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Albyn dropped a comforting arm around her shoulders. “Hush,” he chided. “Everyone saw Kieran reach the cliff first.”
“Don’t you dare tell me to hush. Kieran cheated and that makes Egan the rightful winner of the race.”
Garrick shook his head and responded with a low indulgent laugh. He gestured for Ula to approach, and the crowd parted to allow her to come closer to hear his pronouncement. “A challenge may be won by whatever means necessary, my lady, and there is no rule banning a ruse. Indeed, there are those among us who prize a clever mind over a brave heart any day.”
“A clever ruse is one thing, but to stab the man who’s challenged you to a swim is quite another,” Oriana argued. “How can you condone such a foul deed?”
Garrick spread his arms wide. “I saw no weapon,” he announced with a careless shrug. “Did you see one Neal, or you, Albyn?”
Albyn couldn’t meet Oriana’s fiery gaze and hated not being able to take her side. “No, but that doesn’t mean Kieran wasn’t armed.”
Neal patted his ample belly before offering his opinion. “I saw no blood until Egan climbed out of the sea. He could have cut himself on the rocks.”
Oriana nearly shrieked in frustration. “How can you claim to possess a keen eye and then give voice to such a blatant lie? Kieran feigned drowning, and then not only attempted to drown Egan when he came to his rescue, but stabbed him as well. He’s won nothing today but disgrace.”
Ula drew herself up to her full height. “Of course you’re disappointed, but I’ll not have my son insulted.”
Garrick raised his hand in a plea for silence, then stared at Oriana a long moment. When his eyes narrowed, many of those standing nearby took a cautious backward step, but Oriana didn’t even flinch. “Without dispute,” Garrick stated calmly, “Kieran was the first to reach the cliff, and I declare him the winner of today’s challenge.”
Oriana had lived with a mortal fear of Druids, but when they abused Egan so badly, she could not keep still. She looked Garrick directly in the eye, and silently dared him to threaten her back. “The Dál Cais are guided by fools,” she swore. “May you have the king you deserve.”
Albyn’s hand closed over her mouth before she could curse the whole lot any further, and desperately afraid for her husband, she fainted in his arms.
Chapter Fifteen
When Oriana came to, she was lying next to Egan on his bed. Albyn was seated on her husband’s right side and methodically stitching up the gash crossing his ribs. The Druid glanced toward her, but all she saw were his bloody fingers, and she promptly fainted again.
“Your bride has no stomach for blood,” Albyn commented absently.
“ ’Tis no flaw in a lass,” Egan argued, but his eye
s remained closed and his words were slurred by the potent ale Albyn had forced him to consume before he had begun sewing him closed like a sack of grain. “Are you nearly finished?” he asked through clenched teeth.
“Just a few more stitches.” Despite Albyn’s confident reply, his hands were shaking so badly that he was making very slow progress. He hated to cause his friend additional pain, but he did not trust his care to anyone save Oriana, and she had proven to be worthless.
Egan turned his head to the side and slurped another mouthful of ale from the cup dangling from his fingers. It should have eased the searing pain in his side, but he was still in agony.
“If you wrap me up tightly tomorrow, I might be able to stand; but it’s Kieran’s turn to choose the challenge, and where will I find the strength to fight?”
Albyn shared that same fear and had to swallow hard before he took another bloody stitch. “A challenge allows no time for a wounded man to recover, but by striking you in the left side, Kieran failed to impair your strong right arm.”
“It was no act of kindness,” Egan replied. “The sea cushioned his blow, and he missed my heart.”
“You should have let him drown.” Albyn fumbled with the needle and silently cursed his own lack of skill, though he doubted Egan would complain about the width of his scar.
“His life was never in peril,” Egan reminded him.
When Albyn conceded the point, Egan fought to distract himself from his friend’s continuous jabs by thinking only of Oriana. She had been so distant on the afternoon they had met that he had not thought any man would ever win her heart. That he had achieved that miracle stunned him, and that she lay so near was his only comfort. Still, he was plagued by the vexing doubt of the value of a seeress who could foretell the future but was nonetheless unable to warn him of danger.
He cursed himself for blaming her when he had known from the outset that the challenge might well prove deadly. He had played it her way though, merely toying with Kieran rather than killing him quickly, and that ploy had cost him dearly. He drew in a deep breath and instantly regretted the searing pain that shot clear to his toes.
As soon as Egan could draw a breath, he muttered, “Now I shall have to kill him.”
“That’s the way to think,” Albyn encouraged. “You might have intended to win without taking Kieran’s life, but he’s lost all hope of such generosity now.” Yet even as he spoke, Albyn feared Egan would be unable to raise a dagger, let alone a sword, to continue the challenge.
Albyn knew Egan would not accept defeat with a manly bow either. No, he would demand Kieran fight him although he no longer had any hope of winning. Albyn was equally stubborn, however, and would not allow Egan to throw away his life in a doomed battle. Confident Oriana would be a willing ally in protecting her husband’s life, he vowed they would succeed in the effort.
The three of them might leave the fortress of the Dál Cais with no more than their lives, but that was a treasure beyond measure. Oriana had stirred, and until he had finally closed Egan’s wound, he hoped she would not open her beautiful golden eyes and faint for the third time in a single day.
