He’d be in for quite a fight should he try. Though perhaps, considering his size and strength, she’d be better served by trying a different defense.
“Besides, I am a woman of the world. Whatever would give you the impression that I’m yet a virgin?”
Again he laughed, stretching out a hand to her. “Your own reaction. If I’d had any doubt of it, which I didn’t, your reaction would have set me straight enough. Now then, come out of your corner lair, Shield Maiden, and make yourself comfortable over by the fire.”
She considered refusing the hand he offered, but the shivers coursing through her body convinced her to do otherwise. Sitting by the fire actually sounded good.
He handed her a blanket that he pulled from a stack in another corner and waited, unmoving, until she had wrapped it around her and taken her seat.
“Since you assure me you have a name, perhaps we should begin there. I am called Halldor O’Donar. And you are?”
He spoke with a deep and oddly reassuring voice, with an accent she’d not encountered before.
“Where do you come from, big man? You’ve a strange sound to yer words.”
“And you’ve an insolent sound to yours. Let us say that I come from somewhere other than here. A place where we’ve the courtesy to exchange our names upon meeting.”
A flash of embarrassment sparked her mind, along with a twinge of guilt. She looked away from his face for a moment to compose her thoughts. “Well spoken, Halldor O’Donar, and well I deserved that rebuke. I am Bridget MacCulloch, daughter of the House MacUlagh, descended from the Ancient Seven who ruled all this land upon which you...” She stumbled to a halt as he rolled his eyes.
“A Pictish princess. I should have guessed from the way you behaved, if not from the way you look.” He shook his head and leaned back against the large stones surrounding the fireplace. “Why is it every Pict I’ve ever met felt the need to recite their lineage back to the beginning of time?”
Howdarehe?
“I’m no a princess but a regular woman. The MacDowylt murdered my father. Hanged him in the courtyard of this very castle, for no reason other than his having followed Malcolm instead of Torquil. I will have my satisfaction from that man, one way or another.” Her chest heaved with pent-up emotion.
“I feel for your loss, Bridget MacCulloch. And though there are no words to remove the pain ofthe loss you feel, I can assure you, your father sits even now in the great hall of Valhalla, surrounded by Valkyries, enjoying the rewards of a warrior’s life.”
“Bollocks.” Her father’s people might have believed that was reward enough. She did not. “I’d much prefer him to be sitting here with me.”
“We don’t always get what we prefer, now, do we? And of all the things you must settle for not having, personal revenge against Torquil MacDowylt will have to top the list.”
“I should have ended the bastard’s life when I found him sleeping in his tower.” Sleeping or whatever that had been. “With that strange sword of his only steps away, I let the perfect chance slip through my fingers.”
“A strange sword, you say?” Halldor’s head tipped to the side and he leaned forward. “Can you describe it for me?”
“Aye. Fine and shiny it was, with strange markings engraved along the length of the blade.” No point in sounding foolish by telling him that the foul thing was likely bespelled, the way it had beckoned to her when she approached it. “Neither letter nor number the markings were, but a match to the scroll lying next to it.”
“A scroll? It was open? I suppose it would be asking too much that you’ve learned to read?”
Could the great, hulking beast of a man not go five minutes without insulting her? Shecouldhavelearned to read. Often enough Jamesy had tried to sit her down to teach her, but the scrawlings in a book had never matched the lure of sword or bow.
“I ken the names of the letters and I recognize a written number when I see it. The markings upon the blade and the scroll were neither of those. They were such as I’d never seen before, all odd squiggles and sharp angled lines.” With a demand to be touched she had barely been strong enough to resist.
Halldor stared off into the dark corners, lost in his own thoughts for the next few minutes, almost as if he’d forgotten she were even there.
She cleared her throat to remind him.
With a sigh, he leaned back against the stone, fixing her once again with his unwavering stare. “Nonetheless, I tell you in all truth, you must forgo your quest for personal revenge against Torquil MacDowylt.”
She expected as much from Torquil’s underling, no matter that he had stepped in to save her life.
“And why is that?”
“Because you’re no match for Torquil MacDowylt.”
How little Halldor O’Donar knew of her.
“I am a match for any man.”
