Later in the evening, Brienna was sitting in her room, working on a piece of tapestry by candlelight because she had promised Lasair back in the village that she would. Their conversation had been too short; Brienna knew if they had had more time to talk, she would have let loose all her reservations about marrying Donnall, which went beyond just her sadness that her father would not be attending the wedding. But since the wedding would happen anyway, the least she could do was not let her old nursemaid down by showing her a chest full of shoddy needlework when she arrived in a few weeks.
Someone knocked lightly on her door, and Brienna beckoned them enter, thinking it was Isobel come to rehash the drama of what had happened in the great hall earlier, however it was not Isobel—it was Donnall.
He had to bend nearly double to get through the small doorway. Once inside he looked sheepish, like he was not expecting to find her alone; indeed, it was hardly proper for him to visit her at night without an announcing it, and her without a chaperone. Brienna felt herself longing for Lasair, but she stood, put down her sewing, and bowed her head in greeting.
"Good evening," she said.
"Forgive me for coming to you like this," Donnall said, his voice in a breathy whisper. He looked around as if he would find an excuse for his visit in the furnishings of her room. "Ah," he said, gaze settling on the window. "My room faces the hill, and I was hoping to see the cliffs over the sea from a good vantage point."
He walked to her window tepidly, and Brienna felt like if she made too loud a sound he would jump like a scared mouse and scurry away.
"My window faces the meadow," she said apologetically.
Donnall had reached it and was looking out.
"I see," he said. "Too bad."
He sounded so truly disappointed that Brienna felt sorry for him.
"But perhaps if you lean out a little, you could catch a glimpse of it," she offered.
Donnall slid his long torso along the sill, poking his head out far enough that he must have been able to see almost around the other side of the castle. Brienna looked at his spindly legs anchoring him to the floor and thought that, by just lifting him up like she would a wheelbarrow, she could tip him right out the window and be done with this whole wedding business for good.
Her stifled giggle made him pull back inside the room so he could face her.
"My romantic notions amuse you?" he asked, insult twitching in his eyes.
"No," Brienna said. "It is rare to meet a man who is as interested in nature as he is in politics."
Donnall seemed appeased by this praise and idled near the window. Standing so near him, Brienna felt dwarfed by his teetering frame, which always appeared on the edge of tipping over. He reminded her of a tall birch about to be felled.
"No more rare than a woman who can hold her own in a conversation about the intricacies of war," he complimented her, recalling their dinner conversation.
Brienna nodded her head in thanks. It occurred to her that she'd always been intelligent, but it was Llewellyn who had given her the proficiency in such topics as strategy and diplomacy. However, she knew better than to express her gratitude to another man in the ears of her betrothed.
"I'm so glad to see that my queen will be not only beautiful, but also wise," Donnal went on, reaching out and taking her hand.
His touch was unexpected, and without meaning to, Brienna flinched, nearly tearing her small hand away from his large, bony one. Her rejection spurred something in Donnall, who gripped her wrist tightly and held her, his body overwhelming her with its closeness as he towered over her. She arched her neck to look up at him, wearing an expression of chaste bewilderment so that he would think her reaction was due to surprise and nothing more.
"Do I frighten you?" Donnall asked. He sounded breathless, as if the prospect might please him.
"No," Brienna answered honestly. She didn't fear him anymore than she feared food she'd never developed a taste for, like liver. "I'm just not used to—"
"The touch of a man?" Donnall asked, his tone taking on a veneer of kindness. He released her wrist and she clasped it in her hand, rubbing the mishandled skin. "That is good to hear. I have been very anxious too, about the new... experiences marriage will bring."
"Oh," Brienna said, feeling a stab of compassion. If he was as inexperienced as she was in love, then maybe that explained his odd behavior. "That's normal, I guess."
"Forgive me if I seem too eager," Donnall said. "But I have been waiting for our wedding for—my entire life, it seems. Ever since my father told me he'd garnered me a princess from Connaught."
He reached out and took her braid in his hands, stroking it between them. He put the tuft of hair at its end up to his nose and inhaled deeply.
"And so have you," he continued.
Brienna was spellbound by the ends of her hair tickling Donnall's nostrils.
"So have I what?" she asked.
"Been waiting your entire life for our marriage," he insisted, a little ruffled.
"Yes," she agreed pragmatically, not wanting to anger him. "Yes, of course."
"It's hard to believe that it's only a matter of weeks, now, before we will be wed," he said, letting her braid go and staring off, forlorn.
"Yes, it is." That, it was easy for her to agree with.
"Such a long time before I can satiate my desire to hold you in my arms," Donnall sighed. "It must be hard for you too, now that I'm here."
Brienna said nothing, glad that she could depend on propriety, for once, to defend her choice to keep her mouth shut.
"But since we are to be married anyway," he went on, "I'm sure no one would begrudge us one little transgression."
Before she knew what was happening, Donnall was holding her by the shoulders as he stooped down to kiss her, his mouth landing on hers like a hawk swooping down on its prey. Very quickly her body and mind passed through a series of sensations and emotions. Her skin went cold she stiffened in shock. Once the surprise passed, she was outraged that he would take such a liberty with her. Then she remembered that this was her betrothed, that she had a duty to fulfill a promise that her family had made to his over a decade ago, and she felt sad, abandoned, and powerless.
Just as she was about to push him away, Donnall pulled back, lips drawn back in satisfaction.
"Just a taste of what is to come, my love," he said. "Do I please you?"
"Yes," she whispered. She didn't care if it was a lie; she just wanted him to go.
"What's that?" he said, loud, shaking her slightly.
Provoked, Brienna raised her head and glared at him, not bothering to hide her dislike. "Yes!" she declared, putting as much hatred into the word as she could.
Donnall chuckled. "That's what I like to see," he said, letting her go finally and loping to her bedroom. Then he turned back. "That sense of self-preservation will serve you very well in our marriage. As long as you keep me happy, like a wife should," he said, raising his upper lip so his teeth were exposed in a threatening grin, "we won't have any problems."
He left, shutting the door behind him, and Brienna slid down onto her bed, clutching the quilt beneath her in two taught fists. Her first kiss, she thought, and it was everything it was not supposed to be; unwelcome, harsh, and hateful. She stood back up and went to the washbasin, where she scrubbed her lips with cold, stale water.
She knew she wouldn't be able to sleep all night. Even though he was gone, Donnall had left her with a twisting, throbbing feeling of illness in the pit of her stomach. Ruminating on what had happened, she decided it wasn't just the stolen kiss or his mercurial manner that had really scared her. It was that he could have gone much farther, and she wouldn't have had any way of protecting herself.
His last words about her sense of self-preservation haunted her. Maybe he had held back, in a stranger's castle, with her brother a few floors away, when they weren't joined in marriage yet. What was waiting to meet her when she went back to Leinster, where Donnall's word was law and there was no one around to look out for her, no one like Isobel or Lasair for her to talk to, confide in?
Admit it, she thought to herself, swiping away a tear that was trailing the length of her nose. It's not that there will be no Isobel or Lasair that has you so upset. It's that there will be no Llewellyn.