God in heaven, what was he doing? He wanted her dead, and now he was risking his life to help her get away?
She started to stumble backward, saw Niall glance at her for a dangerous moment, his eyes filled with something she could not name, his face hard and desperate, resolved and, filled with a pain far deeper than any wound could reach.
The boar swung about.
"Niall! The boar!" she shrieked.
He braced his legs apart, his body now far too close to the edge of the rock ledge. The boar stormed toward him with the might of a hundred fiends. Caitlin saw the flash of Niall's sword, heard the horrific sound as boar and man slammed together.
Blood gushed from the boar's throat, its great head slashing about in agony. Caitlin cried out as the beast shuddered to its knees, lashing out in its death throes.
A guttural cry split the night as the boar's hindquarters slammed into Niall. Caitlin's heart froze as she watched Niall fight for balance on the edge of stone. She screamed as he fell backward into darkness.
If she lived a thousand years, Caitlin would never forget the sound of flesh striking stone, the hideous crash, the cry of pain torn from Niall's throat. The most horrific silence she had ever heard.
She bit her knuckle, her whole body shaking as she stared at the boar, which at last lay still, Niall's sword still embedded in its body. Dear God, what should she do? If she had not awakened, that sword would have been buried in her body. She would be the one lying in the spreading pool of her own blood. She had seen Niall looming over her, sword in hand, hard intent in his eyes.
She had run for her life, and he had chased her, grim with determination to kill her. But why, if the chieftain had sent him to guard... Horror streaked through Caitlin. She feared she would retch. Only one thing could drive a man like Niall to kill. The order of his chieftain. A duty he had admitted to Reverend Mother meant more to him than heaven or hell. Certainly more than the life of one young woman he scarcely knew.
She should grab the sword, now. Take it and flee. She could lose herself in the wilderness, vanish. By the time Conn realized what had happened, no mortal living could find her.
The decision was simple. The only thing she could do. She crept nearer the boar, grasped the sword hilt, and, with a mighty tug, ripped the weapon free. But as she started away, a tusk caught on her leine. She bent down to untangle it,stared transfixed at the glistening white tusk, sharp as any blade. To save her, Niall had risked the horrible death it could deal. There was no other explanation. It would not matter to Conn how she died, as long as she was dead. Even if Niall had felt some odd shame, allowing the boar to do the bloody deed Conn had commanded him to do, it would not have mattered. Niall could have held his silence. No one would ever have known.
Tears welled up in Caitlin's eyes, burned her cheeks. "What am I to do, Reverend Mother?" she murmured, turning instinctively to that presence that had always helped her sort out the tangles of her life. "I do not know what to do!"
Leave him, and he will surely die, a voice whispered in her head.
"But why should I help him?" she whispered aloud. "What if he attempts to kill me again?"
Images poured through her, unwelcome but vivid—the sea, Niall's gruff indulgence, the reluctant smile on lips she knew instinctively curled too seldom in pleasure. And another vision she would never forget, frozen in the instant before the boar crashed into Niall for the final, deadly time. Torment—not fear of death but, rather, a desolation, a reaching out of the soul.
He bled for you, Caitlin, she told herself.He fought for you. He might even have died for you. And if you leave now, you may never really know why he tried to kill you. You will be running from it for the rest of your life.
Swallowing hard, Caitlin edged toward the rim of the cliff, stared down its moonlit expanse. He lay on a ledge as far down as the length from the abbey tower to the ground below. Surely, even a man such as Niall could not fall so far and live. She could say a prayer for him and then leave.
Yet she had barely made the sign of the cross when she heard it. Faint, barely carried to her in the stillness of the night. A moan.
Niall was alive.
Chapter 5
Pain ground deep into Niall's side, black webs of unconsciousness pulling him toward oblivion. Gritting his teeth, he shifted his body away from the sharp edge of stone, his heart skipping a beat as he nearly rolled off the edge of whatever surface held him. A ledge? He could only guess. Yet one thing was certain. Battered as he was, his body restless with pain, one slip into unconsciousness would mean he would fall to his death, alone on this rugged sweep of cliff.
He should have been furious, fighting for his life. Dying now would mean his final quest was left undone. He would be known as Niall of the Seven Betrayals forever. It was a fate he would have battled with his last breath even an hourago. Yet now Niall lay still, uncertain which would be more vile. To die with stained honor or to kill an innocent girl to preserve it. Nay, not just any young woman. Caitlin of the Lilies, with her rare joy and courageous spirit.
He dragged one hand over his face, trying to swipe the grit from his eyes. Perhaps this agony of indecision was the reason Conn had waited so many years to order the girl's death. Aye, and the reason Conn had not wielded the sword with his own hands. Fear of the spear caster Fintan and the power of his fairy magic even from the realm of the dead. Fear of damning himself forever in his own eyes because Caitlin's blood was on his hands.
Bitterness welled up inside Niall, a feeling of being used. Yet was that not a warrior's sole purpose in life? To be used by his chieftain? Wielded like a sword to protect his kingdom?
In all fairness, there were a score of reasons a chieftain could not chase about the countryside to cut down one young woman. The most pressing of these was the certainty that someone would have followed him, discovered his plan for Caitlin's death. And if any at Glenfluirse uncovered the fate he intended for Fintan's daughter, there was no way to know what chaos it mightbring. In the years of Caitlin's absence, fear of the curse had eased because of Glenfluirse's love for Fintan. Conn's vow to protect the spear caster's daughter had absolved Glenfluirse from the terrible responsibility of making an impossible choice between Conn and the only child of the hero they loved.
Even though Fintan was dead, the army's loyalty to the spear caster was still far greater than its loyalty to the chieftain. Fintan had bled with them, led them into battle, become a symbol of all their triumphs and a magic they believed in with all their hearts. Only Niall, Conn's foster son, owed Conn a greater debt. Niall, the one man Conn could trust in this impossible situation. And Niall had failed him.
A grim chuckle escaped Niall's lips. It did not matter now—duty or failure, trust or betrayal. There was no way to scale this cliff face. Caitlin had probably already fled.
She possessed intelligence as well as courage. Surely, she would have taken the horse. If she had, she could put great distance between her and the reach of Conn's power.
Would she return to the abbey? Niall's heart throbbed, a tightness in his throat. He hoped thatthe abbess's God would keep her safe as he had not.
