by Kris Kennedy
He looked her over. “An Irish princess.”
Her cheeks flushed faintly. “Not precisely, but it will do. You would be wise to heed me in those things of which I know more of than you. And that is Ireland.”
His hand fell away and he walked to the window. Sunlight poured through and illuminated him in colors: the vibrantly colored leine hanging just below his knee, red and green and cobalt blue for Rardove; tall black boots. From his hips hung a belt strapped with sword and daggers. His face was lightly bearded and the inked lines swirled down his neck. The sun lit one side of his face, leaving the other in shadow.
He rested his forearm on the wall beside the window and looked back at her. “You may know more of Ireland, Katy, but you do not know more of war.”
“I know more of The O’Fail.”
He sighed. “You are not letting this go, are you?”
She sighed back. “I will try to be docile, but I fear it will fail.”
“I know the sentiment,” he admitted grimly.
She crossed to him and held his cheeks between her hands as he had so often done to her, and smiled into his worried eyes, as he had so oft done to hers. “You’re worrying too much,” she teased.
“You’re not going to The O’Fail,” he replied grimly.
“Oh, Aodh—”
The resumption of their argument was cut short by another messenger flying into the keep, shouting.
“My lord! My lord, they are coming! The English army is marching, burning as they come!”
Chapter Thirty-Four
THE MESSENGER stumbled to a halt and dropped to his knees in front of the dais, his chest heaving. Aodh took a step toward him, bent to eye level as the man dragged his sweating, red face up.
“The English, my lord. I was sent to tell you…they’ve dropped anchor, and they are marching… They are burning everything.”
Silence rent like a bolt through the fabric of low conversations filling the hall. Katarina got to her feet. “Burning?
The messenger nodded.
“Burning…Ireland? Oh no, they cannot do this.” She turned, dumbfounded, to Aodh. “They cannot do this. Those are my people, my lands. They must be stopped. I must…send a message.”
She hiked up her skirts, flew upstairs, calling for people as she went. “Ready a messenger,” she called, hurrying up to the walls, into the wind, her cape flying out behind her. “Send riders to survey the damage,” she said to one man as she rushed by. Their gazes trailed past her, over her shoulder. “And Rudy, bring me a pen and parchment. Bring me Walter! I must send word, at once. They cannot be allowed to burn my lands.”
She pushed the hair behind her ear and whirled back around, flinging out her hand. “A pen!” she shouted impatiently. “I require a—”
Her hand connected with Aodh’s chest. “Oh, Aodh,” she gasped in relief, as if she’d forgotten him. She gripped his arm. “We must send a message to the commander of that army, to stop them.”
“So you said. That would be unwise.”
“And then we must send food, to the villagers, and— Unwise?” she blinked. “No, it is necessary. Essential. They must be stopped.”
“You will not be the one to stop them.”
She was already peering down into the bailey, at a handful of soldiers hurrying by. “Saddle my mare,” she called to them.
Wicker looked up, lifted a hand that fell to his side when his gaze shifted to Aodh. She turned too, and for a few beats, she and Aodh stared at each other.
“Katarina,” he said carefully.
She knew that tone. It was the “no” tone, the one that said his will, not hers, would be done. Again.
“No,” she said, beating him to it, and backed up a few paces. “You cannot gainsay me on this. We must send help.”
“At best, ’tis a ruse, lass.”
“A ruse?”
“Intended to do precisely what you are about to do: open the gates. Make us ride for them. We must do the opposite—”
“But—”
“Hush.”
She trembled with fury. “Did you tell me to…hush?”
“I am telling you to cease. Right now.” His voice was level and hard. “Our people are watching.”
Indeed, all along the walls, and down in the bailey, soldiers and villagers and castle folk were watching the argument between the lord and lady of the castle. She swallowed.
“So, aye,” he confirmed quietly. “Becalm yourself. And if you cannot, then return to the castle, and I will manage this matter.”
She stared at him, not seeing him anymore, but every person who’d moved through her life, telling her what she should not, could not, must not do.
It was the story of her life.
And now Aodh, too? Instructing her to silence her voice? She felt it as a betrayal, sensible or not.
“Do not tell me to calm myself,” she replied in a furious whisper.
He shook his head almost sadly. “Katy, I will toss you over my shoulder if I must.”
She gasped. He held out a hand, directing her to the stairs, back to the keep.
She didn’t move.
“Do not make me do it,” he warned.
“Stop telling me not to make you do things, Aodh,” she snapped. “You will do as you will. Did you not plant your flag on that claim? So, then, do what you will.” Her eyes were fierce, pinned on his. “As will I.”
He watched her a second longer. Something about the silent regard introduced the barest hint of, well…fear. Perhaps terror. Certes a grave and great discomfort in the pit of her belly.
She swallowed. “Aodh, if you would but listen to me—”
He bent and swept her up in a single move and tossed her over his shoulder.
“Good God!”
Shock wrenched the words from her mouth, then fury moved in, fast and hot. She began kicking with her knees and pounding her fists on his back. “Set me down this instant.”
He said nothing as she raged, just clamped his arm around her legs, pinning them to his chest, and walked her down the stairs.
Her face was scarlet with embarrassment, which mattered not at all, for her nose was bumping his back, and all her hair was now a thick dark curtain swaying back and forth over her head and down the backs of his legs, the ends trailing on the ground as he carried her inside to their bedchambers.
Once inside, he set her on her feet. She stumbled back, taking a moment for the blood to return to her limbs.
“How dare you?” she gasped.
“I dare much,” he said coldly. “You think this castle can survive, riven in two? Some who heed you, some who heed me?”
“No, I…” Her words fell away.
“It would not last the night,” he said harshly.
She felt strung up on the strands of a dozen conflicting emotions, some of which were due entirely to the fact that, for the first time in their many complicated, high-passion encounters, Aodh had never looked at her as he was right now.
As if she could not be trusted.
“Never again,” he said, and turned to walk out.
Pressure whirled in Katarina’s body like a tempest, a storm comprised of shame and fury and desire and something so frightening it could not be named.
But Aodh Mac Con suffered none of these things. If he wanted a thing, he took it; if he was angry, he smashed things: walls, houses, lives. His confidence was his armor. His right to pass through the world was assured, mayhap not safely, but as he wished. Oh, men were mirrors of one another. They took what they wanted, and left ashes in their wake.
“Are you going to lock me in again?” She flung the words at his back.
He kept going.
“Anytime things do not go as you will them, you stamp on whatever stands against you? I swear to you, we shall have a troubled time if that is how it is to go. Arrogant, mule headed amadán.”
“I see you learned a few foul Irish words too,” he commented, swinging the door open.
“May
hap I was wrong, but you are too. Loscadh is dó ort!”
He slammed the door shut and came back around.
She met him this time, her boots planted. “You think it all yours to take. You think of nothing but taking, of winning. I think of our people. I think to save their homes, and our crops—yes, our crops, for how else do you think we will winter next year? I am thinking to save them a few of the horrors that you and I”—she pushed her fingertips to his chest—“have had to go through. Have you ever had your home burned to the ground? Have you ever watched loved ones die in flames? I did, last winter, when the fire raged. It was awful.” She pushed at him again.
He caught up her hands, bent them to her chest, and pulled her to him. “I have had my home burned thrice. I watched my mother die when I was nine in a fire set a’purpose by Englishmen. I well know the horrors.”
“I did not know,” she whispered.
“No, you would not. I do not want you to know. I do not want to know of it. What I am telling you, Katy, is your path is laid, and it is my path. Our path. And battle is coming, whether you wish it or no. So knowing that, you stand fast. And Jesus God”—his voice broke—“you do not let them lure you.”
His hands gripped her elbows so hard, his knuckles were almost white. His face was taut, his voice rasping, the eyes staring into hers so filled with emotion, it almost broke her heart.
He was afraid for her.
They stared at each other, then, as one, their mouths met in a violent kiss.
They staggered back to the bed, grappling at clothes as they went. Her skirts were hiked up before she hit the mattress. He knelt between her thighs and tore at her bodice as she fumbled with his hose. His erection sprang out, full and hard. He pushed her knees apart and entered her in a single thrust.
She flung her head but did not look away. This union was about a different thing from all their others, and it did not require kisses, which was just as well, for there were none. It required intense, unceasing contact of body and gaze.
Fierce and relentless, he took her, holding himself up on one palm, the other hand gripping her knee to his side, spreading her, allowing him to sink in with urgent, rolling thrusts. She lifted her hips with each surge, put her elbows on the bed and pushed to meet him, battling to take every hard plunge.
Then suddenly, he gave a curse. “Jesus, Katy,” he muttered, and rolled them so she was on top. Her hair fell down around them. His body, still fully armed, lay beneath her.
“Go on,” he said hoarsely. “Take me. Say whatever you mean to say.”
It was an amen. Her eyes filled with…were those tears? Her voice, when she replied, was thick.
“I mean to say…”
She looked down at this man who’d defied every rule, ascended every summit, overcome every obstacle, accomplished every outrageous goal ever set for him. Councilor to a queen. Pirate and lace-sketcher. Courtier and conqueror. Captured a castle, locked her in a tower, and never touched her without her permission.
He’d had a vow imposed upon him, to come claim his ancestral lands, his skin pierced by the promise they’d demanded of him.
And he had done it.
Against all odds, against all the world’s desires, he had done this thing.
“I mean to say,” she whispered. “I love you.”
His eyes widened, then his head dropped back to the bed and he murmured something—it sounded to be an Irish prayer—then he lifted his head and kissed her, gently, so gently. “And I, you, Katy.”
Her tears fell onto their kiss. “I am sorry,” she whispered.
He said nothing, just lifted his hips, rocking into her.
“But I…” she moved on him. “Aodh, the world may hush me, but not you. When you did, I quite lost my mind.”
“Aye, you did.” He curled his hands around both her hips.
“We will find a way,” she promised.
“This is our way.” He pulled her slowly forward, spreading her open as he sank in farther. Her head fell back as a sluggish undulation of pleasure moved through her.
“I was dying without you,” she said, a whispered confession.
“I died a long time ago, Katy.”
She leaned over his mouth. “You are not dead.” She kissed his lips. “You saved my life. You are flame and fire.”
“No. You are the fire. I will tend you.” She closed her eyes, focused on the sensations rippling through her, the scalding pleasure brought by Aodh’s slow possession of her. His acceptance of her, his need for her. Her hair swung, her breasts swayed.
He held her hips, took over the rhythm. “I will listen to you, Katy, when you have something to say. And I will consider it well.”
“I know.”
“But you cannot do that again.”
“I will not.”
“And I will not hush you.”
“Good.”
“That said…,” His words drifted off in an ominous way.
Her body, splayed by him, stilled.
Shifting so that he reclined on only one elbow, he slid his hand between their joined bodies, abrading her slippery-sensitive skin with his thumb, pushing into her wetness, a hard pulse over the nub at the crest of her. “When we are in our bed, Katy, this is mine,” he said, and did it again.
Heedless, she flung her head, trying to breathe, trying to nod.
He sat up and cupped the back of her head. “And when we are in our bed, your mouth is mine.” He slid two painted fingers into her open mouth.
She turned to him, closed her lips around his hard fingers. He stroked them in and out, at the same rhythm she was rocking her hips. As the hard thrust of him pushed up inside her, so his fingers took her mouth. Golden pleasure, hard pleasure, hot shudders of pleasure, filled her.
“When we are in our bed, your body is mine, whatever I want, however I want it,” he instructed, and his mouth closed over her breast, both tongue and teeth.
She arched her back as he took her hard, his mouth alternating between her breasts, their hips meeting in a hard, striking, relentless rhythm. Her body shuddered under the storm of pleasure.
It was over almost before it began. She climaxed with huge, shattering undulations that moved through her body in successive waves. Aodh came deep inside her, a hot, cascading eruption, urging her to come again, and again, as he held her and whispered in her ear of how much he loved her.
Less than half an hour later, he was back on the walls, making plans with his men.
*
“You snore,” said a voice, yanking her out of sleep the next morning.
She rolled over. Pale sunlight illuminated the bedroom. Aodh stood beside the bed, fully clothed, in armor and cloak.
She struggled to a sitting position. “Snore? I most certainly do not!” She clutched the sheets to her breasts.
“Aye you do.” He tossed her her cloak. It settled over her face. “Come.”
She wrestled it off, her hair sparking as it lifted in wild arcs. “Come where?
“We ride for The O’Fail.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
THEY RODE ACROSS a landscape exploding with spring life, flowers, and bright green mosses. Then on the far hill, a high-walled stone castle appeared. Around it, a perimeter of high stone battlements. No simple pele tower this; this was a fortress of strength.
“Are we certain he’s no’ a Saxon?” Cormac muttered warily as they started down the hill and crossed the meadow toward the towering stone ramparts. Small pinpricks of shapes on the walls solidified into men in armor, patrolling the walls.
They rode in silence up the dirt pathway and clopped over the wooden draw.
They were admitted into the outer bailey, and the portcullis gate winched shut behind them with a squeal of iron and a heavy bang as it hit the earth.
The outer bailey was large and hosted a huge contingent of stables and shops, a smithy and kitchens. Cormac had been right; it was more like a bustling English town than an outpost on a marchland. As they passed
, everyone stopped their activities.
They passed into the inner bailey, and drew to a halt in front of the high, narrow stairs that led to the keep. Ré and Cormac dismounted, and the twenty knights and squires behind them did the same, almost in unison, a sort of dance, men who’d long worked together and moved together without thought.
Aodh stayed on his horse, looking at the keep. Katarina cleared her throat.
“By the way, did I mention…?” A significant pause ensued.
His gaze slid off the tower. “What?”
She smiled. “’Tis nothing. Nothing at all. The O’Fail and I once…shared a kiss.”
Stillness radiated out from him like a stone that had set in the sun all day. Ré and Cormac exchanged a wary glance.
“Why?” he asked, very slowly.
It was only a word, but it was enough to make Ré reach out and put a hand on his arm. So did Katarina. “It was years ago, Aodh. Years. It was so trifling, and so long ago, I’d entirely forgotten about it. Until just now.” She smiled brightly.
“Just now, is it?”
“Yes, just this very moment.” Another bright smile.
“What was the occasion of your trifling kiss with the Irish prince?”
“He was one of several princes, you must understand, years ago. A potentiate. Nothing of regard. But…” Her voice drifted off, then came back. “In any event, a union had been proposed. Bandied about, as such things are—”
“You were going to wed him?”
“—but in the end, it came to naught. So, there you have it.” She smiled again.
“I have something,” he agreed, the Irish lilt a little stronger, implying strong emotion, but his words were level and seemingly devoid of emotion. Ré gave a little shake of his head.
She patted the hard length of Aodh’s arm. “Come, he has likely forgotten about it, in much the way I did. One does, you know. Let us forget it ever happened. We shall present our case, and see what he has to say.”
Ré and Cormac had a fairly good idea of the case Aodh was currently preparing in his mind. They watched him close his eyes, take a deep breath, and get off his horse.