“I never told him so.”
“Nay?”
“To be sure, no. Can I help what thoughts get in a man’s head once he lies wi’ a woman?”
That caused another sort of pang. Had Conall—sunny, even-tempered Conall—felt toward this woman what she felt for Ardahl after being with him, touching him, tasting him? Her heart convulsed in pity.
“So,” she said weightily, “ye did lie wi’ my brother. Why? Why, if ye did no’ love him?”
Another look, sharper this time. “Och, Liadan, ye cannot be such an innocent as all that. D’ye think a woman has to feel love before she lifts her skirt for a man? There are plenty o’ other reasons.”
“Like what?”
“Your brother was a nice lad. A sweet lad. And I am a generous woman.”
Was that what she called it? “He wanted to handfast wi’ ye.”
“Did he? And how d’ye know that? Did he tell ye so?”
“He did not need to. I knew my brother, the kind o’ man he was. Honorable. I could see by the way he spoke o’ ye that he had given his heart.”
Brasha snorted. “Honor! ’Tis overrated.”
“Ye might well say so, if ye have none.”
Brasha stopped walking and turned to face Liadan. “Your brother is dead and gone—killed by his closest friend. So what does it matter now, what he felt for me?” She tipped her head to one side. “It must be terrible for ye, having the very monster who killed Conall living wi’ ye, taking his place. How ever d’ye bear it?”
Liadan could not speak, her anger too bright.
Brasha shrugged and answered herself. “I suppose we bear what we must.”
“How long ha’ ye been seeing Cathair, Brasha? I want to know.”
Thoughts again moved in Brasha’s eyes like light on water. “I can see whomever I wish. Stop seeing whomever I wish and go back to him after. What did ye expect me to do once your brother died? Grieve forever? Go to my grave as an old woman alone?”
“So far as I can see, ye did no’ grieve at all.”
Brasha shrugged. “Ye must have seen me, at his grave.”
“I saw somewhat.” It might have been a braw show.
“Your brother was a sweet lad, as I say. ’Tis a pity he had to die.”
Had to die?What did she mean by that?
“Would ye ha’ married him, if he’d lived?”
An amused smile danced over Brasha’s lips. “Probably not. The ties that bind also tie a woman down, do they no’?”
And besides, then how could she have gone back to Cathair?
Liadan felt sure Brasha had used her brother. To damage Ardahl, no doubt. But how?
“I pray,” she told Brasha viciously, “your misdeeds come back upon ye and that ye pay for them.”
Carelessly, Brasha tossed her head. “Do we no’ all pay for our misdeeds, in the end?”
*
