“I told ye to stay with Joan…”
The voices faded as they walked away. Marcán shook out hisléineand drew it over his head. The urgency came back, even more powerful this time. It became so overwhelming, he jerked the door open. She disappeared beside the roundhouse, Merewyn close behind. Too far for him to call her back.
Turning back into the room, the memory of their lovemaking came back in full force. The sound of her voice confessing her love, and his own assurances of her worth. It would take a hundred more such affirmations to counter the damage her mother had done to her. That Beibhinn cared only for herself had never been more apparent. It had galled Marcán these many years. A dangerous woman. And the damage she’d done to her children was not limited to Fergus. Marcán decided to stay closer still, hoping to ward off her poor treatment of Astrid.
That the woman hated him was obvious. Beibhinn hated him with an unimaginable passion. Unable to keep Diarmuid away from him, she’d taunted him since he was very young, even putting a hex on him. Unheard of from someone who claimed herself to be such a God-fearing woman.
Her claim that all Seers were from the devil was something no one disputed. It was commonly believed they were in the same league as witches. But did not God alone decide what color a person’s eyes would be?
He must have been ten and five, just back from his first battle and feeling quite full of his own importance, when he’d first overheard her speaking of his eye color. It was right after Maeve had been accepted into the clan as their healer. Intrigued, he had stopped to listen, hiding behind the open door of the roundhouse. When Beibhinn had loudly proclaimed that anyone with two different-colored eyes was a Seer, Marcán had become so incensed he’d shoved the door shut and stepped into the room.
“Marcán.” The woman had had the decency to look ashamed.
“And who is this handsome young man?” Maeve had smiled, showing no indication she’d noticed his eye coloring.
“I am called Marcán.” Livid, he had kept his eyes on Beibhinn, nostrils flaring. “And this may be the wife of theri túaithe, but she is wrong in what she is telling ye.”
Beibhinn’s face had turned beet red. The feeling of gratification had been heady. When he’d noticed the look of fear Maeve gave Beibhinn, he’d added. “As ye can see, I have two different-colored eyes and I am a warrior, not a Seer.”
Maeve had shifted. “I have heard yer name mentioned, as well as yer ability in battle.”
“And this woman should have something more to do than gossip,” Marcán had said. “’Twas just this week the priest spoke against such devil’s work as that.”
Later that day, it had occurred to Marcán that hisri túaithemight not have appreciated such treatment of his wife. Much to his surprise, Diarmuid’s father had actually laughed at the tale—but he had also issued a warning about his wife’s vindictive nature. He had heard plenty of tales since, many of them from Diarmuid himself, that had proven the man right.
Now Marcán hoped to wed Beibhinn’s daughter. She would fight him every step of the way, but it wasn’t up to her. It would be up to Diarmuid to accept their union, and Marcán had no doubt his friend would. He stepped into the sunshine. Faolán and Philip passed him on their way to the roundhouse.
“Marcán.” Faolán tipped his head but stopped a few feet away. “Go o-on, Philip. I-I will be there a-anon.”
Faolán came over to him. The man who had stopped Pádraig’s advances on Astrid. Apparently, he had perfect timing.
“Faolán.”
Marcán wondered if Faolán knew what he had saved Astrid from. There was some discoloring on his jaw, a cut above his eyes, but there was no telling how he’d sustained the bruises.
“Were ye in a fight whilst we were away?”
“H-horseplay. No more.”
Asking him flat out would indicate Marcán was in Astrid’s confidence, which he was not yet ready to reveal.
“W-we missed ye a-at the celebration last night,” Faolán said. “Though ’twas a quiet celebration out of respect for o-our king and his w-wife, w-we looked for ye to tell us o-of the battle.”
Marcán sensed the accusation in his voice, so he countered it with his own. “I would prefer to wait until Aednat can also join us.” He blocked the door when Faolán attempted to peer inside. It would be important to tread lightly with this. At least until his betrothal to Astrid was announced.
“Did y-ye sleep in here l-last night? A-alone?”
Again, something in his tone did not sit well with Marcán.
“D’ye not have duties to see to, Faolán?”
The man narrowed his eyes. “I-I take my duties very seriously, a-as well ye know.”
The duties he didn’t mind doing. Diarmuid did not entirely trust this man, and while Marcán was grateful for Faolán’s role in protecting Astrid, Marcán had to agree. “Then ye best see to them.”
“O-one o-of those duties i-is protecting our w-women. That includes A-Astrid.”
“Is there something ye wish to tell me?”
