by Silver James
Ciaran and Niall discussed the situation. They reasoned the cowards could not travel very fast nor could they get far with an injured woman. Or one held against her will. The clann would find the miscreants and Becca within the fortnight, and when they did, Ciaran’s retribution would be fast and furious. As soon as Becca was found, he would wed her, bed her, and that would be the end of it.
****
“How did this happen?” the female accused.
The male was silent. He had not anticipated the interference of these oafish fools.
“Ah.” She interrupted his reverie, aptly reading his mind. “And you were the one who called them fools. Now, who is the fool?” She sneered.
“’Tis not over yet,” he grumbled.
“Why do you delay the inevitable?” a second, deeply masculine voice interjected.
“You promised the time until Lughnasadh,” the first male insisted.
“They must be bound and the Covenant consummated by the end of that day,” the second intoned.
“Or what?”
Three breaths were drawn in sharply.
“How is this?” the second male barked.
“The veil is thin, Mac Lir,” the woman complained.
“Who the bloody hell are you, and why do you keep mucking about in my life?” Becca demanded.
“She should go back,” the second man decreed.
“No!” three voices cried in unison.
“’Til Lughnasadh, then!” the second pronounced.
Silence.
“Please?” Becca whispered.
“Hush, Child,” the woman hissed. “Lest he hear you.”
Silence came, followed by darkness.
She wanted to cry, or scream, or hit someone but there was no one to hit and she knew those others had gone so there would be no one to hear her cries. “Okay,” she defied the dark. “You have really pissed me off now. I will not go back.” She stamped a foot she couldn’t feel. “I will stay here. Ciaran and I will be together. You can’t make me go back.”
“Empty threats, Child of the Mortals,” the second male voice growled at her.
Becca shivered. Then she got really angry at her own fear and at these unseen voices that kept whispering nonsense to her. “Empty threats?” she snarled with more bravado than she felt. “We’ll just see about that now, won’t we?”
The woman smiled. The mortal had been right. The Child would always have the last word.
Chapter Thirteen
Every morning, men rode out from Caisel Ailfenn to search. Each day, they hoped one of them would find Becca or hear news of her whereabouts. Each night, they returned to the great hall with heavy hearts. As time passed with no sign of her, Ciaran grew more morose. Niall and Riordan often rode out together and shared their worry. Given Ciaran’s temper, he would likely kill with his bare hands the man who’d taken Becca, especially since his wound kept him from joining the search.
Siobhan insisted that Ciaran take care of himself and she dutiful checked his healing wound and changed the bandages. She clucked about like a mother hen, until he ate something at each meal. His temper was a powder keg, and she was the only one who dared confront him.
Ciaran stalked through the keep, often standing on the walls. With a hand shading his eyes, he watched the distant hills. His feelings about Becca’s disappearance waffled from hour to hour. One moment he’d swear she’d been taken from him, the next that she’d run away. He snarled at people, an angry wolf with his ruff up. Siobhan, finally reaching even her limit, ordered Niall and Riordan to get him roaring drunk. The castle would be able to relax for a few hours at least.
Taidhg, once her faithful guard, felt responsible for Becca’s welfare. The night of her disappearance, he went to Ciaran and sank to one knee in front of his chief. Wincing at the pain radiating off Ciaran, Taidhg made his vow. “I will bring her home to you, Taoiseac,” he pledged. “On my life, I will see her safe again.”
At dawn the next morning, he began his search at the stream where the trail had grown cold. Working his way upstream, in case one of the O’Neill had sneaked down from the north, he found no trace of the three horses and riders. At each croft and hut, he stopped to ask about two men and a woman. No one had seen or heard a thing.
Finally giving up, he turned his search to the south until he eventually found a shepherd boy who remembered seeing a campfire. The boy claimed he crept up on the camp to see who it was. He remembered two scrawny bays and a magnificent black tied to a picket line. Two men, broad and thick with reddish hair and beards, sat at the fire talking. The boy had been unable to hear what they’d said. He saw no woman, but he did remember seeing a bundle trussed up with rope not far from the fire.
Taidhg grimaced at the description, praying his mistress was still alive. The description fit any number of rogues running about the countryside, but Taidhg had a sudden hunch. Two thick-bodied men with red hair sounded all too familiar. Because they were headed in the right direction, he guessed they might be the O’Flinn brothers.
When the boy showed Taidhg where the men had camped, he pulled off the silver clasp holding his cloak and gave it to the boy in thanks. Thrilled with his prize, the youngster skipped off back to his herd.
The soldier scouted the campsite. Three horses had indeed been staked there. Taidhg also found sign of three different pairs of boots. That was the first hopeful sign he’d had. He would spend the night here and proceed to Ballinfaire the next day. At the O’Flinns’ keep, he’d learn whatever he could about Becca’s whereabouts, and then he would ride hard for Ailfenn to fetch Ciaran.
****
The first two days of her captivity were absolute torture for Becca. She came to once, only to find herself hanging upside down and bouncing along Arien’s side. Blessedly, the darkness reclaimed her almost immediately. That night, she awoke, bound hand and foot with a nasty rag stuffed in her mouth as a gag. She fought down the vicious nausea and concentrated on stopping the ringing in her head. Becca spied on them by opening her eyes to bare slits so Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum would think she was still unconscious.
The oldest one was called Darroch, and the younger was Luthais. Luthais was slightly smaller than his brother, but since both probably weighed over 250 pounds, that didn’t say much. They were dirty, stank, and thought nothing of standing to relieve themselves into the fire. If these two were indeed the now Becca’s brothers, this Becca pitied her other self. She’d learned enough from their conversation to know they’d had something to do with the beating her body received just before Ciaran found her. She was, however, confused by the distance involved. The brothers spoke of leaving Becca’s body near Balleymough, but Ciaran had found her not far from Ailfenn, nearly three days’ ride away.
Exhausted and hungry, Becca finally let the darkness claim her again. She would find some way to escape and make her way back to Ciaran, or she’d think of a way to get a message to him so he’d come rescue her.
The next morning and every morning thereafter when she awoke, her first thought was of Ciaran. I’m alive, she’d whisper to the heavens. I’m alive and I love you, Ciaran.
She spent two more days hanging upside down over her saddle before the Tweedle brothers let her sit astride Arien. She figured they were close enough to their destination they no longer feared discovery by someone loyal to Ciaran. Late on the third day, Becca caught sight of what had been her alter ego’s home. The place was dismal. Squalid huts huddled together beneath the grimy stone walls of the keep. Dirty faces stared at her as the three rode by. No guard in crisp uniform greeted their arrival. Skinny pigs and skinnier dogs milled about the courtyard.
Luthais pulled her off Arien and unceremoniously slung her over his shoulder as he slouched into the hall. The rancid air reeked with the smell of rotten food and human waste. The big lug carried her upstairs and dumped her into a dingy little room, pulling the heavy door shut behind him. A stout crossbar dropped into place with a grating thud. She wasn’t going anywhere
for a while.
Only the moonlight shining in through a high window lit the room. She noticed the bed was little more than a cot covered with a thin blanket and a small bench stood beside the empty hearth. In another corner of the room, there was a bucket. Becca guessed what it was for and at that moment, she didn’t care if it was only one step above a bedpan, she needed to use it. She hoped someone would be around in the morning to empty it.
After taking care of business, she tried the door just to be sure. It didn’t budge. Becca really needed more light to see what she was doing. That promising to be scarce until morning, she gave up and curled up on the cot with the meager blanket wrapped around her. The stones radiated a damp chill, and Becca was glad she still had her trews on beneath her skirt. The only familiarity they’d shown her were the clouts they periodically rained down on her head and shoulders to keep her in line. As she drifted off to sleep, she sought to touch Ciaran with her mind. “I love you,” she told the darkness. “And I keep your heart within mine, now and forever.” She could only hope she had reached him somehow.
****
Down in the great hall, the brothers asked about their father. The steward told them he was in the village, and they knew what that meant. He’d taken a woman to tup and would be back eventually. They called for mugs of ale and sat down in the great hall to await his arrival.
Just before midnight, the front doors banged open and Garbhan O’Flinn stomped into the great hall. He was an older, meaner version of the brothers. The two younger O’Flinns had gotten drunk waiting for their father. They’d nodded off, heads pillowed on the grimy table while their snores echoed off the rafters.
The steward crept forward, and in a dry, croaking whisper, told the O’Flinn about the bundle his sons had dragged home. He watched his master’s face turn a mottled shade of burgundy, and scurried off before feeling O’Flinn’s fist.
“An’ what do you mean dragging that bit o’ fluff back here?” O’Flinn roared.
Startled, both men fell off their respective benches onto the floor. “Yee don’ understand, Da,” Darroch pleaded. “’Tis where we found her and how.”
His father struck him across the mouth before he could finish. “She’s nothin’ but bad luck, that one. I want her outta my keep.”
Darroch crabbed away far enough so his father’s long arm couldn’t reach him again. “But, Da, she was ridin’ one of the MacDermot’s finest horses. On MacDermot land. She even told us the MacDermot would give us a reward if we returned her.”
That stopped Garbhan dead in his tracks. “The MacDermot?” he roared. “I offered her to him ten years ago, and he turned her down without so much as a by your leave. Him turnin’ her down caused all the rest to look down their noses at us. Now, he thinks to have her without any arrangement?” The man stormed around the hall kicking dogs and sleeping men out of his way.
The brothers cringed, waiting for his fit of temper to simmer down.
“How dare she not die?” he raged. “How dare she crawl to the MacDermot and bring shame upon this house?” The madder he got, the more outrageous his accusations against Becca. Before the old man was done, he’d conjured up an elaborate plot whereby the MacDermot had secretly seduced her and lured her away, all to bring shame upon the O’Flinn sept.
Grabhan stormed up the stairs and tossed aside the crossbar on the door to Becca’s prison. He threw open the door, rushing inside. Becca rolled off the bed and cowered beneath it, hoping the dark would hide her from the raving lunatic standing just inside the doorway.
“Where are you, you bitseach?” the man roared, vainly trying to see in the dark.
Becca held her breath. It didn’t matter what language the man spoke, Becca knew what the word meant. She choked back a cry as a leather strap sang through the air and battered the cot above her.
****
Ciaran sat bolt upright in bed. Wherever she was, Becca feared for her life. He was as certain of that fact as he was of his name. A cold, dark anger squeezed an iron fist around his heart. If anything happened to her, he would spend the rest of his days hunting down the man who had hurt her.
****
“Da? Da!” Luthais cried. “Yee’ll kill her, and then where will we be? Da, I’m tellin’ yee. The MacDermot will pay to get her back. Cattle. Horses. Gold, even.”
The old man stopped swinging his arm and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Aye, Luthais. Methinks you might have the right of it. Ridin’ a good horse, was she? And dressed fine?” he mused.
The younger man led him out of the room. He hadn’t stopped his father out of any pity for his sister. Pure and simple greed made him intervene. Something in Becca’s tone of voice when they’d taken her convinced him a great reward could be had for returning her to the MacDermot.
The door closed, and she heard the crossbar being shoved back into place. Becca reached up and pulled the blanket off the bed, wrapped it around her, and rocked back and forth fighting tears. She had never been so scared in her life. Not lying in the cold and dark on the side of that Colorado mountain, not standing back-to-back with Taidhg and fighting two O’Briens at once—not even when she first saw Ciaran lying on that pallet looking like death itself. These men held her fate in their hands, and there wasn’t a blasted thing she could do about it. If they killed her, no one would ever know. What would become of Ciaran then?
****
Taidhg rode into Ballinfaire just after sundown, but he saw nothing fair about this forsaken place. A poor excuse for a public house squatted on the outskirts of the village. Taidhg hadn’t bathed or shaved since beginning his quest for Becca, so he fit right in with the rest of the denizens.
It took a couple of days to get the information he sought. Two men-at-arms, beard-deep in their ale, spoke of the cailín locked away in the keep. Taidhg bought them a round and expressed his interest. One man looked around to see who might be listening, then leaned forward. In a conspiratorial whisper, he told Taidhg all about the poor cailín.
“’Twas just before Albun Eiler,” the man said. “The O’Flinn was in a right ferocious rage. Seems the last in a long line had turned down his daughter’s hand. He beat the cailín senseless, then bade his misbegotten sons to take her out and leave her. Told ’em to finish the job he’d started.” He swallowed most of his cup in one swig, wiped a grimy hand across his mouth, and continued. “When the brothers came back, they bragged ’twasn’t an inch of her body ’twasn’t bloody and bruised. They’d stripped her to make sure.” He took another sip, swilling the ale around in his mouth before swallowing. “Then about a sennight ago, the brothers come riding hard leading a fine black horse with the cailín on it. Luthais spirits her into the castle and locks her in a room on the second floor.”
The man finished his brew and looked at Taidhg expectantly. Taidhg obliged him by ordering another round for both men. After the scrawny serving maid deposited the drinks and scurried off, the man continued. “There was a fair uproar when the O’Flinn returned that night. Swore she was bad luck, and the sons shoulda’ made sure she stayed dead.”
Taidhg’s hands formed tight fists under the table while he steeled himself, fighting to keep his anger in check. How could a man want to see his own child dead, especially one as fair and brave as Becca? When the man spoke of the O’Flinn charging into the room and beating his daughter, it was all Taidhg could do to stay calm with a blank face. He took a long steadying breath. It would not do to give himself away now.
The man finished his story by saying the girl was kept locked up in her room, and only the brothers were allowed in to feed her once a day. None of the men-at-arms had laid eyes on her since that first night. Some doubted she still lived.
“But as parsimonious as the O’Flinn is,” the man continued, “he ’twouldn’t be wastin’ food on a dead body.” The man winked at Taidhg. “Rumor has it the brothers stole her back from another clann, and even now, the O’Flinn is on his way to Tuam to press suit against the Taoiseac who’d been harboring h
is daughter.”
Taidhg was torn. He could stay and try to rescue Becca. Or he could ride for Ailfenn to report to Ciaran and return to free the cailín. If she was still alive, Taidhg was fairly certain she’d manage to stay that way a while longer. If the O’Flinn had gone to the king, he had some plan in mind and a live Becca was surely a part of it. Ballinfaire was, even riding hard, two days closer to Tuam and the king than Ailfenn. It was a hard two days’ ride back to Ailfenn, two back here, and then the ride to Tuam. Or four days ride to Tuam from Ailfeen. Taidhg had no choice. He had to ride for Ailfenn. Becca would have to fend for herself a bit longer.
****
Ciaran slumped in the chair drawn up before the fire. The flickering flames etched his face with shadows, emphasizing the melancholy radiating from him. Riordan, his feet stretched toward the fire, occupied a second chair in Ciaran’s den. He watched his cousin over the rim of his mug. A fortnight ago, he’d had been envious. Becca was a comely cailín and the bond she and Ciaran shared was one he’d, thought he’d wanted. Now, he wasn’t so sure. Every morning, Ciaran declared Becca was still alive, that he could somehow sense she was still in this world. Each night, he swore he would find her. Despair and hope raged a terrible battle in his heart and mind every hour of the day.
As Riordan peered at Ciaran’s haggard face, his heart went out to the other man, remembering all too well the way Becca suffered after Ciaran had been wounded. Their bond was remarkable. If it was this bad for his cousin when his true mate was just missing and in danger, what would come of the one left behind when the other went to the ever after? He wondered if the grand passion attached with true mating was worth the desolation, the anguished loneliness, forming the flip side of that coin.
The guard on the walls called out a challenge, and every man in the great hall came to their feet, hands to swords. Tense, they waited, ready for anything. A few minutes passed before the front door finally opened, and the guards ushered in a man wearing the colors of the O’Conor. By the time he strode into the center of the great hall and looked around for the MacDermot, Ciaran awaited him. Immediately flanked by Niall and Riordan, a full company of men-at-arms also stood ready.
