Lana wrung her hands together, glanced between the two men she claimed as her offspring. “Nae even a fortnight old, so wee and frail. Ronan and Minerva were struggling at the hut and the babe wouldna suckle—Minerva’s milk wouldna come. But she was doing her best and although delicate, the babe was loved. Cherished.
“My own pains started that night, soon after a townsman had brought word of the battle. Minerva was terrified for Ronan but she didna take her babe and leave me. She stayed, until my own son was born.” Tears now trickled down the worn, wrinkled face that Conall had loved the whole of his life.
“When my son had come at last, Minerva could keep herself from Ronan nae longer—her soul mate, she called him. But she knew she couldna take her babe into such danger. She made me swear to care for him, keep him safe, and I couldna refuse her. Not when she had cared for me and mine so well.”
Conall felt a lurch in his stomach. “She never came back for…him?”
“Ohhh,” Lana breathed, rocking back and forth. “Aye, she did. She did. But nae for days. Days and days, so that I thought she was dead, like Ronan. Perhaps took her own life.”
The old man groaned and Conall saw that he had dropped his head into his hands. “Oh, forgive me, Minerva. I thought—I thought she would. I thought she was to waste away atop a useless grave. I—I kept her from leaving. I was crazed with grief myself, and I locked her away. Blamed her.”
Lana let a pause settle between them before continuing. “Dáire returned from the battle a broken man. His…his mind was nae whole, knowing that his brother was gone. He cursed the Buchanans, Minerva. I was worried what he would do if he discovered I harbored her son, even though the babe was Ronan’s, as well.”
“What did you tell him, Lana?” Conall asked quietly. “Of the two babes?”
“I told him…I told him naught. He assumed the pair of you were twins.” She gave a watery smile. “After Minerva had been gone for hours, her babe hungered and I was too weak to fetch more goat’s milk. So I tried to nurse him and he took to me. And that’s how Dáire found us—the three of us.” Her eyes looked lovingly upon Conall and Duncan.
Then Duncan stirred. “But she came back, Mam. Did you then refuse her?”
“I did,” Lana confessed in little more than a whisper. “Nae directly—I was too afraid of her to face her. I hid in my house like the coward I was when she came, but I refused her all the same.
“Dáire discovered her creeping about the wood with her wild wolf like a madwoman and went to her. I thought one of them might kill the other. I could have stopped it. I could have admitted the truth to Dáire and given Minerva her son. But the truth would have broken Dáire completely, knowing his pride had cost a little boy his father, and he already hurt so much!”
Lana squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. “And the bairn—he thrived! Each day he was stronger, sturdier—I had milk aplenty for the both of you and I had grown to love Minerva’s child as fiercely as my own flesh. I feared for him with her, deep in her own grief, estranged from her kin and, by then, what little milk she had would have been gone. I told myself I was saving him.” She averted her face. “But I admit my greed now. I wanted you both. I heard her screaming from the wood and yet I kept still. ’Twasthenthat she cursed the town—nae after the battle, nae over Ronan’s body. She cursed us because of me. And I never, ever told.”
Conall heard a sniffling and looked up to see tears streaming down Eve’s face, a look of horrified sorrow in her eyes. She swallowed and spoke to Lana in a creaky voice.
“Which one?” she asked. “Minerva’s son—which one?”
Conall took a step forward. “’Tis I, Eve. Could you nae fit the pieces together? When I left town…then our bairn.” He stopped, looked to Lana. “Tell her ’tis I, Mam.”
“Oh, Conall,” Lana whispered. “Dear, sweet, brave, Conall. My love, forgive me.” Her smile grew even sadder. “’Tis Duncan.”
Evelyn did not know whose shock was greater—Conall’s, Duncan’s, or Angus Buchanan’s. The longhouse was instantly flooded with silent but palpable, crashing emotion, and the sadness of Lana MacKerrick’s tale combined with the discovery of a new reality to create a wave of feeling in Evelyn so intense it caused an uncomfortable twinge low in her belly. She gasped but her reaction was lost on those in the room with her. She, too, forgot about her discomfort in the face of the maelstrom.
“Nae,” Duncan moaned, dropping onto his hands. “Oh, Mam, nae—tell me it isna so!”
Conall staggered back two paces to lean his shoulders against the wall, his face bloodless and drawn, staring at the man in agony on the floor. No longer his brother.
“Duncan,” Conall rasped. “Dunc, it means naught. It changes naught.”
Angus Buchanan, too, stared at the wiry man as if, in the instant Evelyn saw it, he also saw in Duncan an essence of the aged, gray old healer who had breathed her last on a rocky grave in Evelyn’s arms.
“It changes all,” Angus said. He rose slowly, slowly, and Evelyn kept a keen eye on the old chief for the telltale signs of his earlier spasms.
Lana stumbled across the room on a sob and fell to her knees at Duncan’s side, throwing her arms about his shoulders and clinging there even when he struggled to free himself.
“Listen to Conall, Duncan,” she pleaded. “He speaks true! Aye, I’ve done a terrible wrong, but ’twas only because I loved you so! You are still mine—still ours! Still MacKerrick! Your da was—”
Duncan shot to his feet, flinging Lana onto her backside. His slender face was twisted and reddened with pain, his eyes leaking angry, resentful tears.
“I doona know who me da was!” he shouted. “All those years when Da—Dáire—favored Conall”—he flung an arm toward the silent man against the wall—“I thought ’twas because ofmyfailings! When I was looked over as the weaker, the lesser—”
“Dunc, you were never the lesser,” Conall croaked.
“You know not, Conall!” Duncan gasped and swiped at his eyes angrily with his forearm. “’TwasyouDáire depended on,youwho he groomed to lead the clan,youwho he fought to secure a bride for, a life, a future, while I had to be resigned to being tied to Mam’s apron. And you pissed on it at every turn! You didn’t love Nonna, but you took her anyways. Just like the town! You couldn’t loveour people”—he barked a mirthless laugh—“enough to let go of your pride to save them! The cost was too high for proud Conall MacKerrick!”
Duncan drew a gasping breath. “But I longed to help them—would have handed over me own bollocks to Angus Buchanan himself had I thought ’twould be of any relief. And I did help them, too! Once you had gone to the hut in the vale, I worked tirelessly for food, to bring cheer and hope to the people, andI succeededwhereyou failed! Each and every time!”
