Healer (13 page)

“I do not deserve such honor.” Rory put his hands upon her shoulders.

Heaven help her, Brenna savored their touch instead of pulling away as she should.

“What do you
see
now, Brenna?”

“I see you kissing me.” Brenna stopped. She dared not look further, for what she saw would come to be and it mustn’t. Not this soon.

“Are you enjoying it?” He pulled her closer, without so much as a wince of pain.

She went willingly, allowing his shirt to soak her clothing. “Most heartily, sir.”

A half sigh, half laugh escaped the lips only inches from hers. “There is no woman like you on this side of Heaven.”

She was going to swoon. It was the heat. His closeness. The fact that she’d stopped breathing.

“And who am I, then, Brenna?”

“The man I love.” There. The truth was out, and she was about to drown in it most willingly.

“And who is he, my sweet?” His lips brushed hers, hesitantly. As if he was almost afraid of what she might say.

“The man I will marry when the time comes, if you’ll have me and the son I’ll bear you.”

Rory stepped away so suddenly Brenna swayed and stumbled. She caught herself on the candle shelf, overturning one. Hot wax spilled over her hand. “Oh!”

“Brenna!” Rory seized at her hand and began to blow on it. “Forgive me,
a stór.
”

But the damage was done. Rory’s reaction to her heart’s desire slapped her as cold and harsh as winter’s breath.

“It was a foolish notion.” She jerked her hand away, but she couldn’t help the tears glazing her eyes. The Devil take them. “But you asked me what I saw, and I told it as I saw it. It isn’t set in stone.” She sniffed hard and wiped eyes on her sleeve.
Or is it?

“But you have a gift. You said you saw what I saw as a child when you held me … and now this.” Rory tried to close the distance between them, but she dodged him and reached for the pile of clothing she’d discarded.

“I also dreamed I could fly, but I’m not about to jump off a crag. Not
all
dreams come true.” Only those she saw through the eyes of her soul.

“What if we want them to come true?”

Brenna froze in disbelief.

Father God, my heart cannot bear such leaps and lows.
Her things clutched to her chest, she straightened and turned on bare feet.
“We?”

Rory held up his hands in a show of surrender. “You have bewitched me, Brenna of the Hallowed Hills. You drew my soul from the depths of hell and breathed life into me with your song. You nourished my body with your herbs and loving care. It was for you that I came back from death’s door. And it is only for you that I will remain on This Side, for I cannot imagine a future without you as a part of it.” Rory glanced at the floor. “If you would have me, half the man that I am.”

The torture in his voice pulled Brenna to him. She caressed his cheek. “You recover by the day, Rory. I promise you that you will be all you were before. You must believe me. Have I failed you yet?”

“Brenna, it is I who will fail you. I will give you no son.”

“Of course you will. I’ve seen it.”

“By my father’s breath, must I say it, woman? My wounds have stripped me of my manhood!”

Brenna’s thoughts reeled, condemned by the agony fueling his anger and frustration. Father God, forgive her. Brother Martin was right. She had harmed Rory most cruelly.

“I have
seen
our child. Not with the eyes of a dream, but with the eyes of my soul,” she assured him. “As you recover, so will your manhood.”

“How can you know?”

Don’t make me tell you.
Brenna looked away, but Rory cupped her chin, turning her traitorous face back to his.

“What”—he hurled each word with accusation—“have … you …
done
to me?”

“Nothing that cannot be undone this day,” she managed. Now that she believed him to be honorable.

He seized her shoulders with a strength that astonished her.
“What,
Brenna?”

“I put herbs in your food and drink to protect myself.”

With a growl, he thrust her away and paced along the edge of the pool, not unlike Faol.

“I took you in as a stranger. I saved your life. But until I came to know and trust you, I did what I had to do. What I will do no more.”

“Indeed you will not,” he snorted, shoving his fingers through his hair. “I’ll prepare my own food from now on.”

“No, Rory, you’ll think about the logic behind my actions and then you’ll see that what I did was right, given the circumstances. And you will believe me when I say that from this day forward, I’ll hold no more secrets from you.”

Still, when he turned to face her, suspicion clouded his face. Hurtful as it was, Brenna motioned toward the passage. “Now, you go up ahead of me. Should you become lightheaded, I’ll be behind to catch you as I can.”

Since Brenna had revealed her meddling with his food and natural desires, dreams Ronan prayed would not come true plagued his sleep. There were visions of Brenna in his arms, warm with desire, radiant … of their coming together and her laughing, no longer Brenna but some wild-haired witchwoman mocking his manhood. Yet when he shook off the nightmare, there she lay a short distance away, sleeping innocent as a lamb in the bed she’d maintained by the fire since revealing her secret. He missed the simple pleasure of awakening to her warmth. Of her touching his forehead and cheek to check for fever.

Now his fever was of the kind that made her decision to make up her bed by the fire a wise one. He rose up on one elbow to watch her. Next to Brenna, Faol opened one eye but made no threatening move or sound. Her lips curled ever so slightly upward. Whatever she dreamed was pleasant. Perhaps she saw him kissing her.

Ronan scowled. Her visions were unnerving at best … if there was anything to them. Perhaps Tarlach had once felt similar anxiety before he went over the edge of reason and fell into murderous insanity.

Faol heaved a sigh deep enough to carry the burdens of the world with it and rose to his feet. After padding across the distance between them, he nudged Ronan for a pet.

“I’ll do all in my power to protect her,” he promised the wolf. Oddly, the two of them had become friends as Ronan’s recovery progressed. At least as long as Ronan kept his voice and manner amiable in Brenna’s presence.

Once Tarlach met Brenna, the old man couldn’t help but love her, Ronan thought. Especially since she had no desire to lead her own clan against the O’Byrnes. Such a match was indeed the answer to the prophecy of peace … without bloodshed.

Although, given her fears about his male nature and the hostility of his clan toward her, better he marry her as Rory first. If he told her who he was, he might lose her forever. After a few days, he’d tell her the truth. By then, he’d have proven his love for her was real. And if her vision was real, she’d be with child. An heir that would unite the two clans. Then he could leave her in the safety of the cave while he went to prepare his family for her arrival.

Ronan scratched Faol’s head absently, glad the wolf could not read his mind. Bad enough his conscience attacked him. But it wasn’t as if she hadn’t deceived him, he told himself. And his reason for lying was as valid as hers. More so. This time, his heart was at stake.

Chapter Eleven

A full year of marital bliss and Rhianon had yet to conceive the son who would become the O’Byrne, the chief of Glenarden. But this year she would have the blessing of her goddess
and
that of the church for Lady’s Day. She’d invited Brother Martin to give a Mass here to celebrate the Annunciation, when the Virgin Mary received the blessed news that she would bear a son. Even now the cooks were busy preparing the feast and painting boiled eggs to adorn the Lord’s Table.

“Careful not to anger the goddess, child,” Keena whispered in warning. Not that her nurse had to speak lowly, for Tarlach’s snoring could be heard through the thin wall separating his bedchamber from the one that had been hers and Caden’s before Ronan’s death. Rhianon had turned it into a chapel to please the Christian God.

Very much aware of her old nurse’s scrutiny, Rhianon carefully, reverently, took the figurine of the fertility goddess Ostara out of the velvet pouch she kept hidden beneath the mattress of the bed.

Keena came closer to see it. “The Christian God is not the
only
jealous god. Ceridwen will not like this.”

But Ostara was the goddess of fertility whose legendary pet rabbit gave her colored eggs. Rhianon carefully hid the disk-like Ostara in an arrangement of fresh-cut flowers next to Ceridwen, triple goddess of the Celts. “She has had her chance, Keena. Perhaps Ceridwen needs help.”

Standing back, Rhianon made sure the visiting priest would only see the flowers on the small altar shelf beneath the tapestry of the cross Rhianon had made. He’d approve the banding together of the deities no more than Keena.

“Faith is in the heart, not in some object or image,” he’d chided her when she expressed astonishment that there was no image of God Himself.

Well, she’d prayed to get with child to His invisible God ever since Martin had been tutoring the Gowrys hostage, and all to no avail. Symbols worked better.

“If only I had a picture of the Blessed Virgin like Arthur has on his shield.” Rhianon sighed. “That would show God the fervency of my desire.”

“What would a Father God know of women’s travails?” Keena disdained. “Common sense tells me not a thing.”

“The priest said He gave a woman more than
thrice
my age a son, Keena. Enough now! I will have a son to inherit this kingdom, no matter which god grants my desire.”

Keena drew up to as full a height as her hunched frame would allow, her dark eyes glittering. “I love you too much to lead you astray, Rhianon. ’Tis the source of my words and has been since the day you were born and handed into my care. Your desires are mine.”

“And I love you for it.” Rhianon rushed to embrace her nurse. “But I am desperate. You know I am.” She smoothed Keena’s wild, uncombed hair away from her withered face. “I need this babe.”

“And, by the goddess, you shall have it, as your mother delivered you. I will see to it. And don’t forget Heming.”

Rhianon sobered at the mention of the hunter and soldier of fortune. She had not seen him since the Witch’s End.

“I saw him this morning before you awoke. He asked for you.”

Of course he would. One indiscretion when she was but sixteen and the oaf acted as if he had some claim on her. Rhianon had thought him still off with Arthur. The man was a worrisome shadow that could not be detached.

“Then I shall see him when … I see him,” Rhianon finished. The hairy Welshman knew things about her that Caden had only begun to discover. And some that her husband would never know. “Surely—” Rhianon broke off at the creak of the door. “At the feast tonight,” she finished, walking toward it.

Not certain what—or whom—to expect, Rhianon yanked it open.

No one. Not at the door. But close by, the Gowrys princeling wrestled a bone from one of Tarlach’s hounds.

“You there, Daniel,” she called to him. “Did you see anyone standing here at this door?” She preferred to keep her plans for Glenarden between her and her own.

Perpetually hungry, Daniel of Gowrys was like Tarlach’s hounds—always hanging about the spit in the main hall or in the kitchen, hoping for a handout.

“Nay, milady.” The lad hurled the bone, shaking his head. “Nary a soul.” Both wolfhounds bounded over empty benches after the treat, knocking some over in the process.

Rhianon scowled. How she hated those dogs. And she didn’t trust Daniel, either, and had told Caden as much. Wild and unkempt, Daniel skulked about the hall, always watching, always listening. He was old enough to slit their throats while they slept. For that reason, he was locked in a storage room at night. Fit enough lodging for him, even if Merlin Emrys insisted the lad receive an education from Brother Martin.

“Get out of here, you whelp!” Keena raised her cane and shook it at the boy. “And take those mange-ridden mutts with you until you learn to behave in a civilized hall.”

At the awkward and gangly stage where boyish muscle raced to fill an increasingly manly frame, Daniel climbed to his feet and walked away from them. On reaching the door, he turned back, a murderous look simmering beneath the mop of unwashed hair that spilled over his brow.

“Look at me like that again, laddie,” Keena warned, “and you’ll never live to see that rat hole of a place you call home again.”

The boy’s mouth quirked, begging to curl into a snarl. He shifted his gaze from Keena to Rhianon, then back to the crone. Rhianon shuddered at its ferocity. But the enemy Daniel made was far more dangerous. It wouldn’t be a matter of
if
Keena made good her warning, but
when.

For now the timing wasn’t right. It would lead to the youngest O’Byrnes’ death. Then Caden would annihilate the Gowrys, with or without Arthur’s blessing. And Rhianon would be queen of both the Gowrys hills and the lowlands of Glenarden.

Or would she be queen of ashes left by Arthur’s warband? Nay, if war were to start, it must be clearly done by the hand of the Gowrys … perhaps even their princeling.

The Vernal Equinox. Light and darkness met on equal ground. From this day forth, seeds would sprout and grow into bounty. Nature would multiply. It was a time, according to the message of the robe-clad priest holding court in the open field, for rebirth.

Or love and lust,
Caden thought, glancing at his wife. Clad in the green of the season with a wreath of first flowers crowning her golden hair, Rhianon took his breath away. Never had a woman had such a hold on him. The sun
and
moon would be hers, could he pluck them from the heavens.

Indulging in this celebration was the least he could do. Thankfully there would be feasting and song afterward. That is, if the priest ever ceased drolling on and on about gifts and God.

“Your Cymri forefathers worshipped creation. They saw a living god in the sea, the trees, thunder …
all
of nature,” the priest said. His clear, strong voice carried over the crowd. “Today we know that it is the One Creator God, present in all living things, not many lesser dieties. That is why Scripture says that nature and the heavens declare the glory of the One Creator God. The One God who breathed life into it. So until the Word came to them, your forefathers could not have known that it was the One God’s breath that grew the tree and moved the sea about us and the stars above us. Our God is so grand and far-reaching that our human minds cannot embrace all there is to know of Him.” He chuckled. “And, for all my study of Him, I speak of the shortcomings of
my
mind as well.”

Then stop talking and let’s eat,
Caden shouted at the priest in silence.

“Yet,” Martin continued, “our druids knew this. The wisemen knew.” The priest glanced at Ailill. The druidic bard nodded in affirmation. “But the old thought was that you, the common man, could not come to know a God whom you could not detect with your ears or eyes … or by the touch of your hand. That wisemen, priests or druids, had to intercede on your behalf … much like the Pharisees separated the Hebrews from a relationship with their Heavenly Father.”

“This is
not
what I called him here for,” Rhianon fumed next to Caden. “I am going to withhold some of our tribute.”

“Besides, these men thought, how could one get to know a spirit God who created all life and breathed His power and life into them as you know your father or brother or friend?” Brother Martin raised both hands to the sky.
“Jesus Christ,”
he shouted, causing Rhianon and half the assembly to gasp.

“Jesus came to show us all, even the most learned of us, that we can … we
must 
…
and it is through Jesus that we can do this. God loves everyone from kings to paupers, from the learned to the feeble-minded. God longs for you and me—priest, chief, warrior, woman, and servant—to walk and to talk and to commune with Him. The God who made all wants to be our
anmchara
. Our soulmate. He wants to be our Father who loves each of us, even when we have not been lovable … or good … or just. He is a Father who loved us so much, that He allowed His Son to be sacrificed for all our sins.”

“Good for us, but not for the Son,” Daniel of Gowrys spoke up. Seated on the grass between Tarlach’s gray wolfhounds, the young man stared at the priest as if daring him to reply.

An uncomfortable snicker fluttered through the gathered crowd.

Caden bristled with indignation at the affront to the priest. “No one cares what the likes of you thinks, Gowrys.” Besides, the priest needed no reason to extend his talk even longer.

“
Christ
cares,” Martin admonished Caden gently. “You see, Daniel, Christ chose to be the sacrifice—the last and only sacrifice that man would ever need to make—because He loved us and He knew that we could never follow the laws of God perfectly enough to have eternal life. He could have called legions of warrior angels to defend himself against His enemies—”

“But this is
Lady’s
Day
, Brother!” The nip in Rhianon’s voice signaled her patience had reached its end. “Save your stories of Christ for your sessions with that unlearned oaf. Tell us of His mother, whose fertility was such that she could bear a child without knowing man.”

“I prefer
our
way,” Caden whispered into her ear.

“Shush,” she replied, smiling at the priest as though she’d not heard Caden. But the telling color rising to her cheeks told him his wife had heard him well and agreed.

“As God created all of nature by the power of his Word, so His Spirit created the child in the Virgin’s womb. As the farmer plants seed into the earth, so God’s Spirit planted a son in Mary. And even today, as man and woman come together in love, it is His Spirit that gifts the union with fertility, for it is no secret that not all such unions produce children.”

Now that
was
something every man present was surely thankful for. The squeeze of Rhianon’s hand shot Caden through with shame at the drift of his mind. He knew she wanted a child. So did he. A son and heir to whom he’d pass Glenarden with pride and joy, not the grudging reluctance of Tarlach.

“Today, Heavenly Father,” the priest began with what Caden hoped was a closing prayer, “we honor the willing heart of Mary to accept God’s will. May our hearts be as willing to accept Your will for us. We honor the mothers, the mothers-to-be, and all of nature, asking God’s blessing on them to bring forth new life after the Long Dark. Bless us with bounty in our crops and livestock and bounty in our cradles in this season of rebirth.”

How holy men loved the sound of their poetry and praise.

In the corner of his eye, Caden spied the Gowrys prince ambling away from the gathering, the dogs and a guard assigned to watch him following. He and Tarlach were the only black clouds in Caden’s brightening future, yet they ate away at his insides like lye.

When the priest motioned one of the servants forward with the bread and wine, Caden let out a long sigh of relief. It was almost over. Once he and Rhianon had partaken of the Eucharist, they would be free to return to the keep, where the steward and villagers had set up the feast.

“This bread and wine is the power of salvation through the sacrificed flesh and blood of the crucified Christ. It is the power enabling us to remember the Christ as He asked us to do each time we partake of it. And it carries us across the ages on the wings of His love to His table. Such is the threefold magic of the Eucharist given by our Lord to His apostles and posterity.”