by Emily Royal
It was the same reason why Ma had not wished to remain at Glenblane. Ma would never admonish him, for it was not a woman’s place to do so. But the expression in her eyes mirrored the corner of his soul which he had tried to ignore. It whispered to his conscience each night when he lay alone in his chamber, tormented by the memory of that sweet body writhing beneath him in pleasure—the body of the woman who now wallowed in the dirt.
His lust for vengeance had been ignited by Ewan’s revelation—and her confession. But strong-willed as she may be, she was still a woman. Did she possess the power and authority to control her father’s men?
He grimaced at the memory of his own treatment of her, how she had accepted her violation and the hardships he’d subjected her to. Almost from the moment he’d taken her captive, he had known how to make her submit.
Alice.
De Montford had used his daughter’s love for her sister to bend her to his will at least once. She had agreed to wed that monster Allendyne so that Alice may be spared such a fate.
Had Tavish misunderstood her?
You must understand…
She had said those very words just before he’d cast her aside.
Elyssia loved her sister. She had endured so much to keep Alice safe. After her escape in the forest the day after his men had violated her, she had let herself be recaptured—all to protect her sister. Even her brutal whipping had arisen because Alice was being molested.
“Oh, Elyssia, perhaps I have misjudged you…”
Since her exile to the outbuilding, he had avoided her, unwilling as he was to place himself before temptation. But he still ached for her. The burning need within his very bones had only grown with intensity as each day passed.
He could not live without her.
The time had come to set aside his hatred. When he returned, he would listen to her explanation. He would discover the truth about Elyssia de Montford and the day her fate became entwined with Flora’s.
* * *
“Why won’t you speak to me, Lyssie?”
What Alice lacked in wits she made up for with insight. Though Elyssia tried to hide her self-loathing over how she’d secured their passage, Alice knew something was wrong. Each morning when they woke, she issued a gentle enquiry, as if she hoped that before Elyssia had fully roused from sleep, her defences would be weak enough for Alice to penetrate.
“I’m well,” she said, “just anxious for us to return home.”
For four days and nights, they had ridden hard. Angus had insisted they put as much distance between them and Glenblane as possible. As the light faded at the end of the fourth day, Malcolm’s horse grew restless, its ears twitching. But despite Malcolm’s concerns they were being followed, Angus had insisted they continue. The two men had argued, and Malcolm had deferred to Angus’s greater age, size, and authority.
Tavish would have returned to Glenblane by now. Would he send his men to retrieve her, or would he rejoice at being relieved of the burden? He would hate her, even more, when he learned of her whoring.
“Get up.”
Alice’s body tightened at Angus’s command. Since taking his payment, he had spoken little to them apart from the occasional insult which Elyssia closed her ears to and Alice, thankfully, did not seem to understand.
Were it not for Malcolm’s presence, Angus would have taken further payment from her. But after a warning from Malcolm, he’d contented himself with telling her how unpleasant it had been to lie with an English whore as if he were the one who’d suffered from their transaction.
Angus waved a waterskin at Alice. “Fetch me water.”
“I’ll do it,” Elyssia replied.
“I didn’t ask you, whore.”
Alice laid a hand on Elyssia’s arm. “The river’s not far from here, Lyssie. ‘Tis no trouble.”
As soon as Alice’s footsteps had faded into the distance, Angus drew his knife. His face darkened with hatred.
“Angus, what are you doing?”
“‘Tis not your place to ask questions, Malcolm. Hold the whore.”
“For what purpose?”
“The good of the clan.” Angus raised his knife. “I should have done this when I first saw you. I fucked you like a sow, now I’ll gut you like a pig.”
“Angus, no.” Malcolm drew his sword.
“You do as I say,” Angus snarled, “or must I slice you open as well?”
“Tavish would not agree to this.”
“Tavish is a fool and does not know his own mind. We’re at war with Longshanks, yet while she entices him with her fat thighs, Tavish grows weaker. But no more! I’m to leave her here for the wolves—far enough away where he’ll never find her.”
“On whose authority?”
“It matters not.”
Malcolm raised his sword and shielded Elyssia with his body.
“I won’t let you harm her.”
Angus drew his sword with a hiss of steel against leather. He thrust it at her, but Malcolm parried the blow and the clash of steel sent sparks flying.
A guttural growl rang out from the darkness between the trees.
The whispers of movement which had plagued them for the past day magnified into heavy crashes as thick, blurred shapes sharpened into the forms of men.
Barbarians.
A battle cry rang out.
“Stop!” Angus cried, “‘Tis I!”
Malcolm pushed Elyssia to the ground. “You must hide!”
“But Alice…”
“I’ll protect her when she returns.”
“She’s my responsibility. I must find her.”
She turned her back on Malcolm to run in the direction Alice had gone but staggered forwards at a blow to the back of her neck. She heard a soft plea before blackness engulfed her.
“Forgive me.”
* * *
When she opened her eyes, the light had almost gone. Warm fingers caressed her face and traced a circle on her cheek before they drew an imaginary line down her nose. Alice’s touch was unmistakeable.
“How long have I been lying here?”
“I don’t know,” Alice replied, “but it’s almost dark now.”
“What happened?”
“He said I must hide with you and not move or speak until either he returned or you woke.”
“Who?”
“The kind one.”
Malcolm.
I’ll protect her when she returns.
What had he done? Closing her eyes, she relived the sensations in her body—her neck throbbing, a strong grip on her arms, being lifted, before falling to the ground once more.
The undergrowth grew more thickly where she sat, huge fronds of bracken and bramble which would have concealed her position.
Alice helped her to her feet.
“He bade me give you this when you woke.”
Alice held out a knife in a leather scabbard. Elyssia took it and unsheathed the blade.
Malcolm’s knife. She had seen it when he gutted the fish he’d caught on their journey. The blade was well-honed, sharp, and almost as long as her handspan. Though well balanced, it was heavier than her own knife—the one she had given him two years ago.
Tavish. The green of his eyes was everywhere—in the grass underfoot, the moss on the trees. Would she ever be free from him?
“We must go to him,” Alice said. “He is near.”
Hope tangled with panic before Elyssia understood that Alice referred to Malcolm.
“There!”
Men’s bodies adorned the ground. Two displayed the plaid of Clan MacLean. Scattered among them were six others, their dirty tunics already stained with their life essence. On the edge of the carnage, Malcolm’s horse stood placidly. It pricked its ears up as they approached.
“Malcolm!”
Elyssia fell to her knees beside one of the bodies. Dark stains covered his chest. A gaping hole leered at her from his side, red globules congealing around the wound below which a pool of darker red ha
d soaked into the ground. A sword lay beside his lifeless hand. Malcolm would never use it again.
She whispered a prayer before she ran her fingertips over his eyelids, shutting his eyes from the mortal world.
A liquid cough made her jump. Brandishing the knife, she turned towards the noise. One of the men was still alive.
His huge body was all but destroyed. One arm had been severed at the wrist and shards of bone protruded from where the hand should have been. A thick wound ran diagonally across his face, severing his features in two, his left eye reduced to pulp.
He opened his mouth, and a spurt of red sprayed out.
“Treacherous bitch!”
Angus.
“What happened, Angus?”
He coughed again.
“Betrayed, bitch!”
On the brink of death, when the gates of heaven might, even now, welcome a penitent sinner, he still chose to utter words of hatred.
A hand gripped her wrist, and he drew his lips back.
“Kill me.”
“No,” she said. “I’ll not have your death on my conscience.”
His remaining eye glistened and a bead of moisture pooled in the corner.
“I beg you, lady,” he choked. “I cannot endure the pain.”
Even though he hated her, he asked her to perform a service. His body destroyed, limbs trembling, chest heaving in agony.
He was pleading for kindness.
“My heart… make it quick.” He gritted his teeth.
She nodded. Her soul, lost as it was, had little to lose by ending a man’s suffering.
A low moan escaped his throat. “Do… do not let Alice watch…”
“Shhh…” she soothed, “speak no more. Alice, turn your back until I say.”
She lifted the knife and held it over Angus’s chest where the heart lay.
“Tell me what happened here.”
He coughed, sending a splash of red liquid from his mouth. “I was betrayed… the barbarians… the clan is at risk.” Another cough and he groaned. “Please, I beg you, do it now."
Though he had cursed her and called her bitch, she could not refuse his request. Closing her eyes, she drove the blade between his ribs.
Angus may have hated her, but he had brought about her freedom. In the end, he had shown enough humanity to call her sister by her name and ask Elyssia to ensure Alice did not suffer to witness an act of murder.
Beneath the hostile flesh and bone, a heart had beaten inside his chest—the heart she had plunged a knife into.
“Have you done it?” Alice asked quietly.
“Aye.” Elyssia wiped the knife in the grass. “We must leave now. These bodies will attract wolves—or worse.”
“Where shall we go?”
Malcolm’s horse looked up as Elyssia moved towards it and patted its flank.
“Home, Alice. We’ll go home.”
* * *
The summer sun had not yet slipped below the horizon when Tavish arrived home, bone-weary from journeying but eager for the battle to come.
The castle came into view. Sunlight formed a halo round the outline of the stone.
“My lord!”
Tavish dismounted and handed his horse to the servant who had greeted him. Voices hailed the arrival of the laird, and the main doors opened to reveal Callum and Margaret. She rushed forward and offered her lips to him.
Kissing her forehead, he ignored the frown on her face and turned to greet his brother.
“I trust all is well, Callum.”
The young man shifted his gaze to Margaret.
“Aye, we’re well.” He cast his eyes down. Always so passionate and forthright, why couldn’t he meet Tavish’s gaze directly?
“Callum, what’s wrong?”
He looked at Margaret, and she shook her head.
Something was amiss.
“Answer me, Callum.”
“Brother, the whore has gone.”
“Elyssia? Dear God, is she dead?”
A momentary flash of anger crossed Margaret’s face. Tavish took Callum by the shoulders.
“What happened?”
“She’s not dead, but she has left.”
“And Alice?” Finlay’s voice was stricken with panic. “What’s happened to her?”
“She’s gone also,” Callum said. “Forgive me, brother, we had a traitor in our midst.”
“Who?”
“Angus.”
Not Angus! Of all Tavish’s men, Angus loathed the English the most. He would never betray his clan.
“Don’t be too hard on him, my love.” Margaret laid a hand on his arm. “Even the most loyal of men succumb to temptation.”
“What do you mean?”
“She… she… must have persuaded Angus to take her. Malcolm also.”
“And where are they now?”
“They’re…” Margaret’s voice broke off into a sob “…they’re dead!”
Callum took her in his arms, stroking her head. “Shhh, Margaret. I’ll tell him. Don’t distress yourself.”
Stroking her head, he lifted his gaze to Tavish.
“The whore persuaded Angus to escort her home.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“Do you not?” Callum cried. “Are you still blind to her true nature? How do you think a whore persuades a man to do her bidding?”
“Elyssia would never do such a thing.”
“You fool!” Callum snarled, voice shaking with emotion. “How quickly you forget what she did to Flora! I saw her, Tavish! Saw her with my own eyes. She offered herself to Angus, lifted her skirts and offered herself to him like a whore, on all fours in the dirt, tempting him to fuck her from behind. Poor Angus. He could not withstand such temptation, and he died for it! I sent out a search party, and do you know what they found?” Callum’s voice cracked with emotion. “Bodies! Morcar’s men must have attacked them. Angus and Malcolm were murdered. There was no sign of the women. I pray the wolves found them.”
How could Elyssia have been capable of such a deed? To lie with another man? Perhaps she had done it to punish him for casting her aside.
It mattered not. He would never see her again. Even if she were still alive, she had her duty to her sister; Tavish, his duty to his clan. For each of them, their loyalties necessitated acts which furthered the destruction of the other. Their irreconcilable beliefs confirmed they could only ever be enemies.
Elyssia was a product of the English, of de Montford, oppressors he would have purged from his beloved homeland.
Now was the time to rally the men, to draw strength from their hatred of the English. In a few days, they would leave to join Wallace and fight for their freedom. He would not rest until they had destroyed every stinking Englishman in the place. He prayed he would meet de Montford face-to-face in battle. He would take pleasure hearing that man scream as he drove his sword into his flesh. Only when the odour of death—de Montford’s death—filled his nostrils would his work be done.
Chapter 22
“Lady, we’re nearly here.”
The battlements of de Montford Castle came into view over the tops of the trees. The grey stone, once so comforting, now symbolised confinement.
Though blessed with fine weather, Elyssia’s melancholy had only increased, the rays of the summer sun mocking her with each step she drew closer to home.
She smiled at the man riding beside her. She had been fortunate enough to encounter a small party of English soldiers. The second-in-command, a young nobleman by the name of William de Neville, had agreed to escort her home together with four of his men. Too young to be tainted by a lust for power, he reminded her of dear Richard—eager to display his gallantry. He could not fail to notice her swollen belly, but he had said nothing other than to offer her his cloak for the journey, to conceal her shame.
He had spoken of an army mustering near Falkirk to fight Wallace and his supporters, his youthful exuberance yet to be tempered by the harsh realities of war.
Falkirk—might he be there?
The main doors to de Montford Castle looked as they always had. Thick, dark wood soaked up the light and blackened her heart.
The doors opened to reveal Papa and Mamma, flanked either side by two men-at-arms. Tall and muscular, Robert de Montford looked every part the nobleman. Despite his advanced age, his shoulders were broad and strong, toned muscles evident even through his tunic. He flexed his fingers on the hilt of his sword, the sunlight catching the large emerald ring on his left hand. Mamma, her slim figure clothed in a gown of pale blue silk, eyed Elyssia with distaste.
At a word from Papa, his men drew their swords.
William dismounted and, bowing to Papa, introduced himself. Papa’s head inclined towards him in a gesture of acknowledgement before he cast a disapproving eye on his daughter.
“Agatha.” His voice held no emotion.
“Papa!” She dismounted with Alice and moved towards him.
Ignoring her, he turned to her escort.
“My stables are at your disposal, de Neville. Take your horses there, and my men will tend to you.”
De Neville bowed before signalling his men to follow him. Before the dust had settled Papa levelled his gaze on Elyssia, his eyes darkening with rage.
“What are you doing here?”
“We’ve come home.”
Curling his lip into a sneer, he stepped forward too quickly for Elyssia to move away and delivered a blow to her face.
“You dare show your face here? Your husband murdered, his men butchered by animals, yet you survive and return to plague me at my door?”
“We were taken by Highlanders…” Alice pleaded, but Elyssia squeezed her hand in warning.
“Highlanders?” he snarled. “Then I presume you’re no longer chaste.”
Mamma covered her mouth in a gesture of disgust.
“Have you both been whoring yourselves?”
“Alice was left untouched, Mamma.”
“And you, Agatha?”
Elyssia met her mother’s gaze, searching for the compassion she had never received as a child.
Papa snorted. “Pity you couldn’t keep your legs closed, Agatha. Your sister is worthless either way.”
“Papa…”
“Be silent!” Mamma interrupted. “Two respectable husbands we found for you, and you saw fit to discard them both. What possible reason could you have for returning to us sullied? You cannot expect us to find you a third husband. None would have you. You’re worth even less than your half-wit sister now.”