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didn't finish but
reached out and clamped her hand around Maire's wrist. "Come, girl. You
can sleep with my maidservants—"
    "No, leave me be! Leave me be!"
    Never having struck a soul in her life, Maire lashed
out now in terror, scratching Adele's arm so wildly that the woman cried out in
shock and pain. Maire didn't stop there, but flung her elbow once more into the
Norman's ribs with such desperation that, in his surprise, he released her.
    Her eyes riveted upon the door, she lunged away from
him, her heart hammering in her throat, one hand clasping the blanket to her
body while she prayed with all her might for her legs to run. Run! Yet in her
haste she lost her balance almost at once, her stiff right leg dragging behind
her, no aid to keep her from falling. She hit the floor with a terrible thud,
her anguished sobs nearly choking her as incredulous laughter filled the room.
    "Oh, this is truly rare! Irish, a bump on the
head, and a useless cripple as well. If you think I would have chosen such as that to be your bride, Duncan
FitzWilliam—"
    "By the blood of God, woman, enough!"
    His roar thankfully silencing his half sister, Duncan
was at the wench's side before he even realized he had moved, her heart-wrenching weeping touching him even more than had her ungainly flight
for the door. That so lovely a young woman would suffer such an affliction . .
.
    "Easy. Let me help you," he said as he made
to lift her. Duncan was not surprised when she tried to struggle away from him,
her ink-black hair damp with the tears streaking her ashen face. But she didn't
fight him long, her sobs growing still as well, as if sheer exhaustion had
overtaken her.
    And he had no doubt she was exhausted, despite what
little Adele had told him. As he carried the wench back to the chair and gently
set her down, he could only wonder at the horrors with
which her day had been filled, his scowl deep indeed as he met Adele's gaze.
    "This attack you claimed—"
    "So it was, but my men triumphed, I'm delighted to
say."
    Her tone more than slightly defensive, Duncan imagined
it was anything but an attack, again given what he'd seen of her debauched
retainers. Yet there was no purpose to exploring that now. "Where did the
battle take place?"
    "Where, brother?" Adele's grimace marred her
lovely features as she massaged her injured arm. "How am I to say? I know
little of this country."
    "But you said you were heading north. Did you come
across these Irish on the plains? Near Dublin? God's teeth, Adele, where?"
    She started at his harsh tone but answered him, her
voice grown twice as affronted. "South of Dublin. I believe there were
some mountains to the west."
    Mountains? That could only mean Wicklow. Perhaps they
had been attacked after all, Duncan considered grimly. But what of the wench's impassioned
protest when Adele had said her knights had been made to defend themselves? No
Irish clan loyal to King John would have wantonly raised their weapons against
Normans.
    "Why did you stray from the coast?" he
persisted, glancing at the wench. He saw that she sat huddled, with her eyes closed, her chin slumped to her chest. "Did no one tell
you when you landed your ship in Wexford that the mountains are filled with
rebel clans and to stay clear?"
    "Of course they warned us, but we weren't so close
that I considered it any danger."
    "No danger?" Duncan gave a harsh laugh.
"To stray anywhere near those mountains is pure folly. There are clans,
Adele, the O'Byrnes and O'Tooles, who would have relished skewering each of
your knights with a hundred arrows, then left their
corpses to rot under the sun. Two years ago when we were fighting the de Lacys
and their vassals in the north, there were so many raids by those bastards in
south Leinster that King John has since tripled the reward for Black O'Byrne, a
rebel I long to capture and hang myself."
    Her throat suddenly gone dry, Maire tried not to move,
tried not to make a sign that she had paid any heed to what was