chapter 8
Healing is a matter of time, but it is sometimes also a matter of opportunity.
—HIPPOCRATES
Lais lifted Mairi into his arms, ignoring her squeak of surprise and turned to face his laird. “I will do another session of healing on her.”
Talorc nodded. “Abigail will accompany you.”
“If you wish, but my power to heal is stronger when there are no distractions.”
“I believe your patient will be distraction enough,” Talorc said wryly.
Mairi gasped at this and squirmed, but Lais carefully kept her close. “Exactly,” he agreed with his laird. “Adding further distractions to the mix will hamper my ability to heal my patient, but I will bow to your will.”
The laird shook his head. “You are almost as arrogant as your prince.”
“I believe that is the pot calling the kettle,” Abigail said with a small laugh.
Since Lais agreed, he did his best to hide his amusement. He liked his head just where it was. Attached to his shoulders.
“You will not take advantage of her innocence,” the Faol declared. “She is under my protection.”
Lais did not blame the laird for doubting his honor. After what Lais had done to his own people, he did not expect the trust of other Chrechte.
’Twas why Eirik’s friendship was so important to Lais. The prince had never once questioned Lais’s motives or actions.
But the insult to his integrity still wounded. “She is my patient. She is safe under my care.”
“Of course she is safe with you,” Abigail soothed and then glared at Talorc. “My husband did not mean to imply otherwise.”
The laird didn’t look in the least repentant. “He wants her.”
Abigail blushed and gave Mairi a pitying look.
Mairi made a high-pitched sound of protest, but she didn’t try to get out of his arms again. Her wounds must be paining her. And that was all that mattered right now.
“I will treat her as if she were another ward of the Sinclair,” Lais said.
“Good.” The wolf alpha’s eyes promised retribution if Lais did not do as he’d promised. “Because for now, that is exactly what she is.”
“But I…my father…he won’t…” Mairi’s sweet feminine voice rambled out in confusion.
Talorc ignored her, his face softening near miraculously as he looked at his wife. “’Tis time to take the boys digging in your herb garden, I think.”
“The last time you did that, they dug up my thyme and our dinners suffered,” Abigail said with asperity, but an amused twinkle in her eye.
“Then you had best come supervise us.”
“I suppose I had better at that.” The Sinclair’s lady’s lips twitched with humor.
“By your leave,” Lais said to the laird, indicating the stairs with his chin.
Talorc’s attention came back to Lais and Mairi. “Do what you can for her. She is no warrior to suffer such pain.”
Lais should not have been surprised that the Sinclair laird had noticed Mairi’s discomfort, or that the wolf cared about it, but part of him was. And it shamed Lais to realize he had his own judgments based on past experience to overcome.
“I will.”
Talorc nodded and then led his family from the great hall.
Lais carried Mairi up to his bedchamber.
He’d been taken aback when the laird had offered him a room in the keep beside Eirik’s. But Talorc had said that with Lais’s Chrechte gift of healing, he would be an invaluable member of the clan and best kept close to the laird’s family.
Healing Mairi in Lais’s nest would help him focus and draw on the strength of his Chrechte gift. His weapons nearby, the furs Lais had brought with him from his home in the forest were arranged in a way that made his eagle feel comfortable and safe, despite them being on the floor.
He kept a bowl of fragrant herbs used for healing in the high window, the scent soothing and a reminder at the same time. Anya-Gra had taught him that while his ability to heal others was a great gift, he did not have to use it alone. One of her daughters had spent the last seven years training Lais in the use of herbs, tinctures and other treatments in healing ailments for both Chrechte and human.
The only furniture in the room, a long narrow table against the wall opposite the bed, held jars, pots and pouches filled with his tools as a healer from this training. In the center rested a small wooden box. Decorated with a carved dragon on the top, it had a raven, an eagle and a hawk decorating three sides and nothing on the back. Inside, rested the small amber stone Anya-Gra had given Lais the day after he had gone to live among the Éan.
A memento to the fact he’d been given a second chance, the dark yellow crystal helped him remember that day of healing in the cavern seven years past. Anya-Gra had also worked with Lais in using it to focus and enhance his healing gift.
Kicking the door shut, he bumped the bar with his shoulder so it fell in place, ensuring no one could barge in and interrupt them. To break his focus at a crucial moment in her healing could have very detrimental effects on Mairi’s recovery.
“This isn’t Ciara’s room,” the sweet blonde said as he laid her on his furs, her blue gaze filled with confusion.
He settled a smaller, rolled-up fur under her head. “It is mine.”
“But ’tis not seemly.” She tried to get up but barely lifted her head before settling back with a pained expression. “I cannot be in the room of an unmarried soldier.”
Though he trained with the warriors, he was not one of them. “I am healer, not a soldier.”
He poured water from the ewer kept in his room into the large wooden bowl he used for all manner of things. It had been carved thin and polished to a high finish by one of the skilled woodworkers among the humans that had made their lives with the Éan in the forest.
“Pffft.” Her mouth pursed adorably and the urge to kiss her was almost stronger than his will. “That is hardly an important distinction.”
It was to Lais. He would never again attempt to hurt another Chrechte unless in defense of others. “You heard the laird. Your virtue is safe.”
She blushed so brightly, it nearly hid the remaining bruises on her face. “That is not what I meant. I never thought…You wouldn’t want…I’m ugly with bruises…You…”
The diminutive human woman was charming and much too desirable when she got flustered. Lais found himself smiling despite having to fight an internal battle of lust. “You are safe in my company.”
“I never doubted it, but that is not the point.”
“What is the point then, little one?” Her trust in him was an even stronger aphrodisiac than her beauty.
He needed to draw a breath not infused so strongly with her scent. He stood and went to his table, gathering herbs and cloths for treating her.
“My name is Mairi.”
“Is that the point?” He could not stop himself teasing as he placed the things he’d gathered beside the bowl of water.
“Of course not.”
In better control of his desires, Lais arranged her more carefully on the furs so there was no undue pressure on any of the areas that would be giving her the most pain. He had to fight from turning each touch into a caress and was proud of himself when he managed it.
Her breathing turned shallow and she closed her eyes, two spots of color burning high on her cheeks.
“Did I hurt you?” He had tried not to.
“No.”
“What ails you then?” But his eager senses told him before she opened her mouth.
Mairi had been excited by his touch.
She fisted her hands in the skirt of her plaid. “You are very close.” Her voice was laced with accusation.
“I can hardly heal you from across the room.”
“I did not expect you could.” Her eyes snapped open, their blue depths reflecting a message he did his best to ignore. “I just…you are close and it feels strange.”
“Aye.” Pretending ignorance to her might spare her feelings, but it would not change the truth between them.
“For you, too?” she asked in surprise.
He shrugged, no intention of answering that question or what it implied. If she could not see the way his kilt was starting to tent from his arousal, he certainly wasn’t going to point it out. He had never been attracted to a patient before, but the night prior had been the first time that healing someone had made him ache with the need for sex.
He would be ashamed of his reaction, only he knew his eagle wanted to claim this human as their mate.
Lais’s reaction to Mairi was inevitable.
“Why do I feel so drawn to you?” Her features were pale with pain, but a confused desire burned in her sky gaze.
“You are my patient.”
“It is more than that. With my father’s view on how to deal with his frustrations at my lack, you can believe I have spent much time with the MacLeod healer. I was never so drawn to her. I was grateful to her, but never felt the odd sensations I do with you.”
He laughed, Mairi’s naïveté sweetly amusing.
“You are amused because you do not think I realize this is a man-woman thing,” Mairi said quietly. “But I don’t feel drawn to the others this way, either.”
“Others?” he asked, knowing he would regret doing so.
“Your prince, the laird, that big blond warrior who looks ready to kill at a moment’s notice.”
He’d never heard Niall described as such, but close enough to it that Lais smiled. “He is a great warrior, but would not harm you.”
“If you say so.”
“I do.”
“You are one that likes the last word,” she accused.
The pain never quite leaving her face reminded him he might need his amber stone for this healing session.
He got up and retrieved it from the box. “You are one that likes to talk a lot.”
“It is true.” She didn’t sound too happy about Lais’s observation though. “My father finds it most annoying.”
“I do not.” He knelt beside her again, laying the amber stone near her head, his fingers touching her golden hair.
’Twas all he could do not to bury his fingers in the silken strands. But everything about her intoxicated him with more potency than well-aged whiskey. Her scent, so feminine and so right, teased at his nostrils and he could not help taking a deep breath to feed his eagle’s need.
It was a mistake and he realized that immediately, but not soon enough to prevent the shudder of his body as his craving for the MacLeod woman grew.
Were she not yet so painfully wounded, he would not be able to subdue his need for her. Of that he was certain.
Perhaps the Sinclair had been right to question Lais’s control, if not his honor.
“I’m glad,” she said softly. “I do not wish to give you a disgust of me.”
“’Tis not possible. You have shown great determination and courage, I can do naught but admire you.” And want her with a hunger he doubted even Eirik’s dragon could match.
She said nothing as Lais bathed her feet with herb-infused water that would keep away infection from the few scratches that remained. They had been torn and battered the night before and he’d started his healing there, unaware far more serious wounds awaited his Chrechte touch.
“So, why am I so drawn to you and not the others?”
“I told you, I am your healer. You feel my power working inside you. It draws you to me.” ’Twas a good excuse if wholly spurious.
“So, you are not drawn to me?”
“You are daring in your speech for an innocent maid.”
“Only with you. I hid from the man my father chose to wed me as much as possible and only spoke to him when I could not avoid it.”
For a woman who liked to talk as much as his Mairi, that said much about her feelings for the man her father had chosen for her. Lais’s eagle had his own opinion of said warrior and a bloodthirsty way of dealing with him in mind.
“You are spoken for?” he asked her in a tone made hard by his dislike of the possibility.
“Am I truly the Sinclair’s ward?”
The Sinclair had given her sanctuary, but today, he had given her more…he had given her a place in his family. “He said it. It is so.”
“Then…no.”
“Explain.”
“My father promised my hand without my consent.”
“’Tis not uncommon, particularly for a laird’s daughter.” Though a man whose habits led to his daughter spending time with their clan’s healer was not one who would choose carefully for her prospective mate.
“But if I am no longer under his authority, then his promise on my behalf is no longer binding. Since I never agreed to it, I am not bound by my own words, either.” She shivered. “And it is a good thing, too. The man has too many of my father’s traits.”
“He would have beaten you?” Lais asked, fury toward this unknown clansman growing inside him. “Is he Chrechte?”
The Macleod clan had an illness that needed Niall’s skills rather than Lais’s to heal.
“Yes, though he is not a very strong wolf.”
“Even a weak wolf is much stronger than most humans.”
“Yes.” She turned her head away. “He did beat me. Not all of these bruises are from my father’s fists.”
Eirik had told Lais through the royal Éan mind link last night that Mairi had been beaten by her father and was in need of healing, but to hear it from her own lips was worse than a kick to Lais’s gut.
“Why?” Not that the why mattered because naught could ever justify such cruel cowardice, but Lais felt the need to understand as much about this human woman as possible.
Even if he would never claim her for mate, she would always be important to him. He had been given a new life among his brethren, but he knew he did not deserve it. He would never ask a wife to take on a warrior with such a compromised past.
No matter how much his eagle craved the touch of this woman. She was a patient and she could never be anything else.
Nevertheless, Lais would do his best to protect her from this point forward. Understanding how she came to be here was a necessary step toward doing that.
“I ran away the night before I was supposed to wed Ualraig.” Mairi’s eyes pleaded for understanding. “I could not bear the thought of marriage to a man so like my father. Ualraig was only willing to take me as his wife because he was sure I was not his true mate and he could still share his seed with a femwolf, given the opportunity.”
“How do you know this?”
“He told me.”
Lais cursed. No wonder she avoided conversing with the bastard. “They found you.”
“They are Chrechte. Of course they did, but I’d gotten almost to the northern border of our land.” She sounded proud of that fact and she should.
To have eluded her Chrechte hunters that long was indeed an accomplishment.
“How did you get away the second time?” And manage to make it all the way to Sinclair land on this occasion as well.
“They left me for dead.” She took a deep breath and let it out, her distress still all too apparent to his senses. “I woke to so much pain and realized if I did not go, I would die exactly as they intended. I knew of an old warrior who lived on the border of our land, ostensibly to protect it, but really my father did not like him.”
“He helped you?”
“After a fashion. I stole his horse.”
“You did not have a horse when Ciara found you.”
“No. I sent him back the way we came. He was a smart horse, he’s no doubt home by now.”
That explained her ability to make it so far, but not how she had done so undetected.
“So, your father believes you are dead?”
“I do not think so, not by now.”
“What do you mean?”
“They would have gone back for my body, after the wild animals got to it.”
The MacLeod laird’s evil was even worse than Lais had first thought. Even a laird could not admit to killing his own daughter. So, he had taken measures to make sure he was not accused of doing so.
“They meant to make it look like wild animals had gotten you when you ran away,” Lais said with disgust, his stomach rolling at the thought. “You were still alive when they left you. A Chrechte would have known.”
“Yes.”
And still the two vicious bastards had left her so hurt she would not have been able to protect herself from a piglet, much less a wild boar. “Evil.”
“Yes.”
“But you were not so fragile as they thought and you were clever enough to make your way here.” He let the admiration he felt sound in his voice.
She deserved it.
“I was already very close. I think my father hoped to blame my death on another clan, so he left me where he and his soldier found me near the border of MacLeod land.”
“You outwitted him.”
“I did, but if Ciara had not found me last night, I do not think I would have survived to the morning.”
Lais knew she wouldn’t have. “But you did.”
“Yes and in the end, that is all that matters.”
No, her father’s perfidy and cruelty had to be addressed, but not now and not by her.
He began to remove Mairi’s plaid.
She grabbed at the fabric, tugging it close to her. “What are you doing?”
“I need to see what I can of your injuries.”
He had no choice but to use his inner sight for her internal injuries and bones. Though it used much more of his power and exhausted him in the process. He could not waste his energy trying to see through her plaid for her modesty’s sake.
“But I can’t be unclothed in your presence.” She swallowed, looking and smelling very nervous all of a sudden. “It would not be right.”
“I am a healer,” he said with exasperation.
“Are you saying you’ve seen scores of women without their clothing so you could heal them?” she demanded, sounding riled at the thought.
He did not bother to dignify that ridiculousness with an answer. He simply tugged at the plaid she grasped so tightly.
Refusing to let go, she shook her head.
“Our Chrechte gifts do not come without cost,” he told her.
“What does that have to do with you undressing me?”
“You could undress yourself, but your ribs are still too tender to allow you to lift your arms easily.”
“You are going off topic again.”
He would have smiled at her testiness, but this was not an argument he could give in on. “I only have so much strength to heal with my Chrechte gift before I will need sleep and time before attempting to heal you further.”
“So?”
“So, if I waste my power to protect your modesty, I will not be able to effect a change on your more serious wounds.”
“What do you mean waste your power?”
“I have to see your wound to heal it. Doing so with my eyes allows me to focus my energies on the healing rather than the seeing.”
“But last night—”
“I made the mistake of protecting your modesty and used my energy to see your wounds without taking off your clothing.” After he had already wasted too much working on the superficial wounds on her feet and face that had been obvious even in the moonlight.
“But you helped so much.”
“And have a lot more to do to make you well. I am not even certain I saw all your internal injuries last night.” By the time he’d realized how very damaged she really was, Lais had half exhausted himself trying to see her bruises under the clothes.
“You can see through my clothes?” she asked in shock.
“Nay. ’Tis not like that. Part of my gift is the ability to sense or see the injury, but if I use my strength to do that, then I have less available to heal what I find with my mind’s eye,” he tried explaining again.
’Twas not as if he could see the creamy curves of her skin, but the injuries called to his inner sight and he understood what they were and what needed to happen to heal them.
“You are not just going to remove my dress, are you?”
“Nay.”
“You want to take off all of my clothes?” she asked in a small voice.
“They beat you all over.”
“Yes.”
He let her draw her own conclusions.
After a few moments of silence, she finally nodded, looking away. “Very well.”
“I do not do this to embarrass you, little one.”
“I believe you.” But she still kept her gaze averted.
His eagle wanted to comfort her. “Perhaps I should bring Abigail in after all.”
After all she had been through, Mairi deserved every consideration he could give to her.
That got Mairi looking at him, the panic in her face a kick to his gut. “No. Please. I would rather no one else witnessed my nudity.”
“But she is our lady, a healer as well.”
“And she will see my shame.”
“Your shame?” Being nude before him caused her to feel shame?
Tears filled Mairi’s eyes. “The cuts, the bruises—the evidence my father and the man who was to take me to wed thought so little of me, they beat me with no care if I lived or died.”
“Oh, sweet one, the injuries to your person are their shame, not yours.” He brushed his hand over her shoulder, the need to comfort greater than any other craving in that moment.
The moisture in her eyes overfilled and slid down her temples. “It does not feel like it.”
“Mairi, you are beautiful, kind and sweet. You deserve to be protected, not hurt.” And he would protect her.
“I ran away. I embarrassed my father; I should have kept his promise on my behalf.”
“No.” Lais cupped her face, forcing her wet eyes to meet his. “You cannot honor the promises of a man who has no honor.”
“He said I was an unnatural daughter, that I was no use to him. He hates me.”
“He is an evil bastard that I would gladly eviscerate with my eagle’s claws.”
Her drowning eyes widened.
And he could not stand it any longer. She was his, though he could never fully claim her. But he could let her see that she was valuable.
He lowered his mouth and kissed her softly; he would not hurt her. “My eagle wants to mate with you. You are not useless.”
He pulled back and she looked up at him sadly. “You don’t want to mate me though, do you?”
“I cannot.”
She nodded. “I understand.” Though clearly she did not.
Lais took hold of her belt, intent on removing it. “Let me show you your value. Let me heal you.”
“All right.”