“Ah, and what is that look supposed to mean?” she asked. “Was I truly so bad?”
“No’ bad at all.” She’d been better than the others. Of course, she had a proper weapon. “I was just thinking—”
“What?” She took a step closer to him.
“How much I want to kiss ye.” He should not say it, he truly should not. But there was no one left to hear, and anyway, his whole body longed for her.
A gleam took hold in her eyes. “No’ half so much as I wish to kiss ye. I am that surprised I have the strength for it.”
He smiled. She had heart, this woman he adored.
“Let us make an agreement, Ardahl—since we are no’ at leave to touch one another. When I look at ye—this way—that is as good as a kiss. And when ye wink at me—”
“Wink?”
“Ye know.” She gave an overtly emphasized wink. “Ye ha’ kissed me back.”
“I am no’ at all certain I can wink. Both my eyes tend to close at once.”
She smiled still more broadly. She stood so near, he could reach out for her. He had to fight the impulse.
“A blink, then.”
He blinked at her and laughed. A miracle, that he could still laugh. “Folk will think there is somewhat amiss wi’ my eyes, I will be blinking at ye so often.”
“The women will no’ care. They adore ye. But no’ so much,” she breathed in a whisper, “as I do.”
Suddenly their connection became deadly serious. “Liadan—”
“I know. I should no’ say it. Ye are as good as my brother.”
“Go home and put a poultice on the worst o’ your bruises. I am goin’ to my post.”
“Be safe,” she beseeched him as she moved past, not looking at him now. “For ye carry my heart.”
*
The next morningwhen Ardahl left his guard post and walked home through the misty morning, for it looked like rain, folk sidled up to him—mostly men, many of them aged. A few women. A few younger men, all wearing sheepish expressions.
They handed him weapons. Passed them to him in a secretive fashion with whispered words.
“A sword I do no’ use anymore.”
“Have this for the women.”
“It belonged to my brother, it did.”
Ardahl accepted the offerings because he did not know what else to do. When he got home, he placed them in a clattering pile inside the door, beside his own.
Mam and Liadan, who were both there making breakfast, stared in astonishment. He shrugged in response.
“Passed to me by tribesmen, mostly, on my way home.”
“Our men worry about their women as much as they worry for themselves, it seems,” Mam commented a bit dryly.
As usual, Liadan followed Ardahl out to watch him wash. “All quiet on guard duty?” she asked, touching him with nothing but her gaze.
“Aye. The men are jumpy, though. Every sound sends them scrambling.”
