Waiting For You

Darkness settled around me like a jewelled cloak of velvet black, hiding me, protecting me. If I were a child, this would be naught but a silly game, one that would end in scraped knees and squeals of laughter, me grinning and my two brothers scowling over losing to a slip of a girl.

Again.

But not this time.

Tonight, beneath the dim light of the half-clad moon, away from the sounds and safety of my Father's hall, I knew there would be no escaping. I was just turned sixteen, old enough to know that this was no game, that I was no longer a child and this man anything but my brother.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are..." he whispered, his voice carrying ever so softly on the cool breeze. "You know I'll find you, little dove."

Little dove. How long had it been since he'd called me that? His footsteps crunched on the unswept stones beside me and I pressed myself against the chill wall at my back, willing my gown of dark lavender to blend in. He was so close, so very painfully close.

"You promised, remember?"

The image of that night, its breathless exhilaration, its terrifying promise, engulfed my trembling body. Of course I remembered. How could I forget?

We'd found ourselves alone in my Fathers study, as we had a thousand times before. I in my father's chair, my legs curled beneath me as I watched dampening flames flicker out of existence, and him, whittling away at a tiny piece of wood, the gleam of his blade casting dazzling patterns on the beamed ceiling above.

"What are you making?" I'd asked, my curiosity drawing me into a crouch beside him.

He'd grinned at me, a lopsided smile that showed off the dimple in his left cheek.

"It's a present, little dove."

"A present?" I leant closer, trying to see past the tilt of his tanned hand and the confident strokes of his small knife. "For who?"

He shrugged, and I couldn't help but notice how broad he'd grown, in both chest and shoulder. I shook the disturbing thought from my mind and turned my attention back to the little trinket, held safe in his hand.

"Show me."

He raised an eyebrow.

"Please."

His blade slowed despite my tone and I could see him mulling it over, deciding whether or not to give into me as he usually did. He sighed, sheathed his knife and slipped the frustrating secret into his pocket.

"Another time, Catty."

I lifted my chin and glared at him. "Don't make me wrestle you for it. You know I'll win."

He snorted as he uncurled himself and stood, towering over me. I shot up an instant later, straitening my skirts in an effort to hide my fury that he'd outgrown me, not just by the usual hand span or two, but an entire head and shoulders.

"It's not proper or right for young ladies to wrestle. Besides, that was years ago. We're not little children anymore."

It was my turn to snort. He was calling me - me! A young lady? I was a beanpole, a moon kissed stick with barely a curve on her. Budding ones maybe, but nothing even close to womanly, not yet at least. And I had neither the time nor patience for the intricacies of tamed hair and precious gowns of eye catching colours and revealing cuts.

No. A Lady, I was not.

"You're a woman in your own right Caitlyn," He said, as if hearing my thoughts.

I stared at him, unable to swallow the thick lump of surprise that seemed to have wedged itself in my throat.

He turned from me without a backwards glance, heading for the door. "I should go. Fynn would kill me if he found us alone together."

"Why?" I asked, the odd statement loosing my tongue. Our brother was unrelenting with his black and white ideals, but as far as caring about Raff and I being alone together? That was as normal and natural as breathing.

He paused in his retreat, his brown eyes searching my face in a way that left my heart racing. What he found there, I wasn't sure, but it made him reach into his pocket and pull out his little treasure. I went to him, burying my small hesitation beneath a rush of victory as I looked down at the thing cradled in his hand, resting there as if it were the most precious thing in the world to him.

A ring, I realised, made of two Ivy vines twining them selves together, meeting and parting then meeting again, like lovers and their coming together and parting of passionate embraces. He took my hand in his, and I felt its warmth as he closed my fingers around it.

"Raff?" My voice was small, barely a whisper.

"It's for you."

"But... why?" He'd given me lots of little treasures over the years, most of which I'd kept in a small box under my bed, but nothing like this.

"Because I'm leaving with Fynn tomorrow, and I want..."

I stood frozen, my feet rooted to the spot as I willed him to finish his words so I could make sense of this, of him. He released my hand with a sigh then brushed a dark curl from my eyes, his calloused fingers running from my temple to my ear.

"You Caitlyn. I want you."

I reefed away from him, horrified. "I'm your sister Raff! What you suggest is – is sick. Wrong!"

"I am no more your brother then the man who mucks out the stables, who shoes your father's horses or tends his cattle." He hadn't raised his voice, he'd never do such a thing to me, but that didn't mean there hadn't been a fierce edge to it.

I stayed where I was, just outside his reach, my stomach twisting itself in knots. If Fynn ever found out about this, about what his best friend and for all intents and purposes, our brother, had just said to me – he would kill him, childhood bond or not.

"I know, but – but we grew up together. You and Fynn and me... and... and..."

"And that doesn't change the fact that I am not your brother. That I have a man's desires, a man's heart and a man's dreams."

I stared down at my clenched hand, too afraid to uncurl my fingers and look at the embodiment of his love within.

"Caitlyn," he said, so close I felt the sweet warmth of his breath on my skin. It sent my heart into a thundering fit, one that threatened to shatter my ribs from within. "Look at me."

I did as he bid, unable to refuse him. What he wanted from me was wrong. Evil. But oh, what I wouldn't give to reach out and touch his face just now, to feel what it would be like to have his arms wrapped around me and the heart in his chest thumping against my cheek...

"I'll be back in two summer's time. You'll be sixteen then and..." He took a steadying breath, his dark eyes intense, almost frightening with the depth of longing they showed as he leant forward and kissed me. It was soft and sweet, a tender embrace of the lips that sent a wave of honeyed warmth coursing through my veins.

He made himself pull away, his breathing as ragged as mine as he pressed his rough cheek to my forehead, his words so quiet I almost didn't hear them.

"When I come back, promise me you will kiss me again. If you feel nothing for me other than you do your brother, I'll leave you be and go. But if..."

I nodded my promise, even before he'd finished speaking, and as he relinquished his hold, his lingering gaze revealing how much it pained him to go, I felt the hot rush of tears grace my flushed cheeks.

I squeezed my eyes shut, willing out the cold that seemed to be seeping into my very bones from the ancient stone at my back. The sound of his footsteps had stilled and there was nowhere else for me to go. No escape, for I was surrounded by nettles and thornbushes, still waiting to be reefed from their barely thawed ground.

If he'd returned when he'd suppose to, an entire season from now, I would have been able to slip away. Maybe I still could if I made a run for it, but not without shredding my dress. I could hear their whispers now, those of our guests and newly returned men, wondering why I had changed from a more than appropriate gown whilst barely half way through the evening. But even if I was willing to ignore their whispers and my father's disapproving looks, the chances of me outrunning him once he'd heard me, were nigh impossible.

I straitened my shoulders, opened my eyes and lifted my chin. I had no choice but to face him. No choice but to hope that someone strolled out here by accident and interrupted us before he had a chance to claim what was owed.

Oh, I wanted him to kiss me all right. I wanted more than anything to know that feeling again. I'd pined for it, for him, the entire time he'd been gone. His ring, hanging from the soft leather cord beneath my dress was testament to that, but I couldn't tell him. I could not let him believe that after all this time, he and I were possible.

Fynn would be horrified, and my father... disapproval aside, he'd never part with the chance of a new ally for the sake of his daughters heart, no matter how much he loved me. It just didn't make sense in the grand scheme of things. I sucked in one last, deep breath and stepped from the safety of the garden bed.

"I think that's the first time you've ever thrown a game," he said, turning to regard me with eyes that seemed to blend with the night.

I shrugged, knowing how the light spilling out onto the path behind me would be framing my figure, one full of all the curves I'd lacked the last time he'd seen me. I was taller than I'd liked to have been and no amount of time in the sun had been able to take the pale edge off my milky skin, but I knew without being pretentious that I was pretty, even striking in my own way.

Dark, almond shaped eyes set above a petite nose and almost too full lips were framed by long hair that softly curled its way down my back. My waist was small and my once stringy limbs now had a graceful appearance about them. I hadn't been a woman when he'd left, but even I could not deny the truth of it now.

"You were the one who said we were no longer children."

He nodded, keeping his distance from me as one would an abandoned kitten before trying to tempt it forward with a small pitcher of milk.

My fingers, in long habit of shaking with my nerves, grew in their tremors. I locked them together, entwining them in the hope that their reaction to him would escape his notice. "We weren't expecting you back so early. It's barely spring."

Father had thought it a good idea to send the two boys away to our Uncle's holding, twelve days hard ride from here, not long after their sixteenth birthdays. He'd said a growing man needed the education of many, not just the same select few his entire life. He'd also said that the wisdom gained by learning to keep your eyes and ears open amidst different households and their varying guests could prove an invaluable tool for the future.

Fynn, my true brother in blood, had not wanted to go alone, not that he'd ever voice such a thing. But we'd all known it, and for one reason or another, father had seen the wisdom in sending Raff along with him. Raff, the wet nurses son. Raff, the boy who'd grown up with us, lived with us, laughed and cried with us... Raff our brother in everything but blood.

"Your Father sent Fynn a message, needing him home immediately."

I nodded.

Things around here had been strained of late, full of worried glances and tight-lipped silences. I wasn't one for keeping a nose in the affairs of men, as was my place, but I knew it had something to do with the lands that lay north of Lord Patrick Schoone's, one of Father's long time Allies. From all accounts, a new lord had taken residence there, one the whispers said, had inherited it through evil deeds.

Lord Patrick had known the previous Lord of the land, but had been neither friend nor foe, the both of them happy to keep their distance and tend their own affairs, as long as each other's borders were respected. Apparently, the new Lord didn't feel the same way, not if Lord Patrick's stories of murdered livestock, burnt crops and stolen horses were to be believed.

"Did you learn as much as father said you would?" I asked, disentangling my mind from the horrible images flashing before it.

"More than I ever expected," he said, his voice growing quiet. Something was bothering him, and now, it was bothering me too. After everything he'd said about fulfilling promises, he still hadn't made a single move towards me. Had he changed his mind and found another? Had his earlier words, reminding me of my promise been nothing but a cruel taunt?

"You're frowning, Caitlyn."

"Sorry," I said, schooling my features into the perfect image of serenity despite the disquiet feeling growing within me, taking on an unexpected strength of its own.

All this time I'd been so worried about hurting him, that I'd not once considered how much he could, and indeed might, hurt me in return.

"Was there something you wanted?" I asked, deciding to hurry this up and be done with it. I didn't like the way my stomach was rising to my throat, or the pressure that seemed to be building unbidden behind my eyes.

He looked down at my laced fingers then back to my face. "You're not wearing my ring."

"I..." I felt for the comfort of it, hidden beneath the soft cloth of my dress. "I did not wish to raise questions over who had given it to me." It seemed like a safe enough answer, definitely not a lie but still far from the truth I longed to tell him.

If I'd had the slightest bit of courage I would have slipped his ring from under my gown and shown him that his gift of love had never broke contact with my skin, not since the moment he'd curled my fingers around it. But what would that achieve, even if I was brave enough? I wasn't even sure he wanted me anymore.

He opened his mouth to speak.

"It's okay," I said, cutting him off before he could butcher my heart with his words. "If you've found another girl, I mean. You were gone a long time and -"

"You think I would forget you that easily?"

I closed my eyes for the barest of moments, my heart racing. "I don't know what to think." I looked up and met his eyes, and I knew in that instant that I'd been wrong. Wrong to doubt and wrong to think I could ever keep the secret truths of my heart from him.

"There is none in this world that could replace you, Caitlyn. I could not do it, even if I wanted to."

"Nor I you," I whispered, wishing he would hurry up and claim his promise. My entire body was trembling with the effort not to run over to him.

His eyes lit up at my words, matching his sudden smile as he made a move towards me. My chest heaved with my quickening, expectant breaths, making my head swim. I'd dreamt of this, pictured it too many times to count before pushing it aside and telling myself it could never be.

"Caitlyn?"

My heart stopped dead as I spun towards the doorway. "Fynn!" I said, forcing a shaky smile to my lips. "I was just asking Raff where I might find you."

My brother looked from my flushed face to Raff's, then back again. "I was in a meeting with Father. Come, it's time for supper."

I went to him, hoping he was oblivious of my efforts to calm myself as I took his offered arm and let him guide me inside.

Father's usual dour expression had been replaced with a genuine smile as he sat at the head table, exchanging words with a man of wide girth, sitting to his right.

"Lord Patrick's here?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

My uncle, seated to my fathers left I'd expected, joined by his unpleasant and beady eyed wife, but not Lord Patrick. Surely I would have heard news of his intended visit before now if it had indeed been planned?

That being said, Fynn and Raff's return hadn't been planned either.

"Yes," my brother said, appearing unwilling to part with anything further.

I glanced at him with a small amount of curiosity as he walked me to the dais and seated me next to our generously proportioned Aunt before taking his own place next to Raff, directly opposite.

Fynn's blue eyes, the exact shade of our Mother's, looked sharper, harder. His mouth had a new tightness about it, one that said he was less likely to fall into an easy smile, and his charcoal hair, like mine and Fathers, had been cut close to his scalp. It wasn't short enough to raise the wrong eyebrows or put you in mind of one of those brute mercenary's from the south, but short compared to the shaggy mane he'd left with.

I let my rather harsh scrutiny of my brother go as one of the younger, more pleasant looking serving women placed a decent sized helping of stewed meat and fresh bread before us. She let her sleeve slip a fraction from her shoulder as she moved, her downcast eyes lifting ever so slightly in my brothers direction before she righted it. I pressed my lips together, stifling my amusement. The poor girl, Inara was her name, would never have a chance with him. The teasing revelation of smooth, pale skin may have tempted another Lord's son, at the very least peaked his interest, but not Fynn's. Not in this lifetime at least. My father stood as soon as she'd deposited her last platter and moved away. I stole a look at Raff.

His gaze was intent on my Father, showing the respect a Lord of his magnitude deserved, but there was something in the way his eyes seemed suddenly shadowed that made me want to shudder. I hadn't noticed in the dim light outside, but the softness, the open honesty of his face was gone, just like Fynn's. His hair, always too long for good taste and worn loose and wild had been hacked to his shoulders and tied back as tight as it would go. And where an almost permanent growth of soft stubble had adorned his cheeks, was nothing but smooth, almost too tanned skin.

His eyes flicked to me and were gone again, so fast even I barely saw it, but the tiny tug of a smile at the corner of his lips said that I hadn't imagined it.

"I give warm greetings to my guests, friends and family, and all those who attend them. I welcome you into my home and hope that your stay with us, however long, will be one of safe harbour and fond memories."

My father wasn't one for flattery or flowery speeches. If he spoke, it was usually short and strait to the point, so for him, the welcome he'd just offered was on a par with an enormous hug. He must indeed have been glad to have his sons home.

A rattle of goblets leaving the tables and returning again reverberated throughout the hall as every able bodied person drank to my father's toast. He took his seat, the silver streaks at his temples catching in the flickering light as he nodded to Fynn, then turned back to talk quietly with Lord Patrick and my Uncle.

"Eat child, before you waste away to nothing. Your father might not notice your bony arms but believe me, any red blooded suitor with half an interest in securing you for his own will."

My cheeks flushed at my Aunt Caroline's words, not from shame or embarrassment, but anger. Yet I picked up my spoon and said nothing, just gave a polite smile and swallowed the first of what I deemed would end up being too many mouthfuls. There was a line between eating a decent meal and outright gluttony, but I was not about to remind her of that. It wouldn't be worth the lecture.

She removed the spoon from her mouth. "Your uncle and I will be staying until Summer's start and I'll be expecting your company. There'll be none of these long rides and days spent running wild beneath the sun. You are to stay by me where I can make sure none of your duties are skimped, and that you've learnt all that a wife to be must. Your father can't be expected to use his daughter to seal an alliance if she isn't fit to be seen."

"Yes aunty," I said, acknowledging her as calmly as I could as I took another mouthful.

She was staying the entire spring? An entire spring! She'd be watching everything I did, every move, every look, every word. I let out a silent sigh. At least it would stop me from sneaking off and getting myself into trouble with Raff.

I put my hand to my lips, pretending to stifle a yawn though I covered a smile. He was watching me even now, his eyes carefully guarded so no one else would notice, none but the one person who mattered.

Me.