by Pamela Clare
A man who might have been Iain’s twin ducked through the door. “She ought to ken the truth of it.”
Confused, Annie felt her stomach sink. “Please. I dinnae understand.”
It was Morgan who explained what had happened. He told her how she’d toppled down the embankment, nearly landing at their feet. He told her how the Rangers had been under orders not to risk their mission by intervening in other battles, but to move silently through the forest. He told her how Iain, unable to turn his back on her and yet knowing three hundred French were nearby, had ignored those orders and saved her, tipping off the French to their position. He told her how the French had pursued them relentlessly, leaving too many of their fellow Rangers dead.
Connor glared at her. “And now they’re goin’ to flog him for it—a hundred strokes.”
“Wh-what?” The blood rushed from her head. “They cannae do this!”
Connor crossed his arms over his chest. “Aye, by Satan, they can.”
A muscle twitched in Morgan’s jaw. “They have Iain in irons in the guardhouse, and tomorrow at sunrise, they’ll tie him to the whipping post and flay him.”
Trembling with rage and afraid for Iain, Annie found herself on her feet. “Then ’tis good your commander wishes to speak wi’ me, for I would surely speak wi’ him. Once he hears all Iain did for me, he’ll be moved to mercy.”
Morgan stood, thrust his chair aside. “Wentworth doesna ken the meanin’ of mercy, lass, but you’re welcome to try.”
Annie spotted her moccasins on the floor, slipped her sore feet into them, and then wrapped herself in the gray cloak. “Take me to him.”
She walked as quickly as she could out of the cabin—then stopped. Rough men surrounded her—Rangers and Indians. A few of them she recognized. Most she did not. They stared at her, their faces grim, and she wondered if they blamed her for Iain’s plight and the deaths of their comrades.
The grizzled man who’d carried in the washtub stepped forward, gave her a grin. His voice bore the lilt of Ireland. “Killy’s the name, miss. Don’t be lettin’ this lot of stupid Scots trouble you. Have you ne’er seen a pretty woman before, you louts?”
A voice came from somewhere in the throng. “No’ one so bonnie as this.”
From behind her, she heard the low growl of Connor’s voice. “Put your eyes back in your head, Dougie, or I’ll feed them to the fishes.”
Morgan stepped forward, raised his voice to the crowd. “The lass is goin’ to speak wi’ Wentworth to see what can be done.”
Heads nodded, and the men gave way.
As Morgan and Connor guided her through the crowd, Annie did not feel the heat of their eyes upon her. Her thoughts were on Iain.
Was he cold and hungry? She remembered only too well her weeks in gaol—the rats, the moldy bread, the darkness, the bone-chilling cold.
Was he afraid? The pain of so many strokes would be unbearable, far worse than a single act of branding. He might even die.
Did he regret saving her life? Surely, he must. He’d lost men, and now he was to face the public humiliation and agony of flogging.
Would the commander listen? Aye, he would. He must.
She would make him listen.
Chapter 12
Iain’s brothers led her past beehive-shaped ovens and rows of wee cabins toward a great river that shone like a ribbon of silver in the twilight. On the other side stood Fort Edward, the beautiful red and white crosses of the Union flag unfurled against the sky. A lump formed in Annie’s throat at the sight of it—a symbol of home.
Two Rangers stood watch over the bridge. They nodded to Morgan and Connor—and stared at Annie. As she neared the river, Annie realized it was not a true bridge but many boats tied side by side and covered with planks that had been lashed together like a raft. At least a hundred feet across, it bobbed on the water.
She stopped and stared. “I cannae swim.”
Morgan tucked his arm through hers. “We willna let you fall in, lass.”
“And if you do, we’ll call Cam to fetch you out.” Connor chuckled. “’Twas he who fished Cooke out. If I lived to be a hundred, Morgan, I swear I’ll ne’er see so laughable a sight as that.”
Annie scarce heard their banter, her gaze focused on the floating bridge.
Dinnae be a coward, Annie.
Fighting her trepidation, Annie took first one step and then another, holding tightly on to Morgan’s arm. The row of boats sank slightly beneath her footsteps, the water flowing in a great rushing current beneath her, making her dizzy.
“Dinnae look down if it frightens you.” Morgan spoke to her as if she were a child.
You take more lookin’ after than a bairn.
Annie lifted her gaze to the opposite shore, forced herself to walk with untroubled steps.
Beneath her, the torrent raged.
Another step and another and another.
’Twas with great relief that she at last found herself on the other side.
Before her loomed the great earthen ramparts of Fort Edward. Morgan and Connor led her past the gawking British soldiers who guarded this side of the bridge and through a seeming labyrinth of high walls. Inside the first set of walls, hundreds of canvas tents stood in tidy rows, lit from within so they seemed to glow. Inside the second set of walls was an empty stretch of ground sundered by a deep ditch that was spanned by a single wooden bridge. Beyond the bridge rose the high ramparts of the fort itself, from which soldiers and cannon peered out at her, dark silhouettes against the darkening sky.
A few of the soldiers called to her, their words boorish and indecent.
She pulled the cloak more tightly around her.
Morgan took her arm once more. “They will no’ harm you as long as you’re wi’ us.”
“I’ll cut out their bloody tongues.” Connor glared up at them. “The whoresons wouldna dare speak so if she were a Sassenach officer’s lass.”
Sassenach. It was a word Annie had rarely heard growing up. The Argyll Campbell Clan had close ties with England and with the Crown, and Sassenach was a word of rebellion, a word of hatred. It made her feel uncomfortable to hear it spoken now.
But the leering glances of the British soldiers made her uncomfortable, too. Men had never treated her with anything but courtesy—until Uncle Bain had denied her and cast her into gaol. Now it seemed men were always raking her with their eyes and saying vile things. Was this how common-born women were treated all the time? God forbid!
They passed through the gate into the fort itself. Wooden barracks two stories high stretched along its four walls, leaving the center open like a large town square. One building stood out from the others. It was smaller than the rest, but it had glass windows and two stone chimneys. A pair of soldiers flanked its doorway, their muskets tipped with bayonets.
’Twas before those two soldiers that Morgan and Connor led her.
“His Worship wants to see the lass.” Morgan released her. “She’s here.”
Annie gaped at him, shocked by the disrespect in Morgan’s voice.
The two soldiers glowered at him with eyes that told Annie such open contempt was nothing new.
Then one of them spoke, his accent clearly British. “Your brother’s finally going to pay the price for his insolence. Are you next, Captain?”
Connor took a step forward, but Morgan restrained him. “Our brother is about to pay the price for bein’ a man—somethin’ the likes of you couldna understand.”
For a moment the four men glared at one another in silence, and Annie could feel that words had brought them nigh to fighting.
She stepped forward. “Why do you argue? Are you no’ on the same side in this war?”
’Twas Morgan who answered. “No’ by choice.”
The soldier who’d spoken shifted his angry gaze to Annie. “Wait here.”
She watched the soldier disappear through the door, her stomach suddenly a-jitter. Would this colonel blame her for Iain’s disobedience or the dea
ths of his men?
Morgan seemed to read her thoughts. “Dinnae let him daunt you.”
Annie took a deep breath, resolved not to be frightened. No matter that the colonel would see her only as a poor frontier lass. Inside her skin, she was still Lady Anne.
The soldier opened the door and bade her enter. “Through there, miss.”
“We ken the way.” Morgan strode in before her.
She lifted her chin, smoothed her skirts, and followed him, Connor behind her.
Paintings hung from plastered walls in gilded frames. Thick carpets woven in the Orient clothed the waxed wooden floor in hues of claret, black, and gold. Graceful white tapers burnt in silver candelabra upon tables of polished wood.
Almost at once she felt more at ease, as if she’d stepped through a magic portal, from the frontier, untamed and strange, into the world she knew. Surely the man who lived here was a gentleman and would listen to her. Surely he could be moved to compassion.
She followed Morgan into the next room to find three men in their waistcoats seated before a fire, glasses of brandy in their hands. Two looked over at her, their curiosity about her turning to open contempt when they saw Morgan and Connor.
The third man gazed down at a marble chessboard, his face in shadow, his hands clasped, his forefingers pressed to a point against his lips. Fine lace decorated his throat and wrists. A diamond glittered on his finger. Though he wore only his waistcoat, every detail of his uniform was neat, every hair in his white, powdered wig perfectly in place.
He raised a finger for silence and continued to stare at the chessboard.
Connor grumbled. “Och, Jesus.”
After several minutes’ contemplation, the colonel picked up the white bishop and moved it forward. Then he turned to face her.
Breath fled her body, and the floor seemed to tilt beneath her feet.
Wentworth.
Colonel Wentworth.
Lord William Wentworth.
Friend to Argyll. Nephew to the Duke of Cumberland. Grandson to His Majesty.
Before she could catch herself, Annie sank into a formal curtsy, her head bowed. “M-my lord.”
She rose on unsteady legs to find him watching her, one dark eyebrow raised, his gaze inscrutable. “And you are?”
Dinnae be foolish, Annie. He doesna recognize you.
How could he? She’d been a lass of twelve summers last time he’d seen her. They’d met when he’d passed a stormy night with Uncle Bain on his way to visit Argyll. Lord William had been twenty or thereabouts and had scarce paid any heed to her, despite her mother’s vexing efforts to win his interest. After all, he was the son of royalty, she a penniless earl’s daughter. But that had been six years ago and half a world away. Would he recognize her now?
She struggled to pull her thoughts together. As a man who’d once met her—and a man of great influence—he might believe her and be able to help her reclaim her name, return to Scotland, and seek justice for her mother. Yet, as a friend of her uncle’s, he might just as easily side with Uncle Bain and be done with her.
Was he her friend, or was he a danger to her?
Perhaps it was the cold glint in his gray eyes or the memory of him laughing over cognac with Uncle Bain, but some part of her refused to reveal herself.
She prayed she had not already roused his suspicions. “Annie Burns, my lord.”
“I understand you owe your life to Major MacKinnon, Miss Burns.” He sat again, but did not motion for her or Morgan or Connor to join him. “Please explain how this came to be.”
And so Annie told Lord William how she’d just finished milking the cow, when she’d heard screams and gunshots and realized her sister and brother-by-marriage—she’d almost said “master and mistress”—were dead. She told him how she’d untied the animals, hoping they would divert any attackers, then climbed out the parchment window and fled barefoot through the forest. But by the time she reached the part of the tale where she’d fallen down the embankment, she was trembling from head to foot. Her words faltered.
“Please continue, Miss Burns.”
Annie saw the tall Abenaki before her, saw the look in his eyes, knew what he was going to do to her, what they were all going to do to her.
“Can you no’ see the lass is terrified?” Morgan’s voice called her back from the darkness of her memories. “You’ve heard all there is to tell from Iain and from us. What need is there to force her to relive such horror?”
Lord William’s gaze bored into her. “I need not share my reasons with you, Captain. Continue, Miss Burns.”
Annie clutched her hands in the folds of her skirts, forced herself to speak. “I—I knew they were going to . . . hurt me and kill me. So I forced myself to stand, took a stone in my hand, and I threw it at him.”
“At whom?”
“The tall Indian. I hit him in the mouth. Then he struck me wi’ his hatchet.” She raised her fingers to the stitches on her temple, still trembling. “After that I remember but little.”
“You have no memory of Major MacKinnon fighting off your attackers?”
“’Tis but broken images—gunshots, the sounds of fightin’. And the claymore. I remember seein’ a man wi’ a claymore.”
“How many gunshots?”
She tried to remember. “Two or three—I cannae say for certain.”
For a moment, Colonel Wentworth said nothing but watched her as if to measure her.
Her conscience weighed heavy upon her, and she found it hard not to fidget. She’d just lied to the king’s grandson! Should her lie be discovered and he not find it in his heart to pardon her, they would put her in the stocks and cut off her ears—or worse!
“Do you have kin elsewhere in the colonies?”
“Nay, my lord.”
“Is there anyone I might notify in Scotland on your behalf?”
“Thank you, my lord, but nay. There is no one.” No one she could trust.
Colonel Wentworth nodded. “Another mouth for His Majesty to feed. Very well, Miss Burns. We shall have to decide what to do with you some other time. You may go.”
Stunned to find herself dismissed so easily, she curtsied again. She had not come here to talk about herself. “Please, Colonel, might I speak?”
His brow furrowed, and he frowned. “Very well.”
“I have heard Major MacKinnon is to suffer the lash for savin’ me.”
“He is being punished for willful disobedience that resulted in the deaths of five of his men, not specifically for saving your life. Though I see his plight distresses you, it is not your affair.”
“Oh, but it is!” Annie felt all eyes in the room upon her. “I am deeply sorry for the deaths of his men, and I have no words to assuage such a grievous loss. But whatever else he might have done, Major MacKinnon treated me honorably.”
It was the truth—apart from two stolen kisses and his heated glances.
The frown did not leave his face, so Annie tried to explain. “He risked his life for mine time and again, and I cannae bear to think of him sufferin’ on my account. I owe him my life.”
The two officers sitting nearby chuckled indulgently as if she’d just said something childlike and amusing.
Colonel Wentworth looked at her as if he thought her an annoying bairn. “Miss Burns, you are a woman and young, so I do not expect you to understand when I tell you that Major MacKinnon’s duty was to his men, not to you. As regrettable as your death might have been, the objectives of the Crown place the lives of fighting men first. Though the frontier can be repopulated, once lost it will be nearly impossible to regain.”
His words were a slap across her face, and she felt heat rush into her cheeks. Her voice quavered. “I thought it was the job of the Crown and of the British army to safeguard the lives of His Majesty’s subjects, not sacrifice them like pawns for land.”
Colonel Wentworth stood, his expression unruffled. Though he was not as tall as Iain and his brothers, still he towered over her. His voice wa
s as calm and cold as a frozen lake. “Clearly you do not comprehend the nature of warfare. I punish Major MacKinnon because I must in order to maintain military discipline. Major MacKinnon knew the risk he was taking when he chose to disobey my orders. Now he must pay the price.”
Feeling sick for Iain, Annie met Colonel Wentworth’s hard gaze and sank to her knees. “I beseech you, my lord! Are there no words I might speak to move you to mercy on his behalf? Is Britain so besieged by enemies that there is no room in justice for compassion?”
She felt Morgan move up behind her and heard the warning tone in his voice. “Thoir an aire, a dh’Annaidh.” Take care, Annie.
The room fell silent save the crackling of the fire.
“Lieutenant Cooke, clear the room. Everyone out but Miss Burns.”
“Aye, Colonel.” A young officer leapt to his feet, set aside his brandy, and herded Morgan and Connor toward the door.
“I promised my brother we’d watch over her,” Connor protested. “We cannae leave her.”
“I give you my word that the fair Miss Burns shall not be harmed, Captain.”
Morgan gave a cruel laugh. “Your word? Since when has your word meant augh’ to a MacKinnon?”
But the colonel’s mind was fixed, and Annie quickly found herself alone with him—this man who might help her reclaim her life or who might just as easily betray her to servitude, or worse, to her uncle.
William studied the young woman who knelt before him, her eyes downcast, her braid hanging like a river of gold almost to the floor. ’Twas not hard to see why Major MacKinnon had risked his mission to save her. She was spirited and uncommonly lovely, even black-and-blue with bruises. Her beauty had warmed the blood of every man in the room, including—if William were honest—his own. Her skin was fair, her features refined, her body lush. Poor Cooke had stared at her décolletage as if he’d never seen the swell of a woman’s breasts before.
But there was something about her that gave William pause. It was not her devotion to Major MacKinnon or her distress over his impending punishment. William would expect any woman rescued from such a brutal attack to act in like manner toward her rescuer. Women were, as a rule, meek souls and could not be expected to understand politics or warfare.