“I had no say in whom your brother saw.”
“To be sure. But what did ye think o’ the association?”
He must wonder why she asked, for he directed another long look at her. “I did no’ like it much. But in that instance, Conall did no’ welcome my opinions. He got swept up in her. They—” Abruptly he silenced.
“Master Ardahl, ye need not fear to speak plainly wi’ me.”
“You are his sister.”
“And no longer a child. I know fine what happens between a man and a woman—even if that man be my brother.”
He shifted his shoulders in a twitch of discomfort and glanced at Conall’s sleeping place, where Mam sat.
“She is no’ paying attention.” Liadan leaned closer to him. “They were—”
He made a face. “She was tumbling him. Regular.” The hazel eyes met hers, steady. “Ye know what that means?”
“Of course I know what it means.” Her cheeks heated. “She was taking him to her bed.”
“Naught so formal as that. They met wherever they could. In corners. In the pony sheds. At her house, if no one was to home.”
“The pony sheds!”
Another steady gaze. “He got right caught up in it.”
“As any young man might.”
“He told me he wanted to marry her. I told him to take his time and be sure about it.”
“Good advice.”
“There is somewhat I cannot like about her. But ye canna tell that to a man, even your best friend, about the woman wi’ whom he is enamored.”
“I suppose not.”
“He kept the whole thing close to his chest, but all the warriors knew. When I expressed doubts about her, he did no’ like it. Grew annoyed wi’ me. Even asked if I were jealous.” He snorted. “As if I would be jealous o’ that—” He caught himself abruptly.
“I see.” Did Liadan begin to?
“We rarely argued. Ye know that. But,” Ardahl paused and a new look came to his eyes, “that was when he began growing edgy wi’ me. Turned right prickly about it.”
“Could—could that be what he was so angry about that last day, when—”
Ardahl shook his head. “I do not know what he was so angry about that day. I have racked my brains over it. That was not mere anger, but rage.” Again, he studied her. “Ye believe me?”
“I find that I do.”
He puffed out a breath.
“Not,” she added, “that it matters what I believe.”
“It matters. To be sure, it does.”
“Brasha—she does not seem as grieved at Conall’s death as she was at first, or as a young woman hoping for marriage should.”
“One who’d taken him so often on her thighs.”
“She laughs with her friends and stands to gossip by the wall of the training field.”
