhoul could have accomplished either of those tasks while he was here.”
“Aye, I’m certain he could have!” she whispered as she shivered again, knowing Danhoul’s presence in her bedchamber was not questioned by Eireen or even by Killian any longer. She would need to distance herself from the young man before she might be driven to commit another sin she could not undo.
It was the day of Samhain and when Eireen came to her as she sat by the window, Alainn sensed the woman’s untypical anxiousness as she looked at Alainn.
“What is it, Eireen? What causes your uneasiness?”
“I would ask you a favor, milady.”
“If I’m able, I will attempt to grant it, Eireen, for you have been a kind friend and a doted much upon me.”
“Your grandfather is here, milady, as he has been here most every single day in the past weeks. He wishes to see you most assuredly.”
Alainn looked away from the other woman and, as she did so frequently, she cast her eyes to the castle’s graveyard that she could see in the distance. She had not seen her grandfather since that fateful night... the night she could not permit herself to think on.
“I would ask that you allow him audience this day, milady, as a simple request from me.”
Alainn’s eyes questioned the reason for her request, but her voice remained silent so the other woman knelt down beside her and placed her hands on Alainn’s knees and stared deeply into her eyes.
“He is sorely aggrieved for you, milady. You are his only granddaughter, the daughter of his son who has been missing since before you were born. I can sense he feels a great kinship with you; you are the last connection to his beloved son. His eyes reveal his deep sadness at being unable to see you for himself. Please do not make me go back down those steps and tell him, yet again, you will not see him this day.”
Alainn had always felt the woman was undeniably empathetic towards her and she could see how deeply Eireen was affected by her grandfather’s melancholia as well.
“Please, milady, see the man, he is aged and weary. He longs to see you, his only daughter lives far from here and his grandson, Riley O’Brien, begging your pardon, milady, for I know he’s your kin, but he’s somewhat of a stubborn and unfeeling arse.”
Alainn stared at the other woman, but made no attempt to reply.
“Please, Alainn!”
Although Alainn had often told Eireen to refer to her by her given name, she had always refused, saying it would be improper. She had never ever referred to her by anything but her title, and something in that spoken word, in her actually referring to her by her given name, made her feel the woman’s deep friendship and it moved her. She swallowed hard, for she had been allowing herself to feel nothing for so long.
Alainn then glanced up at the armoire in her chamber for she was startled to see the spirit of Shylie O’Rorke sitting upon the tall piece of furniture. She was staring at Alainn with notable impatience, waiting for her to answer the other woman’s plea. She had crossed her arms stubbornly and Alainn recalled she’d often seen her cousin Rory do such when he had been in discussion usually with his brother, and he impatiently awaited his response. The young spirit eyed her with growing impatience.
“My father simply wishes to look upon you, Alainn! Do you truly mean to disallow him that one small courtesy? I alerted your husband to the dark demon when he attempted to take you, so it would seem you owe me a favor in return.”
Something close to a scowl crossed Alainn’s face and her brow furrowed at having this unwanted decision forced upon her, but she inhaled deeply and finally responded.
“Aye, I will agree to see my grandfather this day, Eireen.”
The caring woman embraced her warmly with relief on her face, and then hurried out the door before Alainn had a chance to rethink her decision.
Alainn was startled when Shylie then moved from her previous location and floated down beside her, and she was further surprised when the young spirit spoke aloud and not through telepathy.
“My father has come to see of your wellness and invite you to attend his druid celebration this night. Although I am aware of the deep pain that fills your heart, and of your wish to stay here in this chamber indefinitely, one day you must actually step out of the doorway. When that first step is taken it will set you on the path to healing your heart and your conscience.”
Alainn rose and stood by the arched window staring outward, seemingly ignoring the young spirit’s attempt at the wisdom that might benefit her. Ever persistent, Shylie continued.
“My own parents needed to carry on each time after my three brothers were killed in battle. They needed to endure the grief and heal once more after I, their youngest child was found murdered, and again after Teige disappeared. My own dear sister, Si
obhan, had to see her heart mended when she lost each of her newborn babies, five newborn babies.”
The spectral girl held up one hand to firmly emphasize the number of newborn babies her sister had lost. And then she repeated in a louder voice. “Five babes!
My parents and my sister each made the choice to finally accept their pain and to grieve their losses, and then to live... to live for the others who remain alive. You remain alive, your husband remains alive, and both of you face this unimaginable sorrow alone, separately. ’Tis a great tragedy in itself for your love is uncommon.”
Alainn sighed deeply, but continued on with her silence, beginning to feel more than mildly infuriated with the spirit’s words and her very presence.
The drawer of Alainn’s night table flew open widely though no one was near it, and several sealed letters were revealed. One letter in particular sailed out of the drawer and into Shylie’s hands. The spirit girl purposely placed the letter in Alainn’s own hands.
“You must read the letter from my only sister, my darlin’ sister, Siobhan, the first letter she sent you weeks ago, only days after you lost your wee babe. The many others she has sent simply convey her deep concern and continued messages of sorrow, but this one... it holds secrets she had told to no one, secrets I only know of because I am a spirit. In it you will find much wisdom and great strength. I insist you read it, Alainn!” she declared and then vanished into a soft mist as the door was opened.
Her grandfather appeared old, much older than he’d seemed only weeks earlier. He embraced Alainn tenderly and gently took her hands in his. He placed a soft kiss upon her cheek. He could find no words to express the sorrow he felt for her, but she saw it in his saddened eyes, and so he and Alainn simply sat together in silence for some time. She knew he could sense her great pain and how deeply her heart had been scarred. He finally cleared his throat and began to speak, but not of her loss or in consolation, yet his voice, as always, held a gentle quality that calmed and comforted Alainn.
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