What was that compared with the risk of losing him?
She held him tight, seeking something beyond mere kisses, beyond the physical. She needed the very warmth of his soul. His arms folded around her and drew her in.
“I do no’ want ye to go from me. I fear—I fear if ye do, I will never—”
“Hush,alanna. Do no’ say it.”
Nay, she would not give voice—and more power—to this terror that gripped her heart.
“When? When d’ye go?”
“Tomorrow night, when we are thought to be on watch.” He bent his head tenderly and peered into her face. “’Twill help me if ye keep faith. Believe this will work. He is but a young lad, and there alone.”
“I believe in you.” She would, till she died and beyond.
Chapter Forty-Seven
It had beena warm, kindly day, the sort men dreamed about when they thought of home. The sort that lived in the memory. Skies washed with blue, a soft, gentle breeze carrying fragrance from the hills. Sunlight sparkling on the waters.
Something for a man to carry with him when he went off to die.
Ardahl recalled countless such days from boyhood, running half wild with Conall and others of their friends, their mams not knowing where they were most the time. Getting a scolding—albeit a mild one—from his da when he got home, for Da was still alive then.
Now the day faded away from him as night set in. A memory of beauty.
Just like the woman he left behind.
Ah, but she was beautiful, his Liadan. More beautiful than a summer’s day. It wounded him to cause the grief he had seen in his eyes when he left her.
How, och,howwould she endure if he did not return?
He’d wanted to hold her at their leave taking. To kiss her. To impart impossible reassurances. He could do none of those things.
They’d practiced with the rest of the women. But after, he had not gone to take up his post.
Now he stood at the edge of the settlement, in the dark, with Dornach, Cathair, Fearghal and three ponies. No one elsearound. No chariots this time. Chariots drew notice. They would cross Brihan’s land in the dark, unchallenged by his guard. Meet with Brihan’s man at his border with Dacha. They would leave their ponies at that place while the fellow guided them in.
If the man in question had not turned his cloak.
“Ye will return the boy to his father,” Fearghal told them, there in the new dark. “And the alliance between us will be bound.”
Aye, so. Ardahl understood it. He just did not know it could be done.
“Have faith,” he whispered to himself now, as he had to Liadan when he left her, denying the terror in her eyes.
Come back to me,she’d beseeched him silently.
I will return to ye. I will find ye. Always.
It might be better, Ardahl thought as the three of them set off, Fearghal remaining behind there in the dusk, if there had been some cloud cover. Even rain. The sky arched over them like a transparent dome, light blue fading to deep cobalt in the east. They could use better cover.
None of them spoke as they went. Dornach had thumped both of them on the shoulders before they set off, his form of reassurance.
They rode in a line, Dornach first, then Cathair, and then Ardahl, who would rather have Cathair ahead than behind him.
The ponies made more noise than they did. Like shadows, they moved across the land. Ardahl did his best to shut away the doubts that threatened his mind.
What if Brihan’s guide did not meet them? Worse, what if it was a trap?Do not think that way.He had not let Liadan say such things. He could not allow himself to.
