Waging War Read Online Free PDF Page B

could barely get the words out.
    He looked me straight in the eyes. “Ye’d go
on and live the life ye were meant to live.” Ringo gripped my upper
arms and made me look at him. “Ye ‘aven’t told ‘im any of yer
fears, ‘ave ye?”
    I shook my head no.
    “Good. Ye can’t.”
    “Why not? We’re supposed to share things
that matter to us. He’d understand.”
    Ringo let go of my arms and ran his hands
through his hair. “Saira, it’s like the man who admits to ‘avin’ an
affair. The admission makes ‘im feel better for tellin’ the truth,
but ‘e ‘ands it to ‘is wife to carry around as ‘er own. It isn’t
fair. Ye know Archer’ll never do a thing to ‘urt you, so ye get to
walk around feelin’ just fine, but what ‘e wants gets buried in
makin’ sure yer ‘appy. Ye don’t get to tell ‘im this one. I’m
tellin’ ye, it isn’t fair.”
    I really didn’t want to hear this, not from
Ringo, not at all. I spun away and headed toward the door. But
guilt made me angry and I turned back to him. “You didn’t fight for
Charlie, and now you’re telling me I can’t fight for Archer? Go
wipe your conscience on someone else, Ringo, because that’s not fair.”
    The door was too heavy for me to slam behind
me effectively, but it wouldn’t have made anything better anyway. I
passed Sanda on the landing as I raced up the stairs to my
room.
    “It’s hard t’ outrun yerself, lass.”
    I wanted to keep going until I could shut
myself away in my room, but somehow I couldn’t do that to Sanda. I
turned to face her. “What about fear. Can you outrun that?”
    “Only if ye stand still and face it do ye
have a chance against fear.”
    I made myself square my shoulders and walk
the rest of the way to my room.
     
    After a couple of hours of very fitful
sleep, I finally gave up the idea of rest as a waste of time. It
was still dark outside, and I guessed dawn was only about an hour
away. I dressed quickly and slipped down the hall to the other wing
where Ringo slept.
    I knew he’d hear me the minute I opened his
door, so I didn’t bother knocking. His eyes were open and looking
at me as I sat on the end of his bed.
    “I’m sorry,” I whispered.
    He looked at me in silence for a long
moment. “Ye lash out when yer scared, ye know? Like a wild thing,
ye are.”
    “It wasn’t right, what I said about Charlie.
And I’m so sorry I said it.”
    He finally sighed and sat up, wrestled the
bedside light on, and scrubbed his palms across his eyes. “Wipe my conscience?” he scoffed. “Ye pick an ungodly time to wipe
yers, ye wench.”
    I bit back my smile. We were good, but I
still tread carefully. “I think about Charlie all the time, and how
she’s doing as Valerie Grayson’s protégé. No matter how clever
Charlie is, the sixteenth century isn’t easy to navigate, and Henry
Grayson’s death in France hurt his mother in ways I can’t even
imagine.”
    I tried to picture what it would be like to
live in a noble house in Tudor times. Hygiene issues alone were
enough to send me running, not to mention court politics and
Immortal Descendant intrigue. I shuddered.
    “Charlie’s braver than I know how to
be.”
    “Ye might say that. Though sometimes bein’
alone becomes what ye know, and choosin’ otherwise is the ‘ard
part.”
    I looked into his gray eyes and saw the pain
in them. “Did she run away from a life with you, or run toward one
with Valerie?”
    He watched me for a long moment, then
finally shrugged. “Doesn’t much matter, does it? We’ll either find
each other in the end, or we won’t.”
    “How can you be pragmatic about that, Ringo?
It sounds so lonely.”
    He smiled gently. “We’ve all been alone in
our lives. Ye’ve ‘ad yer mum, but ye’ve only relied on yerself. I
‘ad a mum for five years, and Archer never ‘ad a mum at all. But
all of us ‘ave known what it is to be loved, and that makes us
lucky. But the thing about love is it’s like the wild thing ye