Part 11 (1/2)
”Nay, I would see them live as they have. 'Tis I who will suffer the price, PenDragon. Me alone, and they know this. Imprison me, beat me, do as you wish. My people belong to your king by strength.” She flicked a hand to encompa.s.s the army trespa.s.sing her home. ”I belong to Donegal.”
To belong somewhere, Gaelan thought enviously. To call a plot of land home so fiercely was beyond him and he was desperately trying to understand. But still, he had a task to accomplish and his duty was to King Henry first. ”You have yet to sign terms, princess.”
”You have yet to present any that are just and fair.”
d.a.m.n me, but he wanted to shake her and clenched his fist against the urge. ”Your folk will not bend unless you do, then I cannot have them as va.s.sals nor can they be trusted to follow the lord's orders.”
”I see you are still in a bit of a fix, then.” She would not make this easy for him.
Gaelan fumed, his temper foaming near the edge of boiling. ”By G.o.d in heaven, woman, you force me when I do not want to hurt you!”
She tipped her head. ”Only last night you said you would not. Are you not to be trusted?”
Gaelan raked his fingers through his hair and swore foully. Siobhan inhaled, retreating a step, and he straightened, gazing down at her for a long moment. She winced when he barked a command for his soldiers.
They surrounded her.
Driscoll rushed forward, his sword drawn. ”Nay, PenDragon!”
”Lock the princess in the tower.”
Siobhan's eyes widened. ”Nay, I've work to do!”
”It will go undone then.” He flicked a hand and the soldiers grabbed her arms.
Her people revolted, racing to her, and she shouted in Gaelic. They stilled, their gazes s.h.i.+fting between her and her captor. She looked at him, jerking her arms free.
”You do it, PenDragon.”
Gaelan didn't touch her, yet nodded ahead. Siobhan walked and people stepped back to let her pa.s.s as she entered the hall. She paused, her gaze scanning them briefly in warning not to take up arms before she moved swiftly to the stairs. She caught Moira's eye, a silent plea to not let Connal see this, then continued on. To the tower. She pa.s.sed her own room, taking the narrow staircase leading toward the sky. A single door stood open, a place her son often went to play. Inside was a musty pallet tossed in the corner, a stool and chests of Tigheran's garments. Gaelan stepped inside and ordered the guards to remove the trunks. Siobhan surveyed the room, then moved to stand before him.
She pried a key from her girdle and held it out to him. ”You would not be wantin' me to escape, would you now?”
Her lips bore an odd smile as Gaelan accepted the key, then stepped closer, unfastening her girdle full of keys and charms and jamming it inside his tunic. ”Nay, I would not.” He turned to leave.
”Do not take this out on them, PenDragon. Swear to me.”
He looked back at her, his eyes as cold as the wind skating across her beloved home. ”I swear to naught, princess. Until you do.”
Siobhan turned her back on him and he sighed, closing the door. Beyond it, Gaelan fell back against the wall, mas.h.i.+ng his hands over his face. He did not want to do this, G.o.d above, he did not. But her compliance was a necessary part of turning the lands over to Henry's liege. He had to have her obedience. She was a proud, honorable woman and only an oath would bind her.
Yet even as he walked away, Gaelan knew one way to gain control without it-and the price was too high. Even for his king.
They spat at his feet as he pa.s.sed, crossed themselves if they happened to meet his gaze. Little work was accomplished, the keep in utter chaos. Rhiannon was even less help, hiding off with Connal, he supposed. He couldn't find them. Gaelan recognized that the work progressed because Siobhan encouraged them with her smiles and warmth and strength.
She refused him each time he came to ask for her oath, not uttering a word, but simply giving him a blank look. On the second day he thought she would surely break her silence. She was hungry, he knew.
”Eat,” he said to her back when the old man Davis brought her a meal.
She didn't turn around, staring at the floor.
”Think of your son then.”
Her gaze jerked to his.
”Nay. I have not seen him.” The alarm on her face was enough to bring him to his knees. ”Rhiannon has taken charge of him.”
Her shoulders fell and she moved to the only window, its shutter loose on its leather hinge and sagging pitifully. She sat on the window cas.e.m.e.nt, her hands folded, and stared out the window at the yard below.
She looked the fairy queen Reese was so fond of describing, he thought. The sun blistered the floor around her skirts like a pool of water, dancing off the silver trim of her kirtle. The cool breeze lifted her hair across her face, s.h.i.+elding her from him in a veil of deep red mist, making the bells tinkle softly. Gaelan arched to go to her, to plead with her to give him what he needed, what he must demand, for the sake of preserving her people's lives. But she wanted naught of him and his kind. She hated everything about him, hated enough to refuse food and refuse to fight her imprisonment. He almost wished she would throw something at him, for her fire was preferable to this unending silence.
”Siobhan, la.s.s.”
She s.h.i.+fted again, a move so subtle he might not have noticed. But he noticed everything about this woman. She'd paled, her skin a little less rosy. Guilt swam through him. He'd done this before, he'd forced submission from a dozen traitorous earls, Italian counts, even a moolah, but naught affected him more than he wasting of this princess. Gaelan took a step inside and, without looking, she sensed it and stiffened.
His anger flared. ”Eat, princess. Or I will force you.”
She turned her head. ”When you leave, I will eat.”
”Good.”
As he backed out of the room, he heard, ”When you leave Ireland, savage.”
He hesitated, then shut the door and locked her in.
Siobhan watched from the tower as PenDragon rode through the gates, his destrier's powerful legs prancing majestically. Her gaze followed him as he tossed the reins to Reese and stormed across the yard. The lad darted out of his path, lest he anger the man further. PenDragon yanked off his gauntlets and dunked his head in the rain barrel, snapping it back, then shaking like a dog. His hands braced on the barrel's rim, he tipped his head back, and the yards separating hem from ground to tower and across the ward, closed.
Her heart did a strange twist in her breast. He looked exhausted, dark smudges under his eyes making them look like the caverns of a soulless man. His gaze thinned in a speculating way she'd come to know and he arched a dark brow, asking the question he'd put to her daily. She shook her head. He flung himself away and strode to the armorer. Though she could not hear his words, the thunder of them sent people scattering.
For the past three days he'd done this, riding out and returning hours later in no better mood than before. And each time he was alone. She knew he'd not found a village girl to bed, or his disposition would hopefully be a sight less ferocious, and she wondered what he did out there without a single man-at-arms or knight in his company.
Not a soul pa.s.sed through the gates who was not inspected, nor was anyone allowed to leave. She might be in the tower, but her people were prisoners as well and Siobhan was terrified she'd push him too far. With one incident, he could slaughter them all. It was best to keep silent then, for everything she did, apparently, angered him. And here was only absolution in death.
In the darkness of the tower, she wondered if 'twas her pride forcing her against him or her heart. She did not think she could bring the man to his knees with a fasting or silence, yet he had to understand that he could not treat her or her people as if their wants did not matter. She rubbed her arms, the wood provided long ago burned to naught but white ash. She missed her son, wanted to hold him, but the Englishman denied her even a glimpse of her precious little prince. 'Twas worse than being denied food. She gained strength form Connal, from his unconditional love. And she needed it now. For her feelings for the knight were crowding the needs of her people.
”Nay. Do not bother to translate,” Gaelan said tiredly, his hand up, his gaze flicking to the baker holding a stack of bread loaves and delivering a vicious glare that would normally grant him a thras.h.i.+ng, then to Siobhan's man Driscoll. ”The Maguire.”
Driscoll clasped his hand behind his back and nodded.
'Twas the talk and he only now had heard it enough to understand the meaning. Psaim, marriage, gra love. If another soul mentioned the Maguire and his undying love for Siobhan, he thought he would explode. It grated down his spine worse than the thought of her up in the tower without food and her family. Her silence was driving him mad, shoving him between anger and bitter regret. And he wondered-over and over until he could barely speak without growling-if she loved this chieftain.