“Och, very well.” If Liadan stayed here in the hut, she would likely go mad.
The settlement felt completely different with the warriors gone. The women came out, left off their tasks and chores. They stood in groups of two or three speaking in low voices. The old men emerged likewise and told their tales to any who would listen of old battles, the horrors faced. Of wounds and death and blood.
Children, picking up on the peculiar energy, ran about making a din, not knowing why.
A fact of life that all the men who went away, either on foot or rattling in the chariots, would not return. A battle lost could be a devastating thing, costing them dear. The border, though, must be held.
There would, aye, be a cost.
Whose son, brother, husband, lover would come back over the hill?
Whose would not, save on his shield or on the bottom of a chariot?
Liadan might never see Ardahl MacCormac again.
And so what? He was a serpent, was he not? He had taken Conall from them.
Only, he swore he had not.
And was that not just what he would do, the traitor? The betrayer?
Chief Fearghal stood outside his hall with his wife, Bridie, at his side and their two young children running about. During anything save outright attack, Fearghal always stayed back to defend the settlement and hold strong if the very worst happened.
The very worst could right well happen. A crowd of enemy warriors could come screaming over that hill.
For now it was quiet, save for the muttering of the women and the old men holding forth. Fearghal spoke reassuringly to a knot of women.
“Let us hear what the chief has to say.” Flanna dashed off. Liadan did not follow. What could the chief say? He knew no more than they what was happening at the border.
One woman stood alone with her shawl raised over her head, half shadowing her face. Shunned by the others.
Liadan took the place at her side. “Mistress MacCormac.”
“I did not get a chance to speak a farewell to him.” Tears ran down Maeve’s face. “I may no’ see him again.”
“I bade him farewell and gave him Conall’s armor. He went bravely.”
Maeve turned and stared into Liadan’s face with what might be astonishment.
“Ye did him that kindness?”
“Not a kindness. He has taken Conall’s place and has a right to his belongings.”
“Och, I was so afraid. His armor is all at my house. I thought—”
Liadan put her arm around the weeping woman. “Courage. My mam always says we who wait back must be twice as brave as those who go.”
“’Tis the not knowing that hurts so.”
“Aye.”
Maeve adored her son. Whatever he had done, whether he be the serpent Liadan thought him or not.
It could take days for word to reach them from the border, even though it was not far. The battle itself could take that long. The agony of waiting might well continue.
But as they stood, she saw Fearghal summon a lad to him.
“Let us see what the chief is about,” she bade Maeve.
