Those had touched Conall’s skin. Protected him.
“Ye have his sword? Your own things are at your mother’s. Ye canna go without.”
He stood there washed over by gratitude and shame. He did not know what to say.
A cart rattled up beside him. The driver called down, “Ye be wi’me. Dornach’s orders.”
His name was Cullan, and Ardahl recalled his partner had been killed at a skirmish near the end of winter. The man did not look pleased to be partnered with Ardahl.
Naught to be done for it. He leaped aboard the chariot, steadied himself with one hand on the front rail.
He had time for only a single look at Liadan, who stood perfectly still in the green turf while they rattled away.
*
“Just so yeknow,” Cullan said as they took a place in the line of marching men and chariots. Not where they should be, but back a goodly way. “I am only partnering wi’ ye because Dornach ordered it. Me, I want naught to do wi’ ye.”
“Understood.”
“Ye be a betrayer of the worst kind, and a false friend so far as I am concerned. Conall was a finer man than ye’ll ever be.”
“I agree.”
Cullan looked surprised at that. “If ye think so, then why did ye kill him?”
“I did not kill him.”
“Och, so it happened by magic, did it? Enchantment, maybe?”
As the chariots rattled along, clansfolk darted forward to speak hasty farewells. To sons, to husbands, to brothers, to lovers. Those they might never see again.
Ahead, in the second chariot—for the first belonged to Dornach and his driver—rode Cathair, pale head high and proud. A figure darted forward to his side—a woman it was, with her skirts caught up high. She reached out a hand to Cathair, and he reached back. Their fingers touched before she fell away.
Her long, wavy brown hair marked her identity. Brasha.
Conall’s love.
There was something in it. Ardahl felt certain of that. He had no time for such thoughts now. But it bit at him.
A force awaited them on the border. And a man who allowed his thoughts to stray from battle paid the price, swift and hard.
A broad stream marked their boundary with Brihan’s lands. It flowed over the breast of the hill and glittered beneath the rising sun. They rattled on a goodly distance, silent but for the clatter of their weapons and the hooves of the ponies. Each man contemplating the thoughts in his own mind.
A glorious day to do battle. Blue sky with a few fair-weather clouds sailing back eastward. The scent of wild thyme on the breeze. What looked like ten score men spread out on the other side, awaiting them.
Dornach drew them up with a raised hand on the high ground above the water. Accustomed every man to obeying him, they rattled to a halt, the ponies tossing their heads. The warm breeze ruffled their manes, and the hair of the men.
Fairghal’s forces had the advantage, aye, of higher ground, yet that force Ardahl saw facing them was a strong one, so strong it felt like a punch to the gut.
Brihan of Brioc must be a fool, to let so many warriors cross his land and do battle with Fearghal. Aye, he might have an agreement with Dacha that he thought would keep him safe. But should Dacha conquer Fearghal’s lands, what was to keep him from helping himself to the weaker holding that lay between?
Mayhap he had already done so. That could be why the army arrayed here looked so vast.
They could not allow Dacha a victory.
That realization seemed to spread through Fearghal’s forces. It traveled from man to man by whispers and mutters.
Even Cullan, who by his own word detested Ardahl, spoke bitter and low. “By the holy goddess, will ye look at that?”
