Page 49 of The Dark Wolf's Deliverance

‘He is a man before he is a priest, so trust me, he has designs on you.’

‘Designs of putting me in a nunnery maybe. He keeps talking about redeeming my soul.’ She smiled, hoping to draw Conall out. He seemed different with her, guarded, remote even.

‘It is probably because you have been too much in my company, and he thinks my wickedness might have rubbed off on you. The man despises me, and I probably deserve it.’ He laughed suddenly. ‘Christ, I can picture you now in a wimple and such. You’ll make a woeful nun, Kenna. Like me, you are more suited to a life of sin and don’t glower at me. I meant it as a compliment.’

‘Alright, but you changed the subject. Why did you call your horse Erebus, such a bleak name?’

‘Alright, I will tell you, but you won’t like it. I chose a dark name because I have a dark heart and a dark soul. There is something inside me that rages at life, at people, at God and the world. I am not wise and dependable like my brother or kind and giving like my sister. I am this family’s black sheep, the one that doesn’t fit, the one that causes trouble and shame for everyone. There is a kind of chaos in me. I didn’t used to be like this, but when I got to a certain age, I changed and people started to tell me everything I did was wrong, that I am a bad lot. It is even worse since Sgathach Dun.’

Silence followed his admission. Conall glared at her so hard it was as if the blackness he had talked of had come to the surface all of a sudden. The light seemed to have gone out of the day.

‘I never said that out loud to anyone before. Can’t quite believe I am saying it to you now, but you have to know what I am, Kenna. Do not think of me as some kind of sanctuary because I am not.’ He narrowed his eyes and brought Erebus right up against her horse. She wasn’t sure if he was going to kiss her or hit her in that strange moment. His expression was so angry and wild. ‘I am a bad man and that is why you should steer well clear of me.’

‘I don’t believe that. After what we went through together, we are friends, are we not?’

‘Friends. Is that what we are? You know that I used you to get out of Sgathach Dun. I deliberately forged a friendship with you, made you trust me so that I could escape. When you came down to me that first night I saw an opportunity, not a person, not a friend.’

Kenna’s chest became a knot of hurt. ‘And now?’

‘Please don’t hate me for being honest. When I got to know you, how brave you were, how kind, I liked you and I came to care for you. And how did I repay everything you did for me – by seducing you? Standing before my father today, I was ashamed of myself.’

‘If you mean that night in the cottage, I am not ashamed.’

‘Well, I am, and now I can’t look at you without feeling like the lowest bastard there ever was. I should never have behaved in that way.’

Kenna’s face grew hot, and it was as though Conall had put his fist around her heart and was squeezing it. ‘Do you think I’m not good enough for you?’

‘What? No, of course not.’

‘You’re ashamed because you lay with a dirty Moncur, part of the clan that kidnapped and tortured you?’

‘I suppose that doesn’t make you an ideal companion.’

An awful thought wriggled into her head. ‘Did you seek to revenge yourself on my father by making a whore of his daughter?’

‘Kenna, stop! You are wilfully mistaking my meaning. I am trying to tell you that what I did, I should not have done. It was dishonourable of me. You have done nothing wrong, and you should carry no shame for what happened. I regret it, not because I didn’t want you, not because you aren’t lovely and bonnie. I regret it because you deserved my respect, and you did not get it. As I was trying to tell you, I am a bad person, and you should stay away from me.’

‘And what if I don’t want to?’ she replied, feeling tears well up in her eyes.

‘Then the chaos inside me will consume us both. I will only drag you down, Kenna, and besides, there’s something else that troubles me.’

He was pushing her away. She could feel it. Conall could not have hurt her more if he had punched her in the guts, and she wanted to rage at him for the hurt he was causing.

Conall looked down at his hands on the reins, hands that had once caressed her and held her, touching the most intimate parts of her and making her feel worthy and wanted. ‘There is something else, something I find hard to say aloud, Kenna.’

‘Conall.’ A shout behind them had Conall twisting his horse’s head around in a fury. Several young men were riding across the field towards them. Meyrick was amongst them, and Kenna recognised some others from Dunslair.

‘We are well met on this day,’ said one of them breathlessly, nodding his head in greeting to her with a smirk on his face.

Kenna tried to remember his name. Darroch maybe. Yes, that was it.

‘Where are you heading?’ he asked.

‘Nowhere in particular, just riding,’ Conall replied.

‘Well, we have a wager amongst us as to who can make it home first. Do you think you are up to it?’ asked Meyrick, glancing over at her and giving her a beaming smile.

‘I have company, as you can see,’ replied Conall with immense irritation in his voice and a steely look at Meyrick.

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