Maire (14 page)

“What about your breakfast?”

“You eat it,” she shot back, aware of the undivided attention her emergence drew. “’Tis you who needs it, sir, for my appetite has just been appeased.”

With a perfectly wicked grin, she ignored the poorly disguised snorts and sniggers echoing among those close by and gathered her unfurled hair off her neck in a long feline stretch.

“Good day, gentlemen!” she greeted them. “Glorious, don’t you think?”

Upon unwinding a leather thong from her wrist, she tied her hair neatly at the nape of her neck. That done, she helped her face to a refreshing splash of water from a bucket hung on the sides of the ship for the purpose of bathing. A deep breath of salt air was equally renewing, ridding her body of sleep’s stale remnant. With the sun at her back, Maire studied the horizon ahead, where the morning mist still clung to the sea green water.

Behind her, Rowan exited the makeshift bedchamber. “Nothing like a satisfied woman,” he remarked, slapping her backside with the palm of his hand in passing.

Maire nearly choked on the affront. Spinning around, she returned the gesture, striking his hard buttocks with such force that it stung her hand. Having earned Rowan’s abrupt attention, she lifted her chin in defiance.

“I always give as good as I get! You ought to know that well by now, Emrys.”

“Rowan, love.” He cupped her chin. “Faith, I’ve never heard my name whispered with such longing as from these lips.”

Before Maire could react, he leaned down and sealed in her rush of fury with a kiss. It wasn’t as hard as her first one had been, but it gave no less quarter. It was as though he were drinking her dry of strength and thought. No man had ever dared as much. None! When he let her go, she was grateful for the rail at her back. With a forced nonchalance, she rested her arms against it. Her lips curled, a convincing facade of mild amusement.

“You learn quickly for a Welshman, Rowan.”

A loud whistle rose above the flutter of laughter the confrontation evoked in the ranks. Maire had held her own, but had no idea what to expect next from this bulliken. His tongue was as prickly and troublesome as that of the legendary Brichriu, who had turned a kingdom upon itself for the sake of pure entertainment.

A cry from the loft came to Maire’s rescue. “Land ho!”

She turned toward the horizon where invisible fingers had pulled back the drape of mist. There, emerging from the sea, was the sun-kissed shore of Wicklow. The sparkling strip of sand was studded with moss-covered rock and flanked by the rise of time-gentled mountains and thick, game-rich forests. The most accomplished poet had no words that could do justice to the magnificent hues of green, gray, and blue.

Home!
Maire’s heart swelled with the sight, her sparring with Rowan forgotten. She longed to set foot on the land won by her mother, sword land taken from masters of another era when bronze gave way to iron. As her foster parents Erc and Maida had raised her upon Maeve’s death, so this land had nurtured her and her people. Now that she was queen, Maire would be one with it, her life dedicated to its welfare, her love to its people. The gods had chosen her as its steward and ruler.

She mustn’t let Morlach defile the earth and her people with his dark greed. As the gods had led her to victory, so they would continue to do so. Maire had left Gleannmara a girl in warrior’s garb. She returned a queen with a husband, who, despite his annoying side, was an upright man with the skilled sword destined to protect their tuath—even from the evil intentions of the druid lord.

“Wait till you see Gleannmara,” she told Rowan. Already her spirit was as renewed by the tuath’s nearness as its meadows were by spring green. “It will be satisfied with nothing less than your soul, Rowan of Emrys, and that you’ll willingly give once under its spell.” She clasped his hand, capable yet gentle as it was strong.

“Feel her heartbeat,” she said, pressing his palm in place that he might know the excitement beating from her heart, Gleannmara’s heart. “Nine long years away from her have not weakened it. Together, we’ll protect her and make her happy.”

The ship plied toward the shore as though drawn by a magnet. The men gathered at the rail, lifting a victorious song to the sky until the vessel dared not go closer. There was neither bulkhead nor enough water to tie her up if there were. Anchors splashed at the bow and stern to stabilize her, while the crew furled the leather sails, which had served them so well. The pent up excitement broke with the scurry to put a boat over the side.

Even as Maire’s men wrestled with the lines, there was a storm of activity taking place on the shore. Eager crews pushed off boats that would transport the plunder to dry land. Maire remained glued to the land side of the ship, wanting to miss nothing. She, Rowan, and her captains would be the first to disembark. And Brude, of course.

Maire turned to search the deck for the druid. Her exhilaration upon seeing her homeland had momentarily erased all thought of him. She found him sitting by the altar fire, where the ashes of the sacred fire that had blessed their return voyage
still smoked. The stern rail at his back and his head bowed, he looked as though he slept through the chaos. Had he kept the flames going all through the night?

She loped across the deck, dodging men about their own purpose and stopped before the elderly man. There was a pile of bones spread on the deck, the remains of the pig the cook had roasted the day before for the wedding feast.

“Brude, we’re home.” She placed a gentle hand on his rounded shoulder.

Instead of answering, the druid held up his hand, as though to quiet her. Through half-lidded eyes, he stared at the bones, searching for an augury.

“Won’t you sing our song of victory?”

Brude’s fist came down amid the pile so suddenly that Maire jumped back. Weakness settled in her stomach as the druid’s angry gaze lifted to her face. He knew she’d deceived him! The sickening thought barely registered before he spoke.

“The battle isn’t over, my queen. Morlach still holds Gleannmara. You must be elected by the people.”

Maire went cold at the grim implication in Brude’s voice. “What did you see?”

Brude gathered up the bones and, with her help, rose to his feet. The stiffness of his limbs made Maire wince in empathy, but the man made no verbal complaint. He tossed the bones on the dying fire and watched as the moisture in them hissed and crackled.

“Was it bad?” Whatever Brude saw unleashed fingers of alarm along her spine.

“There was nothing.” The druid wiped his hands on his robe in frustration. “Nothing! You have given Gleannmara all she would ask of you, and I have failed you.”

“Perhaps there’s nothing to see.” Maire had never seen Brude so distraught.

“Oh, it’s there, masked by darkness, but there, nonetheless.”

“Morlach?”

“Who else?”

“Perhaps the Welshman.”

Maire started at the unexpected suggestion coming from behind her. She turned to see her youngest foster brother.

“Declan! You’re looking well for all of yesterday’s misfortune. You gave us quite a scare.”

It was true. The Scot’s bronzed color had come back to him, but with it, his ill humor. Worse, it was infectious.

“How can you accuse any evil of the man who saved your life?”

“I never asked him to!”

“At least pretend it was worth his trouble!”

Declan closed a warning hand about her arm. “You’ve made a grave mistake. He isn’t as he seems, Maire. I feel it in my bones. Beware that husband of yours.”

“That I will do,” she assured him. Her foster brother was given to melodrama, but this was neither the time nor place. She lifted one of the long braids the warrior wore to keep the hair from his face and flipped it over his shoulder in an effort to diffuse the tension. “Just as I’ve kept you out of trouble all these years… or tried, at least.”

The Scot suddenly pulled her closer and pressed his lips against her forehead. “I’ll be here for ye,
anmchara.
Never doubt it.”

“Aye, soul friend,” Maire replied lightly. So it had always been—she, Declan, and Eochan together. Raised together. Trained together. One was her right arm, the other her left. “The three of us make a good lot, tho’ ’tis hard to say for what.”

The intimacy of their pledge was no more sealed by the clasping of arms when Maire found herself being lifted into the air with a mighty roar. She seized the tousled head of her friendly assailant to keep from falling backward, laughing.

“Eochan, you’ve scared me out of a year’s growth!”

“Time to stake your claim as queen,” the burly Scot told her. “And I’m bound to present ye, sure as I’m livin’.”

“She must take Emrys ashore.”

“But he’s needed to get them horses to land, Brude,” Eochan objected.

“’Twould be a shame for them to drown in our hands,” Declan chimed in. “Let the Scotti carry their queen and the hostage the plunder.”

To Maire’s astonishment, the druid pondered the suggestion for a moment. It wasn’t like Brude to back away from one of his decisions.

“Perhaps it would be best to keep Rowan a secret until he’s needed.” She slid off Eochan’s shoulder.

A strange glimmer in his gray gaze, Brude looked over to where Rowan soothed the snow-white horses. “I’ve been feeding them my special hay, but they are high-strung animals. The man has a gift.”

“So do you.” Maire placed an affectionate hand on the druid’s shoulder. Few dared to touch Brude, but he’d carried her as a child on his shoulder as Eochan had just done. She never thought twice about the privilege. “I think the sea air is unkind to the bones of a landsman such as yourself, Brude. No doubt once you’re back in your lodge, the augury will come back, painting pictures of the future in your mind as it always has.”

Maire saw that Brude was lowered into the boat first by means of a leather sling before she and the others joined them. Her men took to the oars with eager hands, eyes fixed on the beach ahead. It wasn’t likely their families awaited them, but the shore clans would give them royal welcome. Tomorrow, wagons would be hired to transport the booty to Gleannmara.

“Look, comin’ down to the shore,” a MacCormac shouted.

Maire looked in the direction her captain pointed, where a retinue made its way to the beach through the cluster of lodges at the crest of the rise. Fluttering from tall poles were the royal blue and gold of Gleannmara—and the red and black colors of Rathcoe, Morlach’s domain.

“Brude?”

“Aye, like a painted picture,” the druid answered her. “I thought ’twas Morlach’s ink muddying my sight, just as he turned the wind to bring you more quickly to his clutches.”

His words pebbled her arms with gooseflesh. A man with common weapons, she could fight. But one who wielded spirits…

“The confrontation comes sooner than I anticipated.”

“I’ll stand with you, Maire,” Declan vowed from the seat across from her.

“And I!” said Eochan.

“And I!”

“And I!”

The chorus was unanimous. Gleannmara’s men were not about to hand her over to the wizard of Rathcoe without a fight. Deeply touched, Maire steeled the glaze in her eyes and stood up in the boat, her feet braced to ride its rocky course to the sea-soaked sands.

“Gleannmara!” she shouted, raising her arm over her head.

“Gleannmara!” the men chimed with her.

“Queen Maire!” Declan shouted, starting a chant in sync with the beat of the oars in the foamy surf.

“Queen Maire… Queen Maire… Queen Maire…”

A wave caught the vessel. Eochan steadied Maire as they were swept toward the beach. The men vaulted out in the shallow water and used the momentum to push the craft well onto the sand. Eochan lifted Maire free and handed her over to her captains, who carried her on their shoulders out of the reach of the lapping surf to where the colorful retinue awaited.

Morlach was not among them. At the lead was his apprentice, Cromthal. Though his years were but half those of his master, Cromthal’s black hair was shot with gray and his skin drawn like the bark of a tree on his gawky frame. Maire thought he resembled the black heron on Morlach’s crest.

As the junior druid stepped down from his wicker chariot,
the men quieted. Head held high, Maire moved to the fore of her ready captains, Eochan and Declan flanking her on either side.

“I greet you a free man, Cromthal.”

“And you a free woman, Queen of Gleannmara. I take it from the revel that you have indeed proved yourself worthy.”

“Before many witnesses,” Brude assured him, stepping up beside her.

Cromthal spared his elder no more than a glance. “Though your departure was a surprise to my master, your victorious return is not. Morlach awaits you at Gleannmara. Guests from all five provinces are gathered there to witness your homecoming and your marriage, including Diarhmott’s own Finnaid, who has come to perform the ceremony. The master has been preparing for your birthday for many cycles of the moon.”

“Then Morlach has overestimated himself,” Maire said, glad that the panic running riot inside her was not betrayed by her strong voice. One of Diarhmott’s own druids. By all the tides, they were done for! Surely he’d see through Rowan’s charade. “I welcome the victory celebration, but there will be no marriage between us. You see, Cromthal, I’ve not only brought home prizes of great worth, but a husband as well.”

Had thunder struck the apprentice, he couldn’t have looked more staggered. Maire’s tenuous advantage, however, was short lived, for Cromthal recouped his authoritative demeanor in a breath. His words fairly boiled over with incredulity. “What manner of trickery is this?”

“’Tis no trickery,” Brude assured him. “I blessed the union myself and have the sacrificial bridal blanket in my trunk, bearing the proof of the consummation. We’ve more than good number of witnesses who will testify to this truth for the high king, should Diarhmott require it.”

“Then show the man to me!” Cromthal grew white with anger, his eyes burning demon black. “Show him!” he demanded, the muscles of his neck taut as a bowstring.

“Here!”

Startled, Maire turned to see Rowan of Emrys emerging from the sand-lapping sea on the white stallion. The animal snorted, blowing saltwater and foam from its nostrils, and pranced up to them as though delighted to be on solid ground again.