chapter 6
He is the best man who, when making his plans, fears and reflects on everything that can happen to him, but in the moment of action is bold.
—HERODOTUS
Eirik landed in the area behind the keep that the Sinclair used to train his elite soldiers. He had waited to approach until the wall and tower guards were looking elsewhere and would have waited for a cloud to cover the moon as well, but the human woman in his arms was too wounded for such a delay.
Even so, he had been tempted to stay in the air longer just to experience the joy pouring off Ciara in delicious waves.
She had not wanted to fly but had loved it once they were in the air. A fearless Chrechte if he had ever met one.
’Twas why he had not been willing to tell Talorc about Ciara sneaking from the fortress at night. Eirik was too impressed by her sneakiness and courage.
By happenstance, he had been there the first time she’d made the jump from her window to the wall. She could not have known it would work. He had not believed it would and had shifted to his dragon with no hope of catching her this time before she landed gracefully on the wall walk. The leap should have not been possible, even for a wolf.
But she’d made it and he had to respect that.
Besides, his raven had enjoyed watching over her as Ciara ran through the forest, a sense of possessive protectiveness usually reserved for family filling him as he flew above her.
Ciara had not liked finding out she’d been watched over, however. Independent faolán.
If he were not in his dragon form, he would be smiling as he gently laid the human woman, Mairi, onto the ground. Dragons did not smile though and any attempt to do so would be more frightening than reassuring.
He was unsurprised when Lais stepped out of the shadows. Eirik had called to the healer through the mental link he shared with all the Éan before he ever took flight. As a direct descendant of the first keeper of the Clach Gealach Gra, Eirik could communicate with his people at will. He could also hear them when they needed him to, but had been trained to block the attempts as well.
“She has not regained her senses?” Lais asked, already examining Mairi’s bruises and scowling over them.
“No,” Ciara answered, probably assuming Lais had been talking to her. She squirmed in her perch on Eirik’s neck. “I need to get down.”
Having her naked body astride him, even in his dragon form, had been a challenge to Eirik’s self-control. He could smell her scent, taste her on the air around them and the feel of her thighs against his neck only made him think of what they would feel like wrapped around his body when he was a man.
The desire to shift right now, while she was still astride his beast burned inside him. He forced himself to ignore it; this was not the time to give in to his carnal lusts.
He flicked his tail up to give her something to hold on to as she climbed down while folding his wings back to create a protective shield for her—both so she would not fall and to hide her nakedness from Lais. Were he to look up from his patient, which he showed no signs of doing.
Fortunately for Eirik’s temper, she dismounted from the opposite side to where Lais knelt by Mairi. For whatever reason, Eirik’s dragon was ready to cast fire at the thought of Lais witnessing Ciara’s nudity.
They were Chrechte, damn it. Not the tamed humans among the clans. Eirik was in no way influenced by civilized conventions, but if Lais were to lay eyes on Ciara in all her nude beauty, Eirik was not entirely sure he would be able to control the instincts of the beast.
Lais nodded his head toward a pile of cloth on the ground. “I brought covering for Ciara as you asked.”
Eirik hadn’t asked, he’d ordered. Nevertheless, he said, Thank you, through the mental link before calling forth his human form.
As soon as he had completed the shift, he grabbed light fabric he knew to be one of his shirts and tossed it to Ciara. “Cover yourself.”
“Bossy dragon.” But her beautiful green eyes still glowed with the happiness she’d experienced in flight and her mouth curved in a sweet smile he wanted to kiss.
She pulled the shirt on quickly. The hem hung down past her knees and in the moonlight it did an adequate job of preserving her feminine modesty. But if he looked closely, he could see her nipples, still hard from the cold air, poking against the thin material.
He was looking closely. Very, very closely. So intently in fact, that he could just make out the juncture of her thighs behind the fall of fabric.
He wanted nothing more in that moment than to rip the damn thing back off again and have his way with the little wolf that hid her caring heart behind a mask of indifference.
Looking at her standing there in his shirt, he had to smile. Compared to him, she was a wee thing, but it was easy to forget that with her fierce spirit.
A spirit the Sinclair insisted that she had kept locked deep inside herself until Eirik’s arrival. Eirik thought it was fury at her brother’s killer coming to live among her clan that had brought her emotions to the surface.
But unlike Ciara, Talorc had not blamed Eirik for Galen’s death, or the subsequent suicide of Ciara’s mother. The laird maintained that the feelings Ciara was finally exhibiting did not run along the lines of hatred.
Unwilling to argue the matter, Eirik had left the deluded laird to his illusions.
“And you?” Ciara demanded.
Eirik’s brows drew together in confusion. “What?”
“Mairi could wake up any moment.”
“Aye, ’twould be a good thing.”
“Not while you are still naked,” Ciara gritted out.
And Eirik smiled. It pleased him more than it should that the femwolf was apparently afflicted by a strain of un-Chrechte-like modesty on his behalf as well.
She’d made it clear that she was no more interested in finding a mate right now than he was. And though she had finally acknowledged that her brother’s death was of Galen’s own making, it did not follow that she would ever consider aligning her life with his killer.
If Eirik were looking for a mate, which he was not. He had too much to do for his people right now to spend time trying to placate or woo a woman. He could not even be sure a woman existed that he could share his life with, much less one that he could call true mate. He had two natures besides his human one to appease when choosing his lifelong bed partner.
The raven and dragon were often at odds inside him when it came to choosing a course of action. What were the chances they would agree on his mate?
“What has you scowling?” Ciara asked in a teasing tone. “You were smiling just a moment ago.”
“Is a near-dead human woman found on Sinclair land not reason enough to frown?” he asked as he donned his kilt.
It was made of the hide from the first boar he had brought down on his own. His aunt had tanned the leather before fashioning a hunter’s kilt from it, since his mother had not been alive to do so and his sister had been too busy protecting their people as a full-fledged guardian warrior.
As prince of his people, he had never worn a plaid, not even the weave of muted forest tones the Éan had taken to be their own colors.
He had not decided if joining the Sinclairs would change that fact.
Ciara bit her lip, the happy glow fading from her features, her gaze quickly averting to look at the woman lying in the grass. “We should get her inside. I need to wake Abigail.”
“Abigail’s healing herbs are a wonder to be sure, but they cannot compare to a Chrechte’s gift.”
“Lais is a healer?” Ciara’s voice had dropped low in wonder. “I thought only the sacred stones could be used to heal.”
Eirik grabbed her shoulders and spun her to face him squarely. “What do you know of the Clach Gealach Gra?”
She rolled her eyes, not in the least impressed by his angry demand. Which, considering the fear she had shown toward him thus far, was some kind of miracle. “Lais asked me the same thing.”
Eirik tossed a look of censure toward his people’s healer that went unnoticed. “Did he?”
Lais had paid Eirik no heed, but Ciara nodded. “You act like only the Éan have ever heard the stories of the ancient Chrechte and their ways.”
“The Faol tell stories of the Clach Gealach Gra?” None of the wolves the Éan had taken into their confidence had mentioned this.
Ciara looked at him as if wondering at his sanity. “The world does not begin and end with the Éan, Master Dragon. There are other Chrechte in the world and they have their own pasts, though there is no doubt that at one time they intertwined.”
“Do not say that aloud.”
“That the Chrechte share a common history so long ago none of us can be sure of the truth and the myth in our ancient stories?”
“Do not mention my other form,” he said through gritted teeth.
She rolled her eyes. Again. “You really think you are going to keep your secret from the clan with the way you go flying off in your dragon form when you get into a snit?”
“I do not have snits.” And he had never taken his dragon form when there was risk of being seen except around her.
She was bad for his secrets and too much a challenge to his self-control.
“Of course not, Your Royal Highness. A prince would never admit to something so mundane.” Ciara said the word prince like another might say dung.
But he refused to be drawn. “Do not attempt to change the subject. I asked what you knew of our sacred stone.”
“Very little.”
“Do not lie.”
“I am not.” Her eyes threw green daggers at him.
“She can mask her deceit,” Lais inserted and then went back to full concentration on his patient.
The daggered look turned onto the once-again-oblivious healer.
Eirik said, “That is not possible.”
“Just as it is impossible to turn into a dragon,” Ciara said with pure sarcasm. “I’ll make a note of that.”
“The Sinclair said you were quiet. Biddable.”
With an expression of affront, she demanded, “Are you saying I am not?”
“Aye.”
She crossed her arms, no doubt having no idea how it impacted the fit of his shirt on her. The action put her lovely breasts into relief, making her dusky nipples press against the thin linen. The hem had drawn up as well, exposing more of her enticing legs.
All of it topped by an expression that tempted him to tame her. “You? Are arrogant.”
“And you have yet to admit how you came to know about our sacred stone.”
“My brother.”
Just mention of the man filled Eirik with fury. “He told you of our stone? Had he plans to steal it?”
“Of course not. He told me the stories of the sacred stones, how they could bestow gifts during the coming-of-age ceremony and be used to heal those of Chrechte decent.”
“Like me.” The words were spoken in a weak feminine voice and had both Eirik and Ciara spinning to face Mairi and Lais.
“You are Chrechte?” Eirik asked with disbelief.
The woman had no scent of animal at all.
“My father is.”
“But you have no beast.”
“She can give me one.” Mairi pointed to Ciara. “She is keeper of the Faolchú Chridhe.”
“The wolves have a sacred stone?” He glared at Ciara.
He would not believe it. What stories had she told this broken human? If it were true, Talorc would have revealed such to Eirik. If not the Sinclair, then Barr. Eirik’s brother by marriage would not have kept something so important from him.
Ciara did not meet his eyes, something secretive in her demeanor. “It was lost before we joined the clans.”
“But she can find it,” Mairi claimed.
The slight wince was barely there on Ciara’s face, but he saw it. Had she made the claim to Mairi and not expected to be held accountable for it, or did Ciara not want the Éan to know of her hopes to find the Faolchú Chridhe? Did Ciara share her brother’s view of the Éan?
“Is this true?” Eirik demanded, wanting more answers than he would ask for. “Never mind. You can mask any lie you tell me. I will ask Talorc.”
He turned toward the keep, determined to do just that.
“Wait.” Ciara’s voice was too urgent to deny.
He stopped, not turning back toward her.
“I have not told him yet.” He could hear her moving toward him and then feel her hand on his arm. “Please, let me tell him.”
He spun to face the femwolf, knocking her hand away from him with his quick movement. “You have not bothered to tell your laird?”
She shook her head. “I haven’t told anyone since Galen. I was afraid to, afraid it would spark the same madness in them.”
“You blame your sacred stone for your brother’s idiocy?”
“No, I blame his desire to use its power, but I couldn’t be sure…”
Her lack of trust in Talorc staggered Eirik. “The man believes himself your father,” he bit out.
“He is, in all the ways that count, but Galen was my brother, my protector. And still, finding the Faolchú Chridhe was more important to him than anything else.” Her voice was husky with an old grief, but her eyes glittered with fresh fear.
“Talorc is nothing like your brother.”
“I know.”
“And still you have not told him of the wolves’ sacred stone?”
“I planned to.”
“When?”
“Soon.”
“Why wait?” He wanted her to admit it, her mistrust of her own father and laird.
“It has great power, temptation for even the most honorable Chrechte. It can call forth the conriocht, not just the wolf.”
A werewolf? They were myth.
Eirik almost laughed at his own arrogance. He shared nature with a dragon and he doubted the existence of the conriocht? A creature that was said to tower over other men and had the snout, fangs and claws of a wolf and the strength of ten men, the conriocht would be invincible to all but a dragon.
Though it could not fly.
“So, you would deny this power to your laird, to your fellow Faol.”
“Perhaps it was denied us for a reason. The Faolchú Chridhe disappeared and while my brother claimed it was stolen by the Éan, I am not so sure. Perhaps the leaders of our people saw the misuse of its power and hid it to stop such a thing from happening again.”
“’Tis all conjecture.”
She nodded. “It doesn’t matter. It wants to be found now and will give me no rest until it is.”
“Your dreams.”
“What do you know of my dreams?”
“Only that they keep you awake at night. You look as if you sleep less than a mother with twin babes and a new litter of pups to care for at once.”
Her shoulders drooped. “I am tired. So very tired.”
“Tonight you will sleep. Tomorrow, we speak to the Sinclair.”
Her mouth twisted as if she found something darkly funny, but she nodded. “Tomorrow.”
Eirik turned back to Lais and Mairi. “Is she well enough to be carried inside yet?”
“She is, though barely. She had many injuries…broken bones, bleeding inside, severe bruising in many places. I have healed what I could, but she needs more tending and sleep. I need rest before I can continue.” It was obvious Lais did not like admitting the last.
Eirik respected him all the more for doing so and nodded. “I will carry her into the keep.”
“No,” both his healer and that keeper of secrets, Ciara, said together.
He ignored Ciara to give Lais a questioning look.
“I have enough strength to carry her.”
Eirik took in the protective stance Lais had over the human, the way he held his body between her and the other two Chrechte. Even more telling was the fierce light in Lais’s brown gaze. The usually even-tempered man looked ready to throw down in battle over the right to transport the broken woman into the keep.
Eirik took a deliberate step backward. Think long and hard before you take a human woman as a mate, he said through their mental link. “Take her to Ciara’s room,” he said aloud.
Mairi would need watching and Ciara, for all her secrets, was the only logical choice. Talorc would not tolerate an unattached male sleeping in the same room as the female, human, or not. So, healer, or no—Lais was out.
That left Ciara.
Who, unsurprisingly, did not argue Eirik’s order to have Mairi carried to her room. For all her attempts to show herself otherwise, she had a caring nature she could not hide.
She followed them into the keep, the still quality of her silence bothering Eirik, though it should not.
She wanted none of him and he wanted nothing of such a deceitful Chrechte. Her reasons for not telling the Sinclair about the Faolchú Chridhe would imply Ciara did not share Galen’s view of the Éan, but that was only if Eirik accepted as truth those claims.
Her ability to mask her deceit and the secrets she kept meant that he could not accept anything she said so easily.
When they got to her bedchamber, Ciara quickly drew a traditional plaid in the Sinclair colors of blue and black around her. She made pleats with nimble fingers before wrapping the end over his shirt in a diagonal across her chest. She pulled a blanket of the same fabric back on the bed for Lais to lay Mairi down and then stepped back, allowing the healer room to care for his patient.
“I will awaken the laird and tell him of the night’s happenings,” she said in a subdued voice before quickly leaving the room.