Page 89 of The Speed of Lightning
“I was there that day, MacLean. I saw it.”
“Aye, well, I lived it, MacSorley.”
“And I nearly drowned for it. I saw you strapped to that table, and I saw what was in your eyes—the pain, the conflict, and above all the love you bore your father. There’s nothing in that to be ashamed of.”
He turned, trudging toward Caolghlas, avoiding her gaze. She hurried beside him, breath quick. “You loved him and you took the mark to honor him, even though it cost your conscience. I saw you sneak to Tarbert. I saw you pray on Sgùrr na Cìche. I knew how much that mark cost you, and it broke my heart because it was so dear?—”
“Enough!” The word tore from him, his chest pounding, control slipping. “I was a coward! I was trying not to cry thewhole time because I knew I would never be the man my father was. It shamed me then, and it shames me now. From the moment I came of age I have fallen short of everything he was. Can you no’ see it?
“The only thing I’ve ever had is my faith—and even there I failed. I took the mark and walked back on it. Weak then, weak now. Unable to choose the clan over myself. A man caught between Jura and Christendom, a washout in both.”
He stared down at her, her mismatched eyes wide. Bog whined, and she patted his scruff. “’Tis all well, Bog. Da needed to get that off his chest.”
A second wave of anger burst over him. He yanked her hand and strode off. “I am no’ that mangy dog’s da!”
She let him drag her, unbothered by his sudden flare of temper. “All right, all right.”
They walked in silence through deepening snow until they crested the hill. Wind whipped in freezing gusts. Caolghlas loomed on the horizon, its towers stark against the white.
Doubt struck him like ice, cracking his resolve. If he failed in this mission, would Freya still see him the same? Would he still see himself as a man? Self-preservation urged him to take her home, to keep her from this side of his life, to avoid falling short again.
A warm palm slid over his neck, pulling him back. She moved his beard aside, brushing her finger over the beginning of the wolfhound.
The touch undid him. He wanted to cling to frustration, to nurse his self-pity, but her finger, light as snow, left him defenseless. Her hand slid behind his ear, tangling in his hair, and he folded into her as docile as Bog. She was so close, her beauty overwhelming, her presence beside him unshakable.
His voice was rough. “What are you doing, lass?”
“I needed to see it, to remind myself it isnae a magical mark. It’s as I thought.” She pulled him closer, brushing his temple. He felt hunted, caught in her snare. “’Tis just a mark. It holds no power.”
Her hand slid under his fur, untying the laces of his tunic to shift it aside and reveal the wolfhound. “The man who endured the mark is compelling. I saw no weakness in him when he stood in honesty on what he believed, nor when he vowed an oath to the one true God, nor when he let his father cast him away. I felt the strength of his God that day—a first glimpse of dawning faith, the first sounds of a powerful call.Thatis why I followed you, Calum. Because I believed in you, and in you alone. To me, that is what this mark will always represent—the day I began to believe. And I still believe. In God, and in you.”
He looked down at the twisting dog upon his chest. For years he’d thought of it only as a blemish, a reminder of weakness. And yet, in her telling, it became something else—a mark of faith, of truth, of strength.
He caught her hand and kissed her fingers. “There’s the Storyteller for you. Always a deeper tale to be told.”
A smile curved her lips as she leaned in and pressed them to the wolfhound’s cheek. Warmth spread across the muscle. “Yes. And the tale is that ye have a Bog stigmaed upon your chest and arm. Adorable, really.”
He yanked his tunic closed and strode after her and Bog. “It’s the hound of war, Freya—not that daft mutt.”
She skipped ahead through the snow, face bright with cheer as she whistled. “Come. Come, Cù Cogaidh—we’ve a clan to reclaim.”
Chapter 25
CASTLE CAOLGHLAS - FEBRUARY 10, 1387
It was a mad spark of an idea, and yet in that madness lay its brilliance. Freya clutched Calum’s arm as they followed the dark-haired maid through Castle Caolghlas. Her heart thudded with every step. Soon she would stand before the Hebridean Shield—her first true meeting with them since being revealed as the Storyteller. It fell to her to explain what Týr had once planned, and what Calum planned now.
Could she make clans believe in impossible victories? Could she sow fear among enemies? Could she bring down the corrupt MacDonald king? If she could make the Shield believe, she could make the world believe.
The stone halls were dark and spare, the few furnishings worn with age. The maid’s eyes stayed lowered, as if hope had long since left her. Had she, too, suffered loss in the raids?
Freya cleared her throat. “Is there a lady of Caolghlas?”
The maid flicked her blue eyes toward Freya. “Not to speak of. Only myself. I am the housekeeper. The laird keeps a small household.”
The maid was a beauty—cream skin, dark hair gleaming in the dim light. Calum’s gaze lingered. “I feel I know you from somewhere.”
The woman angled her head away. “I dinnae think so.”
