Debt? What debt? Morwyn glanced at Brennus but his face was inscrutable.
Caratacus swept his hand at the group of terrified civilians. “I can’t take them north with me. Even if they had horses, they’d slow us down. Ensure their safety, Bren. And then return to Gaul, to your kin, and forge the destiny that was always yours.” He glanced at Morwyn before once again looking back at Bren. “As the great war goddess said—there are more ways than one to fight the enemy.”
And then he was gone, and Morwyn leaped on the horse behind Gwyn and galloped after him, only to have Gawain wave her to a halt.
“I’m going with him,” he said without preamble.
Holding Gwyn tight with one arm, she reached for him and grasped his hand. “Treachery awaits in the land of the Brigantes. You have to persuade Caratacus to change course.”
“Morwyn, there’s nowhere else.” A tired finality threaded through his words. “The British tribes have all succumbed to Roman domination. Only in the far north do they still resist.”
She tugged his hand to her lips, her heart aching for all that had been. All that could never be. “Gawain, watch your back. Come out of this alive. We need you.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Do our people really need us anymore?” Before she could answer he pulled free. “Be happy, Morwyn. That’s all I ever wanted for you.” And then he was gone.
Chapter Thirty-Four
As night fell they camped deep in the forest, not risking fires to cook their food in case the Romans were still searching for fugitives. Judoc had also joined them, and they’d traveled a fair distance from the battlefield, all things considered.
Morwyn leaned back against a tree. The women and children gave the three of them a measure of privacy, in deference to their status, but instead of sitting next to her, Brennus sat opposite, forearm resting over his raised knee, other hand occupied with his dagger.
Perhaps he didn’t wish Judoc to know of their relationship?
She smothered the pain that thought caused, but couldn’t help the subsequent one. Was he ashamed of her, because of her Druidry? She knew he still cared. He couldn’t hide the raw emotion in his eyes from her. But did he still want to care?
“What are we supposed to do with them all?” Judoc’s voice was low.
“Some can still return to their home villages.” Brennus shrugged one shoulder and she caught him looking at her, until he realized she saw, and then he jerked his attention back to Judoc. Goddess, did he now hate the way he still desired her?
Did he still desire her? After they’d left the mountain he hadn’t so much as touched her hand. In fact, he’d gone out of his way so they didn’t touch even by accident.
“But not all. Some of their villages are destroyed.” Judoc appeared supremely unaware of the tension vibrating in the air around him. Perhaps she would blow another dart in his neck, render him unconscious. Perhaps then Brennus would deign to talk to her, to tell her why he no longer sought her company.
“Some wish to return to the Roman settlements.” Brennus sounded as if he had no opinion on that one way or the other. “Wherever they want to go, I’ll ensure they reach their destination.”
“Perhaps,” she said, feeling she had been excluded from the conversation for long enough, “some would embrace the adventure of starting over, in Gaul.” That was his final destination, after all. Would it be hers? Could she bear to leave behind her beloved Cymru, never again see her kin still ensconced on Mon?
But I’ve already left Cymru. Where could she go, if she stayed? Back to Mon, back to trying to persuade the other Druids they should leave the sacred Isle? And do what?
Caratacus’ rebellion had failed. There was no rallying point any longer.
In the gathering gloom she caught Bren’s furtive glance before he once again concentrated on stabbing the ground with the tip of his dagger. “If that’s what they want.”
The pain inside her breast magnified. Not once had he asked where she wanted to go. What she wanted to do. He accepted her presence as an inevitable, yet ultimately uncomfortable, burden.
“What about Camulodunon?” She glared at him, knowing he couldn’t see because it was too dark. “There are plenty of opportunities there.” Such as begging, whoring, slavery, degradation—
“I always intended to take you there before I left, Morwyn.” His voice was stiff, as if she had insulted his honor.
Her hands fisted on her lap. “If I wished to return to Camulodunon, Gaul, I could do so by myself. I certainly wouldn’t wish to put you to any inconvenience.”
Judoc made an odd sound, as if he attempted to suppress a laugh. She rounded on him. “Do you have something to say, Judoc?”
“No. I wouldn’t presume.” He still sounded amused. Goddess, she’d give him something to laugh about if he interrupted her again.
“I’m well aware you could return to Camulodunon on your own.” Brennus still sounded insulted. How dared he be insulted? It wasn’t she who had turned her back on him. “And I regret Gawain was unable to accompany you. But whatever your thoughts, I’ll deliver you safely to your friend in the colonia.”
He would deliver her? Like a dispatch?
And then his other comment penetrated the fog of fury in her brain.
“Gawain?” She hoped she didn’t sound as stupid to Brennus as she did herself. “Why would you regret such a thing?” She remembered Brennus had pulled alongside her as Gawain had left. He’d had a hard, shuttered look on his face as he’d watched the other man ride off and now that she thought about it, that look had barely diminished.
A shiver scuttled over her arms as the insistent, nagging uncertainty that had plagued her all day spilled from the abyss into her consciousness.
Brennus had not killed Gawain. That had never been the reason why he thought she left him. And yet Brennus assumed she knew something—something so devastating it would cause her to give up on their love.
But what?
“Because”—there was a hard, ugly edge to his voice—“I know you still love him.”
She stared at his dark silhouette. If only there were light enough to see his face, his eyes. “Why would you draw that conclusion?” As far as she could recall, she had never even mentioned Gawain’s name to him.
He shifted, as if the conversation irritated him. “You called out his name in the night. I hoped it wasn’t the same man I’d fought for his beliefs. Then I hoped it wouldn’t matter. I was wrong.”
She hugged her knees and leaned forward as if that would help pierce the encroaching darkness. “In my visions, I saw Gawain murdered. That’s why I called out his name.” She could feel the truth shimmering between them, insubstantial and fragile. She had to find the right words, had to discover what Brennus thought she knew. “I don’t love Gawain, Brennus. But he is the reason I left you.”
She could scarcely see him, but she knew he tensed. Fleetingly she wished Judoc would have the decency to leave them alone, but obviously he possessed no such sense of honor. She blanked him from her mind, and concentrated solely on the man she loved but was so perilously close to losing. “On that final morn, the Morrigan showed me the face of Gawain’s murderer. It was you, Brennus. I thought she was showing me you, my beloved, had killed the man whose death I’d vowed to avenge. That’s why I left. Because I couldn’t bring myself to kill you.”
For a moment the silence of the forest was absolute, as if it held its breath, waiting for the final denouncement. And then, so suddenly she scarcely saw him move, he was kneeling before her, his hands on her knees, her legs pressed against his chain mail.
“Morwyn.” There was an odd crack in his voice that tore her heart anew. “I thought the only reason you accompanied me this day was because Gawain turned his back on you.”
She threaded her fingers through his. “No.”
His head dropped and his lips moved over her fingers, gentle, reverential kisses that seared the core of her being. “Come with me to Gaul. Build our l
ives together.”
Her head dropped also, their foreheads touching, breath mingling. Her heart implored her to agree, agree to anything and everything because it was all she wanted. To be with him, build a life together, share her knowledge of the old ways with all those willing to learn.
But she couldn’t. Not until she knew the entire truth.
“Why did you think I left you? What did you think the Morrigan had shown me?”
“It doesn’t matter.” His heated words grazed her lips and his hands cradled her face. “Nothing else matters, Morwyn. Only this.”
It would be so easy to agree. To push the questions to the back of her mind, allow them to rot into obscurity Except if she did, the past would forever haunt her; a decaying fog of suspicion and doubt.
It couldn’t be connected to his wife. And yet somehow she knew that it was. Knew it was intrinsically connected to that night six years ago that he’d told her of. And the night three years ago—that he had not.
“Tell me what happened that night at Dunmacos’ village.”
His fingers bit into her flesh, molding the bones of her face, but she refused to flinch, refused to cry out. Refused to defend herself because she knew his reaction was purely instinctive, without malice.
“Nothing happened.” His voice was guttural. His brutal grip lessened. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
She threaded her fingers through his hair. She wished she could see him but there was a false sense of safety in this darkness. “What happened that was so horrific you thought I could leave you because of it?”
Air hissed between his teeth. “Leave it, Morwyn. I’ll never speak of it again. Not to you, not to anyone.”
She tightened her grip on his skull. “It’s killing you, Gaul. From the inside out, it’s eating you alive. And I won’t let it. Do you hear me? I won’t let it.”
“She’s right.” The disembodied voice shocked her for a moment. She had forgotten Judoc’s presence. There was no longer any trace of amusement in his voice. “You’re consumed with guilt and you have no reason to be. What you did—”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“Have you even told her of Eryn?”
“Yes.” Morwyn wound her ankles around the backs of Brennus’ thighs. He refused to surrender to her touch but she clung on regardless. If he left her now, physically or emotionally, she would lose him forever.
“It took more than a year before he regained strength enough to pick up a weapon,” Judoc said.
“I swear,” Brennus said, “I will tear out your tongue, Judoc.” But he didn’t pull from her embrace, nor cease caressing her face with his thumbs.
“Tell her of Caratacus’ offer, Bren. If she’s worthy enough to be your wife, she’s worthy enough to hear the truth from you.”
Silence echoed. Finally he sucked in a ragged breath.
“He offered me a contingent of his finest warriors to hunt down the man responsible for the death of Eryn.” His fingers slid along her face, broke contact. “We hunted, and eventually we found our prey.”
“Three years ago.” Now it made sense. “And you burned his village, as he had burned that hamlet.” It was just. Why did the memory haunt him so?
“We thought the village was long deserted. And it was. Only Dunmacos and his followers should have perished that night.”
“But?” The whisper trembled between them. Because she knew what he was going to confess.
“But.” The word fell from his tongue like iron. “The bastard had brought his young wife along.”
She closed her eyes and tried not to let him feel the distress rippling through her body. She understood his code of honor. It was no different from hers. Justice demanded retribution. How could she condemn him for exacting such justice from his enemy’s wife?
But, goddess. For him to have inflicted such heinous crimes turned her stomach. She tensed her muscles and smothered the urge to vomit. Refused to show him by the slightest sign how repugnant she found his confession.
Whatever sins he had committed that night, he’d suffered for them a thousandfold every night since.
Could she forgive him? She didn’t know. But could she leave him for seeking such justice for his own wife?
No. Never. Because the man of that night wasn’t the man Brennus was. Not in his soul. His mind had been turned with grief, his reason blinded with bloodlust. He was not, at heart, a rapist or murderer of the innocent. He was . . . her Gaul.
“I understand.” Her voice was faint. She needed air. Space. She needed—
“I killed her, Morwyn. It was my fault.”
The world was already black, but now the blackness entered her heart, filled her soul. A cold, clammy blackness that sank insidious fingers into her brain, numbing her senses. Killing her from the inside out.
“Fuck it, Bren.” Judoc sounded furious. “You might want to be a martyr but I was there, remember? I was part of it.”
“Yes.” Brennus’ voice was remote, as if he were no longer in the forest but reliving that blood-soaked night. “You were.”
“So why don’t you tell Morwyn the truth? Why don’t you explain what our honorable men were doing while you and I systematically searched the huts for signs of life before setting them ablaze?”
“I was still the reason they were there, Judoc. The reason the last moments of her life were filled with pain and terror.”
A thread of distant light flickered in the suffocating black. Blindly she reached for him and dug her nails into his biceps. “Caratacus’ men raped her.”
“They were animals.” Disgust filled Judoc’s voice. “They dragged her from her hut, bleeding and weeping. Threw her at Bren’s feet. And urged him to brutalize her, the way Dunmacos had brutalized Eryn.”
“But you didn’t.” The certainty glowed in her mind, destroying the earlier crippling suspicions. How had she imagined for even a fleeting moment her Gaul was capable of such despicable acts?
He believed in justice and fighting for his cause. But she knew he didn’t relish violence, as some men did. Bizarrely she recalled the man in the latrines whom Brennus had punched. At the time she had seen no reason for his outburst. But now, knowing the man, knowing his protective instinct and tortured guilt at having been unable to save Eryn, she realized he had defended her honor.
His captive. A woman who believed him her enemy. And yet when the other man had called her a whore, Brennus had leaped to her defense.
“She begged me for mercy.” His voice was devoid of emotion. Except, beneath that facade, she could hear the agony. “I took her in my arms but it was too late.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
“No one could have saved her.” Judoc sounded weary. “You know that, Bren.”
Brennus tore from Morwyn’s embrace and she clawed wildly, but he’d retreated beyond her grasp. “I wasn’t there,” she said into the pitch of night. “But I’ve seen what a pack of men can do to a woman. How long had you been searching for Dunmacos? How many men had you lost to the cause?” Goddess, if only she could see his eyes. See if she was getting through to him. “If Dunmacos hadn’t murdered your wife, you wouldn’t have gone after him. If Dunmacos hadn’t brought his own wife to that village, she would still be alive.” She pushed herself to her knees, shuffled across the forest floor until she bumped into Brennus’ outstretched legs. “You did show her mercy. You gave her comfort in the last moments of her life.”
No breeze stirred the leaves. No nocturnal creature rustled among the undergrowth. Brennus was so still he might have been one of the stone statues in Camulodunon. Except she could feel the heat from his legs, hear his ragged breath, and then his battle-scarred hand grasped hers, as unerring as if he could see through the enveloping night.
“Caratacus pledged me his men on the understanding that if we wiped out Dunmacos and his closest followers and kin, I would take his place in the Legion. Shoulder his reputation for brutality. Use his military history as leverage.” A shudder racked through him
and Morwyn edged closer until she could wrap her arms around him, offering him whatever comfort her body could provide. “We’d already slaughtered his kin before we tracked him down. But none of us had heard mention of a cousin, Gervas. Or the fact Dunmacos had recently taken a bride.”
“War is brutal.” Her whisper barely made it past the constriction blocking her throat. Brennus had suffered at the hands of his enemies. But he suffered so much more at the mercy of his conscience.
She swallowed, gathered her courage. Her offer was small, but all she had. If he rejected it, she would understand and never confront him with her heritage again.
“Brennus.” She hesitated, unsure whether she could continue, but he rubbed his jaw against the top of her head in a familiar, comforting gesture, and she sucked in a deep breath. “I want to return with you to your homeland. To Gaul. Take my place by your side.”
His arm tightened around her waist, a painful grip edged with desperation. As if, until this moment, he hadn’t been certain she would want any such thing.
“Be my wife, Morwyn.” His voice cracked on her name. “Gods know I don’t deserve you, but I can’t help loving you. I’ll defend you to my last dying breath.”
“Oh.” She threaded her fingers through his, glad he couldn’t see the foolish tears trickling down her cheeks. “I don’t need defending, Gaul. I’ll just take your love. If you take mine.”
“Always.” His pledge muffled against her hair and she closed her eyes, willing herself to continue. To offer him a chance of spiritual peace.
If he could accept.
“I’m a chosen one of the Morrigan.” How could there be any doubt in her mind of that now? “A Druid. I can’t change that.”
“I wouldn’t want you to.” A jagged sigh speared his body. “Morwyn, your Druidic heritage is a fundamental part of who you are. I can see now. Not all Druids are blinded by ancient prejudice.”
“There’s something . . . I wish to offer you.” Goddess, she hoped he could not hear the tremble in her voice. “If it wouldn’t offend you, when we reach Gaul, I want to perform the sacred ritual of Arawn. The ceremony for those of noble blood who are continuing their journey.” She flicked the tip of her tongue over her lips. “For your wife, Eryn.”
Captive (The Druid Chronicles Book 2) Page 30