The evening had one or two compensations. Murtray’s harper came out to play. Old Coll showered his listeners with beauty, the clear, fragile notes from his harp weaving a sure spell. If Darlei closed her eyes, she could almost imagine herself on the cliff top once more, gazing into eternity.
Holding Deathan MacMurtray’s hand.
And that brought her to the second of her compensations. He had smiled at her. Deathan had.
It happened when they entered the hall, before he went to his place at the other end of the same table where she sat. After that, she was not able to see him, but she held the memory of that smile to her while she thought about him.
Thought about the way he looked tonight. Dressed in a green tunic that picked up the color in his eyes and with the wealth of his hair mostly braided—yes, her one glimpse had showed herall that. He wore a medallion at his throat—his strong, tanned throat.
She thought of his hand that she’d held. Wondered how it would feel if he touched her body with his warm, calloused hands.
Wished he would.
What was happening to her? She never entertained such thoughts.
He is to be my brother.
That reminder brought such sorrow to her mind, she could scarce endure it. An old ache, it seemed, and deeply rooted. But why should she feel that way?
She barely knew the man. How could so many emotions connect her to him?
The bard began to sing a sad, soft song of love and longing. Darlei closed her eyes again as Coll’s sweet voice transported her. Away from this table. Away from this hall. To another place entirely.
She stood in the forest, the tall trees that surrounded her casting their own evening shade. A man stood at one side of her, and a tall, lean, gray hound at the other. Enduring a hard journey, they were, and yet her heart—her heart lacked for nothing.
She looked at the man. A stranger.Not a stranger.Tall and lean, he had brown hair and gray eyes specked with green.
The sight of him made her heart swell and her emotions rise unbearably. He was about to speak to her when—
“You will need to learn our ways, and no mistake. That way, ye will no’ make—well, unseemly blunders. I do no’ ken how it is among yer folk, but here our women tak’ a step back and do no’ speak out o’ turn. They ha’ influence, to be sure. My own mam does. And yet—”
The spell that had been woven shattered. Darlei opened her eyes and looked at the man beside her with loathing.
“You are mistaken in me,” she said.
Rohr goggled at her. She could only guess at the ferocity of her stare, based on the wildness of her feelings.
“Eh?” he said.
“You are mistaken, Master Rohr, if you think I can ever be put in a box or otherwise shut away to speak only when you permit it. I am a princess, do not forget.”
Low and angrily, he replied, “A princess who is to be mywife. Whether or no’ either o’ us likes it. Ye will learn yer place.”
“Nay,youwill learn my place, which will never be behind you.”
She was upset that he had ruined the spell, that fragile thing she’d almost had in her grasp, and angry he should speak so to her.
Father glanced at her warningly and several heads turned. The big room had gone quiet in respect for the bard, and their words carried.
“Daughter,” Father grunted.
“Listen to the music, pray,” Darlei told Rohr, but it was too late. Her pleasure was ruined and Master Coll finished playing soon after.
On the whole, so she decided, she preferred it when Rohr did not speak to her at all.
She puzzled over it later when in her bed. Not Rohr’s words—those she understood. She began to realize the kind of man he was. But she puzzled over the glimpse she’d had of the man standing beside her in the forest.
So real had he seemed. So very dear to her. How could he be mere imagining? Naught more than a part of the spell woven by the music?
