Sins of a Highland Devil

by Sue-Ellen Welfonder

  Alasdair was also staring at her, scowling fiercely. Then he whirled to face his men, thrusting his sword to the heavens as he turned.

  “Arms!” Alasdair shouted the word, breaking the spell. His command unleashed chaos in the tiered viewing platforms as the crowd went wild. Closer by, the air filled with the shriek of steel as men on the field reached over their shoulders for the swords slung across their backs.

  “Shields!” James yelled as hotly, bringing up his left arm to thrust his targe over the right edge of Colin’s. “Shield wall, now!”

  “Odin!” The Mackintosh Berserkers roared as one, surging forward like a tide, every man wild-eyed and howling. Some of them sent throwing axes winging through the air as they ran, their shouts and snarls blending with the unholy knocking of wood and iron as men from the other two clans locked their shields together.

  Quickly grouping into a tight wedge, James and his men held their swords straight out before them, using the long blades as spears so that their shield wall bristled like a hedge of deadly steel. From the corner of his eye, James saw Alasdair urging his men into the same age-old battle formation. Then both groups of warriors began pacing forward, swiftly closing the distance between them.

  Somewhere trumpets blared. And the pipes screamed louder than ever, the skirls earsplitting as the pipers dared to march closer, blowing gustily as they strutted back and forth along the outer edges of the shield wedges, each wail and drone meant to stir the blood.

  “Hold tight!” James ordered when the man to his right let his targe slip.

  “Valhalla!” Kendrew and his Berserkers gave another great shout and split in two, each group veering away from the center of the field. They whooped as they ran, clearly intending to circle round and attack from behind when the two shield wedges smashed into each other.

  “Hah—look at them!” One of James’s men yelled as the Mackintoshes raced across the grass. “They’re turning tail. No stomach for a fight!”

  “Shame, you!” Another man called after them. “Running off like the women you are!”

  James adjusted his grip on the iron handle of his targe, knowing better.

  Kendrew and his wild men weren’t fleeing the field.

  And they’d fight like demons.

  But it was good for his men to shout taunts. The more they jeered, the less they’d think about dying.

  Then Alasdair and his warriors slammed into them and the gates of hell opened as steel, iron, and men clashed fiercely together. The crash was terrible, loud as thunder and rocking the earth. Every man reeled, some men staggering backward, several falling to their knees.

  Shock waves of pain shot through James’s arms, flushing him with heat and jarring his bones. He set his jaw, blocking the teeth-rattling agony, the loud ringing in his ears as the horrible noise of splintering wood and steel scraping on steel echoed across the field.

  “Push back!” James snarled the order, surging forward into the press of the MacDonald shield wall. “Push hard now! Don’t give!”

  “Ottar, Ottar!” Several of James’s men began chanting the name of the clan’s most revered ancestor, Ottar the Fire-worshipper, whose famed standard sited Castle Haven and became known as the clan’s Banner of the Wind.

  Others took up the cry as men strained, shoving with all their might against the unmoving wall of shield-to-shield MacDonalds. “Ottar, Ottar!”

  They lunged, panted, and pushed, gaining several feet only to have Alasdair and his men heave them back again, retaking the ground but gaining no more than the few feet they’d lost so briefly.

  “Again!” James blinked the sweat from his eyes as they pressed heavily against the MacDonald line. Baring his teeth, he stabbed and thrashed with his sword, trying to plunge the blade into the hair-thin space between the MacDonald shields or knock aside one of them, freeing a gap in the wall.

  But the round, leather-covered targes overlapped so snugly that not a breath could squeeze past them. And his blows, however huge, glanced off the sturdy Highland shields without so much as denting them.

  His men fared no better, though Colin did cause one of the MacDonald shields to crack.

  But the targe didn’t spring apart, however fiercely Colin swung at it.

  Cameron shields were proving equally invincible, and that was something, considering the force Alasdair and his men were putting into their blows.

  Then the cracked MacDonald shield did split, but its wielder didn’t cast it aside, even though one half sagged dangerously, exposing the man’s hip.

  “Forward!” James urged his men to push again, not liking how close Alasdair stood to the man with the broken half-shield. Colin had succumbed to battle fever and was slashing at the MacDonald shield wall as viciously as if he were one of Kendrew’s Berserkers.

  “Push, I say!” James put all his lung power in the command. “Break their wall.”

  As long as they were straining to burst through the MacDonald resistance by brute force, his hotheaded, sword-swinging cousin would be too occupied to make a wild swipe at the man with the half-shield and lop off Alasdair’s head in the by-doing.

  Colin’s aim suffered when he lost his wits.

  James glared at Alasdair now, trying to send him a silent warning.

  If the fool had any sense, he’d grab a shield from a man in the ranks behind him and thrust it into the hands of the broken-shield warrior before Colin or one of James’s other men could thrust a blade past the damaged targe, piercing the gut of the shield wielder. And—very likely—also land a killing strike to Alasdair.

  “Shove harder!” James cursed the lackwit as his men lunged mightily, gaining a yard.

  “MacDonalds—hold fast!” Alasdair’s voice rose above the din, greater than the clanging of swords and the men’s grunts and curses.

  Then, just as the two shield walls pressed so fiercely against each other that a shudder ripped through both sides, a sharp scream went up from the back of James’s group. An ominous thud cut off the man’s agonized wail. Another yell—and more—followed quickly, all accompanied by the sickening glide of steel grating on bone.

  “Odin!” Thirty deep voices bellowed the war cry.

  The Berserkers were back.

  And the bloodlust was on them. Shrieking like hellhounds, they hurtled their light throwing axes at the men in the front of shield walls. They were even quicker to fall upon the men at the rear, slashing and hacking with larger Norse battle axes until the blades ran red.

  In a blink, the shield hedges broke.

  Men everywhere whirled to face the new threat, challenging the Mackintoshes with swords, dirks, and axes, the deadly thrusting edge of their targes. Some men even used their bare hands.

  Chaos spread, the stench of death imminent.

  And through the red haze of fury, James searched for Alasdair’s flame-bright head. But the MacDonald chieftain was nowhere to be seen.

  Unless—James leapt over the body of a fallen MacDonald, a sick feeling churning in his gut—Alasdair had been cut down before James could reach him.

  He had seen the fool running straight for the Berserkers, sword drawn and fire in his eye.

  “Aggggh…” A kinsman lurched at James, bloodied arms outstretched, his chest streaming red from an ax gash in his neck. The warrior—a bonny lad only a year younger than James and recently wed—crumpled to the ground before James could grab him.

  Not that it mattered, as the man’s sightless eyes stared up at James.

  “Ottar!” James threw back his head, bellowing the cry.

  Everything around him went black, the horror of battle-frenzied men hacking, slashing, and stabbing each other blotting all but the hammering thunder of his own pulse roaring in his ears.

  A rush of hot, blood-drenched air hit him and he whirled, just blocking a vicious sword swipe that would have sliced him in two. The MacDonald warrior’s blade stuck in James’s shield, the vibrations of the blow storming up his arm. He jerked fast, yanking the sword from his ass
ailant’s hand. Tossing aside his impaled targe, he swung his own blade upward, slicing into the soft flesh beneath his foe’s chin before the man could reach for his dirk or ax.

  The man fell, spouting blood and surely dying, but James didn’t wait to be sure.

  Instead, he leaned down and helped himself to the warrior’s targe, yanking the shield down and off the man’s blood-slicked arm. Stinging sweat dripped into his eyes, almost blinding him, but instinct let him thrust his own left arm into the two leather straps on the shield’s back. Then he straightened and glanced round, secretly grateful that the MacDonald wasn’t anyone he recognized.

  “Valhalla!” A Berserker ran at him, the wicked edge of the man’s war ax arcing for James’s head.

  “Skald!” James bellowed back, leaping aside as the man charged. Whipping around, he swung hard, driving his blade deep into the Mackintosh’s side. The man roared, toppling heavily to the ground, his ax still clutched in his hand.

  Somewhere—in another world—the crowd cheered, their shouts of glee lifting above the furious blare of pipes. Rage, hot, swift, and terrible, swept James. He spun about again, this time glaring at the Lowland spectators. But his fury only earned more hoots and whistles as they jumped to their feet, yelling for more blood.

  Utter silence came from the barricades where the clansfolk stood.

  Above it all, the hellish din and the eerie quiet, the wild howling of the Berserkers went on without cease, piercing and terrible.

  Panting, James gulped air. Blood, hot and thick, pulsed from a gash above his ankle. It was a wound he hadn’t felt until now and likely took when a MacDonald in the shield wall stabbed beneath his targe, slicing at the only Cameron flesh he could reach.

  Ignoring the pain—for he felt it now, sharply—he once again scanned the mass of fighting men for Alasdair. But he could hardly distinguish his own warriors. Blood reddened the faces of every man standing, even staining their plaids beyond recognition.

  Only Kendrew’s Berserkers stood out from the rest, their wild-eyed grins and ferocity setting them apart. And even they ran crimson, their tangled manes and wolf pelts blood-drenched and streaming red.

  One of them raced at him again, roaring fury, his huge war ax whirling. James raised his targe, ready to take the ax swing, but the man tripped over a fallen MacDonald and slammed facedown onto the gore-slicked grass. Leaving him, James ran on, dodging swinging blades and lurching men, many of them dying on their feet, their lives spent before they could even open their mouths to scream.

  “Come, bastards! Our hounds want your flesh!” Colin’s cry came from James’s left, and he wheeled about to see his cousin grinning devilishly, his great sword flashing in a deadly figure-of-eight motion as he taunted two ax-wielding Mackintoshes, their own expressions equally fiendish.

  James sprinted forward, eager to help Colin send the men to Odin’s corpse hall, but Colin’s arcing steel sliced off his opponents’ ax hands before James could reach his cousin’s side. The two Berserkers screamed, reeling backward, blood spewing like a fountain from their naked wrists.

  “Colin!” James hurried, jumping over the wounded and dying. He skirted the increasing number of men now fighting in single combat, warriors circling and hacking each other with dirks and axes.

  Unaware of him, Colin leapt back as the two Berserkers charged, lashing at him with the iron-rimmed edges of their shields. But the blood gushing from their empty wrists pooled at their feet and they slipped, crashing to their knees even as Colin rushed in, lopping off their heads with one terrible sword swipe.

  “Skald!” Colin thrust his red-smeared blade to the sky, shaking it fiercely.

  James stared at him, his cousin’s triumphant shout chilling him.

  The horror of it iced his veins. The sharp metallic reek of blood—and the ghastly stench of other, worse things—froze him where he stood. He closed his eyes, only for a beat, to clear the burning scorch of sweat, and when he looked again, Colin was gone.

  James shuddered, his own bloodlust draining away when he spotted Colin running across the field, making for one of the few clusters of still-fighting men.

  Almost all fought one-on-one now. More littered the blood-red ground. Colin was just now cutting his way into the fiercest affray yet going and—praise God—James knew the brash-headed fool would emerge without a scratch.

  James might be the devil.

  But Colin had an angel on his shoulder, always.

  Somewhere behind James, a Berserker howled again—the same mad wail he’d heard before—and James whipped around, his heart stopping when, across the emptying field, a dazzling flash of white caught his eye.

  Rannoch stood at the MacDonald barricade.

  The stag was staring at him, his antlered head high and his snowy coat shining with the brilliance of stars. But when James blinked, the creature disappeared, vanishing as quickly as he’d appeared.

  And now…

  Geordie stood with his paws on the railing, his grayed head tipped back as he howled and whined piteously. Terrible, gut-wrenching wails that—James knew—were the cries he’d mistaken for the Berserkers’ worst howls.

  To be sure, they’d bellowed like fiends, but the soul-splitting wails had been Geordie’s.

  The dog who—James knew from Alasdair—had hardly made a sound in years.

  “God’s mercy!” James gripped his sword, staring at the raggedy beast. His heart split, the soiled ground rolling beneath his feet.

  Catriona was on her knees beside the dog. She’d wrapped her arms around him, her bright head buried against his shoulder, her face turned away from the slaughter.

  “Mother Mary…” James dropped his sword, a hot, sick feeling sluicing him, squeezing his chest until he couldn’t draw a breath.

  “This is how you thank me, Mackintosh?”

  Alasdair’s furious voice came loud from James’ right. “I risked all, even riding to Nought, your God-forsaken keep to warn you of treacheries—”

  An outraged roar—Kendrew’s?—cut off Alasdair even as James snatched up his blade and pounded off in the direction of the two chieftains’ angry voices.

  James ran blindly, knocking aside men and—only once, thank the saints—barreling right over a low mound of mangled and torn bodies. And when he reached Alasdair, he saw at once that he’d guessed rightly.

  Alasdair and Kendrew were clashing steel. Though—James’s gut clenched—it was Kendrew’s huge Norse battle ax that the Mackintosh chief tossed from hand to hand as he stood grinning at Alasdair. Malice streamed off every inch of Kendrew’s towering, bearlike body, while a gaping red wound in Alasdair’s left arm showed why Kendrew smiled so wickedly.

  Worse, Alasdair’s injured arm wasn’t just bleeding. It hung limply at his side, useless.

  Men often fought with grievous cuts and slashes, wielding their blades on sheer will alone. If they could. Alasdair did still clutch his sword with his right hand. And his face was hard-set, his anger alive, seething. But his blade’s swings were feeble, the blood pouring from his left arm draining any strength that was left in his sword arm.

  “Hold!” Like a man possessed, James threw himself between them, sword raised. “Come at him again, Mackintosh, and you’re a dead man.”

  Kendrew laughed. “Bluidy hell, I am, whoreson!”

  Alasdair scowled. “Begone, Cameron. I dinnae need your help.”

  Ignoring them both, James let his blade flash, slicing cleanly through the haft of Kendrew’s ax. Then, before either man could blink, he lunged closer to rend a groin-to-hem rip in Kendrew’s kilt, exposing more than the bastard’s thick, naked thighs.

  Grinning wickedly himself now, James kicked aside the lout’s fallen ax blade. Still smiling, he rammed the tip of his sword against Kendrew’s belly.

  “Say it’s over.” He pressed the blade into hard muscle, thrusting only enough to draw a bead of blood. “Say it now, or I’ll slice down, unmanning you before you can wipe that mad grin off your poxy face.”
<
br />   “Odin!” Kendrew thrust his jaw, glaring.

  “Fool!” James jabbed his sword tip deeper—and jerked down, ripping an inch of flesh. Blood welled, spilling down Kendrew’s loins. “I’ll no’ kill you, see? I’d rather watch you tell your womenfolk that you’ve become one of them!”

  “Bastard!” Kendrew hissed, the skin around his mouth turning white.

  “Say it’s over.” James sliced lower, vaguely noting that a loud silence was spreading across the field. Even the pipes no longer skirled, and no cheers now came from the spectators, only thick, deep stillness.

  “The words, Mackintosh.” He eased the blade back a bit, risking mercy. “Now, or—”

  “It is over, you arse!” Kendrew jerked away from him, clutching his stomach as he bent double, defeated. “Have you no’ seen?” He turned his bearded head, glaring at James and Alasdair. “We’re nigh the last men standing.”

  James stared at him, lowering his sword as trumpets blasted and the crowd roared. The pipers started strutting again, though now they played a mournful lament. Many of the spectators ran down from the tiered viewing platforms to race onto the field, their cheers deafening.

  Throwing down his sword, James dragged his arm over his forehead. “It cannae be done so long as we’re on our feet. No decision made until—”

  Alasdair threw aside his own sword and leaned down to fetch James’s blade from the grass, thrusting it at James. “Have done, Cameron. Make an end to it—one good turn for saving me from dying beneath a madman’s ax.”

  James took his sword but retrieved Alasdair’s and handed it back to him, forcing the lout to seize it. That done, he scowled and then yanked his own untouched battle ax from his belt, tossing it at Kendrew’s feet.

  “Then let’s end it in proper Highland fashion!” He raised his sword high, waiting for Alasdair to bring up his blade and slam it against James’s own.

  When Alasdair did so, Kendrew swore and spat on the ground. But then he snatched James’s ax off the grass and, perhaps a little too forcefully, thrust it against James’s and Alasdair’s raised swords.

  And as they stood there, scowling darkly at each other, waiting for the King’s trumpets to blare a final fanfare, somewhere in the crowd, a terrible howling eased to soft and quiet whimpers.