Chapter 30
SEVEN WEEKS LATER
Temair advanced, studying her adversary carefully, scrutinizing him from head to toe. She could spot no shortcomings, no vulnerabilities. He seemed unflappable, unshakeable, unconquerable.
Her opponent approached her with the same assessing gaze. By the time he was through perusing her, she felt like he knew her every strength. And every weakness.
She gulped. Under his smoothly confident regard, she sensed her chances against his assault dwindling. This wasn’t a battle she would easily win. And if she didn’t, she feared a man of such power and skill would seize the advantage before she even had a fighting chance.
She took a deep breath, steeling herself against the temptation to simply yield to him before the engagement could begin.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this,” he purred.
She shut the chamber door behind her and arched a skeptical brow. “Ye’ve been waitin’ since last night under the oak tree,” she corrected. “And the night before that in the stable. And the night before that by the lough.”
“True,” Ryland said with a wicked grin, “but if feels like forever. Besides, this is the first time we’ll be trysting as husband and wife.”
Temair smiled. She thought it felt like forever too. Gazing at her incredibly handsome bridegroom in his wedding finery, she could already feel her heart quickening and her body tingling with anticipation.
She still couldn’t believe how much had happened in the last several weeks. She’d gone from being a woodland outlaw, at the mercy of a merciless father, to the head of her clann, with the power to restore justice. She’d put her sister’s soul to rest, righted her father’s wrongs, and willingly wed an English knight.
An English knight who was laying siege to her even now, launching his first attack.
“Come to me, outlaw wife,” he growled, carefully lifted the wedding wreath of myrtle and lavender from her hair and tossing it onto the bed.
She countered his assault by running the back of her hand over his jaw, marveling at its freshly shaved smoothness.
He caught her wrist, turning his head to place a kiss in her hand. When he made a small circle in her palm with his tongue, her fingers curled reflexively.
Not to be outdone, she lifted her free hand to his ear, tucking his hair behind it to trace the delicate folds with the tip of her finger.
He shivered. Then he lapped at the webbing between the fingers of her captive hand.
She gasped as an erotic spark fired to life within her. Hooking the back of his neck, she pulled him close and murmured against his mouth, “I’m goin’ to rob ye, English.”
“Is that so?”
“Aye,” she said, licking at the corner of his lip. When he turned his head to kiss her, she pulled away. Picking up the bata she kept at the foot of her bed, she spun it once and placed the narrow end at his throat. “First I’m goin’ to need your brat.”
He stiffened, wary of her weapon. “My brat?”
“Aye. Give it to me now.”
“You mean my mantle?” he teased.
“Aye, rogue, your mantle.” She was still learning his foreign terms.
With his hands harmlessly aloft, he stepped back from the bata and then dutifully worked loose the silver brooch holding the mantle together at his throat.
She held out her hand for the brooch, and he placed it in her palm. She wiggled her fingers for the mantle, and he offered it to her as well. She cast both onto the pallet.
She peered down at his feet. “I’ll have your brogs as well.”
“My boots? But they’re far too large for you.”
“Hand them o’er.”
“Fine,” he conceded with a sigh, removing them and casting them at her feet.
“Your inar.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, his eyes twinkling. “My what?”
For a moment, she couldn’t remember. “Your haub-…surc-…” She poked at the garment with the bata and then finished triumphantly. “Your surcoat. Give me your surcoat.”
He gathered up his long green wool surcoat and tugged it off over his head.
She took it from him, threw it aside, and tapped the bata against her lip, considering what she wanted next. “I’ll take that…that…” She waved the bata at his undershirt.
“Not my tunic? Are you sure, lass?” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I’m not wearing anything beneath it.”
“Oh, I know,” she assured him.
He fought back a grin and peeled the white linen tunic off, exposing his broad shoulders, his powerful chest, and the ridged muscles of his stomach below.
She felt the familiar ache of lust pulsing between her thighs. But she refused to surrender to her desires yet.
“Your chausses,” she demanded, fixing her gaze on the tie that held them up at his hips.
“Interesting.” Staring at her with hunger in his eyes, he pulled the tie slowly loose. “You’ve no trouble remembering the name of those.”
Her cheeks flushed as she watched him slide the brown woolen chausses off—taking out one towering leg, then the other—and dropping them on the floor.
Her voice came out on a breathless whisper, “Now your braies.”
He crossed his arms boldly over his chest. “Nay.” His lips curved up in a wicked, willful smile.
She blinked in surprise. “What do ye mean, ‘nay’?” Was he ceding the battle?
“I mean nay,” he said. “I won’t do it.”
“Why?”
“Because, outlaw, if you intend to rob me of my last stitch of clothing, you’ll have to come take it yourself.”
Temair bit the inside of her cheek. He was a clever knave. He knew that once she came close, she wouldn’t be able to resist him.
Still, she couldn’t back down from his challenge.
Clinging to the bata as if it would somehow protect her, she crept forward to do the deed.
He made no move to help or hinder her. Instead, he watched her with a smoldering gaze and a smug half-grin.
With one trembling hand, she awkwardly untied the knot securing his braies. When they dropped to the floor, she saw that he was already primed and ready, like a beast about to charge. She inhaled sharply.
“Now you,” he murmured.
She frowned and shook her head.
In the blink of an eye, he snatched the bata from her hand, spun it, and set it at her throat. “Now you,” he repeated.
Her eyes wide, she could only sputter. “How did ye…that’s not f-…bloody…”
“Your brat, wench,” he demanded.
“Shite.” Her breast heaved as she averted her gaze and unfastened her brooch. The scarlet brat dropped to the floor, but with the bata at her throat, she couldn’t bend forward to pick it up.
“Now, outlaw,” he said, licking his lips, “I want to take a peek at those lovely toes.”
A frisson of desire coursed through her as she remembered two nights ago when he’d sent her to new heights of passion, nibbling on them. “Nay,” she gasped.
“Oh, aye. Give me your brogs.”
Swallowing hard, she slipped out of them, nudging them toward him with her toe.
“That’s a beautiful léine,” he said, lightly tracing the intricate silver embroidery over the bodice with the tip of the bata.
She held her breath as the bata grazed her breasts, awakening every nerve.
“Beautiful,” he repeated.
She released a sigh. The léine was beautiful. Made for her sister, it had never been worn. The soft blue cloth was embroidered with silver thread, in knots that intertwined in a border with no beginning and no end, representing the eternity of marriage.
“Take it off.”
“What?”
“Take it off.”
“But I’m not wearin’ anythin’ underneath.”
“Oh, I know,” he said, echoing her.
She hesitated.
He dragged the tip of the bata down the front of the léine, ending just before he reached the spot that was throbbing for his touch “Do it.”
She knew once she took off the léine, once there was no barrier between them, the real battle would begin. And she was feeling defenseless.
But she couldn’t back down now. So with as little ado as possible, she slipped her arms out of the sleeves and pulled it off, shaking her head so her long, loose tresses would at least partially cover her.
At first she wouldn’t look at him. She stared at the floor, at the bed, at the fire, anywhere but at the man with the magnificent muscles, the soul-searing gaze, and the bold manifestation of lust.
“Look at me,” he bade her.
She shook her head. If she looked at him, she’d be lost.
“Look at me.” He nudged her chin with the bata.
She shook her head.
Finally, he let go of the bata. It clattered to the floor.
When she instinctively looked up, he was gazing at her with such hunger, such adoration, such passion that she couldn’t resist him.
They came together in a breathless embrace. Kisses and caresses led them to stagger to the bed. He pressed her onto her back atop their discarded clothing, and she hugged him close with her heels.
Their skirmish was brief this time. Their passion, like a tightly drawn bow, was already on the verge of release. A few dozen eager thrusts, and they soared together like a flaming arrow, lighting up the night sky with a glorious brilliance, then cooling and falling back to earth.
Much later, after they’d made love for the third time and she lay spent beside Ryland, Temair marveled over how much her life had changed—as a woodkern, as a wife, as a woman.
Yet it wasn’t only her life that had been changed. Changes were coming to all of Eire as well.
The new English king was making his influence known. Already in some places, birthright had taken the place of honor price. In the north, the clann structure was disappearing, replaced by a feudal system of lords and vassals. The language was changing, as were the customs.
In some ways, it seemed wrong to her to let these changes happen. The Irish way of life was worth fighting for. And to Temair, who’d been born and raised in conflict, making her way with her wits and her weapons, resistance came in the form of pitched battle between the two factions.
And yet, making love with Ryland didn’t feel like a battle at all.
“’Tis a curious thing,” she breathed, “trystin’ with ye.”
He was too weary to raise his head. “Aye?” he mumbled into the mattress. “How so?”
“It feels like a surrender,” she said, “but also like a victory.”
“I suppose so.”
“So who wins?”
His soft chuckle warmed her. “Both. Neither.” He turned his head to look at her. “I don’t think ’tis meant to be a war. ’Tis more of an alliance.”
She lifted her brows. “Like the alliance between our two countries.”
He closed his eyes and gave her a sleepy smile. “Aye. We bring together the best of each and make something stronger.” He yawned.
She smiled a secret smile. He didn’t know how right he was. “The way that two metals are forged together to make an unbreakable steel blade?”
“Aye.”
“Or leather and wax melt together to make impenetrable armor?”
“Mm-hm.”
“Warp and weft threads weave together to make a sturdy léine?”
“Mm.”
“Or a husband and wife tryst together to make the babe I’m havin’ in the spring?”
He sighed. Then his eyes flew open. “Wait. What?”
She grinned. She couldn’t wait to see what their loving alliance had forged.
Well-respected by their father’s warriors and well-loved by their mother’s clann, their babe would doubtless possess the best qualities of its mother and father—the chivalrous heart of an English knight and the wild spirit of an Irish outlaw.
One day their children would be the caretakers of a glorious legacy—that of the chieftains of the O’Keeffe and the lords of de Ware.
THE END