“She’s one of the chosen, I tell you.” Torcaill stepped from the dark of the trees almost as soon as Ronan let himself out a little- used gate in the castle’s outer walling. “The brilliance of her nigh blinded me.”
Ronan suppressed the urge to snort. “She is a bright one, aye.” He looked at the druid, almost adding that the great green bauble glittering at the vee of her thighs all night had near blinded him.
That, and other things.
Not to mention the effect of the top crests of her nipples. Pert and crinkly crescents of a fine rosy hue, they’d peeked above her bodice each time she deigned to draw a particularly deep breath.
Which, he’d observed, she’d done far too often.
He frowned, his jaw and other places tightening.
Even now, in the chill dark of the wood, he could see the creamy fullness of her breasts, the sweet press of her nipples against the edge of her low-dipping gown.
He also remembered the silky huskiness of her laugh and the way she seemed fond of sliding a slow finger up and down the hilt of her eating knife.
“You err, my friend.” He reached to flick a fallen leaf off the druid’s cloak. “Lady Gelis is earthy, not chosen.”
Earthy in ways that weren’t good for a man.
He was sure of it.
A sense of doom circling round him, he bit back a groan and shoved a hand through his hair, so distracted he wasn’t sure if he’d blurted out his woes or kept them to himself.
Not that it mattered.
Torcaill of Ancient Fame, as all addressed the white-maned wizard, wasn’t a man to hide secrets from.
“She has the third eye.” He gripped Ronan’s arm, squeezing. “I saw its light shining like a lodestar. She —”
“The sight?” Ronan couldn’t help his surprise. “That canna be. My grandfather knows her as well as if she’d grown up beneath his over-long nose. He would have told me if she was ataibhsear.”
Torcaill made a dismissive gesture. “Idohave the third eye, and I’ve never known it to lie.”
Ronan released a breath, too aware of that truth to argue.
“You still mean to follow your plan.” Torcaill looked at him, his eyes seeing all.
“I have no choice.”
“There are always choices.”
“And you no longer approve of mine.”
“I did not expect her to be gifted.” The druid pulled on his long white beard, his gaze thoughtful. “She has great power, that one. Even the cold flames of Dare’s torches responded to her. Did you not feel their bursts of warmth?”
“I felt Lady Gelis’s heat and naught else!”
Ronan scowled. The old wizard’s ability to loosen his tongue was almost as vexing as his own inability to ignore his bride’s charms.
Her siren charms, the saints preserve him.
Gelis MacKenzie was the meaning of seduction.
It scarce mattered whether she had a third, fourth, or even a fifth eye.
She affected him.
He swallowed a curse. His head was beginning to hurt and a hot throbbing ache between his shoulders threatened to drive him mad.
