The Maiden of Ireland

“Where are we going?” asked Hawkins.

“To Clonmuir. This way.”

* * *

Dark triumph surged in the heart of John Wesley Hawkins. The ugly business would be over before he knew it. He had made a rendezvous with Titus Hammersmith, the harried Roundhead commander who could not best the Fianna, and already he had gained the acquaintance of the maid of Clonmuir.

But God, he thought, his eyes riveted on her as he climbed over brambles and rocks to the top of the cliffs. The last thing he had expected was this. Cromwell had painted a daunting picture of a half-wild barbarian woman. Thurloe swore she was well past marrying age, but Wesley couldn’t believe it.

This, he thought, still gazing at her, is something a man might believe in.

The moon had started its rise, and pale, watery light showered her. She had skin as smooth as cream. Her tawny hair and eyes gave her the fierce beauty of a tigress, while the soft edges of her full mouth and the delicacy of her features reminded him that she also possessed an excess of feminine assets. Caitlin MacBride was a formidable yet irresistible mixture of implacable will, wily intelligence, and endearing Irish whimsy.

And she could lead him to the Fianna.

For a week, Wesley had combed the woods and dales west of Galway where the Fianna had last struck. But heavy rains had washed away any sign of the warriors’ retreat. Then he had scouted about Clonmuir, watching the comings and goings. He had observed no wild warriors, but fishermen and farmers. No mail-clad berserkers, but an old man chasing a shaggy black bullock. No host of heroes, only small bands of half-starved exiles.

Odd that he’d seen no priest.

We’ve culled every cleric from the area. The memory of Thurloe’s words swept like a chill wind over Wesley.

This evening he had watched a girl streak across the heaths on a beautiful black horse. He had followed her to the remote beach and had seen her speaking with a stocky dwarfish fellow.

When the dwarf had vanished, Wesley had initiated the encounter. His story of shipwreck was as weak as watered claret, but the lie about being a deserter from the Roundhead army had gained him a small measure of sympathy.

Sympathy was a useful tool indeed.

They walked across a boggy field. The earth felt springy beneath his feet. The girl beside him was silent and absorbed in thought.

He noticed the forthright manner in which she walked, a purposeful stride mitigated by the slightest of limps. The flaw was subtle but his tracker’s eyes took note. He burned to ask her what unhappy accident had hurt her. He held his tongue, reluctant to provoke her quick temper.

The night wind swept up the dark honey waves of her hair and fanned them out in a thick veil. Her bare foot caught a rock and she lurched forward. Wesley’s first impulse was to put out a hand to steady her, but he drew back.

Pretending not to notice the stumble, he asked, “Your father is the lord of Clonmuir?”

She hesitated a moment, then said, “Yes. He’s the MacBride, chief of our sept.”

“So Clonmuir is your ancestral home?”

“Yes. Since Giolla the Fierce became the servant of St. Brigid. And until the cliffs beneath it crumble and the keep falls into the sea.”

He started to smile at her vehemence, but realized his amusement would not sit well with her. “Cromwell claims the entire coast of Ireland, three miles deep, for the Commonwealth.”

Her chin came up. Her eyes flashed in the moonlight. Her body went as taut as a drawn bowstring. “I spit on Cromwell’s claim.”

“You’re devoted to your home.”

“And why shouldn’t I be?” She spread her arms, embracing the broad sweep of the rugged landscape. “It’s all we have.”

Wesley caught his breath and wondered at the ache that rose in him upon hearing her speak, on watching the reverential and possessive way she walked across Clonmuir land. The mood of the sere wind-torn grasses racing up to meet the broken-backed mountains, the spirit of the misty wide sky crowning the craggy jut of land, flowed in her very bloodstream.

Something about her called to him, and the yearning he felt discomfited him thoroughly. He had made a vow, broken it, and gotten Laura. Her appearance in his life had compelled him to renew his oath of celibacy. Like a drowning man, he had clung to that oath, turning aside invitations that would have brought a smile to Charles Stuart himself.

So how could he be feeling this heart-catching tenderness for a wild, barefoot Irish girl? Damn Cromwell. And damn Caitlin MacBride, for Wesley could not help himself. He stopped walking, touched her arm.

“Caitlin,” he said urgently. “Look at me.”

She stopped and eyed him warily.

“What happened to us, down there on the strand?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You do. Don’t deny it.”

“Moonstruck English fool,” she murmured. Her words meant nothing, for the shadowy rhythms of her speech captured him, and the secrets that haunted her eyes beckoned mystically.

“Caitlin MacBride, you do ply strange arts upon a man.”

“I do no such thing.” She drew away and started walking again.

I cannot trust her, thought Wesley. Yet at the same time he admitted to himself that he had never met so compelling a woman. Heather and moonglow colored every word she spoke. Fierce conviction molded every move she made. She plundered his heart like a bandit after treasure.

A dangerous thing. For the plundering of hearts was supposed to be Wesley’s specialty.

They passed a great, brooding rock that sat on the upward-sloping lip of a cliff. Tiny facets in the granite winked in the moonlight. Wesley paused, passed his hand over the surface of the stone. “There are symbols chiseled here,” he said, and the rough whorls beneath his fingers made him shiver.

“So there are.” Sarcasm edged her voice. “Pagan runes.”

“Who put them here?”

“Probably the first MacBride to leave his cave and proclaim this the Rock of Muir, his throne. Come along, Mr. Hawkins. We’re almost to the stronghold.”

Clonmuir crouched like a great beast on a cliff overlooking the sea. Its west-facing walls resembled a set of teeth bared at the snarling breakers. To the east rose rocky hills that disappeared into the haze of the night. In the distance, moonlight glimmered around the high gable of a church topped with a heart-shaped finial.

They entered the stronghold through the main gate and walked across a broad yard of packed earth, empty save for a few weeds straggling along the walls and chickens roosting in nests of dried kelp. Wesley could make out the humped shape of a small forge barn and several thatched outbuildings, a cluster of beehives, and a cloistered walkway leading to a kitchen.

“Wait here.” Caitlin left him standing by an ancient stone well while she crossed to a long, low fieldstone building with a stout door. She opened the door and a chorus of equine noises greeted her. The famed ponies of Clonmuir, Wesley realized.

A man’s voice spoke in Gaelic and Caitlin replied in low tones. Wesley strained his ears but could not hear the words. A small girl with long braids crept around the side of the stable, gaped at him briefly, then darted back into the shadows. The years of conquest, Wesley realized, had taught all Irish to be cautious, even in their own homes. A flash of shame heated his face. He had come here under false pretenses to coax secrets from Caitlin MacBride—secrets that could force her to forfeit her home. The idea sat like a hot rock in his gut.

She rejoined him in the yard. “Come along,” she said briskly. “We deny hospitality to no one—even an Englishman.” They made their way to the donjon, a tall, rounded structure with walls pierced by arrow loops and tiny windows. She pushed the heavy main door open.

Sharp-scented peat smoke struck Wesley in the face, stinging his eyes. A translucent gray fog shrouded the scene in layers, from the woven rushes on the floor to the blackened ceiling beams. The great hall had no chimney, only a louvered opening in the roof to draw out the smoke.

Children cavorted with a lanky wolfhound in a straw-carpeted corner. A group of women sat knitting skeins of chunky wool on fat wooden needles. Most of them conversed blithely in Irish, but the youngest was silent, sulky, and dazzlingly beautiful.

At a round table a group of men drank from horn mugs and cracked nuts in their bare hands, throwing the shells to the rush mats. The eldest wore a knitted cap on his head and had a waist-length white beard. Beside him sat the dwarf Wesley had seen with Caitlin. The fellow spoke rapid, colloquial Gaelic and swung his legs as he talked, for his feet did not reach the floor.