Page 49 of For an Exile’s Heart (Ancient Songs #2)

R arely had Adair seen a more beautiful season. Late spring had been easing into early summer when he left home for Alba, and the full of it when he and Bradana returned. Now, Erin bloomed around him as if determined, in all her splendor, to show him everything he loved.

Soft, gentle mornings cloaked in mist that rose with the first rays of the sun to reveal the sweet shapes of the hills and valleys he’d known all his life. Noontimes when he worked at the training field, and the scents of sod and horse and wild thyme filled the heated air. The glitter of the river at nightfall, when the quiet seemed to arise like magic from the very ground, to enfold him.

What man could ask for more?

Not he.

Why, then, did he yearn for something else?

It was a longing that, at first, he did not recognize. He had longed for Bradana all his life, without knowing it. At first when this other wanting began to dog him, he thought it was because he wished to be with her at all moments, even while at work or with his father.

Then it began to haunt him even when he was in Bradana’s company. When they walked together with Wen through the woods or over the braes. When they lay together in one bed at night.

He could not understand it. Despite his rather fraught relationship with his father and his uneasiness with Baen, he had all he’d ever sought. Work he enjoyed more and more each day. Time to spend with his friends if he wished. The company of the woman he adored in the land he loved.

Then why did this discontent pull at him?

He could not lay the disturbance at Bradana’s feet. Though she seemed quieter than before, and a bit lost, she did not speak of missing home or complain to him. By her insistence had he returned to Erin. As the days slipped past, did she begin to find a place for herself in Erin? It seemed so. She once more played for him on the harp. She even began to make new songs.

There could be no greater pleasure than lying at nightfall while the notes from her harp trembled through the still air and shivered around him. Not even making love to her pleased him so well.

He did not speak to her of his discontent and, indeed, only puzzled over the elusive feeling at odd moments.

One afternoon when he finished up with training, he noticed Baen standing at the far side of the field. Adair had taken on working with the youngest of the lads, ages twelve up, and they made a clamor and din, laughing and teasing one another as they started home.

Slowly, with his sword still in hand, Adair walked over to his brother.

“That is a rowdy crew,” Baen observed, frowning at the youngsters.

“Aye, and I have worked them hard.” Adair also looked at the lads, but with affection. “They have boundless energy, do they not?”

Baen flung him a searching glance. “What has made ye take them on?”

Adair shrugged. “It is as I told ye and Father when I came back—I want to be of service here. And Daerg did not want the job. He said they lacked discipline.”

“And so ye, also lacking discipline, thought ye were up to the task?”

Adair narrowed his eyes at his brother. “I may ha’ lived lightly before I went away, but I always did focus on my training.”

“Is that wha’ ye called it? All the times ye were off over the hills wi’ your friends when it came time to drill, or when ye had a sore head from sitting in the ale hall most the night? Focusing, was it?”

“It never affected my skill wi’ a sword.”

“Nay.” Baen’s lip curled. “Ye were always gifted in that regard, were ye no’? As Donnar always said, only imagine if ye had applied yourself.”

Donnar had said that about him? Adair always believed the man approved of him.

And from whence did this aggression on Baen’s part come?

“Brother, I would almost think ye do not welcome me working with the lads.”

“It is not that. Someone has to take them on, and the gods know no one else relishes the task. They seem to favor ye. Everyone favors ye.”

Adair eyed his brother again. Was this jealousy speaking?

Mayhap so, for Baen went on, “Including Father. The favored son returns, is that the part ye play? That is how all the old stories go. Just so long as ye know, it does not wipe out your carelessness o’ the past.”

“I am not playing a part.”

“Are ye not? The bright star who returns from Dalriada with failure and a stolen woman, but nevertheless makes himself out to be a hero.”

“I never claimed to be a hero.”

“Have ye not?”

“And when it comes to it, ye too failed in your task in Alba.”

Baen sniffed with disdain. “I am to be chief here one day. I should never have been sent on so menial a task.”

“Ah, too good to fulfill your duties, are ye?”

“As ye have always been.”

Adair drew a breath. “Brother, if ye do not want me here in Erin—”

“So long as ye make yourself useful, I have no objections. Just remember to whom this land belongs.”

“It belongs to all o’ us.”

“And that one day ye will swear fealty to me.”

Adair said nothing.

Baen began to turn away but swung back. “And be aware, Adair—if the high king calls for warriors, ’twill be ye who leads our forces.”

Because he was expendable? That was the implication, and it felt like a slap in the face. Adair’s high spirits, earned while training the lads, evaporated in a poof.

He watched Baen walk away and wondered at such ill feeling in a brother. He kept wondering even after he went home and shared supper with Bradana. And later, when he, Bradana, and Wen went walking through the soft, gentle evening.

Bradana glanced at him once or twice as if sensing his mood, but said nothing of it. They spoke in murmurs, relating the events of their days, and watched Wen frolic over the hillside and down to the stream.

Not until they sat together on the side of the brae—a favorite place to watch the sun go down—did Adair ask, “Bradana, are ye happy here?”

He caught her sharp look before she treated him to her profile and said, “I am happy anywhere ye be.”

“Aye, so.” He knew that, down to his soul. And it had been at her insistence, as he reminded himself yet again, they were here. He would have stayed and fought beside her grandsire.

He would have stayed.

“I do wonder how they fare,” she said softly after a moment. “My grandsire and Morag, and all the others. And I wonder, is my mother all right?”

“Aye.”

“But I will mak’ a place here wi’ ye.”

She reached out and captured his hand, threading their fingers together tight.

He marveled again at the strength of this thing between them, almost terrifying in its depth and intensity. They sat quietly for several moments while the sun sank in the sky. Peace should have found Adair then. For he was here, was he not? In the land he loved, with the woman he loved. What mattered Baen’s ill feeling or the uncertainties of the future?

He had known always he was naught but a third son, if one who received a certain measure of favor. Mayhap Baen was jealous of that. Or mayhap he meant only to use Adair to best purpose when his day as chief came. Adair had no ambitions to reach farther, had he?

Be content , he told himself. Yet contentment refused to come.