Page 15 of Connal

Her gaze shifted up to the gallery that led to Connal’s chamber. “Maybe I can find another way to pry him out of that room.”

Connal ignored the food Meg brought to him at dawn, and instead took out his knives to inspect the hilts and sharpen the blades. He doubted he had slept more than an hour since Valerie Baker had arrived on the island. Now exhaustion dragged at his limbs, making him clumsy. Every time he thought of her heavenly eyes and smiling lips he wanted to go and find her. Each impulse to do so made the weight of his guilt grind that much harder. The sadness and self-disgust now seemed to sink into his very bones.

I must step down, soon. I shall name Shaw my successor before the clan. He cannae refuse me while all his brothers look on.

A knock on the door made his blade stutter off the whetstone and slice across his palm. Reflexively he dropped it and stood to look for a rag.

“Don’t panic, it’s just me.” Valerie slipped into the room, her smile vanishing as soon as she saw the bloody cut. The cloak she carried dropped to the floor. “What happened?”

“Go fetch the healer,” Connal said, intending to turn away from her, and then she was holding his wrist and pulling him over to his wash stand. “’Tis naught but a nick.”

“Nicks don’t drip a puddle of blood on the floor.” She poured some clean water from the jug onto the wound and then bent to inspect it closely. “Were you planning to cut your wrist? Did I spoil your aim?”

Looking down at her curly blonde head and breathing in her soft, warm scent made Connal dizzy. “I’m sharpening my knives.”

“You’re not very good at it. Get someone else to do the job.” She took a clean linen, wrapped it over the cut, and then tugged him over to his bed. “Sit before you fall.”

He would have argued, but his legs chose that moment to give out, and he dropped down. Valerie sat beside him, pressing her thumb over the linen where it covered the wound. She had paled, and gripped him slightly tighter than seemed necessary. Over and again she worried at her bottom lip with the edge of her teeth.

“Leave me,” Connal said, wondering if he would be able to stay upright much longer.

“You’re not my laird, so stop telling me what to do.” She pushed his shoulder until he lay back, and then placed his wounded hand in her lap and peeked under the linen at it. “It doesn’t look like it needs stitches, which is good, because I have only a little first aid training and you people probably haven’t discovered suturing yet. Was it on your morning agenda to pass out and bleed to death?”

He stared up at the blue canopy that Joana had loved. He wanted to tear it down; he wanted to wrap it around him like a shroud. “We half-Fae cannae die from small wounds nor blood loss.”

“Then when I want to kill you I’ll be sure to stab you in the heart.” When he looked at her she made a comical face. “That’s a joke. A jest.”

A sense of ease came over Connal as he watched her fuss over his hand, and his eyelids grew heavy. “Fetch Duncan, then. He shall attend me.”

“You’re still not my laird. I guess ordering people around comes naturally to you.” Her cool, slim hand settled on his brow. “You look like you haven’t slept for days.”

“I’ve searched all the scrolls my sire left the clan,” he admitted. “’Tisnae any method we may use to return you to your time.”

“Don’t tell that to Captain Dee-Nyall. He’ll have a meltdown.” As he frowned Valerie sighed. “I don’t know why, but that man doesn’t like me very much. Maybe he and that girl Meg are good friends. Duncan has a great poker face, and he’s not a touchy person, so I can’t tell what he thinks. And then there’s Shaw, who looks and acts like the island’s biggest heartbreaker, but I’m pretty sure that’s a front.”

“The Pritani stole him as a lad from us.” Remembering the years of searching the mainland for his younger brother made Connal even more wretched. “When I found Shaw again he’d grown to manhood, and had their marks inked all over him. He’s ever refused to speak of what he endured.”

“A lot, I’m guessing.” She stroked his hair back from his brow. “Close your eyes and sleep now.”

“You’re no’ my lady,” he muttered, even as he obeyed her. “You cannae command me.”

Valerie said something, but her voice had dropped to a whisper, and then sleep came over Connal like death. Spiraling down into the endless blackness, he wondered if he had actually died, and experienced a terrible longing to go back to her. At last he understood that he was merely asleep. No nightmares came for him, however, and his thoughts settled into a harmless muddle. Finally, finally he could rest.

Oblivion, he decided, could be as tempting as a beautiful woman.

From the position of the sun when he next opened his eyes it seemed to be mid-afternoon. Valerie lay curled up beside him, her hand on his belly. The cool, sweet scent of her filled his every breath as if she’d just come from swimming in a fairy pool––or did she simply bathe in spring air in her time? Some delicate color had returned to her face, which near glowed in the pale light from the window slits. The gleaming tangle of her soft golden curls made his fingers itch to touch them. So did the rosy curves of her lips.

’Tis but lust for her.

For a moment Connal allowed himself to imagine waking every day with this beautiful creature in his arms. Joana had never liked being held in her sleep, and would grow restless and wake whenever he tried to pull her close. He’d been contented with simply knowing his wife’s face would be the first thing he saw every morning, and the last thing he saw each night.

Valerie’s hand moved from his belly down to his thigh, brushing over the growing bulge of his cock. He imagined her palm lingering there a moment, perhaps even pressing against him, but no, she simply moved closer and murmured something.

Connal heard the door to his chamber ease open, and looked past her shoulder at Fletcher, who grimaced at the sight of them on the bed together before withdrawing. At least the seneschal would say naught of what he had seen.

“Of course he won’t say anything.” Valerie didn’t open her eyes. “Fletcher is more discreet than a Swiss bank manager. With his face blindness he can’t even tell who you’re sleeping with anyway.”

“You shouldnae lay with me.” He wanted to sound disapproving, but failed.