“In one week I’ll be back for him. I expect him to be healthy and strong. If my child dies, yours will suffer a worse fate at the hands of my men. All of them,” he said.
Cecily nodded slowly, as if it took every ounce of strength she had left just to do that.
A quick squeeze of the boy’s hand was the only farewell Fraener offered before turning to leave the room. Using her power to fuel her muscles and speed her movements, Neala retreated to the kitchen. By the time Fraener walked through the doorway of the bedroom she was filling a pan with water. He paused long enough to look her up and down with a lascivious grin but said nothing as he walked out the front door. A shiver traveled through her, making her skin crawl.
Shaking off her unease, Neala moved to where she could see out the window. The warriors mounted up and rode off. She watched until they disappeared into the forest. Except for their tracks they left the land untouched.
Slowly Neala’s hammering heart returned to a normal rhythm. She had more than half expected them to steal whatever they wanted and burn everything in their wake. It was good to know they could show restraint, even if it was only for the sake of their leader’s son. It meant they were at least part human, but more importantly, it meant they had a weakness.
18
At her exhausted ma’s request Neala made the Dane a special tea that would help ease his pain. She preferred to let him writhe all night but she needed him sound asleep. Even worse, she was going to have to clean him and dress his wound. Her ma had collapsed as soon as the warriors left and her da had carried her off to bed. It was better that way. She didn’t want her parents near such a dangerous man.
Arms loaded with clean rags and a bucket of warm water, Neala forced her reluctant feet to carry her into the room. The boy smelled like sweat and blood but thankfully the stench of decay was gone. Her stomach dropped as she realized she was going to have to undress him. His head turned toward her and he regarded her with the brightest blue eyes she had ever seen. They were lovely, like the ocean on a calm day. It was wrong that a murderer could have such lovely eyes.
Looking quickly away, she busied herself with arranging the towels and bucket on the night stand. “I have to get yer clothes off,” she told him.
“Really? We just met,” he said.
Heat flushed to her cheeks and her eyes flew open. Anger chased the embarrassment away. “I guess ye’re feeling better.”
“Yeah, but I’d be this charming on my deathbed. Then again, I guess this kind of would have been my deathbed, if it wasn’t for your mother that is,” he said.
She liked it a lot better when he’d been in too much pain to talk. “She did what she had to so yer da wouldn’t slaughter us.”
The mirth drained from the young man’s eyes and his smile withered. He looked away as if ashamed. “I’m sorry. I was only trying to lighten things up since you’re about to see me naked,” he said. From the tone of his voice it sounded like he meant it. His sincerity melted Neala’s icy demeanor ever so slightly, but it didn’t last.
“So ye wouldn’t be sorry if I wasn’t about to strip ye,” she said.
“No, I truly am sorry. I’ll just stop talking now.”
“That would be great.”
Her heart thudded harder as she looked down and contemplated how to start getting his clothing off. There was so much blood that his clothes were ruined. The wound had closed up some and the flesh around it looked healthier. Still, she could see layers of meat and muscle because the wound was gaping open. Such things didn’t bother her. With healers for parents she was used to it. Getting a strange boy naked who happened to be one of the enemy, now that bothered her.
“I should probably take this off first. It’s kind of hard to undo,” he said. His hands fumbled with his belt and Neala suddenly felt faint.
“Please tell me ye have something on under yer breeches,” she said.
His eyebrows pushed up into his blond curls as his eyes widened. “Of course I do. I’m not one of those savage Scotsmen,” he said.
Laughter bubbled over Neala’s lips before she could stop it. It was humorous that a Dane would call anyone else savage. But the funniest part was that the rumors about the Scottish were true. Neala had heard they didn’t put much stock in undergarments, at least not the men.
Clamping her teeth against the laughter, she helped the boy remove his belt. She had to peel most of his clothing off, including the shirt of leather armor. He winced and cried out a few times. She resisted the urge to apologize. It bothered her that she cared about causing him pain.
By the time she washed all the blood from him, every one of the rags she had brought were soiled and the water was red. His fit body was covered in bruises and cuts. Neala knew battle had to be rough, but this seemed a bit excessive.
“Ye have so many bruises,” she murmured. She hadn’t meant to say it aloud. The words had slipped out.
Rather than grin proudly like she had expected he would, he blushed and looked away. The muscles of his jaw stood out as he clenched his teeth. “My father and his soldiers do their best to help me practice and become stronger. Sometimes practice gets a bit rough. Nothing I can’t handle,” he said in a bold voice that failed to sound brave.
A most unwanted pang of sympathy stabbed Neala. “Yer own da did this to ye?” She clapped a hand over her mouth but it was too late, the words were out.
The surprise that filled his eyes caught her completely off guard. Gone was the young man fighting to be clever and brave and pretend he wasn’t in a world of pain. Now he just looked like an astounded boy who couldn’t believe someone was showing him compassion.
“I’m sorry, it’s just ye know, he’s yer da,” she said.
Gathering up the rags to keep herself busy, she looked away from those blue eyes that had now grown tender. The cleverness and arrogance she could handle, but not the tenderness. It made him seem a little less like a monster and she didn’t like that.
“We’re a race of warriors, it’s our way,” he said with a sneer.
“Ye don’t sound like ye want to be a warrior,” she said as she wandered around the room and picked up the supplies she had brought.
“Of course I want to be a warrior, I’m a Dane,” he said, but his tone was bitter.
Neala had wanted to be a warrior for so long that it was hard for her to imagine someone who didn’t want to be one. The thrill of challenge, the sound of steel ringing upon steel, and the chance to test one’s skill. Just thinking about it made her kind of euphoric. But then her da hadn’t forced the life down her throat, he had forced another one entirely upon her. Since she didn’t know how to shield her heart from sympathizing she did the only thing she did know how to do and shielded her power from him.
“It’s getting cold in here,” he said as a shiver ran through him.
Neala froze in place. Was it possible he was actually sensitive enough to have felt her shielding? No, that was crazy. Danes were savages who had no connection to such things.
“If ye’re able to move over here I’ll make up the bed,” she said as she motioned to a chair beneath the window.
Doing something kind for him was the last thing she wanted to do, but if she didn’t then her ma would. Right now her ma needed to rest, not waste more of her energy on someone who she should have let die. Her da wouldn’t do it, of that Neala was certain, but her ma would likely get up in the middle of the night to check on the boy. It was the woman’s nature; she wouldn’t be able to resist the urge.
The young man struggled to sit up and blew out a sharp breath between his teeth as he winced. His hand went to the dressed wound at his side and hovered over it as if afraid to touch it. The legends had always described Danes as being tougher than steel, impervious to pain. This young man didn’t seem so tough. He swung his feet off the edge of the bed and swayed as if he might fall back onto it. Neala kind of hoped he would because he’d probably hit his head on the wall. Unfortunately, he remained upright.
With a sigh, she resigned herself to the fact that she was going to have to help him. This had already taken far too long. Doing her best to ignore the odor of sweat and old blood, she ducked under his arm and lifted him from the bed. While he was nowhere near the size of his da, he was still solid muscle and weighed more than at least two sheep. Neala poured power into her legs, back, and arms and lifted him easily. This way it took barely any effort to carry him across the room and deposit him into the chair more gently than she would have preferred.
“You’re strong for such a small woman,” he said.
Her teeth ground together against a reply and she turned back to the bed. There was little she hated more than being berated and thought less of because she was a woman. But what did she expect from a Dane?
She removed the blood-soaked blanket and replaced it with blankets from the chest at the foot of the bed. The scent of the pine chest wafted up from the blankets but there was another scent mingled with it as well. It was minty and woodsy; the scent of her brother. She remembered this quilt. Her ma had made it for Lorcan one winter solstice. Blinking back tears, she tore the blanket from the bed and replaced it with another.
The boy must have seen the tears in her eyes when she helped him back onto the bed because his expression softened.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he said.
Sliding out from under his arm, Neala backed away. “Then ye shouldn’t have come here,” she said.
A few rapid blinks banished her tears and a deep breath helped calm her spiking power. The need to be away from this young man and back in the comforting presence of her Order was all but consuming her. They needed to know she was all right, even if she wasn’t quite sure she was. She picked up the mug of tea and turned back to the Dane.
For a moment he looked near tears himself, then his features transformed into the look of a carefree, tough young man. Maybe she had imagined his remorse, probably.
“Drink this. It will help with the pain,” she said as she handed him the mug.
He accepted it and held it up to his nose. His nostrils flared as he sniffed it and his brow furrowed. “What is it?”
“An herbal mixture of me ma’s. Ye needn’t worry, we wouldn’t kill ye now after she’s gone to so much trouble to save ye,” she said.
Most of it was true. The tea was her ma’s mixture, she had just added a little something extra to make him sleep. If she was going to leave her parents in the house with him, she wanted him knocked out. The part about not killing him—well she hadn’t decided on that yet.
The young man looked long and hard at her before nodding and chugging the tea down. He handed the mug back and she started for the door, pausing to grab her brother’s quilt off the trunk.
“Do you have anything to eat? I’m starving,” he said.
A muscle in her check started to twitch. After a moment of struggling to control her anger, she turned back, ready to let him have it. But he had already collapsed onto the bed and was fast asleep. There may be a chance she had mixed it a bit strong. Oh well.
19
The sound of her da’s snoring launched Neala off the bed and out the window. She hit the wet grass running.
Finally!
It had started to feel like her da would never go to sleep.
The night was so dark that she had to switch her vision so she could see by the energy in living things. Rain was pouring down in huge drops that soaked through her clothes in moments. The night air was warm enough that she didn’t care. It was the kind of rain that wasn’t going to let up. She knew she should go back for her cloak but she didn’t want to take the time. The need to be with her Order—one of them in particular—was too much to fight anymore.
She slowed her pace once she reached the barn door so she wouldn’t scare the horses. The two black and white geldings stalled together barely stirred at her passing. Dubh’s head lifted as soon as she took his bridle from the hook on the wall. His big, sleepy eyes blinked several times as he put his head over the stall door. The pounding of the rain on the roof made Neala feel bad for him.
“Sorry lad, I have to take ye out into the storm,” she said.
Dubh snorted and started bobbing his head. She knew that gesture well. It was his way of showing impatience. Neala grinned as she put the bridle on him. The expression felt strange upon her lips, as if she shouldn’t be capable of smiling after today.
“I should have known ye wouldn’t mind.”
In one easy leap, she was on his back and they were riding off into the thick, wet darkness. Using her foot, she closed the barn door behind her to keep it from rattling in the wind and giving her absence away. The plan was to be back long before her parents awoke. To make sure, she encouraged Dubh into a trot once they reached the trees.
The forest had an ominous feel to it. Bumps rose along Neala’s arms, and her back and neck crawled with the sensation of being watched. She was fairly certain there was no one there but that didn’t help her shake the feeling. The energy of every living thing in the forest was muted and smeared together. Someone could be hiding in the undergrowth or behind a tree. The rain washed away energy trails.
Every tree held a potential threat behind it and every twist in the path made her heart beat faster. Her power built so much that it felt like bugs were crawling beneath her skin, trying to get out. She couldn’t concentrate well enough to slow her breathing and control her power. It was a good thing the Danes couldn’t see energy because she had to look like a lighthouse in the night.
The desire to hide had her hunched over Dubh’s neck, trying to appear as small as she could. She was also starting to get cold and the stallion was putting off a lot of heat. But more than his heat was comforting. He wasn’t just a familiar friend who represented safety. The feeling he gave her was similar to the comfort Irial and Liam could instill in her. The how or why didn’t matter so much right now as the effect. Her power receded enough that the pressure dropped. She no longer felt like she was going to explode.