Hidden Jewel (Heartfire Series) (17 page)

"Never judge a book by it's cover, Father," she said softly. "No matter how interesting, how
innocent
it might look on the outside, there's always the possibility o' one hell of a nasty paper cut once ye look inside."

Every single pair of eyes around the table stared in surprise at hearing such a bold statement from the girl. And then she giggled in her oddly low-pitched voice; such a perfectly childlike sound, so unexpected, that her father laughed aloud, the very air around the huge man suddenly so full of his mirth that the others were compelled to join in his laughter.

"Your sense of humor matches your Mama's, Abby," James said moments later, wiping streaming eyes with his napkin. "And I gotta say, I'm damn proud of you. Not only have you grown into a real beauty while you were away, you also learnt well
and
became a smartass to boot!"

Barking a laugh, Ailill said, "I came by it honest, at least; but I thank you for the compliment anyway, though it isn't necessary. I was trained to be a warrior by the very best in all the land, after all." Her eyes sparkled with a sharp wit, the sudden ease of her mind. 

"Nah. You're wrong there," said James, staring at her in sudden seriousness. "While you may have learnt from the best, I am of the opinion that you are far better than Himself." Blue eyes narrowed in speculation, James added, "But I believe you already knew that. Didn't you?"

"Well, I did have that idea," she drawled smoothly. Her teeth clenched tightly, squaring her jaw, as close to baring her teeth to the man as she would come. "It isn't an impossibility for a wee lass to best the vast array o' braw men in her life, if that wee lass be myself."

Ailill's gaze was drawn down the table to where Micah sat, his mug poised halfway to his lips. Setting it down slowly, he half-turned, meeting her eye. His face was flushed from the heat of the day and something more, something that darkened his eyes nearly to obsidian. He stared at her hard; she felt a trickle of sweat roll down the back of her neck at the intensity in those dark eyes.

"Och, 'twas a rather sexist notion ye had,
Shaemus
; that which forced ye to challenge me," she added a moment later, intentionally broadening her accent to the rich dialect of home just because she could and because she knew how it irritated her father, who had requested that she lose the “odd speech” for the time being, to better her chances of attracting “the boys”. Her acknowledging look down the board flashed back in Micah's eyes; the lad was willing her to speak up for herself, to point out her father's mistakes while she had the chance. "Aye, being the naturally
gifted
lass that I am, I could easily take offense to your questionable practices, the unfair demands you've chosen to heap upon my wee shoulders these past weeks, as if I haven't enough on my plate already. Such contempt, aye, such
open insult
might easily set me on the path toward escape, to hie back to the Highlands quicker than ye can blink, Father." James gaped, the surprise marring his handsome features completely unfeigned. With an icy glint in her eyes, she glared back. His notion of fun and games was now at an end.

"You have proven yourself, Ailill... better than I'd expected," he argued wearily. "I know of MacDuff's penchant for testing your limits, pushing you as close to the edge as he can. He taught me in exactly the same way! I wished to see for myself all that you've learned while you were away. That was all." He attempted a beseeching smile that did not fit his strong, well-defined face. "Am I forgiven?"

"No,
Shaemus
, but we'll work on that."

James blinked slowly even as his daughter turned her gaze briefly back to Micah's; her eyes flashed, a glimmer of triumph and Micah gave her a barely perceptible nod. He'd heard what James was saying as he sparred with the girl, had been nearby when the man started in on her first thing in the morning. Talk of marrying her off to him and his twin would have been a delightful idea had he not sensed an inner struggle, a prideful anger that rolled off the tiny young woman in waves. And more... James had obviously expected her to sleep with them the night before, if what he'd overheard that morning was any clue. Shocking, the very idea that her parents would push her into something so final as that without any thought of her own feelings on the matter. The knowledge had made him angry; it bothered him that he now felt as if he had to step back from the man he had come very close to idolizing, that he had to scrutinize what had, and would, come out of James' mouth. He felt as if he and Jacob had been undergoing some sort of testing since they'd arrived and, because he had no idea why, Micah found it plain damn unfair.

"If ye wished to know all that I have been learning whilst I was away," she intoned, fury deeply bedded in her soft-spoken, carefully controlled words as her eyes moved back to James, "Well, ye ken the way to Scotland, the land o' your own birth. Naught stopped you from visiting in the past dozen years, ye ken? But nay! You insisted that I come here, to a land that is alien to me and mine. And, rather than welcome me home as the long-gone daughter I am, you've the audacity to make demands upon my person. Not a fucking chance... it will take a bit more than pretty words to bring you even an ounce of forgiveness. All of you." Sweeping her gaze down the table, she stopped briefly on her mother, her father, before coming to rest on her grandmother at the far end.

"I wish to see my cousins. Do ye arrange it, Fallon." Her tone was unapologetic, commanding in an imperial air, as if she were used to getting whatever she asked for or demanded. The only thing lacking that would have made her seem like a spoilt princess was a harping whine, in the brothers' silently shared opinion.

The old woman glanced at the brothers. "Ye ken the impossibility o' that, Ailill."

"Nay, I ken that
you
do not  wish me a moments comfort, a brief respite from your damned demands," Ailill snapped. "Perhaps I
will
leave this place... ye can't stop me. 'Tis why you're still here rather than at Skye. So that I won't just up and disappear, as I did so many months ago, no?"

A slight shrug was the only acknowledgment the old woman gave, her strange eyes, not blind it turned out, swept back and forth between the two bewildered young men, the clear orbs glittering like diamonds. It seemed she was willing them to... what? Micah was not sure. Jacob felt words forming on the tip of his tongue before he understood what was happening; his mouth seemed to open of its own accord.

"I don't want you to go, Abby," he said slowly, eyes wide with surprise. "I, we... need you, uh, aw shit... what's happening?" Nearly frightened out of his head, he shook himself hard, looked to his twin for an answer Micah could not have even begun to give. "You are the answer to everything. Your people are dependent upon the choices you make. Answer the call to duty and lie with us, Ailill. The time of innocence is no more." Horrified at the audacity of the words, spoken in his own voice, Jacob slapped a hand over his mouth and stared accusingly at Ailill, as if she'd suddenly bewitched him. Micah gaped at his twin with mirrored shock.

"Stop it,
Seanmhair
!" Ailill commanded, furious. "Don't you
dare
use these lads to gain what you  desire for the Tribe. And don't you
ever
make demands upon my body again. I will give of myself only when I wish it, when
I
am ready!" She stood, the muscles in her arms flexed, bulging with the effort to keep her voice steady. "This is
my
innocence you are trying to rob me of, auld woman, not your own. I alone shall choose my mates, and you can bet I'll make a better match than you did; my men willna scatter their seed everywhere on earth except
my
womb. Now, gather my cousins, bring them to me. I willna leave this place, much as I wish to. For now, at least."

Turning to Jacob, she said, "I am very sorry my grandmother has used you in this way. It
will not
happen again. My honor is my word and you've earned both." Straight-backed as a General, eyes trained forward, she stepped back one pace, turned on her heel toward the door.

"The guardians cannot come, Ailill," the elder intoned quickly, before her granddaughter could make more of a scene, or simply leave, as had become her way in recent years. "They battle the Rogues down in the Borderlands." Ailill paused, staring sightlessly forward as the woman's words sunk in. Her grandmother hurried on.

"Twas a fearsome battle this time, a great many men; it seems ye left the fight too soon. The fault is my own, for 'twas I who prematurely forced your leavetaking."

"To put it mildly,
Seanmhair
," Ailill hissed through clenched teeth. "Not that you'd dare admit in company to ordering me carried off the field, trussed like a wild turkey if need be; and you know full well that my men would never have done so on any others word! It was they who hid me from you for all those months, after all." 

"Well, aside from the particulars,
necessary after ye'd slipped awa' from Skye like a wily wee reiver
, the point here is that the dastardly Rogues hadna run off to save their wretched necks, as we'd intentionally made ye believe." The regal woman steeled herself against her granddaughter's icy glare. "Nay, they had but fallen back only to reconnoiter, to gather more forces. I am sorry to say, but since ye left they have struck back wi' more ferocity than we've previously seen. Aye, 'struth, we've lost a verra few troops, but it seems ye kent those we did lose fairly well; and, ere ye should ask, nay, ye cannot rejoin the fight; 'tis
quite
at an end and Tiernan is there just now... after so long, he doesna want to be seein' ye on yet another blasted battlefield!"

Shock rippled through the girl in visible waves. Her eyes widened, narrowed in disbelief. "
Tiernan?
"
all but roared. "Ye'd send a sickly lad into battle just to keep me a prisoner, a virtual slave to the whims o' the Elders? It has hardly been enough time since he took sick; barely two years, now, and I know it takes years to recover fully! He very nearly died that day! How dare you!" Her look of disbelief rolled smoothly to one of grief. Ailill's eyes were soon brimming, ready to spill over.

Realization hit home almost at once; two fat crystalline tears rolled slowly down her smooth cheeks. "He wished to go. Because he kent that I was no longer there, that it would take the strength o' the Gentry to put a stop to the Black."

"Aye, Ailill." Her grandmother leveled a gaze on the teary-eyed lass, her expression firm though not completely lacking in sympathy. "Tiernan kens ye too well,
ar saighdear ruadh
. He knew ye'd come if we told ye the full truth."

"Aye, and so, despite the risks to our own, ye swore to say naught 'til the rage had died down a wee bit. Isn't that so?" Ailill stared hard into those prismatic eyes for a long moment. When she spoke again there was a tremor in her voice. "How has he fared... in my absence?"

"He fares well enough. His body is fully healed, strengthened, though unused to wielding a claymoor after so long abed."

"And his heart... how is that, after all that has happened?" Biting her lip hard to keep from crying, Ailill tensed at the slow shake of the woman's snowy head. Her eyes flicked briefly to the twin men, each staring at her warily. They were frightened by her reaction, discomposed by her tears, shed for another man. Sinking down slowly into her chair, Ailill said, "I mun ken all. What goes amiss, and what doesna. Ye ken it."

Sighing deeply, Fallon sat forward, eyes closed. "Tiernan is a strong lad; he's pulled through the illness verra nicely, physically, but his heart aches daily. For you, Ailill. His reason for going to this battle is simple... ye have obligations other than constantly feuding o'er what is yours by rights, by birth and station. He wishes ye to hurry along wi' those duties, so that ye might return to him ere he dies o' a broken heart. Tiernan spent your eighteenth birthday at
Inbhir Nàrann
, lass... alone and as miserable as any ha' seen him. That is the true reason MacDuff allowed him to go. Believe me when I say, Ailill, that your tutor doesna wish to see the
first
son go through this. 'Tis why Jamie has been so uncharacteristically adamant since your return. It all comes back to love."