A Faerie Fated Forever by Mary Anne Graham Page B

advanced with blood in his eyes. Nial saw the menace and knew he was surrounded, but he couldn’t retreat. He had nowhere left to go.
    He opened his mouth to respond with typical Maclee bravado, but glimpsed a trace of sorrow and something else in the other man’s eyes that made him do the thing that a Maclee almost never did. He thought before he opened his mouth again. When he did speak, he made the drastic decision to approach the other laird with total honesty.
    “Answer me, boy,” Carrick demanded as one of his men pushed Nial forward into the castle and another planted a solid fist in his stomach. After doubling over, he finally caught his breath and managed to stand upright.
    He looked at the MacIver, disregarded the presence of the clan warriors who would spread the tale far and wide and said, “I can’t get it up at all these days, sir.”
    "What?" Carrick shouted the question and held up his hand, halting the punch his warrior had drawn back to deliver. Maclee stood with his hands by his sides, making no effort to defend himself or to fight back. Carrick looked deeply into the lad’s eyes. Nial made no effort to hide his expression, and long moments passed as the MacIver evaluated the proud Laird of the Clan Maclee. "It appears that you're less fond of Nial these days than me, which I'd have thought impossible. It seems that you've even wised up enough to regret your pitiful lapse in judgment. You look sorry. In fact, you look downright desperate."
    Nial knew he looked all of that and more. He made no effort to mask any of it - his self-loathing, his despair or his sorrow. Hell, he didn't even try to hide the love shining from his eyes. He did make an effort to halt his most dangerous delusion but he just couldn't screen out that faint flicker of hope.
    “Let him go,” MacIver ordered abruptly, and turned to motion young Maclee into his study. He closed the door and sat at his desk. Then he evaluated the leader of the most powerful clan on the Isle who sat across from him with his soul in his eyes and his heart on his sleeve.
    “So, lad, tell me why I should disregard the grave insult you dealt my daughter and my entire clan and tell you anything about where she is?” Carrick asked, thumping his fingers on the desk. He whispered the rest of the words behind the hand he used to screen his smile. "Actually, I expected you a lot sooner."
    Nial watched the fingers thump the desktop as the tiny hope he'd clung to shrank a little more. The question was one he didn’t think he could answer – at least not in any way that would satisfy the other man. Hope was the hardest to abandon, he thought as he gazed at the laird who would soon order his warriors to either beat Nial senseless and leave him half dead on the steps of Kilcuillin, or to outright kill him. Nial preferred the latter, because he couldn’t go on without Heather.
    The MacIver said nothing more. He thumped and watched and waited.
    “I think you should have me killed, sir.”
    "Killed?" Carrick repeated the word like he expected a denial. He got an affirmative nod instead. "I should birth a blood feud that would destroy Skye for what reason?"
    “Because I deserve it. Because I want it.”
    “You want me to have you killed?”
    “Yes, sir, I do.”
    “Again, I ask, why?”
    The MacIver wanted to know why and the answer shamed him so Nial bounded up to pace the room, ending at the window. He faced the glass rather than the other man as he tried to compose himself, but his cowardice appalled him so he spun around to look Carrick in the eyes.
    “Because Heather loved me and I thought her only a friend. Too stupid or blind to see her beauty, I even proved myself to be so shallow that I thought nothing of the glorious soul that I knew, damn it, I bloody well knew resided within those abominable sacks. I saw her intelligence, her caring and her charm. All of it made me treasure every moment we spent together and long for more and still I wrote her off