Chapter 1
TUATH O’KEEFFE
BARONY OF DUHALLOW
IRELAND
FALL 1193
Temair O’Keeffe closed her eyes and breathed in the sweet smell of dry hay. It was peaceful here in the shadows. Lying in the straw between her two best friends in the world—Bran and Flann—she could forget everything.
Her da wouldn’t think to look for her here. He seldom staggered out of the tower house after supper. Temair would hide in the stable until he drank himself out of his temper and into a stupor. Then she’d steal back into her chamber after nightfall.
She could easily find her way by the light of the full moon. Not that she was afraid of the dark—not anymore. At twelve years old, she knew there were far worse things to fear…
Like the sickness that had taken away her ma two years ago.
The brutal fists her da swung when he was in his cups.
The soft weeping of her older sister late at night.
She stroked Bran’s fur, grateful for the wolfhound’s company. His brother Flann, jealous, licked at her bruised face, making her laugh.
“I love ye too, Flann,” she said, giving him a good scrub behind the ear.
She doted on the two hounds, which she’d raised from pups. They’d wandered onto O’Keeffe land on the day after her ma died. If her da hadn’t been drinking away his melancholy, he probably would have drowned them, saying he didn’t need more mouths to feed.
But Temair had hidden them here in the stable, fed them scraps from supper, and sobbed out her own secret grief over their warm, wiggly bodies.
She’d managed to keep them secret for weeks. By the time her da discovered the hounds, it was too late. They were too big to drown. Indeed, unlike her da, who had never liked the water, the dogs actually enjoyed a good frolic in the river.
Now the enormous hounds deemed themselves her protectors, snapping at strangers who drew too close to her. Which was why they were forbidden in the tower house.
Bran yawned with a squeak. Then he shook his head. One of his flapping ears struck Temair’s cheek. She sipped in a quick breath as it stung her scrape. But when he sniffed at her in concern, she smiled and scratched him under his fuzzy gray chin.
“’Tis all right, Bran.”
That was a lie.
Nothing was all right.
And the older she grew, the more certain she was of that.
She’d seen the pitying looks from the servants after her da blacked her eye or cut her lip. None of the other clann daughters had faces so bruised and broken.
Her da said it was because she was bad. He claimed Temair had the devil inside her.
Maybe she did.
She didn’t always do as she was told. She was headstrong. She had a sharp tongue.
And sometimes instead of enduring the punishment he meted out, she fought back.
Of course, that enraged him even more and earned her a much harsher beating.
But there didn’t seem to be any cure for her wild spirit. She couldn’t curb her willful ways.
Her older sister Aillenn fared a bit better. She was sweet and mild-mannered, agreeable and obedient. She never challenged their da’s authority. She suffered the chieftain’s chastisement in silence.
Maybe it was because Aillenn knew she’d be married off soon. If she could bide her time, she’d be wed to a new master, one who hopefully wouldn’t clout her if she looked sideways at him.
But for Temair, marriage was a long time off. Her only reprieve from her da’s anger was coming here and snuggling with her hounds.
“Ye’re good lads,” she said on a sigh, stroking their streaked gray fur.
They were trustworthy and loyal, better than any of her human friends.
Not that she had any real friends.
Since her da was chieftain, the clann folk ingratiated themselves to him and put up with his cruelty.
But she knew they secretly despised him.
There was not much to like. He was brutal and bad-tempered, impatient and miserly. Since the death of his wife, he’d only become worse.
Because the clann hated her da, by extension, many of them resented her as well. Of course, they wouldn’t dare openly risk her displeasure. But she could see through their forced smiles. She witnessed the sly slant of their glances. Occasionally, she overheard their ruthless and bitter words.
Once, long ago, she’d made the mistake of passing along those words to her da.
She tensed her fingers in the hounds’ fur, remembering the tragic incident.
She’d heard a crofter muttering that her da, Cormac O’Keeffe, was nothing like his brother Senach, the previous clann chieftain. Cormac was a greedy fool, the man had said, trying to squeeze blood out of a stone.
When she’d gone to her da with the crofter’s words, wondering what they meant, he’d purpled with rage under his bright red beard. Snapping up his fighting cudgel, he’d sought out the man and punished him with a vengeance.
When he was finished, the crofter’s ribs and arm were broken. His eyes were swollen shut. And he lay unconscious on the sod.
Temair had been stunned and shaken at what she’d caused to happen. In that moment, she’d vowed never again to confide in her da, no matter what aspersions were cast his way.
She shook off the painful memory and stared up at the wooden slats of the stable ceiling. It was growing dark now. The sun was down. Soon the air would chill and the wind would whistle through the spaces between the boards.
Even her long woolen léine, belted with a leather crios, and the heavy brat covering it all were no match for the biting cold of Eire. But Bran and Flann would keep her warm enough.
She pressed her fingertips gingerly to the cut on her cheek. It wasn’t deep, so it should heal quickly, though her eye would likely be black for a day or two. She tested her lip with her tongue. It was split. But it was almost always split. She’d grown accustomed to the coppery taste of blood. At least she still had all her teeth.
All at once, the hounds lifted their heads, suddenly alert. Temair rose up on her elbows. Bran chuffed softly in warning. Flann scrambled to his feet.
Someone was coming.
Temair’s heart thrust up against her ribs.
Was it her da? Was he was coming to finish her off?
She shot to her feet and drew the dagger she’d tucked into her crios.
Bran rose as well, and the three of them faced the door. The hounds growled quietly. Temair braced her legs and raised her dagger.
“Temair?” came a soft cry from outside.
“Aillenn?”
Temair lowered her weapon. What was Aillenn doing here? How did her sister know where to find her?
“Back, lads,” Temair commanded as she reached for the stable door. The hounds settled obediently onto their haunches.
She peered out. Aillenn was alone. She was wearing nothing but her thin white léine, which was torn at the shoulder, making it droop indecently low on her bosom. She had no brat against the cold and no brogs on her feet. Her face was as pale as frost, which made her lips look like a smear of drying blood. Her rust-colored hair hung in slashes over eyes that seemed empty and lifeless.
Temair’s breath caught. She dropped the dagger in the straw.
“What’s happened? What’s he done?” There was no need to name their tormenter. When Aillenn didn’t answer, Temair widened the door. Her sister could hide in here with her. “Come in. Hurry.”
Aillenn glanced at the interior of the stable. For an instant, her pale blue eyes flickered with hope.
Then the spark extinguished. She shook her head.
“Come on, Aillenn,” Temair urged. “Your léine is torn. Ye’ll freeze out there. Bran and Flann can keep us warm until…until he goes to bed.”
Aillenn winced as if Temair had struck her. She fingered the edge of her torn léine. Then, very slowly, an ironic and unsettling smile tugged at her lips. “He’s already in bed.”
Temair frowned. Aillenn was scaring her. Temair had never seen her sister look so strange, so disconnected, so lost in some other world.
“Please come in, Aillenn,” she begged.
“Nay,” she said woodenly. “’Tis too late.”
“What do ye mean?”
Aillenn’s eyes focused on her and then drifted away. “’Tis too late for me.”
After a moment, her sister’s brows pinched and she locked eyes with Temair. She abruptly seized Temair’s wrist in her icy hand, hard enough to make her gasp. “But ’tisn’t too late for ye,” she said, her gaze burning with intensity. “Go, Temair. Get away. Now. Tonight. Save yourself.”
Temair blinked. “What? Why?”
“Just go,” Aillenn insisted, squeezing Temair’s wrist with bone-crushing strength.
“Aillenn, what are ye sayin’? I can’t just leave,” Temair said, wrenching her hand out of her sister’s grip. “Where would I go? Besides, my home is—”
“Temair! Promise me!” Aillenn snarled.
The hounds rose off their haunches in alarm. Temair flinched from her soft-spoken sister’s unexpected harsh tone.
“Promise me ye’ll go, Temair,” she repeated. “Leave the tuath. Tonight.”
Temair’s first impulse was to dig in her heels. She wasn’t about to let her older sister tell her what to do. Especially when it involved kicking her out of her own home.
But she feared the longer she stood here arguing, the more upset Aillenn would become. And the more agitated her sister grew, the more attention she’d draw to Temair’s hiding place. The last thing she wanted was for her da to find out about the stable. If he found out about her safe haven, she’d have nowhere else to go.
“Promise me, Temair!” Aillenn demanded. “Promise me on our dear ma’s grave.” Her voice cracked over the words, and tears formed in her eyes.
Temair frowned. Whatever troubled Aillenn, it must be serious for her to invoke the memory of their ma.
There was no way to refuse her now. Temair reasoned that she could always spend one uncomfortable night in the forest and then return to the tuath in the morn when Aillenn saw the folly of her fears. At least the hounds would keep her safe and warm in the woods.
And she wouldn’t be breaking her promise. Aillenn had asked her to go away. She hadn’t said anything about staying away.
“Fine,” Temair said with a sigh. “I promise.”
Aillenn’s eyes spilled over with grateful tears. “Good. Good. Ye’ll be safe then. At least ye’ll be safe.” She stared at Temair as if memorizing her face. “I will miss ye, darlin’ Temair.”
“Come with me then.” Temair furrowed her brows. She didn’t want to leave Aillenn alone, not when she was acting so strange. “Bran and Flann can keep us warm. I’ll throw my brat o’er the both of us. We can snuggle together like we did when we were—”
“Nay. I can’t.” Aillenn shook her head in sorrow. “’Tis simple for ye, dear sister, but for me…”
Temair thought Aillenn was being overly dramatic and a bit insensitive. After all, their da never beat Aillenn half as badly as he wailed on Temair. Aillenn’s léine might be torn, but her face didn’t have a scratch on it. Surely on the morrow, by the light of day, Aillenn would realize she’d been making much out of nothing.
Temair always found that the world looked bleaker when the sun dimmed and the shadows grew long. With the coming of dawn, even a black eye and a split lip seemed trivial.
Aillenn’s eyes softened. She reached out to pluck a piece of straw from Temair’s hair.
“One more thing,” she said gently. Her voice had grown eerily resigned. “Don’t look back. Promise me. Tonight. Or ever. Never look back. Do ye understand?”
Temair nodded. But she didn’t fully understand. Not yet.
Aillenn kissed her brow with lips as cold as the grave. “I love ye, sister,” she whispered. “Never forget that.”
Temair nodded.
Then Aillenn straightened with a faraway look in her eye. “Go now.”
With an irritated sigh, Temair summoned her hounds, bundled her brat about her, and slipped out the stable door. She headed obediently toward the woods while her sister walked back to the tower house by the light of the rising moon.
Halfway to the trees, Temair suddenly remembered she’d left her dagger behind. Muttering a curse under her breath, she turned with the hounds to go back.
Her sister was nowhere in sight. Temair could have easily have slipped back into the stable and stayed there. Aillenn would never know. Indeed, as soon as they entered, Bran and Flann flopped onto the straw, expressing their preference to return to their warm bed.
But she’d given Aillenn her word. So after she retrieved her dagger, she clucked to the hounds to come with her and headed out again.
As she closed the stable door behind her, her glance caught on the moon. Against the dark purple sky, if she stood just so, the big pale orb appeared to perch on top of the tower house.
When she moved again, she saw a black figure suddenly eclipse the moon. She scowled. Someone was standing on top of the wall. The fool. It was five stories to the ground. A fall from that height would kill a man.
A breeze swept past, blowing Temair’s long black hair over her eyes. By the time she brushed it back, the wind had rushed onward and up, catching the clothing of the figure atop the tower. The instant Temair saw the fluttering léine, she knew who it was.
Before she could scream Aillenn’s name, her sister pitched forward with her arms outstretched. She looked as if she were diving into the lough, the way she and Temair always did on warm summer afternoons. But instead of splashing and sinking into cool waves, Aillenn dropped like a stone, hitting the sod with a dull thud.