Page 23 of A Constant Blaze

And for the first time, as they’d stood before the priest and her shaking hand had been formally given to him, he’d realized her fear. Behind the beautiful woman still lay the defiant child.

He’d been eighteen years old, the ruler of an earldom, and pretty much used to having any women who took his fancy. Even then, he’d been aware that having Halla would be different, and he’d wanted her all the more because of it. It hadn’t been easy taming the hungry beast of his lust, but he’d defeated it by whisking Halla outside the hall, away from everyone, as soon as the ceremony was over.

Her quick breathing was all that gave her away.

He said, “We are friends, are we not? Friends who occasionally shoot each other.”

She laughed as she was meant to, and he took her hand and kissed it. It felt hot under his lips. And she still trembled.

“When you’re used to me,” he said gently, “then I will be your husband. Until then, we’ll let the friendship grow. Do you agree?”

Her face flushed at his words. Her eyes searched his face before they fell. “I agree,” she said hoarsely. Her hand tugged to be free, and she vanished back into the hall.

*

All those yearslater, the memory stirred Malcolm to desire. At eighteen, it wasn’t so easy to control one’s rampaging lusts. Nor after two decades of captivity. Especially when he understood now what he hadn’t then, that part of Halla had wanted to be made his wife in every sense from that very first day. There had been disappointment mingled with her relief.

And now he was going back to her. It would be like those first days all over again. In twenty years, they must both have changed beyond all recognition, outwardly and inwardly. All through his imprisonment, he’d hugged his love for her close to himself. His love for the girl she’d been. He didn’t even know if he loved her still. He loved a shadowy memory, an ideal. And God knew what she felt for the man who’d turned her life upside down; had, in effect, wasted her life and left her alone.

No rumors overheard or extracted from his guards had ever besmirched the name of the Lady of Ross. No embarrassing glances or blurted words had ever slipped from Mairead or Donald to accuse her of the slightest infidelity. And yet his wife was only human. And passionate. And damnably beautiful…

“Time to rise and go,” Donald’s voice said from inside the tent. “Today, we cross into Fife and meet up with Adam.”

Derisive laughter pushed out Malcolm’s breath. Right now, it wasn’t actually unpleasant to feel like a falling leaf, blown this way and that by the wind without him being able to control its speed or direction. The trouble was, that man so blown and led didn’t feel likehim. Like Malcolm MacHeth.

*

Malcolm no longernoticed the biting wind. Through the all but horizontal rain, a swirling mist had resolved into a massive horde of wild men, a huge villainous army, guaranteed to put the fear of God—or at least of the MacHeths—into the southern Scots. Certainly, none of the locals seemed to have stayed to watch.

A scattering of horsemen rode among the host, and it was to those Malcolm’s gaze clung, searching for anything that would identifyhim, his other stranger son.

Beside him, Christian and Donald came to a halt, too. Their Norman escort spread out on either side, bows drawn, although there was nothing so few could possibly do if it came to a fight with such a huge force.

“Run for your lives.” Donald grinned with barely suppressed excitement. “The MacHeths are coming!”

Malcolm’s breath heaved. He didn’t know if it was pride or grief, or even what or who it encompassed. White Christ, but he was a mess.

Or perhaps he was just stunned by the sheer size of the horde which had come to bring him home. He couldn’t even blink in case the dam of his emotion burst.

At last, he made out a figure on horseback, pushing forward to the front—a tall man in a dark red cloak riding a big gray horse. Adam. This must be Adam, his seer son who’d begun the rebellion all over again in his name. At least, Donald said he was a seer, which might have been wishful thinking. Mairead had been more ambiguous. Others again called him mad.

“Don’t shoot,” the Norman Henry said dryly to his bowmen, who were already lowering their weapons. He understood they were the remains of Lanson’s army, acquired by Adam when he’d married Christian, but the details of how they’d come to be trusted were unclear. It couldn’t have been easy for them to just watch such an advance of fighting men who’d so recently been their enemy.

The man who had to be his son rode harder across the flat plain, his men streaming after him. He looked wild and unkempt. And he was clearly Donald’s brother. The wind—surely it must have been the wind—swept Malcolm’s breath away. The horseman veered to the left, as if he were riding straight at Christian.

For an instant, Malcolm feared he would actually crash into her at full tilt, but at the last moment, he pulled on the reins. The horse half reared, whinnying in complaint. Before its front hooves hit the ground once more, Adam was out of the saddle, and as the other riders slowed to a halt, his gaze, oddly wild and unfocused, clashed with Christian’s.

Oh yes, he could easily be insane. And yet his task in all this could not have been easy, as Malcolm well knew—to sit and wait and keep such a huge force of idle men in order while others did his bidding in the lion’s den.

Adam’s eyes met his wife’s for only an instant, for it seemed his real attention was elsewhere. He strode past the head of Christian’s horse and slowed. Without looking at her, but as if he couldn’t help it, he reached for her hand on the reins. She covered it with hers at once, and a half smile flickered on the madman’s lips.

And then he broke away, once more the unstoppable force, striding toward Malcolm, as though, without even having looked, he knew where to find him.

From his own saddle, Donald reached down to grip his brother’s shoulder on his way past. “‘My brother will come for me,’ I told the King of Scots,” he drawled into the wind. “I never imagined you’d send two women.”

“Two remarkable women,” Adam said without pausing. Not, then, totally insane.

“I’ll give you that,” Donald allowed. “Gladly.”

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