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‘Family, you say? The man barely merited the word. Fearchar Bain took me in because I was useful to him. I came here ragged and starving because I had nowhere else to go, no family, no land nor clan, my very name outlawed and reviled. I had to beg on bended knee for shelter at Fitheach and, until I proved my worth, I was forced to sleep with his dogs. I was his sister’s son, but I was not treated as some honoured guest with a soft bed and protection, like you. I was the lowest of the low, not fit to lick his boots, he said.’
He let go of her and turned away for a moment and looked out the windows to the ocean, his chest heaving with some awful emotion.
Morna relented a little. ‘I suppose you don’t have to explain yourself to me, William.’
‘For the love of God woman, it is Will, can you not call me Will?’ he bellowed.
‘If you like,’ she replied quietly, unsettled by his sudden rage. His voice was bitter when he next spoke.
‘Morna, you should know that my uncle only took me in as you call it, so that he could humiliate me and I had no choice but to bear it. A man’s greatest weakness is his pride, that and love, of course, but then I’ve never really had that to lose. Fearchar knew just where to stick the knife to crush my pride and make me his dog.’
‘How?’ asked Morna.
‘I was given the filthiest tasks, slopping out the bilge on the ships, scrubbing the deck until my knuckles cracked and bled with the cold, climbing the mast to haul the sails in raging seas, puking my guts out. I was put to turning the spit in the kitchen, a job for small boys, not a young man. The humiliation burned me far worse than the fire ever did. I had not one friend in this place or in the world. Fearchar hoped I would die and he would be rid of me, but I did not die. Every awful thing I had to do just made me stronger and angrier and, when it came to a fight, no one could best me. That was where my true value lay, in fighting his battles.’
‘Against the Cranstouns?’
‘Against anyone who crossed him. I earned the respect of the clan, and I found I had a talent for leading men and for outsmarting my enemies. The Cranstouns grew to fear me and, because of that, so did Fearchar. He began to see me as a rival for his place as Laird, and I think he would have found a way to end me if I had not had the Devil’s luck.’
‘How so?’
‘A sweating sickness took hold of Fitheach and took Fearchar’s wife and eldest son along with many good fighting men whom he relied on. Then the tide turned in my favour. With so many gone and the Cranstouns poised to exploit our weakness, my uncle needed me. Out of nowhere, I was raised to the level of a treasured son, or so he pretended.’
‘But Drostan said you wanted Fearchar’s wife, and that is why you killed him.’
‘Not his first wife, for she was withered and in her worst years, and not particularly comely in her best either, I shouldn’t think. No, Morna, Fearchar wed another within a month of his wife’s passing. His first wife was scarce stiff in her shroud before he was bedding his second - Edana.’
‘And then you bedded her. Why? Was it to get revenge on your uncle?’
‘No, because she was beautiful and she wanted me as much as I wanted her. I didn’t seduce her if that is what you are thinking, because I didn’t need to.’
Morna’s face burned as a hot bite of jealous struck her heart, foolish, unwanted and shameful.
‘So you killed him to have her.’
‘No.’ He laughed bitterly. ‘I am not a good man by any means, Morna, but I am not as black a fiend as that mewling milksop Drostan would paint me. I broke it off with Edana because she wanted me to kill Fearchar for her. She despised him, you see. Out of spite, she told Fearchar that I raped her and so he challenged me to fight, to the death, on account of her honour, which is ironic seeing as she had none. I killed my uncle before he could kill me, because, more than anything, I wanted to live, that is all there is to it. That fight cost me two fingers, but it was worth it.’
Morna looked at his hand, and he quickly put it down to his hip. She felt her heart clench a little in pity. ‘I am sorry for your hand, William.’
‘Don’t be. My other hand still works perfectly well, for all sorts of things.’ His smile was seductive and warm, and Morna’s face reddened at this implication. He had a way of talking that was of the bedchamber, of warm flesh on flesh, of intimate couplings in the dark of the night and he had just been speaking of his mistress.
The air between them changed, and Morna shifted uncomfortably. Suddenly her fine blue dress was too tight and her breath too shallow. This intimacy, this sharing of secrets, raw and vivid, it was as if a curtain had been drawn back. Suddenly Morna felt open and vulnerable to Will, a man who made her heart race to look at him, a man who was no tame admirer to sigh after her. No, this man was a sea wolf with a sharp bite. She tried to recover her senses.
‘Do you still love this Edana?’
‘Of course not. She forced me to kill my own blood, so I banished her, and that is the end of it. You can judge me a fiend if you like. I won’t grovel for your good opinion, Morna. Think of me what you will, but I suspicion part of you likes to think badly of me. It makes me more exciting, does it not?’
‘I do not know what to think of you, William.’
‘God’s teeth, it is Will, how many times, woman.’
‘I want to believe you, Will, I want to trust you but I…’
‘Trust this,’ he said, grabbing her face in his big hands and pressing his mouth to hers. Their lips met in a heart-stopping kiss, making Morna’s knees melt and her loins flame.
‘No, stop it. Get off of me,’ she gasped, pushing him back. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’ve wanted to do that since the first moment I laid eyes on you. Hell’s teeth, I want to do it again.’
