Warrior's Moon

The bailey was busy with warriors and clanspeople alike, many of whom seemed interested in the new arrivals. And slightly suspicious, if the frowns she and her companion were receiving were anything to go by, but the overt hostility she might have expected toward those garbed as the English was surprisingly absent.

Niall stopped his horse, and the warriors with him followed suit. Shona guided her tired mare to a halt, so fatigued herself she was not absolutely sure she would make it off the horse without sending both herself and Marjory tumbling.

“Should we dismount then?” Audrey asked, her tone showing no more enthusiasm for the prospect than Shona felt.

Shona opened her mouth to answer, only to lose any hope she had of speaking as her gaze fell upon a warrior standing near the open area in front of the blacksmith’s. The man, who was easily as tall and as broad as Niall, wore her former clan’s colors with no shirt beneath the MacLeod plaid to give him any hint of civility.

His back to them, his lack of interest in the English strangers was more than obvious.

But she could not claim the same apathy.

Not when every inch of his arrogant stance was as familiar to her as the mane on her mare’s head after a sennight spent in the saddle.

His black hair was a little longer than it had been six years ago, the blue tattoos covering his left shoulder and arm were a new addition, and his muscles bulged more, but she had absolutely no doubt about the identity of the MacLeod soldier standing so confidently among the Sinclairs.

Caelis. Her beloved. Her betrayer.

Even the sound of his name in her own thinking made her heart beat faster and her hands tighten into fists.

Deceiver, screamed that voice in her mind that had never gone fully silent though she’d been forced to marry another man. Mine, cried the heart that had learned that neither love nor a lover could be trusted at this man’s feet.

She’d given him her love and her innocence.

He had repaid those gifts with false promises and, ultimately, repudiation.

She’d thought never to see him again, been certain that even her return to Scotland would not cause their paths to cross.

After all, she hadn’t gone home to her former clan and she’d been careful to avoid their lands in the journey northward. She’d no desire to come in contact with her former laird and even less her former swain.

How cruel of fate to dictate differently. To ensure that despite the habit her former clansmen had of keeping strictly to themselves, this man would be in this place the one day she would ever spend in the Sinclair keep.

The head of Shona’s mare jerked against her tightened hold on the reins and she felt gratitude that they were no longer moving. Holding the reins like that was one guaranteed way to get tossed from even a loyal horse’s back.

Marjory slept on, oblivious to the near-miss, their new surroundings and to the cataclysm happening inside her mother.

As if Caelis could feel the weight of Shona’s regard, he turned. Slowly and with no evidence of curiosity, his gentian gaze slid over her, his expression dismissive as he took in her English clothing.

She could tell the moment he recognized her, though, the very second he realized she was not just an Englishwoman, but a woman from his past.

He went rigid, his eyes widening with a shock so complete it would have been amusing if she were not so devastated at his appearance in her already turbulent life.

He went as if to take a step and stumbled.

How odd. He was a sure-footed man. Perhaps one of the other warriors had tripped him? Men played games with each other like that.

Even as the nonsensical thoughts floated through her mind, fear screamed through her body. Caelis could not see Eadan. Her son could never know the man who had denied his very existence and rejected the woman he had professed to love.

They needed to leave. Now. The laird of the Sinclairs would simply have to do without the pleasure of making their acquaintance.

That thought alone gave her the strength to break her gaze from Caelis as she jerked her head around, searching frantically for Eadan.

He was already on the ground, his hand held in Niall’s giant paw, a smaller man standing quite near to the huge warrior, talking to them both with an engaging smile.

Shona wanted to scream at them to please put her son back on his horse and then get out of her way. But no words left her lips. She could neither move, nor speak, her panic freezing her as stiff as death.

Even as the need to escape continued to tear through her, she knew it to be hopeless.

Even if she could make herself move, to cry out for Niall’s assistance in getting her son back on his horse, she and her companions would not be allowed to leave the Sinclair holding without seeing the laird. It had already been decided.

And as had happened too often in her past, Shona knew she was subject to the whims of men who held authority over her. This time, it was only by her trespass on his land, but that would not matter to the Sinclair laird.

He was a man with power.

He would demand to be obeyed.

’Twas the way of things.

Hopelessness washed over Shona near to drowning her.

The boy was out of Caelis’s line of sight, but that gave Shona little comfort.

The warrior was bound to see her child soon and when he did? He would know the truth, no matter how much he might like to deny it.

But what he would do with that truth, she could not guess at. Nothing good for her. She’d discovered in the past six years that men rarely made choices to benefit women.

But most particularly her.

Caelis had only been the first man in a long list in her life to exhibit this truth.

“Shona…”

She looked down and saw that both Audrey and Thomas were there, standing beside Shona’s mare. Audrey’s hands were upraised to take Marjory so Shona could dismount.

When had they gotten off their horses?

“Are you all right?” Thomas asked, his tone clearly worried. Both he and Audrey wore matching expressions of concern. “We’ve said your name three times.”

“I…no…” she answered with honesty before she thought to control her tongue.

“What is it?” Suddenly Niall was there, having moved very quickly. “Lady Heronshire, do you need help dismounting?”

He reached up as well. “Give me the babe.”

Dropping the horse’s reins, Shona wrapped her arms around her daughter in a reflexive move of protection.

“Do not touch her.” The snarl came from behind Niall and then Caelis was there, shoving the other warrior away from Shona’s horse.

Niall spun on the other man, knocking him back and shouting. “The hell!”

“She’s mine,” Caelis growled, his voice so animal-like the words were barely discernible.

“Calm yourself,” Niall snapped, sounding less angry for some reason, though he didn’t back away. “The Englishwoman—”

“She is not English.”

“Do ye see how she is dressed? She is a lady, Caelis. Stop and think.”

But Caelis appeared beyond reason, his aggression not lessening one iota. And Shona did not understand it. In no scenario of this moment she might ever have imagined would she have considered him laying claim to her… or was it her daughter?