“Shit, shit, shit!”
He laughed, couldn’t help himself, and she whirled on him, shoved him.
Still laughing, he caught her close, lifted her to her toes. “Once, gods be damned, just once and we’ll be done with it.”
He brought his mouth down on hers, took what he needed. And felt the release of it even as the wanting quivered through him like the bowstring.
The scent of her, the taste, the feel, all these weeks without them, demanded that he take what he could, if only for the moment.
She gave him nothing at first, not even a fight. But he felt that wanting in her as in him. And she surrendered to it, taking as he took, wrapping around him in the quieting sunlight in a field that smelled of grass and sheep.
When he let her go, she put her hand on his heart. “Why once?”
“Because some won’t come back, and I have to give all I have to them. I have to think of them, not my wants, to think of those who fight knowing they won’t come back.”
She left her hand on his heart another moment, then let it fall. “All right. We’ll both think of them.”
She picked up the bow, the arrow, and tried again.
* * *
In the house, Marg stood at the window with Tarryn, watching Breen attempt to shoot an arrow.
“She favors you, Marg. Not just the hair—though, gods, it’s glorious—but the shape of her face, her build. I know what having her back means to you.”
“Such a narrow life Jennifer gave her. Pushing the roundness of the girl into a flat hole, day after day. I think one of the greatest joys of my life has been watching her wake. And the greatest sorrows knowing, now that she has, what she’ll face.”
“You told me her powers run deep, even deeper than your own.”
“Aye. She’s yet to tap the whole of them.” Marg let out a laugh as Breen’s arrow hit the ground. “How long do you figure Keegan’s patience will last here?”
“Never long enough. He trains her to fight, and must of course, but it won’t be the sword or arrow for her in the end.” Another arrow hit the ground, and Tarryn just shook her head.
“And thank the gods for that. Yet she tries, doesn’t she now?”
“There, if he’d guided her so in the first of it…” Marg smiled to herself as Keegan stood, hands over Breen’s hands, face pressed to Breen’s face. “They make a picture.”
“They do.” Enjoying it, Tarryn slipped an arm around Marg’s waist. “And there, she’s hit the target. I wonder why they seem so careful around each other when I’ve heard … What’s all this now? What’s the boy angry about?”
Frowning, Tarryn studied the scene in the field. “How could a man with such kindness in his heart have such a stubborn block of a head? She’s doing her best, isn’t she?”
Tarryn’s eyebrows shot up as, after Breen started to nock the arrow again, she turned on Keegan.
“Angry words,” she said. “You don’t have to hear them to know. Well, I’m pleased to see she’ll stand for herself.”
“That she does when her temper’s stirred.”
“Looks to me like she’s put him in his place. Good for her.” Then Tarryn winced as the next arrow struck the ground inches from Breen’s foot. “Ah, now the eejit’s laughing at her. You can’t train a body if you’re … There’s the way, give him what for!” She all but cheered as Breen shoved her son.
Then fell silent when Keegan yanked Breen against him.
“Well now,” Marg murmured, sipping her tea. “There you have it.”
“There you have it,” Tarryn agreed. “I’d heard he’d bedded her, but now I see why he no longer glides into the Capital now and again to go to Shana’s bed. He thinks I don’t know, but I know where my children are.”
“Ah, youth.” Marg shook her head as in the field Keegan and Breen stepped away from each other, and Breen again picked up the bow. “What a waste of heat.”
“He stepped back from Shana some time ago. Not long, not long a’tall after Breen came through. I’m not sorry to tell you I’m glad of it.”
Tarryn went back for the pot, and now the two women sat.
“I’ll say to you what I’ve said only to Minga, who’s a sister to me. I’ve great fondness for Shana’s parents. Her father is good council, and her mother strong and kind. But when the girl—and a beauty she is, Marg—set her sights on Keegan, I worried. I worried, as it wasn’t my boy so much as the taoiseach she aimed for. It was desire and ambition I felt from her, and never love for him. I want love for my children.”