Reluctantly, she answered, “Eight.”
“When ye were eight, I was a lad of twelve. I have changed some since then.”
“Are ye sure ye have the right mon?” Duncan asked gently. “Are ye confident ye can trust a memory of eighteen years past?”
“I trust my memory. I have relived that day in my nightmares often enough. The faces never change.” She glared at Tearloch. “Oh, how I have wished I could have killed ye then.”
Tearloch took a deep breath. “Ye’re not listening to reason, lass. Just how old do ye suppose I was, in this memory?”
“You have not changed. You simply lie now about your age then.”
“Heed me when I say the only way I could have looked this way eighteen years ago would be if I were thirty years then. That would make me older than Duncan is now. Does that seem possible? I was but a boy of twelve. Did ye vow to see a boy of twelve dead?”
She shook her head, then closed her eyes tight, trying to remember. She could see Tearloch plain as day when he turned his horse to look back at her. “He wore your face, your eyes, your brow. He sat a horse as you do. Explain that.”
Tearloch shrugged. “This mature lad of twelve. Did he command many men?”
She saw the end of the nightmare again. It was always there, but most of the time she tried to put it out of her mind. Trying to recall it was painful, but simple enough. She saw Tearloch turn toward her, pity her, looking possibly older than he did when they met only days ago.
She’d been a fool not to consider... “Pray, where is your father?”
Tearloch’s gutstwisted as he watched his precious captive working out the truth, tugging at strings as if they were simple strands of flax that untangled at her touch. She was Alexander to his Gordian Knot.
His only option was to tangle the lies faster than she could unravel them.
“John Chattan died a year past.” A truth. Thankfully, there were no renderings of his father’s lieutenant, or she might have recognized him as another man in the party who came for her brother.
She shook her head vigorously. “It must have been him. I seeyouturning back to look at me when I protested.Youtold him not to look back. How could he not allow me to look upon Sander one last time? His cruelty remains fresh. I was there, only moments ago?—”
“Moments ago?”
She sighed. “In my nightmare. And it was you. It has always been you.”
“Has it? Or has your mind changed MacPherson’s face for mine? Ye were right weary. Our minds can wreak havoc on usthen. Did yours mix yer memories, perhaps? Can ye remember yer brother’s face just as clearly?”
Judging from the look on her face, she was considering the new knot. He gave her time to get lost in his reasoning, and when she shrugged a shoulder, he knew he’d won.
“Tearloch Chattan,” she said, testing it on her tongue.
“Aye?”
“John Chattan.”
“Aye. His grave is here, at Lochahearn, with his name chiseled in stone.”
“And you swear, upon his soul, that he was not the devil who took my brother from me?”
“On the soul of John Chattan, I swear it.”May John forgive me.He waved Duncan from the room, and when he was gone, he leaned forward to rest his head against Kenna’s once more. “If it had been me, love, I would have taken ye along as well. In fact, I would have taken ye for myself and left yer brother behind.”
She laughed lightly. “You would have been smitten by a mere lass of eight?”
“Verily, I suspect I would.” He lifted her face to his and kissed her, and she allowed it. A delicious moment later, he considered joining her on the edge of the bed when Duncan returned with one woman to treat his arm and another to dress Kenna’s hair.
Though the woman’s ministrations were tender while cleansing the slice in his skin, he grumbled. “Duncan, there is a matter ye and I must discuss, and soon.”
“Oh?”
“Aye. The matter of yer timing.”
