It was hope.
That night she stood at her chamber window and looked down over the dim yard where the watch changed again. Somewhere below, beneath the same roof, Donal moved through the dark as she did.
The knowledge steadied her. It unsettled her more.
She should have been afraid of what this hope might cost. Instead, she found herself thinking the one thing she had forbidden from the moment he crossed her gate.
Stay.
She would speak to him. And when she did, she would tell him he need not leave. For the first time in her life, the thought of marriage did not feel like a cage.
It felt like possibility.
Chapter thirteen
Aingeal meant to speak to Donal after the morning meal. She walked the lower hall with a sheaf of accounts in her hand and Tomas at her shoulder. “Where is Praddig?” she asked.
“Padraig rode west to secure the grain roads,” Tomas explained, studying a ledger.
“My lady,” a breathless messenger skidded to a halt before her, “your cousin has arrived.”
For one suspended heartbeat, Aingeal only stared. The day had begun at a punishing pace, and she had no patience for riddles. Then the meaning struck.
Étaín.
The accounts shifted in her grip. A smile broke over her face.
Tomas, with the quick intelligence of a man who knew her well, took the papers from her hand and stepped neatly aside.
Aingeal did not walk. She crossed the hall at a pace just short of running.
The great doors stood open to the courtyard. Pale afternoon light spilled across damp stones.
Étaín Ní Néill stood near the outer stair with dust on her cloak and laughter already alive in her face. She turned at the sound of the doors, and the instant she saw Aingeal, her whole expression lit as though someone had set a candle behind her skin.
She was beautiful.
Aingeal thought it every time she saw her, and every time it landed freshly. Étaín’s beauty was never still. It did not command a room into silence. It warmed it and invited it nearer. Her chestnut hair had loosened from its braid in soft, wind-curled strands. Her blue eyes laughed before her mouth did.
“Aingeal!” Étaín came toward her in a rush of skirts, cold air, and travel-worn leather.
Aingeal met her halfway. They collided hard enough to make Aingeal stagger, then both laughed as arms wrapped tight and held.
Her cousin’s embrace was as familiar as home. Horse, dust, lavender oil, winter wind. Relief moved through Aingeal with such force it was almost irrational. “You took too long,” Aingeal said.
Étaín drew back and framed Aingeal’s face between gloved hands. “I came as fast as roads, weather, and men permitted, which means I deserve hot ale and admiration.”
“You deserve a bath.”
“I always deserve a bath. I also deserve admiration.”
Aingeal laughed, low and helpless and real.
The courtyard changed around them. Servants pretended not to stare and failed. A young guard grinned openly when Étaín greeted him by name despite not having seen him in more than a year. Brennach, who had followed at a slower pace, stood with his arms folded and the expression of a man grimly prepared to resist delight and already losing.
Étaín saw him at once. “Brennach, you old crow.”
“Lady Étaín,” he grunted.
