Naamah's Kiss - Jacqueline Carey [29]
"Forgive me," he said with genuine contrition. "I don't suppose that's a tale the Maghuin Dhonn care to remember."
"We do, actually." I'd never told him about the pilgrimage to Clunderry. When it came to it, I was as bad as my mother for keeping secrets—but it had always seemed a private thing. "Many of us gather at Midsummer to remember it that we should never be guilty of such pride and folly again."
"The Hellenes have a word for it. They call it 'hubris.'" He hesitated. "Were they kin of yours? The magicians?"
I shrugged. "We are nearly all kin to some degree. One day, I suppose there will be too few of us to continue, else we should grow as inbred as your father's hounds."
"All the more reason to wed me," Cillian commented. "New blood."
I glanced down at my arms encircling his waist, the honey-colored hue of my skin. "That, I think, is not one of my worries."
"True," he agreed. "I'll grant you that one."
On the handful of occasions I'd visited Innisclan after that first time, it had always been quiet and peaceful. Today, it was roiling. The playing field was torn up by young men in wicker chariots dashing around, yelling and waving swords.
"Stone and sea!" I stared. "It's a whole army!"
Cillian laughed. "Nowhere near. 'Tis just a raiding party."
In my head, I knew it to be true. The Dalriada hadn't armed in full force since they helped restore Drustan mab Necthana, my own thrice-times-great-grandfather, to the Cruarch's throne—and then crossed the Straits to aid the D'Angelines in beating back the invading Skaldi. Many thousands had fought in that war.
But thousands was only an abstract number. When one is accustomed to solitude, fifty howling lads can seem a great many.
"Go on." Cillian nudged me fondly. "I've got to join this lot. You'll find Aislinn in the great hall."
I dismounted and fled.
I found Aislinn in the laundry, supervising the boiling of linen bed-sheets. "Moirin!" she greeted me warmly. "I'm glad you've come; it means the world to Cillian. Did you try to dissuade him?"
"I did," I admitted.
"So did I, but Father would have none of it." She cast a critical eye over a sheet hung on a rack. "Is that quite dry?"
"Aye, my lady!" a sweating maid gasped.
"Well and good." Aislinn tugged it loose. "Come, you can help me cut bandages. When the damage is tallied, I reckon there will be some sore heads—and likely worse. It will be a point of pride for them to claim they were tended by the hands of a princess of the Dalriada and one of Alais the Wise's own descendants."
"Will it?" I asked.
"It will," she assured me.
It was good to have something to do. We retired to a quiet salon. Aislinn hummed to herself, shears flashing. I did my best to emulate her, sawing away at the clean fabric in an effort to create even strips. We tidied up the loose threads and coiled them into rolls and laid them in a basket. Her mother was nowhere in evidence, for which I was grateful.
"So," she said after a time.
"So?"
Her grey eyes were keen. "Will you wed my brother?"
I flushed. "Please don't ask that of me."
"Do you love him?"
"Yes, of course!" I'd been all right while we were working in silence, but now the stone walls of the salon began to close in on me. It was hot. I tugged at the bodice of my dress—it was the green dress Aislinn had loaned me a year ago, she'd made me a gift of it—and struggled for air. "It's just that I'm not meant to live this kind of life."
"So it seems." Aislinn summoned a maidservant to bring a jug of cool water. I drank gratefully. "Moirin… please don't take this amiss. I'm not my mother to imagine that you've enchanted Cillian to some dire purpose. It's quite simple. You're a rare and lovely creature and he dotes on you."
I set down my glass of water. "But."
"But he is the son of the Lord