She had explained it all before. With tears and desperate wailing, she had. How she’d never meant to betray him. How she and Corban—who, like the rest of them, had known each other all their lives—had suddenly felt something springing up between them.
Quarrie just bet they had. And he knew precisely what.
“Quarrie,” she said again, “people canna help who they love.”
Nay, he supposed not. But they could help going behind the back of someone who trusted them. Who expected naught but honesty. Who did not see the knife coming before it sank in between his shoulders.
Well, that was the thing about a knife in the back, was it not?
He made himself look into her eyes, deep in. Lovely eyes they were, tipped up a little at the outer corners and fringed by dark lashes.
“Do no’ be angry wi’ me,” she repeated. “Ye used to look at me so kindly.”
Aye, and he’d learned that lesson, had he not? Not to go blithely giving his heart away.
She whispered, “I did care for ye—”
Aye, mayhap just not enough.
He detached his arm from her grasp. “Excuse me, mistress. I am that busy.”
He had time to see tears fill her eyes before he walked away.
By heaven, did he not have enough troubles without adding her in?
Chapter Six
“Master Quarrie? MasterQuarrie, come quick.”
The call came from the top of the wall and carried a note of urgency that had Quarrie’s pulse speeding. The guard was about to change, with the dawn. One of the men set to depart, it was, who cried out.
The fellow’s name was Lohr, and though barely twenty, he had a serious nature and showed a lot of promise.
Even as Quarrie’s feet thundered up the steps, he called again, “A sail!”
Och, by all that was holy, no.
“Where?” Quarrie gasped out even as he joined Lohr and the other members of the night guard, including Borald, who stood at the line of wall that faced west.
Another soft, clear morning it was, and rare enough to have two in a row along this stretch of coast. Rain came swiftly here, in frantic bursts as swiftly gone again, and the wind could threaten to pluck a man from the parapet.
This morn, though, looked like a dream, utterly still with the light reflecting out on the water. The islands clustered there gazed at their own images like a woman gazing into a glass.
Far too lovely a morning for incipient death.
“Where?” he repeated even as he saw.He saw.
It hung out beyond Oileán Iur the way a hawk hangs in the sky, motionless, just before swooping in upon its prey. Anapt enough comparison—indeed, the stillness of the image had Quarrie blinking his eyes and then blinking again.
Was it really there?
Other men came running up the stone stairs, crowding the wall.
Far enough off the boat was, to make Quarrie doubt himself. Near enough that—
“They want to be seen.” He said it aloud. Whoever commanded that boat knew as much about these distances as he. Showed himself in the bright light of the morning. Wanted them to know he was there.
A threat? A dare?
