Claire Delacroix (20 page)

“How do you fare?” the Hawk asked quietly.

Aileen caught her breath and glanced about herself. She peeked beneath the pelts and her cheeks flushed in a most delightful way. “Did Nissa...”

“I undressed you.”

Aileen peered beneath the pelts at the linens, trying to be discreet but her spouse knew what she sought.

“You are convinced that I intend to rape you.”

“I cannot imagine why you would not do so. As long as our match remains unconsummated, it could be annulled.”

The Hawk ensured that his tone was mild. “Would it be more fitting to earn your hatred than to await your welcome?”

She seemed surprised by his question and he sighed that she thought so little of his character.

He leaned closer. “Aileen, our match will be consummated when you come to me and not before.”

She stared at him and he knew that he had astonished her. “But it is your right...”

“And I would have it be our mutual pleasure, as I tried to show you this very day.” The Hawk smiled and she smiled in return, though neither of them spoke of her vision. When the silence stretched overlong, he tried to ease her trepidation with a teasing comment. “It would suit me well if you did not take overlong to consider the matter.”

She regarded him and he fancied that she could read his very thoughts. “But you leave much risk by this choice.”

“I like a measure of risk.” The Hawk shrugged when she seemed unpersuaded. “And indeed, where is the joy of victory if one’s opponent has no choice but to surrender?”

Her fair brow arched. “That did not seem troubling on the night you compelled me to wed you.”

The Hawk felt his neck heat with guilt, though he admired that she was not afraid to rebuke him. “Winning your hand was of too great an import to be left to chance,” he said gruffly.

She looked skeptical still and he claimed her hand. “Understand this, lady mine. However poorly they have begun, I would have these nuptials end well for both of us.”

“Why did you not court me?”

“I feared you would underestimate my charms.”

She looked at him quickly, as if uncertain whether he made a jest at his own expense. He smiled slightly and studied her fingertips, so delicate against his own, as he sought the words. “I apologize for not believing your claim about the visions.”

“You believe me now?”

“I told you once that I learned during my childhood that many apparently impossible marvels are oft true.” The Hawk moved closer and, to his relief, she did not move away. “Your words in the falconry were an echo of what the old healer Adaira had told Tarsuinn when she mended his wound nigh forty years ago.”

Aileen’s eyes widened. “Truly?”

“Truly.”

She looked as astonished as he felt. “Then it did happen,” she mused. “I thought I had but dreamed it.”

He ran his thumb across her knuckles. “It was never my intent to drive you to madness, Aileen.”

She did not smile, but shivered elaborately. “These visions are most uncanny.”

“I know.”

Aileen turned her bright gaze upon him, as if she would rout his secrets. “Because you have seen them, too.” she said with a certainty undeserved. It was his intent to deny as much, but the lady laid a fingertip across his lips. “But you would prefer to forget that any madness had ever claimed your wits.”

“I would prefer that my men do not doubt my wits.”

She tilted her head, her gaze piercing once again. “What happened when you met Adaira of the woods?”

Despite his urge to confide in her, his throat closed over the truth. “Nothing. She died. As I already said.”

The Hawk rose and paced the chamber, feeling the weight of his wife’s gaze upon him. He was not yet prepared to surrender all of his secrets to his beguiling wife. In less than a week, she had stormed his ramparts with alarming ease, and still he knew so little of her.

Two days. He braced his hands upon the sill and stared out into the falling darkness, silently cursing the flickering light on the tower of the MacLaren clan.

The last sliver of the moon sailed high in the sky, casting a feeble night across the lands that would soon be completely his own. The new moon would be the following evening, and his pulse quickened at the thought.

On the morrow, when darkness fell, they would ride out and reclaim the last vestige of traditional Inverfyre. Before the sun rose the following morn, he would enter what remained of Inverfyre’s chapel. He would touch the graves of his forebears for the first time. He would claim the last morsel that was his birthright.

He scanned the walls, counting the sentries, eying the gates, and found all as it should have been. He surveyed the river and the forest, seeking a hint of something amiss.

It was of critical import that nothing go awry at this point. It was of critical import that he not stumble, as Alasdair had feared he would stumble, that he not let the conundrum of his bride undermine his determination.

Aileen would be his bride for many years ahead. Matters between them could wait one more day and night to be resolved. He should be walking the walls, ensuring the security of Inverfyre, not lingering in his lady’s chambers.

But the Hawk found he could not summon the will to leave. What spell had Aileen cast to snare him so effectively?

What could he do to bind her loyalty to him?

He pivoted to meet her gaze. “Tell me of your skill with archery,” he urged. Her expression became guarded immediately and she averted her face. “Tell me, Aileen, what happened between you and Blanche. I know that you have more skill than you showed that day in the forest.”

She lifted her chin, her eyes gleaming. “How could you know such a thing, if indeed it were true?”

He smiled. “I am a warrior and not unfamiliar with a bow myself. I saw how your hands fitted to the weapon, I saw your familiarity with it and your ease. And I saw you change your stance in the last moment afore you loosed the arrow.” He held her gaze unswervingly. “I know that you deliberately made a poor shot and I do not blame you for it. I ask only for the tale.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “So that you can despise me that my inclinations are not womanly?”

The Hawk let his smile broaden. “On the contrary, I can think of no skill more fitting for my bride than that of defending herself and her home. This gives us an understanding in common, Aileen.”

* * *

Aileen watched her husband, her inclinations at war within her. She was filled with Adaira’s conviction, the old words echoing in her ears. She and the Hawk were destined to be together and she wondered how best to persuade him of what she knew to be true.

She was much reassured by his pledges. A fighting man would live and die by his pledge, and she had believed his intent to be true. She liked that he put the choice into her hands. It was time enough that she accepted the man she was coming to know instead of simply believing his foul repute.

It was time she earned his trust.

She swallowed and looked down, stroking the pelt with her fingertips. “I trained with a bow from an early age. I suspect my father only indulged me at first, for I was persistent, but I soon showed skill with it. My mother endorsed my choice and persuaded my father to train me further.” She met his regard. “I found more satisfaction in an arrow finding its mark than a spindle fat with fine thread.”

He smiled that seductive half-smile. “This I understand well enough.”

“And then, just over a year ago, my mother died.” Aileen frowned, than hastened on. “And my father returned from the king’s court with Blanche upon his arm. She did not want another woman’s daughter in her abode, especially as we are nigh of an age. I suppose I can understand that she did not like my father’s affection for me.”

“That is the mark of a selfish soul, lady mine,” the Hawk scoffed. “Affection is to be shared and replenishes itself in greater measure once spent.”

They shared a smile across the chamber that heated Aileen’s flesh.

The Hawk arched a brow. “I shall guess that she named your skill as the reason why you were not wedded, and insisted that your father compel you to cease.”

Aileen sobered, and felt her anger anew. “She burned my bow.” She met the Hawk’s gaze. “She seized it and burned it before the company as she mocked me. It had been a gift from my mother’s kin, carved to my hand. It was mine and mine alone and she had no right to destroy it.”

The Hawk’s eyes gleamed. “And your father? Surely he demanded at least an apology from her?”

Aileen blinked and looked away, bitterness rising within her. “He told me that Blanche had named the matter aright and that I would forgot my foolery in time.”

“Then he is the fool,” the Hawk said sharply, his anger warming Aileen’s heart.

“I thank you for that,” she said. Their gazes locked and held, and Aileen’s mouth went dry with her desire for his touch.

Perhaps she could explain the force of his kisses to him in this moment when they seemed of one accord.

“Do you have a memory palace?” she asked.

The Hawk frowned and shook his head.

“It is not a possession as such, but a trick with one’s thoughts.” Aileen smiled, stroking a pelt as she spoke. “My father taught me to build a memory palace to better recall whatsoever one must. In your mind, you construct a palace, chamber by chamber, and in each chamber resides some detail that must be recalled, oft with some item that will prompt recollection of the whole.”

“Grant me an example,” the Hawk said, and he looked to be intrigued.

Aileen closed her eyes, sitting up straighter. “My palace is much like Abernye, but beyond its gates and the hall and the kitchen is a walled garden. I can see the stones in the wall, I can feel the sun upon my back, I can smell the roses in blossom in the very center of the garden. They reach for the sun, their blooms of richest red. There are three plants and, in their midst, I always find my mother sitting and waiting for me.” Aileen smiled and felt herself flush slightly.

“Surely Blanche does not linger idly in the garden where there is no one in whose life she might interfere? You must mean your blood mother, of whom you are clearly fond.”

Aileen nodded. “My mother loved roses, you see, so she is in the garden of my memory palace. She labored long to persuade them to grow at Abernye, but with limited success. This is how I recall her features, as clearly as if I saw her just moments past.” Her tone turned fierce. “I will never forget her, whatever my father and Blanche would prefer.”

“And so you should not.”

Aileen eyed her spouse, but he smiled.

Crinkles appeared around his eyes, making him look less harsh. “No one has the right to tell you where to grant your heart, lady mine.”

Did he refer to himself? Aileen could not guess. She held his gaze and continued her account, liking how intently he listened. “There are three rosebushes because my mother had three sisters, and they always surrounded her similarly when they visited Abernye.” She smiled in recollection. “Within those blossoms, I see their faces as well. Around the roses are smaller plants, daisies and such, one for each of their children and named for them in my memory palace.”

“This seems a most useful tool.” The Hawk sat beside her on the bed again.

“But more than that. I tell you of this only so I can explain what happens when you kiss me.” She took a deep breath, sensing that he would resist her notion. “It seems that some unseen hand opens doors in my memory palace, doors to chambers that I had never guessed were there.”

“Chambers you had forgotten were there,” he suggested cautiously.

Aileen considered this, then nodded in agreement. “Yes. Chambers I did not know were there but which seem familiar once I spy them. It is most curious. And when I laid my hands upon the walls of Adaira’s hut, the doors flew open with such force that you might have been summoned to my side by the sound of them crashing back on their hinges.”

She glanced up before the Hawk could school his expression and she saw that he knew this sense all too well. Then he looked down at her fingertips, a slight frown between his brows, and she could not fathom his thoughts.

But then, had she not been fearful of the import of her visions? She had drunk more deeply of the well and was reassured by that draught, but the first sip had been terrifying. What had the Hawk seen when Adaira kissed him? Silence stretched between them for a moment, a silence filled with a thousand uncertainties.

Then Aileen knew that she would have to guide her spouse on this path, just as he had guided her in the unfamiliar land of passion this very day.

She tentatively touched the Hawk’s hand, then, emboldened, stroked his flesh. His was a strong hand, his fingers long and tanned, a minute scar upon one knuckle. She marveled at how much larger his hand was than hers, appreciated then how gentle he was with her. “Do you think that it always be thus when we embrace?” she asked.

“What do you mean?”

Aileen met his gaze unswervingly. “The visions descend into my thoughts when you kiss me. Do you think there is a certain number of them that must appear, or will there always be another?”

Something flickered in his eyes, then he granted her that crooked smile that made her heart leap. “There is but one way to know, lady mine,” he murmured. “Are you as bold as your words oft are?”

“Would you rather I was meek and silent?”

“No.” His gaze roved over her as if he found her to be a marvel. “Even when you vex me, I like that you have thoughts of your own.”

“Even when I cast the dogs from the kitchens and insisted the rushes be replaced?”

His smile broadened. “Even then.”

“I suppose Gregory sought your disapproval of my scheme.”

He chuckled slightly and kissed her knuckles. “You suppose aright. He was most flustered, but you showed good sense. I did not challenge your edict.”

Aileen felt curiously pleased by this. She dared to ask yet more of him. “Would I not irk you even if I were to ask you to find a priest to live at Inverfyre?”

His gaze flicked away as he considered this. “It is true that no priest has come from Stirling since Malcolm...” His words faded and his frown deepened.