To be sure, they would have. Or they had camped there, just beyond Rohracht’s lands. Mican would want this visit to be a surprise.
As it was.
Adair’s mind raced, considered options and possibilities. “The chief will have to receive him.” Politely, if the old man could manage it. “It may no’ come to a fight. If Mican does no’ learn we are here…”
“Aye. The healer is with Rohracht now, trying to get him up. He is very tired after yesterday, and spent.”
Bradana made a sound of distress and got up, her hair and the blanket trailing her. “How dare Mican come here and cause Grandfather distress?”
Kindly, Morag told her, “I doubt Mican knows your grandfather is ill. He must have chased down the fact that ye ha’ blood relations here, though, lass. He’s come looking, I do no’ doubt.”
Adair froze in the act of reaching for his sword. “Then he cannot find us here. Bradana, we must sail at once. If Mican finds that Rohracht is giving us sanctuary, he may destroy the dun and the settlement.”
Bradana said nothing, but her face paled.
“Rohracht asks ye to come to him,” Morag told Adair. “At once.”
“To be sure, I will. But we must hurry.”
“Then go on ahead o’ me.”
“I will follow,” Bradana gasped even as Adair went out.
It was a beautiful morning with clear sunlight flowing over the hills to the east and the sea lying calm in a sheet of silver-blue. The settlement should have been calm also. Instead, the word had gone out. Men scrambled for their weapons, and women gathered their children close.
The very feel of it struck on something deep inside Adair, as if he remembered times like this. He had prepared before for such an attack, long ago—only he had not. His father’s lands had never come under attack, not in his lifetime.
Still and all, a feeling filled him, one of determination. Of desperate courage. A man fought in such circumstances. He fought for what he loved.
He came upon the old man still in the act of rising, helped by his faithful manservants and the healer. He groaned as he moved, his wasted form showing beneath the robe they wrapped around him. All yesterday’s buoyant strength and happiness had deserted him.
But his gaze fastened to Adair the moment he entered the chamber and did not waver, save to travel swiftly down to the sword in Adair’s hand.
“There he is. And aye, ready to battle.”
“Chief Rohracht—”
“Grandfather. Ye maun call me Grandfather now.”
“I suppose there is no chance this is not Mican coming?”
One of the manservants answered, “None. Dabhor, who has encountered him before, saw him wi’ his own eyes.”
Adair knew Dabhor, a sturdy, levelheaded warrior of middle years. If the settlement possessed any man who might be considered a war chief, or head of the guard at least, it was he.
Adair’s heart fell a little farther.
“I ha’ sent men out,” Rohracht gasped against the act of moving his old bones, “to escort them in. We shall know much by whether they offer us fight, or come in willingly.”
“Aye.” Adair thought rapidly upon what he must next say. “Chief—Grandfather—this is my fault. ’Tis my head Mican wants in revenge for the death o’ his son. I who have brought this trouble to your door. The way I see it, we have two courses o’ action.”
Everyone in the chamber eyed him.
Determinedly, his hand clutching the hilt of his sword, he went on. “I can leave here—Bradana, Wen, and I can at once—by sea. If Mican does no’ find us here, he cannot retaliate against ye and yours. Or I can turn myself over to him. ’Tis my head he wants.”
“And ye would do that, would ye? Turn yoursel’ over to the man? Knowing ’twould mean yer certain death?”
“To save Bradana, and the settlement, I would.”
