Raibeart was peering out into the dark. Una did the same but suspected his vision was far more acute than hers. She had no doubt that at least a few deaths would mark their trail before they reached Cambrun. All she could do was pray that neither Raibeart nor she were one of them.
She tensed when the hunting party rode into view. The five men who had been chasing her when Raibeart had rescued her were there, but it was the sixth man who made her blood run cold. It was Angus, a man called Death by the other men at Dunmorton, although never to his face. He was big, strong, and lethal. Even more dangerous than that, he was an excellent tracker, deadly with a blade, and cunning. He was not a man it would be easy to lose.
It felt like hours before the hunters rode away, even though she knew it was only minutes. Una had kept expecting Angus’s cold gray eyes to fix upon them, for a knife to bury itself in Raibeart’s heart. Angus was one of the laird’s best hunters and knew how to bring down ones with MacNachton blood. She did not feel all that relieved when they left their hiding place to ride around the hunters and head for Cambrun. Una could swear she felt Angus’s cold gaze on her back, the spot between her shoulder blades itching in warning.
“Why are ye so afraid?” Raibeart asked. “Ye were trembling. Still are a wee bit.”
“Angus was there. He was the sixth mon. He is an expert hunter.”
“The big red-haired mon with the cold eyes?”
“Aye. He willnae lose our trail for long. He led the men who caught every one of us, the ones the laird sent away and the ones he still holds. He isnae one of the laird’s five favored men, but he is close. Verra close.”
“Do ye think he kens the secret about our blood?”
“I couldnae say. ’Tis possible. He spends a lot of time with the laird and his chosen men.” She pressed her forehead against his back. “What Angus is, is a coldhearted killer. He kens enough about us to ken ways to hurt or kill us without risking himself much. I swear, if he didnae have the kiss of the sun so clear to see on his face, I would think him one of us. He is that good at hunting us.”
“Dinnae fret, lass.” He patted her clenched hands. “A MacNachton is nay so easy to bring down, and I suspicion that mon has ne’er faced a Pureblood.”
“I think I heard a touch of arrogance behind those words,” she murmured. “Ye are stronger, aye?”
“Stronger, faster, and more lethal. And, more importantly, verra hard to kill. Ye heal fast, aye?” He felt her nod against his back. “I heal faster. Ye will soon ken exactly what breed ye descend from, so trust me when I tell ye that I can rip the throat out of one mon and be doing the same to another ere the first one hits the ground.” He waited tensely for her reaction to that hard truth.
Una was shocked, even more so when she realized that those words did not frighten her. In fact, her first clear thought was that, if she and the others had had the skills of the Purebloods they were descended from, they would never have been caught and caged. She slowly became aware of how tense Raibeart was and realized he was braced for her disgust or rejection. Despite all her efforts to remain sensible about the man, her heart softened and she lightly hugged him.
“I think there is a lot I need to learn about what I am,” she said and smiled against his back when his chest moved with a sigh of relief.
Twice more they had to elude the hunters, and Una was bone weary by the time they sought shelter from the rising sun. This time Raibeart took her to a small shepherd’s shelter, well hidden behind trees and shrubs. He secured his horse, fed and watered the animal, and led her through a trapdoor in the floor to a shelter below the hut.
“Now I understand why a poor shieling had a wooden floor beneath the dirt,” she murmured. “Does your clan have such places scattered everywhere across the land?”
“In as many places as we can,” he answered. “Each time one of our men weds a lass with lands, we add even more. This is a poor place and we cannae have a fire, so I fear ’tis naught but wine, oatcakes, and cheese for ye this time.”
“Ye keep feeding me,” she said as she sat down on the blanket he spread out and accepted the food.
“I suspicion food has been scarce for ye for quite a while.”
“Certainly since I was captured. The laird wants us kept weak but nay so weak he cannae take our blood when he pleases.” She tensed briefly when he sat down beside her and draped his arm across her shoulders.
“Each thing ye tell me about that madmon only adds to my need to kill him,” said Raibeart, the cold promise of death clear to hear in his deep, rough voice. “The worst of his sins being that he treats bairns with such cruelty.”
Una nodded as she ate, deciding she would just try to ignore what was almost an embrace. The way the laird and his men fed off the poor children like greedy leeches made her stomach churn. She lived in constant dread that the men would kill the little girls, weaken the children so much that they could not recover. The men took far too much blood and gave them far too little food and water to help them recover from the loss. The suffering of the children was one thing that had made all the others agree that she needed to risk escape from the dungeon.
“Aye, he should die for that alone.” She looked at him. “For a wee while I was sickened by the thought that I was like him, for did I nay need the blood of another from time to time just to survive?”
“Nay, ye . . .” he began, but stuttered to a halt when she held up her hand.
“I decided I was wrong to think that way, began to look hard at the differences. He and his men dinnae need that blood to survive; they just want it to make themselves more powerful. I then learned that the others were shamed, too, thinking much the same as I did. I spent a lot of time convincing them that they were nothing like those leeches, and, in doing so, convinced myself.” More or less, she thought, but shook the lingering hint of doubt aside. “I dinnae ken how ye, who are purer of blood, do it, but I, and the others, take mostly animal blood and only now and then. We would ne’er keep people like cattle, feeding off them and nay even trying to be certain that they had what was needed to survive. He isnae worried that he is slowly killing us. He will just hunt down more, aye? That is why he must die, that greed for power and that callousness toward the very people he is stealing it from.”
“Purebloods dinnae kill to feed the hunger. In truth, many of us also use animal blood,” he said. “It suffices most of the time. I cannae say we were so noble in the past, but it has been a verra long time since we killed for blood, long enough that the tales of those darker times are but whispered tales told to bairns to keep them from roaming outside at night or to cause the timid to shudder.”
He reluctantly pulled away from her to spread out the pallet for sleeping. It was enough that she had not pushed him away when he had put his arm around her. Raibeart quickly pushed aside all thought of how perfect she had felt tucked up against his side. It stirred his hunger for her, one that grew fiercer with every moment he spent in her company. That would be difficult to hide once they were bedded down together, and it could easily bring back all her wariness around him.
“It is going to be a long, dangerous ride to Cambrun, isnae it?” Una said once she and Raibeart were tucked under the blanket.
“Ye dinnae think they will give up and go back to Dunmorton?” He turned on his side to look at her.
“Angus doesnae give up, and the others are too afraid of him to do so if he demands they keep on hunting us.”
“Then, aye, the journey to Cambrun could be a troublesome one, but we will get there. Others have done so with hunters hard on their heels. It was the hunters who died, nay the MacNachtons or the Lost Ones they were saving.”
“Such arrogance,” she murmured but smiled, for his confidence actually calmed her fears.
“Aye, the MacNachtons are an arrogant lot.” He lightly stroked her thick braid draped over the shoulder closest to him. “A mon needs to ken his strengths weel or he isnae at his best in a fight. We may have this weakness that causes
us to have to hide from the sun, but we also have many strengths and we learn young how to use them. Ye have some, but, I think, ye have always done your best to hide them away and never learned how best to use them against your enemy.”
Una frowned and then nodded. He was right. She had used her strengths in times of danger, but in a wild, panicked way, not with any true skill. Nor had any of her fellow prisoners who were still held captive. They lashed out wildly, as she did, and such an unskilled attack was probably easy to plan against.
“Ye could teach me how to use those strengths,” she said, seeing the way he stroked her braid when she turned her head to look at him, but finding she was unable to protest the touch, as she knew she should.
“I can and I will.” He could feel the need to sleep creeping over him and knew the chance to take the next step in his wooing would soon be lost. “And I will. We can start as soon as the sun sets,” he promised and then kissed her.
Although he did not rush at her like some untried youth, Raibeart moved quickly enough that she had no time to protest. Her small hands slapped against his chest, but she did not push him away, and he did not try to press his body any closer to hers. Her mouth was soft and sweet, the taste of her one he already craved, but he tightly leashed his hunger for more than the innocent closed-mouth kiss he gave her. When he lifted his head, he winked at her before lying back down and turning his back to her. This time it was not just to avoid any recriminations or arguments but also to hide his arousal. For once he was glad of the way he could not easily deny the need to sleep as the sun rose.
Una stared at Raibeart’s back and touched her mouth with trembling fingers. She could still feel the heat of his mouth against hers and her heart was pounding, but not with fear. It occurred to her that she might have misjudged Raibeart. The man might well know a thing or two about wooing after all.
Chapter Five
“This is a crypt.”
Raibeart looked at Una and almost grinned at the way she scowled at the effigy of a knight that topped a large stone coffin. She did not appear afraid, but she was definitely not pleased by his choice of shelters. After two nights of hiding from and eluding hunters and sleeping in shelters that were little more than holes in the ground, he was pleased to be in a large place with stone walls and a floor. He suspected she would grow less dismayed when he showed her the place where she could actually take a bath. It was one reason he always sought this shelter when traveling this particular path to and from Cambrun.
“Aye,” he said. “There isnae much left of the wee stone chapel that used to cover it, though.”
“I noticed.” She realized she had seen no house, no keep or peel tower. “Whose is it?”
“A wee part of the Chisholm clan used it. The family who built this and tended the lands here died long ago. Plague took them all, and the few shepherds or villagers who survived went elsewhere. I suspicion many fled once the first person fell ill with the plague. Naught left here but these old bones and ruins.” He walked up to her and lightly tugged on her braid when she frowned. “And, nay, ye willnae catch the plague by staying here.”
Una grimaced at her own foolish fears, more so at the fact that Raibeart had guessed them. “I ken it. ’Tis mostly that even the word plague is enough to make one tremble.”
“Weel, I ken of something that will please ye enough to take the fear away.” He took her by the hand and started to lead her toward the rubble-strewn rear of the crypt. “Trust me. Ye will like this.”
She was not quite sure what there could be to like in a house of the dead, but she did not resist his tug on her hand. It made her uncomfortable to be inside the crypt, but she did prefer it to where they had slept for the last two days. Those places had been enough to leave her with a fear of being buried alive.
The sound of water drew her attention just as Raibeart led her around a corner and into a smaller chamber. She gaped at what she saw. There was a deep hollow in the rock floor and water trickled down the stone wall to fill it. It was obvious there was some way for the water to escape the stone basin or the crypt would have been flooded long ago despite how slowly the water ran into the pool. A light cloud of mist hung over the pool. She tugged her hand free of Raibeart’s grasp, knelt beside the pool, and dipped her fingers into the water.
“ ’Tis warm,” she whispered in astonishment. “How can it be warm?”
“There are springs that can run warm, e’en hot, here and there.” Raibeart moved to the corner of the room where there were several bundles stacked on a rough wooden shelf. “We keep some supplies here.” He opened a bundle and held out a length of linen. “My clan stops here whenever they can and, I think, ’tis mostly because of the pool.”
“I can bathe in it?” Even as she asked, she stuck her arm down into the water, uncaring of how she soaked the sleeves of her gown, touching the stone at the bottom just as she reached her armpit. “It has an odd smell,” she murmured, taking a deep breath. “Nay bad, just a little odd.”
“We have decided that, whatever it is, ’tis verra soothing. Takes away the aches of a long ride.”
Una took the drying cloth from his hands, eager to bathe away the dust of their journey, but suddenly realizing she had a problem. “I dinnae have anything clean to put on after I bathe.”
“Between a drying cloth and one of these shirts someone left, ye could cover yourself decently enough. Then ye can wash out what ye wear now.”
Raibeart found himself pushed out of the room before he could say another word. He laughed softly and went to make a fire. It would be best if he kept busy or he would think too much on how close Una was, naked and in the warm water of the pool. He stopped and closed his eyes, shuddering at the thought of how close he was to all he craved to hold. It was going to be a very long day.
Una tossed aside her clothes and slid into the water, a sigh of pleasure escaping her. She sank in up to her chin, rested her head against the edge of the pool, and closed her eyes. Raibeart was right. The water might have an odd smell, but it soaked away every ache in her body.
The moment Raibeart came to mind, she thought of him sharing this pool with her, his fine, strong body as naked as her own. Una opened her eyes so quickly and widely they stung. Her heart was pounding and parts of her itched, ached even, at the mere thought of Raibeart naked. She could almost feel his skin against hers, feel him kissing her, touching her, and her body grew warm.
Just as it had when he had kissed her on the mouth the third day they rested, she thought. He had nipped at her bottom lip, causing her to part her lips, and had slipped his tongue into her mouth. The way he had stroked the inside of her mouth as he had pulled her body close to his had made her ache, in her breasts and between her legs. She had clung to him not only because she liked to touch him, but because her knees had actually grown too weak to hold her upright. It had been the same when he had kissed her when they had wakened. It was the same now and all she had done was think about it.
This was lust, she realized, and sat up, the sudden knowledge clearing the fog of fear and confusion from her mind. Una grabbed the small bowl of soap Raibeart had left her and the scrap of linen to wash with, and began to scrub herself clean as she thought over what she now knew. She had never lusted before and was not sure what to do about it. A maid did not just trot off to find someone to soothe that itch, not like a man would. And, Una knew only one man would do for her anyway. A man who was close at hand and was attempting to woo her.
“Curse it, just what does he mean by that?” she muttered. “Woo to his bed or woo to be his wife?”
Setting aside the cloth and putting a little soap in her hands, Una began to wash her hair. The way her body was so quickly enflamed by Raibeart’s kiss told her that her lust for him was a powerful thing. It would not take much more of his wooing before she found herself no longer a maid. What she needed to do was decide if she wished to allow that or if she should step away from him now, make it very clear to him that he could do no more w
ooing. She would stay a maid.
Why? whispered a voice in her head and she had no answer. Why indeed? She was three and twenty and had been on her own, without home or family, for seven years. In all those years she could count the number of times she had felt safe or happy on the fingers of one hand. Raibeart made her feel both. There was also little chance that she would wed because of her differences so whom was she saving her maidenhead for? Should it not go to the one man in her whole life that made her feel safe, happy, and even beautiful?
Una grinned as she stepped out of the pool and dried herself, wrapping the damp cloth around her wet hair and then donning the shirt he had left for her. She wanted Raibeart and she could take what she wanted for once in her life. As she rinsed out her clothes and spread them out to dry on some of the rubble cluttering the room, she wondered exactly how she could do that. When she stood up to return to the large chamber, she suffered the pinch of uncertainty but shook it aside. Raibeart had shown that he wanted her, even said he intended to woo her. Whether he meant seduction or marriage no longer mattered. He was about to be claimed. She unwrapped her hair and used the cloth to rub it dry as she went hunting her prey.
Raibeart looked up as Una entered the chamber and he nearly choked. She was slowly rubbing her hair dry as she walked toward him. The shirt she wore hung to her knees, but he knew she wore nothing beneath it. Each time she raised her arms a little to rub her hair, the shirt slipped up to her thighs. His hands itched to touch all that smooth skin she was showing him. Instead he nodded and hurried out of the room to take his own bath. He just wished the water were cold.
The sight of her clothing draped over the scattered rocks did nothing to help him regain his calm. It reminded him all too clearly of the fact that all that stood between him and her beautiful skin was one thin shirt. He had always considered desire something a man could easily control, but he had no control around Una, his body demanding that he claim her every time he looked at her.
Highland Hunger Page 4