Page 6 of Taming the Eagle

“I won’t leave her,” he continued, his features tightening. “So don’t ask me to.”

Nausea rolled over Fenella. Her mind churned, frantically searching back through every meeting, looking for clues that would make sense of this sudden revelation. Yet she found none.

“But I thought you loved me?” The words came out in a hoarse whisper.

His gaze never left hers. “I do.”

“And your wife?”

He shrugged. “She is a good woman, and I care deeply for her too.”

Fenella dragged in a deep breath then. Underneath the shock, she could feel anger coiling. “Does she know about me?”

Horror lit his green eyes. “Of course not.”

Fury ignited in her belly. “So, you planned to keep us both?”

Lorcan stared back at her, his silence damning.

Fenella rose to her feet and gathered her clothing. She then began to dress, all the while spearing Lorcan with her glare. “What about all the things we talked of?” she asked, her voice trembling. It wasn’t grief that gave it a tremor, although she knew hurt would hit her like a charging boar later, but fury. “Of how we’d travel north till we found the perfect spot to build a house together … and there we would start a family.”

“It was a dream, Fen,” he replied, a note of chagrin in his voice. “Nothing more.”

“For you, maybe,” she choked out. “But for me, it wasreal. I believed the words you spun around me. I thought we’d one day leave all ofthis” —she swept a vicious hand around her— “behind us.”

He continued to watch her, something akin to pity in his eyes. “Did you really?” he asked before shaking his head. “Life isn’t like that. You can’t run away.”

Fenella stared at him as if her lover had just sprouted a second head. Of course they could flee—people did it all the time.

It occurred to her then, like a rude slap to the face, that she didn’t know Lorcan at all. The image she had of him, as a free spirit willing to do all for love, was as insubstantial as morning mist.

Now the mist was clearing, and Fenella didn’t like what it revealed.

“But I love you,” she murmured, as if the declaration could somehow weave magic. Although as she spoke, something splintered within her. It was as if her youth—and the hope that brightened the world even when life was difficult—had gone.

Suddenly, she felt as old as a crone.

Night was falling when Fenella approached her home once more. Often the wind died at dusk, yet this evening, it howled like a banshee. The temperature had dropped too, the cold air chafing at the exposed skin of Fenella’s cheeks and arms.

However, she barely noticed.

Fenella walked through the world without connecting with it.

She’d stalked out of this valley earlier in the day, vowing never to return—yet here she was, defeated already.

For the first time in a while, she’d returned empty-handed from a hunting trip, but she didn’t care. There wasn’t even a grouse for her mother to roast over the fire pit. All she could think about was how Lorcan, the man she’d hoped to build a future with, had disappointed her.

Things had eventually gotten ugly. Of course, her temper had erupted, grief and rage pouring out of her like a cauldron boiling over. Lorcan had been sorry in the end, had tried to reason with her. But when he’d told her they could still meet as lovers, she’d spat at him. And when he’d remained calm, she’d eventually struck him across the face, screamed insults at him, before gathering her bow and quiver and fleeing the glade.

She’d never go back. That place was forever ruined, as was her heart.

Woodenly, she let herself in through the gate, which had been left unbarred for her, before securing it behind her. Her father had built the high wooden perimeter after they’d lost fowl to wolves a few winters back. It protected them from two-legged predators as well. This close to Ardoch, and after Bricius had fallen out with yet more of his neighbors—in a disagreement over grazing land—it was best to be prudent.

Crossing the dirt yard before her father’s roundhouse, Fenella’s gaze shifted to the lean-to, where the family’s fen pony was stabled. There was still enough light for her to see that another pony, this one larger and as black as charcoal, had joined it.

Fenella’s belly clenched.

Toutorix is still here.