“Seeing as your lady has befuddled your wits tonight, I’ll tell you thatthisis all that ails me this e’en.” He thrust the fiery Highland spirits into Ronan’s hand. “I was in fine fettle o’er having an unexpected guest at my hearthside and drank a wee bit more than I should have. If I’m a bit wobbly on my feet, that’s why.”
He leaned close, raising his voice above the hard drumming of rain on the shutters. “You needn’t fuss o’er me like an old woman. The courier didn’t poison me. And even if he’d tried, I’m no bairn to be so easily cozened.”
Ronan set down the cup untouched. “I didn’t say —”
“You didna have to.” Valdar tossed back his ownuisge beatha,slapping down the little cup with a loudclack. “I’ve known you since you were in swaddling. And” — he swiped the back of his hand across his mouth — “ ’twasn’t Kintail’s man who sought to cozen me. ’Tis you!”
Ronan blinked. “Me?”
“Aye, you.” His grandfather put back his still-powerful shoulders. “Treating me like a feeble auld mannie!”
“I ne’er meant —”
“You mean to protect me, I know, but I dinna need the like.” He waved a hand when Ronan started to protest again. “Ne’er did, if you’d hear the truth of it!”
Suddenly looking younger and more vital than he had in years, he whirled and plucked a great Norse battle-axe off the wall. Grinning broadly, he leaped into a fighting stance and made a few grand flourishes with the axe, then slapped the thing onto the table.
“Dinna ask how often that axe blade’s run red with the blood of our foes,” he said, not even panting. “I say you the times were . . . numberless!”
“Ach, Grandfather.” Ronan clapped a hand on the older man’s shoulder. He hadn’t wanted to make him think he doubted his strength.
He’d feared the Holder had harmed him somehow.
Grateful that he hadn’t, Ronan sought to reassure him. “Everyone at Dare knows of your valor. I only —”
“You want to shield me, I just said!” Swatting Ronan’s hand away, he smoothed his bed-robe. “But you forget, I’m no’ faint-heart. Think you I’d have sailed right to the edge of the Corryvreckan and plucked your lady’s father from that boiling whirlpool if I were?”
But that was years ago.
Ronan kept the thought to himself.
Valdar’s eyes sparked as if he’d heard all the same.
“A man doesn’t lose his heart just because he might count a few gray hairs in his beard!” He thumped his chest in emphasis. “The spirit is the same, especially a Highlandman’s spirit. We are the best of men!”
“No doubt” — Ronan looked from his grandfather’s proud, bristly face to the open window — “and there are surely few who would argue the fact.”
Valdar poked him in the ribs. “But?”
Ronan winced, just managing to swallow a yelp.
But his entire body tightened and he clenched his hands, his gaze still on the dark, wet night beyond the window. Somewhere out there, like as not quite close, lurked a Holder by the name of Dungal Tarnach.
Man of thunder.
A man of such power he clearly possessed the ability to make himself appear as a MacKenzie.
Or bespell Valdar into seeing him thus.
“A Highlander won’t be coddled either,” Valdar gusted on, stepping around to plant himself in front of Ronan. “And we dinna like things kept from us!”
Lunging, he flashed out a hand and plucked the rolled parchment from Ronan’s belt. “Hah!” he cried, leaping back to wave the thing over his head like a trophy.
“Now we shall see what you were trying to keep from me!” He grinned, already unrolling the scroll. “I’ve a mind Kintail wishes to throw a feast in my honor.”
He winked at Ronan, his eyes twinkling. “Now that’d be one secret-keeping I’d forgive you, laddie.”
But when he stepped up to the table and held the scroll close to the light of a candelabrum, the delight left Valdar’s eyes.
