“So I ha’ noticed.”
“It does not seem right.”
Their gazes met again.
“Have ye noticed whom it is she watches during her time there?” she asked.
“I have.”
Liadan leaned still closer. “Is there something in it?”
Again, Ardahl took several moments before answering. “I cannot imagine how. Unless…”
“What?” Liadan settled close beside him and drew up her knees. Now they sat close to one another indeed, making the conversation intimate.
“It cannot be,” he murmured. “No one would—”
“What?” Liadan repeated.
He gazed once more into her eyes. A stare of connection, this was.
At last he whispered, “Master Dornach seems to feel Cathair resents me. That we are—were—in competition for the place of first among the warriors.”
“Ah.” First among the warriors denoted much honor, including one’s place in the great hall during feasts—the great hall that no longer existed.
“Me, I have never competed wi’ anyone. It was enough for me to fight my best and wi’ Conall at my side.” Ardahl swallowed hard. “But aye, this last year I was declared foremost a few times above Cathair.”
Puzzled, Liadan waited for him to say more.
“What if…” he whispered. “What if Cathair used Brasha to turn Conall against me?”
“How so?”
“I am no’ sure. ’Tis a feeling more than aught else. The way Cathair looks at me. The way Brasha looks at him.”
“And he was the one, was he not, who spoke out to say you killed Conall?”
“Aye.”
They were both silent for a few moments.
“Ye think,” Liadan asked then, “they were together in it, trying to stir trouble between ye and Conall?”
“Mayhap.”
“But no woman, not even Brasha—whom, I must admit, I do no’ much respect—would lie wi’ a man just to turn his loyalty.” A woman lay with a man because she loved him. Because she desired him beyond reason. Because she wanted a life with him.
“I cannot claim to know what lies in the mind or the heart o’ a woman.”
“If this be true—” Liadan widened her eyes at him. “The treachery o’ it! The sheer evil. If those two have schemed in such a way to hurt ye—to hurt us—they must be exposed. Cathair isno’ worthy of the honors he collects. And ye… Ye do no’ deserve the disgrace ye ha’ received.”
Now his gaze burned on hers. “Aye, yet I canna figure how—even if she seduced Conall for the purpose—she could have turned him so against me. Caused such anger as I saw in his eyes that day.”
Liadan laid her hand on his arm. “Perhaps I can help to discover that part o’ it. I am able to go among the women as ye are not. I can get close to Brasha. Ask and listen.”
“Ye would do that?”
“I would.”
