For an instant, the green eyes went completely blank. Then some emotion glinted there—fear, mayhap. Or anger. Either way, he knew her. Even in her warrior’s garb, he did. He stared for half a score of heartbeats before he turned his gaze to Moira’s face.
And sneered once more. “This is no’ up to yer war chief, woman. The man who stands at yer side has issued a clear challenge. Will ye sink so low as to refuse honoring it?”
Moira wanted to say she would. Saerla could see that. Indeed, Moira’s lips moved over the words. The MacBeith warriors rumbled behind her. They had, most of them, never trusted Farlan. For the very lands that made up their birthright to rest upon the strength of his sword…
Ewan, who led the council, pushed forward. “I object to this! The man has no authority—”
“Aye, then,” Rory interrupted. “Chief MacBeith, does the man who shares yer bed no’ ha’ yer authority?”
Moira succeeded in forcing out three words. “Face me instead.”
“Nay, och, nay.” Rory gestured at Farlan with the sword in his hand even as Farlan forced Moira ever so gently behind him.“’Tis him I am willing to face. This has been a while in coming, Farlan, has it no’?”
“It has,” Farlan agreed as he took up a fighting stance there in the cleared space between the two opposing armies. His shield bore no device. He was not entitled to that of MacBeith. But it was clear for what he now fought. He fought for his heart.
Moira began to speak again, and Rory turned on her viciously. “The challenge has been issued and accepted. Ye, mistress, canna gainsay it.”
*
Rory could feelas well as see Saerla standing there beside the monstrous MacBeith war chief. She looked as she had the first time he’d seen her, clad for war, armed and determined. But nothing was the same.
The single look he’d stolen into her face had shown him much. Too much. A score of bright images. Her lying beneath him in his bed, passion like smoke in her eyes. Her defying him with a dirk she could not, would not, use at his throat. Her face when they’d parted, contorted by pain and longing.
Now she looked terrified, eyes too wide, mouth held in a grim line. She would have to stand and watch him kill Farlan.
He would have to kill Farlan. His best friend.
Nay. Nay, the man who had once been his best friend. For this was a God-given opportunity. Farlan, though a fine warrior, had never in the past bested him. Could not best him. Would not now. In a few short, bloody minutes, it would be over. All of Glen Bronach would be in his hands.
What was the man thinking?
Rory dragged his gaze from Saerla and looked instead at Farlan. Into the warm, steady brown eyes he knew so well.Farlan gazed back at him, unflinching, without a hint of fear or doubt.
The man had balls, Rory had to give him that. But his woman—the one he claimed to love so well—would have to stand right along with Saerla and watch him die. She would lose her lover and her lands all in one blow.
Should he play the thing out slow, or make it quick and merciful? Single combat happened seldom—they had but played at it when lads—and the warriors on both sides would want something to remember. He should give them that. Beat Farlan back slowly to his lover’s feet. End it only then in a shower of blood.
Give them, aye, something to talk of in years to come.
Leith, with horror in his eyes, stepped forward and caught at Rory’s arm. Aye, Leith, who had witnessed all those boyhood battles, knew what must come. “Rory, ye canna! ’Tis Farlan.”
“Get back wi ye!” Rory shook Leith off viciously. “He will pay for betraying me, for loving her, and she for loving him.”
But nay, it was all about the lands. Love did not come into it. Not the love Farlan had broken with Rory, nor what he felt for Saerla.
Again, he glanced at her. His heart protested within him. He was not so weak as his heart.
Somewhere overhead, a bird sang a beautiful song of sorrow, winging down the glen. He gazed once more into Farlan’s eyes. “Come on, then. Let us settle this once and for all.”
For all time.
Chapter Fifty-Six
Saerla did notwant to watch this terrible combat. But she could not look away. She stood with her hands pressed to her lips and her heart hammering hard enough to shake her whole body.
Beside her, Alasdair straddled the ground, poised as if he would rush in and stop the contest by force. Moira—Saerla could not look at Moira at all.
But Farlan—Farlan went into the battle with his whole heart. That could be seen from the first step, the first crossing of the two swords. He started off better than she had anticipated. Better, mayhap, than Rory had expected. For he pressed Rory hard, bringing blow after blow down upon Rory’s shield like a man possessed. Those blows drove Rory back step by step, his sword at times a mere blur of silver.
