Lady of Conquest (26 page)

“Go. He won’t hurt me,” she whispered.

Rodney backed away from them.

Only she felt the warm breath in her ear and heard the hissed words as Rodney disappeared around the corner. “Don’t count on it, my sweet beauty.”

Then her world went black as pain shot through her arm and to her brain, blocking all the signals mercifully.

The world is running out

like the ebbing sea;

fly far from it,

and seek safety

—Author unknown

7th century

The chill floor felt rough beneath her cheek. Astonishment that she was still alive pierced her foggy mind. Lifting her head a fraction of an inch, she shook it, trying to clear the cobwebs from her brain before daring to open her eyes. She made a vain attempt to stretch her limbs away from her curled body. None of them seemed to be functioning.

Opening her eyes gingerly, she saw Conn standing over her.

He was dressed in the brown and forest green of a Fiannic warrior. Soft leather boots laced up to his knees, matching the leather belt looped around his waist. He wore no sword, only a wicked-looking dagger strapped to his thigh. He gazed down at her with a look that drew the breath from her body.

She frowned, her voice barely a whisper, “Your wound?”

“Your brother is a less than competent swordsman even from the back.” His words were clipped.

“So much blood,” she murmured.

“I’m thankful my loving daughter was there to staunch the bleeding.” His voice dripped sarcasm as thick as honey.

Gelina blinked, bringing the room into focus. Moist rock walls circled them, their dripping surfaces pocked with craggy hollows and overhangs.

“Where are we?”

“You mean you don’t know?” He peered around the high-ceilinged chamber in mock puzzlement. “ ‘Tis so similar to the rock you crawled out from under that I assumed you would recognize it.”

She bit back a sharp retort.

He paced beside her, hands locked behind his back. “We are in a cavern, my dear.”

“I expected a dungeon, not a cave.”

He whirled on his heel. “Then you expected too much, didn’t you?”

“I fear I’ve always had that problem where you’re concerned,” she murmured. “Why are we in a cave?”

He pointed at her. “Because I wasn’t brooking any interference from anyone. Nimbus found you for me, but he’ll not tell me what to do with you. He still holds the illusion that there may be something redeemable in your wretched little heart.”

“And you hold no such illusions?” Gelina asked, her mouth tightening in a challenge.

“None whatsoever. That’s why we’re here. Alone and isolated, away from prying eyes and hearts.”

A chill ran down the length of her spine as Conn stared down at her, an awful light glowing in the depths of his eyes.

She spoke, prattling like a child to hide the fear spreading through her veins. “I’m not afraid of you. The worst that could happen has happened. You’ve found me. There is nothing to be afraid of anymore.”

Conn knelt beside her, tangling a powerful hand in her short curls. He brought her face close to his. “If you think the worst has happened to you, my dear, you have a very limited imagination.” His fingers tightened, and tears of pain sprang to her eyes.

“I cannot feel my arms,” she said, seeking to hide the sudden trembling of her limbs.

He loosed her hair disdainfully. “You’re bound well, milady, much like the way I was bound when your crony Eoghan Mogh tried to sell me into slavery to the Romans.” He smiled pleasantly. “Quite uncomfortable, is it not?”

“You tell me,” she snapped, his little games beginning to try her frazzled nerves.

With a swift move he pulled the dagger from his scabbard and cut the bonds from her arms. The tingling began, intensifying in her right arm until she cried out in pain.

“Oh, what did you do to me?” Gelina doubled over the arm, blinking back tears.

Conn jerked her to a sitting position. With one hand cupping her neck, he poured a burning liquid down her throat. She coughed and sputtered in a desperate attempt to catch her breath. Sticky amber dribbled down her chin.

Her eyes watered as he said coldly, “I wanted to make sure that you wouldn’t be using a sword for a while. Don’t fear. The bone isn’t broken.”

“Thanks a lot,” she sneered.

“I won’t break it unless I have to.” Conn sat back on his heels and took a deep swig from the canteen. “Did the whiskey help?”

“About as much as it did the time you lanced my wound. Not at all.”

She focused her blurred vision on a rock, unwilling to reveal how close the sobs were to spilling forth. The warmth burning in the pit of her stomach unleashed a wealth of regrets as she listened to the stranger’s cold voice beside her.

“And how is dear Eoghan?”

“Do you know him?”

“We’ve met.” Conn’s veiled eyes refused to reveal more.

“Maybe you should tell me how Eoghan is. You’re the one who probably knows if he and Rodney are still alive.” She sniffed. “Not that you would tell me the truth.”

He shrugged. “If they survived the battle with five thousand of my men, I’m sure they still walk the earth. We both know your brother has an unfortunate capacity for survival.”

“Not as unfortunate as yours.” Gelina bit the words off, fury making her careless.

Conn’s hands closed on her tunic. He lifted her off the floor and slammed her to the wall in one fluid motion. She struggled to catch her breath and stared at the dark hair curling over his whitened knuckles. He loosed her; his hands flexed on each side of her. He leaned forward, his knee bent between her legs. She could feel the heat radiating from his tensed body.

“Take care, milady,” he said softly. “You may pay dearly for every word you speak and every black deed you’ve done.”

His face was the face of a stranger in the dim light. Gelina met his glittering eyes, something inside her awakening and dying in the same breath as she realized for the first time what his fury made him capable of. Her eyes dropped to her own waist where a leather belt engraved with the MacRuairc name hung as a condemning admission of guilt.

She slid slowly to the floor, her back pressed to the cave wall. He crouched beside her and retied her wrists in front of her, his head bent only inches from her face. She stared at the dark curls interspersed with gray and fought an absurd desire to lean her head on his shoulder and beg for his forgiveness, plead for his mercy. He glanced up; the unguarded need in her eyes caught him unaware. Without another word he rose and stalked out of the chamber. Lying back on the cold stone floor, she closed her eyes wearily, making her mind a careful blank.

Conn stepped outside the cavern and collapsed against the rocks. Covering his face with both hands, he wondered what had possessed him to bring her here. It had been an effortless assumption that once he got his hands on her, the rest would come easily. It was unbearable to admit to himself that he wasn’t even sure what the rest was. The murdering bitch that had haunted his dreams through the heated summer lay inside the cave at the mercy of his every whim.

But her smooth skin was tanned honey brown from the sun. She struggled to hide her fear of him behind eyes fringed with dark lashes. Her wide mouth spoke without words of a beauty he could never deny. Even the auburn brilliance of her short-cropped hair could not hide it. Beneath the dusty leather of her garments lay the sweet flesh of a woman.

She brought out the worst in him. Never had he dreamed that he would break the Fiannic oaths he held as dear as his own life. He had sworn to avenge the deaths of his fellow warriors, but he had let her live in a moment of weakness. And now she had killed again. For the thousandth time he wondered what he had done to her that had driven her away from him that cool spring night. He stared at the stars, choking back a curse. He could not deny it. Conn of the Hundred Battles was afraid.

* * *

“Conn!” The voice floated out to where he dozed on a note of desperation.

He untangled himself from his bedroll and flew into the cavern, his hand on his dagger. Gelina lay where he had left her, muscles rigid and teeth clenched, staring at her leg.

“Get it off me!”

Her wide eyes watched in terrified fascination as a huge spider inched up her thigh, its fuzzy legs the span of a man’s hand. Unspilled tears welled between her sooty lashes.

An unpleasant smile crossed his features. “You have no fondness for spiders, eh?”

Shooting him a look of pure hatred, she commanded, “Take it away.”

Crossing his arms, he said softly, “Say please, and I shall give it some thought.”

“Please.” Gelina choked out the word, despising herself even as she said it but despising him more. Her eyes never left the spider.

Conn leaned over and flicked the spider from her leg with the point of his dagger. Her body sagged in relief.

“I need to get up,” she said.

“Why?” he asked, sheathing the dagger.

A faint pink graced her cheeks. “I have . . . needs to attend to.”

Conn feigned ignorance. “Needs?”

Her flush deepened. “Must I spell it out?”

“Perhaps.” He smiled innocently, enjoying her discomfiture.

She turned her face to the floor and shook her head. With one hand, he grabbed the back of her tunic, pulling her roughly to her feet.

His voice held no trace of laughter. “I shall untie you. You have three minutes. If you try anything stupid, it had better work because if it doesn’t, I’m going to call back your furry little friend.”

Gelina swallowed as he unknotted her bonds and shoved her out of the cave.

In barely a minute she reappeared, the moonlight behind her throwing her lithe figure into silhouette. She approached him, holding out her wrists in surrender for the bonds to be replaced. Conn took both of her hands in his and turned them upward, his broad thumbs tracing the roughened skin. Gelina bowed her head in a vain attempt to still the sudden trembling of her lower lip.

“I guess I don’t have to ask what you did with your summer,” he said.

Her palms were scarred with a fine line of calluses from long nights of gripping sweaty reins. She met his eyes evenly. Capturing both of her hands in one of his, he reached up and ran a finger over her grubby, tearstained cheek. His thumb traced the curve of her lower lip.

“Your wound is bleeding again,” she said mechanically, unable to bear the mockery of his tender touch.

He loosed her as if she had burned him, placing a surprised hand on the stain spreading over the shoulder of his tunic.

“I would dress it for you but I don’t think my arm would work that well.”

“I would just as soon let a viper dress it, thank you.” Even as Conn spoke, he removed his tunic and ripped it into narrow strips. He wrapped a strand of it around his shoulder, trying to knot it under his arm.

Gelina crossed her arms to stifle the growing desire to help him as he struggled with the awkward bandage. Her lips twitched as he tied it for the third time only to have it slide to the floor in a defiant heap. He cursed loudly and imaginatively.

“You’ll bleed to death before you get it tied.”

Without awaiting his protest, she snatched the bandage with her left hand. His eyes narrowed in a silent dare to strangle him with the innocent scrap of cloth. Biting her lower lip, she looped it around his shoulder, tangling it hopelessly around her fingers. Shooting pains traveled up her right shoulder and down her side. They both sighed in exasperation.

An idea crossed her mind. “Kneel in front of me,” she commanded.

“You’d love that, wouldn’t you?” He stood even straighter, ignoring the blood trickling down his bare chest.

“Bleed to death then. See if I care.” Gelina shot the words back at him, her patience reaching its limit.

He stood for a moment longer, then got to his knees, back straight and eyes furious. “Finish it.”

With both hands working at that level, she fashioned a neat little bandage, securing it with a vicious jerk. A low growl from Conn’s throat made her wonder if she had gone too far.

He sat on the ground, stretching his long legs in front of him, his eyes never leaving her. She sat in front of him, crossing her legs, fighting to convey a calm she was far from feeling. She wondered what thoughts lurked behind his opaque eyes but did not have long to wonder.

“Your brother is insane,” he said as if commenting on the weather.

“ ‘Tis a lie,” she replied, controlling her voice with effort.

He spoke deliberately. “If you were my sister, I wouldn’t have left you with me.”

“He had no choice.”

“Didn’t he? If you were a nodding acquaintance, I wouldn’t have left you with me.”

The quiet assurance in his voice sent a shiver down her spine. She averted her eyes, refusing to let him see the fear nestled within.