Page 16 of For a Wild Woman’s Heart (Ancient Songs #3)

“W ell, and daughter, have you resigned yourself to this marriage? Young Rohr—he has much to recommend him, does he not?” Father asked.

Darlei turned from her seat in front of the glass—a large, very grand glass placed in her chamber to no doubt impress her—and looked at him.

He’d come to her room early while Orle still helped her dress, and seemed most terribly uneasy. He could not keep still and kept stealing hard glances at her.

She had not slept well, troubled by odd dreams. Last night’s music had played through her mind, stirring up echoes of other songs. She’d almost felt as if her own fingers danced upon the harp strings.

Foolishness. She was a woman who rode ponies and shot arrows, not one who played delicate music.

She’d also dreamed of…a man. Nay, he was not Deathan MacMurtray—a bit surprising, since he had been so bright in her mind. Another man this had been, with a mane of long brown hair and green-specked gray eyes.

She wondered suddenly if Deathan’s eyes had specks of green in them, up close. Up very close.

“What do you think of the bridegroom?” she asked Father instead of answering his question.

Orle’s hands, busy upon her hair, froze.

Father stopped pacing around the room. “As I say, he is not so bad. Could be worse.”

How?

“That is not much of a recommendation,” she said flatly. Her anger over this—being forced to this marriage—had hardened into something that surpassed mere distress.

Father sent her another sharp look. “He is of a good age and not ill favored. I am certain that once you get to know him—”

“He no more desires this marriage than do I. he barely speaks to me.”

“Do you speak to him? Do you make yourself gracious and charming?”

Darlei turned from the mirror to face her father. “I do not wish to make myself anything. I am the woman I am.”

“In this instance, daughter, I fear you must try to be accommodating. There are expectations. You—”

Again she interrupted him, something unthinkable back home. “In a few days you—you and all the company, save Orle—will go home. Abandon me here among strangers.” To her horror, tears came to her eyes.

“Daughter, I am sorry. It cannot be helped. I came here this morning for that very reason. Let today be better. Go forth into it open and accepting.”

“Accept my fate, you mean?” Her lips tightened.

“Yes. I entreat you to this for your own good.”

“You would have me ingratiate myself with a man who does not want me.” She thought fleetingly of Deathan, standing by the rear wall of the hall. Watching her.

“As you do not want him. His father means to speak with him also. The sooner you make up your mind, the better for all.”

“I see.” Darlei rose to her feet.

“We are entering a new age. A new Scotland. Old hostilities must be laid aside.”

“Tell that to my bridegroom. He behaves like a small boy kicking his feet because his toy has been withheld. He is jealous of Urfet and angry he did not win those competitions. I cannot respect him.”

Grief came to her father’s eyes. “I regret hearing that. Respect means much to you, as I know very well.”

“Rohr MacMurtray does not respect me. Not anything about me.” Her chin jerked up.

“I am hoping that will change as he grows to know you. But, daughter, you will not help yourself by acting aloof and hard. Is there nothing here you like?”

“The sea. And”—another bright image of Deathan flooded her mind—“Mistress MacMurtray is sweet and kind.”

Father’s face softened. “Make yourself a good daughter to her, then.”

Indeed, if she felt a prisoner, how much worse for that gentle woman confined to her bed?

Last night’s rain had cleared, so Darlei and Orle, having shared breakfast in Darlei’s chamber, went outside for the first time on their own. Only they were not on their own.

The clansfolk were everywhere hurrying about their business. They stared. And they bowed to her, but with very little warmth in their eyes.

She was the savage princess from Caledonia’s heart. The bride who had won the pony race. So foreign she might have stepped down out of the clouds.

But she had a destination.

The sea beckoned to her. With Orle at her side, she picked her way down the stony path that led to the shore.

A lovely day, yes, all the rain clouds chased by a lively wind blowing inland from the west. The sky had turned deep blue with streamers like the tail of a pony, and the sea—even deeper blue—mirrored it with white combers that swept majestically to break over the gray rocks.

Darlei lost her breath when she reached that place, the spray making showers of radiance, and stood on one of the rocks, unmoving.

She might stand forever so.

Far out in the blue water she could see other lands, which surprised her. She had not known there were other lands west of the sea. Oh, there was Ireland, but that was farther south.

In the ancient days, so one of her teachers had told her, the Celtic peoples believed in a land far to the west called Tír na nóg where their fallen heroes went after death.

Could what she saw be that land? Nay, surely not.

There were people on the shore, but they all stood aside from her, watching—still watching. Even when she stepped onto a higher rock where the spray broke at her very feet.

“Darlei,” Orle, who’d remained behind her, called. “Is it safe?”

“Surely. Step up here with me.”

“I do not believe we should.”

They spoke in their own tongue, and the people on the shore began to mutter.

“Darlei, do not fall.”

“I will not.”

She teetered a bit, but it was only at the impetus of the wind.

“She is going to jump!” cried one of the men on the shore.

Suddenly, someone leaped onto the rock beside her. She turned with a smile, thinking Orle had found her courage. “It is magnifi—”

Not Orle. Deathan MacMurtray stood there, alarm filling his eyes.

“Princess! Careful, I pray.”

He seized her elbow, and they stood that way for several heartbeats, gazing into one another’s face while the waves broke over their feet. She felt…

But there were no words for what she felt, no words in all the world.

In the clear light, his eyes were blue, aye, dark blue like the water out beyond the rocks, but with green specks in them. Like the flecks on a gemstone.

She had never seen such eyes.

“I am not going to jump,” she told him.

“I never thought so. But the rocks are wet. Ye could slip.”

“I but wanted to feel the power of it all. It is magnificent.”

“Aye so.” He did not look away from her at the water. “’Tis.”

They stood close, likely far too close. She could feel the heat of his body. She could catch the scent of him even over the salt spray.

She had never smelled anything so good.

But people were watching, and she supposed she had already earned a reputation as the wild Caledonian princess.

“You may—” she began.

A wave broke over them, wetting them both to the waist.

She smiled at him in delight, unable to help it. And it became immediately intimate, even though they stood out here in the open, the focus of so many eyes.

“—help me down,” she concluded.

She thought he would lead her by the hand. Lend the strength of his arm, mayhap. Instead he released his grip on her elbow and swept her up off the flooded rock.

Into his arms.

He did it so easily, she lost all her breath. When he turned and leaped down off the rock right to Orle’s side, she lost all hope of breathing.

He set her down quickly, far too quickly for her liking.

Oh, by all the holy powers of the earth and the sky.

“Ye maun be careful, princess. The sea can reach up and snatch ye right off a place like that. Can ye swim?”

“I have done in the lochs back home.”

“Such still waters are naught to the sea. There are currents beneath the surface, and the waves are far more powerful than they appear.” Fixing her with those incredible eyes of his, he said earnestly, “We would no’ want to lose someone so precious as yoursel’.”

He thought her precious.

At least, he said he did. He might be a flatterer. They had plenty of those back home.

But nay, this man did not flatter. This man possessed a heart both steadfast and true. How she knew so, she could not say.

She just did.