He pushed off the wall and made his way toward the courtyard. The study door remained shut, and the children’s chatter fadedwith each step, until the castle held only him and the steady click of his heels on stone.
11
The sun beat down on the steel in Neil’s hand and the sweat on his skin. He stood at the training yard’s center, the packed earth hard under his boots. The wound in his shoulder pulled each time he swung, but he welcomed the sensation.
It kept him sharp.
“Again,” he grunted.
One of the guards lined up for training charged at him. Neil swung his blade and knocked the man off line, then tapped his ribs with the flat. “Ye are leaning wrong. Fix yer stance.”
The guard widened his stance, his feet skidding.
Neil did not wait; he swung again. Their swords clashed. The guard held up his blade, leaving an opening, and Neil tapped the flat against his breastbone.
“Strike faster,” he snapped. “Or go home.”
Another guard charged, eager and loud. Neil jumped to the side, let eagerness run past, and clipped the back of his knees. The guard hit the dirt and rolled with a grunt.
Neik kicked the fallen blade away. “I leave for five years, and ye all become weaklings,” he snarled. “How have ye been protecting this castle, hm?”
He did not want to think about the study or the table against Kristen’s hip or the sound she had made when his mouth had found hers. But those memories flooded his mind anyway.
Heat flared in his gut. It made him angrier.
“Next.”
Two guards stepped forward to test his temper. He met them without ceremony. The first feinted right and swung wide. Neil parried and shoved him back with the crossguard. The second tried a quick cut on the arm. Neil turned, teeth clenched when his shoulder twinged, and blocked the blow with the edge of his blade. He lunged forward, making the man back up three paces, then twisted and sent him stumbling.
“Keep yer stance,” he barked. “The ground willnae love ye if ye daenae respect it first.”
The first guard came back, but Neil knocked his sword clean from his hand just as quickly and sent it flying. He stared at his fingers as if the air had robbed him.
“Pick it up,” Neil ordered, his voice flatter than he had intended.
He pushed them all harder than they had been pushed in years. He wanted the ache in his arms and the burn in his lungs. He wanted the world to shrink to weight and angle and the plain truth of timing.
“Plant yer feet,” he told one. “Cut short and finish.”
“Use the point,” he told another. “Ye arenae churning butter, for Christ’s sake!”
A laugh rose from the fence, but died down when he turned to look. The guards at the rail fell quiet immediately.
He heard his own breath and the clash of steel. He heard Kristen’s breath too, the one he had swallowed when he had taken her mouth.
He pushed the thought out of his head and drove his blade into the pell with a thud.
“Harder,” he said to no one.
He made it harder.
He madeeverythingharder.
Footsteps hurried across gravel. He did not have to turn around to know who it was.
Lachlan drew to a halt behind him, his hands tucked behind his back.
“Came to train as well, Braither?” Neil grunted, his back still turned.
