Maire (20 page)

“If the winter’s been this harsh on the lowlands of Gleannmara, where food can be grown, you can be certain the Cairthan have suffered more.”

“Crom’s toes, Maire, he’ll have you pitying the scoundrels.” Declan snorted behind her. “Soon the smiths will be beating our swords into plough blades, and we’ll be staring at an ox’s hind half the day long.”

“Better than being one, I’d say.”

The glib remark was out before Rowan could squash it. The sound of Declan’s outraged cry at the insult was underscored by the sound of his steel coming out of its bronze scabbard. Rowan had no intention of provoking a fight, much less engaging in one, but old ways were hard to leave behind.
Forgive me, Father.

He kept his back to Declan as the latter raced up beside him on a shaggy steed.

“Now, Welshman, feel the bite of a man’s blade.”

Declan raised his sword, threatening, waiting for Rowan to respond in kind. Counting heavily on his knowledge of Celtic honor, he made no move toward his own weapon.

“Curse you, man, draw your sword.” Declan nudged his wiry steed closer to the stallion and spat upon Rowan’s leg.

Rowan pulled up Shahar and glanced down at the spittle glistening on laces of his boots. Another time, another place, and Declan of Drumkilly would be dead by now.

“I apologize. My remark was uncalled for. I provoked you into anger. On my account, you’re willing to spill blood… possibly your own.”

At this passive response, Declan glanced at Maire uncertainly. “He insults me again.”

“I mean no insult, Declan, and I certainly will not fight you… not when it was I who provoked you.”

“Declan spat on you,” Maire pointed out. She sat stiff in her saddle, her gaze shifting from one to the other of them.

“Well,” Declan added, “if that’s all that stops you, take this!”

Rowan braced for the impact of the blade the young warrior swung at him, flat side out. But before it made contact, the clash of steel against steel cut through the air. Maire was off her horse and between them, holding her upstart captain at bay.

“His god will not allow him to fight over the foolishness of vanity, but my mother’s gods don’t care if I deflate
your
overblown pride with the prick of my sword.”

Declan flinched as if he actually felt the angry strike of Maire’s warning. His lip curling, he sneered with the bravado of a wounded dog. “And now he hides behind his god and a woman. He has no more fight in him than that Welsh priest when I took this ring.”

Rowan prayed against the raging swell coursing through him, the clamor for revenge. It was bad enough Declan
assaulted his honor, without reminding him of the injustice to his friend. The old Rowan would have already cut the ring from the braggart’s finger and sent it back to Justinian, finger included. The tension in Rowan’s voice was witness to the tug-of-war raging among his emotions.

“I stand by my apology. I was wrong.” He took a deep, steadying breath and released it along with his will for retaliation. “I owe you some manner of retribution, some honor price.”

“Such as?”

“For the rest of this day I shall serve you, save deeds contrary to my faith.”

“The king of Gleannmara serves only the high king!” Maire objected. “Such as you are, you
are
king.” The queen’s expression was nothing less than incredulous.

“The King of all kings served His people.”

Declan smiled. He had the look of cat ready to toy with its cornered prey. “See, little sister, his god condones it.”

He’d rather take a whipping than serve this young fool, but such was the consequence of an unfettered tongue. Rowan could well imagine the advantage he’d just given the Scot. Of all his faults, this was the hardest to tame.

“What will you have me do, good sir?” He ignored the way Maire’s incredulity turned to disillusionment. For a moment, he’d hoped she might understand, but it was clear that she thought him a coward as well.

“I’ll have your stallion for one.”

“Shahar is a spirited animal.”

“There was never a horse born that Declan of Drumkilly couldn’t master.” He slid off his smaller mount and waited for Rowan to dismount. When Rowan took the other horse’s reins in exchange for the stallion’s, the young cock stopped him from swinging onto the gelding’s back.

“Take him to the rear and lead him.”

“You go too far, Declan,” Maire warned, clearly perturbed
by the way events were unfolding, yet at a loss as to how to handle them.

“Once I am certain that Shahar will have you.”

Rowan had raised and trained both the stallion and its mate, Tamar. He’d groomed Tamar so that his mother could ride over the fields of Emrys, for the Welsh in her was as fond of horseflesh as the Scot. While Rowan did not mind eating the dust of the entourage, he did object to the possibility that Shahar might bolt away with, or without, its strange rider. On this uneven ground, a runaway horse could easily stumble and break a limb, necessitating it be put to death.

His mouth a wide show of teeth, Declan vaulted up on Shahar’s back. Before Rowan could say a word, the impetuous Scot shoved him aside with an unexpected kick to the chest and gigged Shahar with his heels. The stallion gave a mighty leap and bolted forward, nearly unseating its rider in the process. A round of mixed laughter and cheers followed them.

True to the equestrian reputation of his ancestry, Declan recovered, at least enough to hold on for what would have been the ride of his life, for there was no stopping the indignant Shahar. The stallion was trained to foot signals and commands, not the cursing and kicking of its current rider. It ran all the harder for the pull on its bit, as if to escape the maniac on its back.

The horse was about to plunge into a dense forest by the time Rowan recovered his footing and raised his fingers to his lips. His sharp whistle split the air, startling the laughing queen beside him. As though running into an invisible wall, Shahar stopped abruptly, feet jutted out, hooves digging up the turf beneath them. Declan continued forward only to be stopped by something of more substance. An oak.

“Care for your servants, Maire, and they will care for you. Mistreat them, even without the intention, and wind up like yon Declan, out of control and at their mercy.”

“And huggin’ a tree like his maithre’s breast.” Eochan came
up behind Rowan and clapped him on the back. “The lad’s worrisome as a gnat sometimes, friend, but he’s good-hearted, for all that.”

Rowan stepped forward and caught the reins of the stallion that galloped back to him. He wasn’t so sure of the latter assessment. “Does a man who steals a ring from a priest deserve such praise?”

“What need has a priest for such a bauble as that?” Eochan laughed. “Aye, me brother gave the man a scare, running up the stone tower and demandin’ he fill the sack with anything of value, but no harm came from it, save the man near crossed himself to death.”

“The priest was my friend. I
gave
Justinian that ring.” Still, Rowan was grateful that his friend had been spared rough treatment, even if the bellowing tattooed warriors had frightened him. It wasn’t a sight such a quiet soul was accustomed to.

“Ach, then. That’s between you and him.” Eochan nodded with new understanding.

“That animal is kin to the pooka!” Declan, his body barked and bleeding from his encounter with the tree, approached, sword raised over his head. “And by my father’s gods, I’ll have blood for blood!”

“Then you’ll take mine first.”

Sword still sheathed, Rowan stepped in the path of the enraged Scot.

“With pleasure.” Declan let out a lusty war whoop and broke into a full run, straight at Rowan.

Maire moved to intervene, but Rowan quickly shoved her aside, into Eochan, and ran forward to meet his opponent in what appeared to be a suicidal charge. With timing the difference between life and death, he waited until he was a sword’s length from Declan. As the latter launched a deadly swing, one that could cleave Rowan’s head from his shoulders, Rowan dove straight for Declan’s legs.

Declan twisted and went down, carried by the momentum
of his swing. The last of his outrage erupted in a loud grunt as he struck the ground. Rowan was on him in a flash, tossing away the sword, which fell from the man’s hand, and twisting that same hand behind his back.

“Still, lad,” he warned, as Declan recovered enough to struggle. “I’ve no desire to break your arm, but I will if you don’t come to your God-given senses.”

Declan growled through his clenched teeth and squirmed, helpless as a newborn calf. “I wouldn’t have killed the beast. Crom’s toes, I’m not that daft!”

“’Tis hard to judge by your actions.”

“I vow, you’ll regret this, Emrys.”

“I already do,” Rowan assured him. He’d added insult to injury where Declan’s pride was concerned, but he truly didn’t know what the hot-tempered warrior might do. He raised his voice so that the onlookers might hear. “And for that, I apologize, Drumkilly. But I’d not have you kill or maim my horse.”

“I’d have you bash in Drumkilly’s head, but there’s no metal nor stone hard enough for the task,” Maire remarked a few feet away in complete disgust. “That is, unless you use your own.”

A ripple of laughter swept through the troop, relieving the taut grasp of tension infecting the men.

“Mayhap our queen is right.” Rowan shoved to his feet.

Declan declined the hand offered, so Rowan took up Shahar’s reins. “As I was going to say before you left us so quickly, Shahar is a highly trained warhorse and sensitive to signals of the hand and feet, so avoid irrational or untoward motions that might confuse and spook him. He expects his rider to be in control as well.”

“White like that with moon eyes,” Declan derided. “I still say he’s kin to a pooka.” He stared at the stallion, clearly in a muddle of second thought. “It isn’t fit that our king should be seen walking behind like a mongrel, no matter how he deserves it,” the warrior said at last. “I’ll have my honor price in some other way.”

Rowan clapped the man on the back. “You remained on his back longer than anyone else has, save myself.”

His rage and humiliation unassuaged, Declan nodded and turned to his own mount. Once the Scot was astride the smaller beast, Rowan leapt to Shahar’s back and took up the reins. The horse nickered and tossed its head, its white-gold mane shimmering like sunlight on rippled water.

“You should have made him apologize. You are king.”

Rowan turned to Maire in surprise.

“A king serves justice. Declan suffered enough by his own hand without my adding to it. To inflict more would be injustice.”

Maire stared, as if to see beyond the serene mask he wore, to the heart of him. For all her warriorlike appearance, she stared with the wonder of a child. To his surprise, she succeeded, for Rowan suddenly felt naked, exposed for all he was to this woman.

She saw, sure enough, but from the puzzlement in her gaze, she did not yet understand. For reasons deeper than his desire to spread God’s Word and ways, Rowan wanted her to understand him—and that unnerved him more than any blade.

T
he night passed cool, with winter’s memory still fresh on its mind.

Maire chose a protective niche in the increasingly rocky terrain of the higher Wicklows. An enemy would need wings to attack them from one side, or a suicidal wish to come head on through the only entrance. Although a watch was appointed, the night was uneventful, save Declan’s vengeful retaliation in having Rowan serve him as a slave.

Maire watched the Welshman brush the last remnant of leaves from his body before mounting Shahar. He’d slept without cover last night, sheltered only by the clothes on his back and that which nature provided, while Declan enjoyed a soft bed of Emrys’s blanket and cloak. Each time the fire died, Declan summoned Rowan to scavenge for more wood, to fetch him another noggin of beer, or to boil him some rabbit to go with the roast venison the rest of them ate.

It was so degrading, Maire stepped in twice to end the folly, but each time the Welshman ran her through with a warning look sharper than steel itself. For all its thrust, his words were humble. “I do service to my word, Maire. No man is exempt from the consequences of a wrong doing.”

“But you were right. Declan is an ox’s behind. And with each order he gives, he bellows the truth even louder.”

“Then let him convict himself, for I will not be his judge.”

From that point on, Declan, well within earshot, was at least less eager to humiliate this strange new king of theirs. Indeed, even the derisive snickers and comments about
Rowan’s lack of backbone—about that which made him male—diminished. It was a show to watch, as one of the O’Croinin or the Muirdach returned from nature’s call with another turn of wood for the fire. All the while Eochan swore he was hotter than his brother’s boiled rabbit and tossed his blanket over to where Rowan made his bed.

For all his madness, Rowan ap Emrys was earning the respect and support of the men who’d taken him hostage, and their queen’s respect as well. He’d done it, not by intimidation but by submission. It contradicted all logic Maire knew, but it was true, regardless. For the first time, in a muddled sort of way, she was beginning to see that Brude might be right. After all, there was more than one way to Tara’s heart, besides that which she knew.

Her mind meandered back to the present, tuning into the conversation between Rowan and Declan. The younger warrior clapped Rowan on the back that morning and declared his honor price paid in full. Now he rode beside his former adversary and sought all he might learn of Shahar and Tamar’s breed and training.

They came originally from the east and were bred as warhorses, not just to carry men into battle but also to participate by protecting their master with their hooves. They moved into defensive positions along with other warriors on like steeds, so that the rider was least likely to be attacked from a blind side.

“Aye, the training looks odd with a horse by itself, as if it were being taught to dance, but a force of them in motion is a formidable sight to behold. I suppose fighting on the border enabled me to see the best techniques of all sides save one.”