Coira gripped the wooden handle of the axe and swung it hard at the remains of the two cages. The men had destroyed her former prison, and now she wanted her chance to demolish the bad memories of her past as well.
“Coira, that’s heavy. Let me do it,” offered Lance, reaching out for the axe.
“Nay. I want to do this,” she told him. “I need to prove to myself as well as my sister that I am strong now.” She brought the axe down on the wooden platform of the cage, but didn’t have the muscles to remove it from the wood.
“That’s enough,” said Lance, taking the axe from her and handing it to his squire.
“Oh, is it my turn now?” asked Jack, looking at the axe.
“Effie, dinna ye want a turn as well?” asked Coira.
Effie smiled down at the newborn babe in her arms. Her husband, Aidan, looked over her shoulder at the baby as well, holding the hands of their daughters, Elspeth and Arabella. Aidan’s squirrel, Reid, sat on his shoulder, chattering away.
“Nay, Coira, I want to stay with little Gavin,” Effie told her. “Every minute with our new son is worth more to me than even demolishin’ bad memories of the past.”
“I agree,” said Aidan, reaching down to kiss his son on the nose. “And someday, little Gavin will be big and strong like his da. And then I will teach him how to throw a caber.” He made silly faces and obnoxious noises talking to his son.
Storm MacKeefe’s head popped up from the crowd when he heard this. “So, will it be Gavin who finally beats me at the caber toss?” asked Storm with a smirk. “After all, we ken ye, nor anyone else of the clan, has ever been able to do it.”
“I can no’ only toss a caber better than ye, Storm, but I am stronger in every other way,” bragged Aidan.
“Prove it,” said Aidan’s good friend, Ian, from next to him. He had his arm around his wife, Kyla, who was also Aidan’s sister. She held their baby, Grant, while the twins, Finn and Quinn, chased Ian’s wolfhound around them in a circle.
“Och, do I hear a competition comin’ on?” The third of the MadMen MacKeefe, Onyx, rushed over, holding his son, Creighton, in one arm and his daughter, Davina, in the other. “Charles,” he called to his stepson. “Start collectin’ the bets. I say whatever the challenge, Aidan is goin’ to lose.”
“Lose? Ye think I’m goin’ to lose?” squawked Aidan, not at all happy at hearing his good friend was betting against him. “I’ll show ye that I willna lose and then ye will eat yer words.”
“Onyx, give me the children,” said Onyx’s wife, Lovelle, hurrying over to collect them. “I am going to take them to check on your wildcat while you boys make fools of yourselves again.”
“Let me help with the children since you’re pregnant.” Zara rushed over to take Davina from her.
“If you men want to prove your strength, how about tossing the rest of these cages into the fire?” asked Lance.
“I can do that.” Aidan gave his squirrel to his daughter to hold and bent down, picking up several of the iron bars at once. Instantly, the rest of the Scots were there to try to prove that they were stronger than the others.
“Coira, now is our time to sneak away.” Lance pulled her over to the side.
“Sneak away? Where are we goin’?” she asked with a smile.
“Just somewhere private where I can kiss you without anyone bothering us.” Lance directed her quickly to the garden. Sweetcakes followed, barking at them.
“Sweetcakes, we’ll be right back. Now go to Zara and play with the bairns.” Coira reached down and petted the dog on the head and sent it on its way.
“Hurry, before anyone sees us,” said Lance, running to the garden, holding her hand.
Coira laughed, having fun. Her heart felt lighter than ever now that she’d faced and released her fears of the past. She had never felt stronger than she did right now.
Lance stopped and pulled her into his arms, kissing her so passionately that she wasn’t sure he wouldn’t have the idea to make love right there in the garden.
A sweet scent of flowers filled the air. Coira took in a deep breath. “Lance, look, the roses are bloomin’,” she said excitedly. They turned to see the rose bush with red roses in full bloom, opening their petals to the sun. Then something caught her eye and she moved closer, taking Lance with her. She gasped when she saw what it was.
“What’s the matter, Coira?” asked Lance. “Is something wrong?”
Tears filled her eyes and she bent down to touch the soft petals of one blue rose, mixed in with all the red ones. “Nothin’ is wrong, Lance. Do ye see this?”
“It’s blue,” he said in astonishment. “I’ve never seen a blue rose before.”
“It’s because it is special and most people never see one in an entire lifetime,” Coira explained. “The legend of the blue rose states that when it appears, enemies turn to lovers.”
“I guess that’s us,” said Lance, pulling her closer and kissing her again.
“I dinna ever want to be enemies again,” she told him, staring into his deep, blue eyes.
“And neither do I,” he told her. “But I would like to be lovers.” He pinched her bottom and chuckled. Coira slapped his hand away and giggled.
“Lance de Selby, what kind of lassie do ye take me for to be pinchin’ my bottom right here in the garden where anyone can see?”
“I take you to be the sweetest, most beautiful, kindest lassie I’ve ever met.” He kissed her between each of the attributes he mentioned. “But most of all, I take you to be my wife, Coira. You are the strongest, most amazing woman I have ever met.”
She blushed and shyly looked up through hooded eyes. “Ye dinna really mean that, do ye?”
“I do,” he said. “You are the sweetest and prettiest flower in this garden. I will love you forever because you are the best thing that has ever happened to me, my Scottish Rose.”
From the Author
I hope you enjoyed Scottish Rose and will leave a review for me.
In history, someone from Clan MacDuff always crowned the Scottish kings. Isabel MacDuff (in my story, Coira’s grandmother) crowned her cousin, Robert the Bruce, after he killed John Comyn and was excommunicated for it. Later, she ended up hanging in a cage left out in the elements for four years, put there by the English. Records show they don’t know what ended up happening to her. But in my story, I come up with a possible solution.
To find out more about this, please read Aidan – Book 2 of my MadMan MacKeefe Series. You will also read about Coira and her sister, Effie, who were put in hanging cages, just like their late grandmother.
Here are the links for the books of my MadMan MacKeefe Series, preceded by my Daughters of the Dagger Series.
Daughters of the Dagger Series:
Prequel
Ruby – Book 1
Sapphire – Book 2
Amber – Book 3
Amethyst – Book 4
MadMan MacKeefe Series:
Onyx – Book 1
Aidan – Book 2
Ian – Book 3
Elizabeth Rose
Excerpt from Aidan
Aidan
MadMan MacKeefe Series – Book 2
The Scottish Highlands. Late summer 1362.
Only a madman would use a stone for his pillow. The Stone of Destiny to be precise.
Aidan MacKeefe tossed restlessly in his sleep, having used the Stone of Destiny as his pillow for the last six months now, hoping to have prophetic dreams. Supposedly, the stone was used back in the days of the Bible, and Jacob had used this exact stone and had dreams of angels.
Aidan was in the middle of a dream. Mist surrounded him in his little stone cottage in the MacKeefe camp. He couldn’t see anything in the darkened room, but then the door opened, and in the bright light – he saw an angel. The angel walked toward him, covered with a long, white, hooded cloak, her fiery red tresses falling in ringlets down to her shoulders. Stopping in front of him, she peeked out from under the hood. While he couldn’t
see her face well in the dark, he could still see her wide, green eyes that reminded him of the color of the moors on a warm summer’s day. Her gaze steadied upon him and she lit a candle in her hand, illuminating her face beneath the hood.
Her skin was fair, like alabaster, and a smattering of fine freckles trailed down her nose and spread to her rosy cheeks. Aye, she was a bonnie lass, and though he couldn’t see her body under the robe, he was sure it matched her beauty. He wanted her badly. Then she smiled at him, and her laugh rang out across the room like the sweet song of a small meadow pipit, bringing with it a fragile innocence to its tone. She was a fine angel. A perfect, Scottish angel. He wanted naught more than to reach out his hands and touch her, but something weighted him down and he could not move.
As she reached out to him, he saw a strawberry birthmark on the inside of her arm that looked like . . . a skull. He felt himself jerk away from her touch, and then she turned away from him and nodded toward the door. Aidan’s attention focused across the small room and, to his horror, he saw English soldiers following her into the cottage with their weapons drawn.
Aidan tried to cry out for help, but couldn’t speak. He tried to reach for his sword at his side, but couldn’t move. Then his eyes scanned down her body and, to his horror, he saw sticking out from the back of her robe right by her doup – a tail. A furry, red tail! It reached out and brushed across his face and, in his only form of defense, he leaned forward . . . and bit it.
The sickening screech of an animal cried out, pulling him from his slumber. His eyes popped open, bringing him out of the dream and he sat up quickly, not knowing what was happening.
Then he saw Reid, his pet red squirrel, scurrying off his chest, scolding him, running in circles around the room. The door opened just then, but instead of his dream angel, his friend, Ian, stood there with a dour expression upon his face.
“What in the clootie’s name was that screech?” asked Ian. His tall, muscular form filled the entire doorway, and his dark hair looked wet as if he’d just come from bathing in the loch.
Aidan jumped up, realizing he was fully clothed, and that it was well into the morning hours. Then he remembered taking a nap, too full to move after eating his fill of skirlie, an oatmeal and onion dish topped off with a goose egg. The food for the clan had been prepared by his younger sister, Kyla, and the chieftain’s wife, Wren.
The door pushed open from behind Ian, and there stood their good friend, Onyx, who had recently married an Englishwoman, Lady Lovelle of Worcestershire, after finding out that his true family was English, not Scottish at all.
“Aidan, ye dunderheid,” said Onyx, spying the squirrel running around the room in a heated frenzy. Onyx’s two different colored eyes stared back at him in question. “What did ye do to yer squirrel?”
“I think I bit its tail,” he said, running a hand through his hair and leaning back against the stone. The Stone of Scone, or Stone of Destiny as most called it, was a large, black, basalt rock with ancient hieroglyphs etched into it. It had iron-looped handles embedded into the sides to use for carrying with a pole through them. The stone was very heavy and took at least two full-grown men to move it – if they were strong. He’d embedded the thick stone into the dirt of the cottage floor to lower it, and pulled his pallet over it, to use as his personal pillow.
About Elizabeth
Elizabeth Rose is a multi-published, bestselling author, writing medieval, historical, contemporary, paranormal, and western romance. She is an amazon all-star and an award-nominee. Her books are available as Ebooks, paperback, and audiobooks as well.
Her favorite characters in her works include dark, dangerous and tortured heroes, and feisty, independent heroines who know how to wield a sword. She loves writing 14th century medieval novels, and is well-known for her many series.
Her twelve-book small town contemporary series, Tarnished Saints, was inspired by incidents in her own life.
After being traditionally published, she started self-publishing, creating her own covers and book-trailers on a dare from her two sons.
Elizabeth is a born storyteller and passionate about sharing her works with her readers.
Please be sure to visit her website at Elizabethrosenovels.com to read excerpts from any of her novels and get sneak peeks at covers of upcoming books. You can follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads or BookBub. Be sure to sign up for her newsletter so you don’t miss out on new releases or upcoming events.
Also by Elizabeth Rose
Medieval Series:
Legendary Bastards of the Crown Series
Seasons of Fortitude Series
Legacy of the Blade Series
Daughters of the Dagger Series
MadMan MacKeefe Series
Barons of the Cinque Ports Series
Second in Command Series
Secrets of the Heart Series
Medieval/Paranormal Series:
Elemental Series
Greek Myth Fantasy Series
Tangled Tales Series
Contemporary Series:
Tarnished Saints Series
Western Series:
Cowboys of the Old West Series
And More!
Please visit http://elizabethrosenovels.com
Scottish Rose: Coira (Second in Command Book 3) Page 8