“Oh, honey.” Líadan pulled her into a hug, comforting her as only a mother could. “I’ll have Máire help me clean him and wrap him. Don’t you think on it anymore.” When Niamh’s sobs grew stronger, Líadan held her daughter’s face so they stared at one another. “Now you listen here. It is not your fault. You did your best. And now Tadhg can join his family. Surely, that’s what he’d have wanted.”
Dallan couldn’t stand to see Niamh so beset. She’d always had a kind heart. He knew she would take such a blow harder than most.
“You stay with her while I fetch Máire,” Líadan ordered Dallan with a pointed look, hurrying from the infirmary without waiting for his reply.
“Where is his family buried?” Dallan ventured.
“In the graveyard at the church.” Niamh wiped her eyes.
“I’ll dig a grave for him.”
She perked up at that. “You shouldn’t. Your shoulder—”
“Is fully healed. As I said, it was just a scratch. Go on, inspect it for yourself.” He took off hisléine, sitting on a bench beside her worktable so that she could see his shoulder easily.
“You’re right.” Niamh looked up at him, a single tear falling down her cheek. “You don’t need to see me anymore.”
Against his better judgment, Dallan brushed it away with his finger.
And she fell into his arms again, her tears returning anew.
*
Niamh’s day passedher by in a blur. She’d stayed awake the entire night, fighting to save Tadhg’s life. Even when it was clear she was losing the battle, she persevered. But as the hours passed, his body only grew hotter, sweat pouring from his brow by midnight. In the darkest hours of the night, his arm went putrid. Still she washed, applied poultices, administered infusions.
By daybreak, she’d lost him. It happened so quickly. The shock lasted for some time, until just before Dallan arrived. By that point, between exhaustion and anger and grief and a thousand other horrid feelings, she could do naught but release it all.
She hardly remembered their exchange, except that he’d been incredibly kind and comforted her. Her mother and Máire had come by with Alva, who had brought her to the kitchens for a meal.
As she lay in her bed, Morrígan purring contentedly on her stomach, Niamh reached into the depths of her mind, trying to recall what Dallan had said to her. She remembered the warmth of his body, the strength of his arms about her, the soft lilt of his deep voice comforting her.
Her door cracked open and her mother smiled at her, stepping in and sitting on the bed beside her. “You should be resting.”
“Spoken like a mother,” Niamh retorted with a small smile.
“I want to talk to you, but if you need rest first then it can wait.”
Niamh sat up, earning a loud protest from Morrígan. Her mother rarely sounded so serious. “What is it? Is something wrong? Is someone else sick?”
She began pushing the covers off her, but her mother stayed her hand.
“We need to speak of Dallan.”
Niamh inhaled sharply. “There’s little to say. Now that he’s healed, I won’t be seeing him again.”
Her mother looked down at her own lap, her hands resting on Niamh’s. “I don’t think that’s true. And I think you know it as well.”
Against her better judgment, Niamhhopedto see Dallan again, but she would hardly say that qualified as knowing that she would.
“Or,” her mother continued, “perhaps you are less observant than I thought.”
“He’s furious with me,” Niamh reminded her mother. “Even if I saw him a hundred more times, there’d still be nothing to speak of, save the ferocity of his mood.”
“Oh, honey. The way he’s been looking at you, if you saw him a hundred more times he’d ask for your hand all over again.”
Niamh’s breath stilled, her hands going cold. “He’s only being nice because we agreed not to discuss our past. The moment it comes up, he’ll be as cold as he was before. And for good reason.”
Her mother nodded slowly, as though giving her words consideration. “Be that as it may, I feel obligated as your mother to make a suggestion.”
