Robbie did not look convinced, but he let her lead him forward. Still, he peered with rounded eyes at each cairn they passed. “Be you sure?”
“Were I not I wouldna brought you here.” Linnet stopped to tousle the boy’s dark hair. “More danger abounds on the road where the others wait for us than here with our ancestors.”
But not much later, as she bent to gather more of the yellow-flowering ragwort from the banks of a tumbling burn, she was no longer so certain. She tensed, her skin prickling despite the day’s warmth and the sweet fragrance of the wildflowers that grew with abandon amongst the tall grass.
Something… someone… watched them from the shelter of the trees, and whoever it was came from the land o’ the living, not the shadow world of the dead.
And they weren’t friendly.
Although the sacred ground upon which they stood was hushed and deceptively peaceful in the afternoon haze, Linnet’s pulse quickened, and she deeply regretted coming to the cairns unguarded save Robbie’s elderly dog.
The old mongrel shared her unease, for he’d abandoned his exploration of the cairns to hasten back to their sides. Low growls rumbling deep in his chest, the coarse fur between his shoulders raised, Mauger kept close to them as he scanned the edge of the woods with wary eyes.
A trickle of moisture rolled between Linnet’s breasts. Plague take her for disregarding Fergus’s offer to accompany them. She’d selfishly wanted to have Robbie to herself, to savor being alone with him in a special place.
Now, she’d brought them both into danger.
Straightening, she dropped an apronful of ragwort into the sack Robbie held open for her. Without letting him notice, she hoped, she scanned the edges of the clearing but saw nothing except the glossy, reddish brown trunks of the great yews and their overarching mass of leafy branches.
Yet she knew someone hid there.
Someone who meant them ill.
“Give me your hand, Robbie lad,” Linnet said as calmly as she could. “’Tis time for us to go.”
“But the sack isna full.”
“We’ve enough for the salve I want to make.” She took him firmly by the hand. “’Tis good to take only what we need, you see, and now is not the best time to collect herbs anyway. Early morn is far better.”
She kept up a stream of chatter as they crossed the clearing. Perhaps by doing so Robbie wouldn’t sense her nervousness… or his dog’s. She also hoped he hadn’t noticed she’d slipped her new dirk from the pouch attached to the band of her apron. Its finely honed blade was far superior to her old herb dagger and would serve her well should she need to make use of it.
At the thought of such a possibility, Linnet tightened her grip on Robbie’s hand and silently thanked Dundonnell’s smithy for his gift… and his foresight.
Then she spotted Duncan. He stood in the green shadows where the footpath reentered the wood. Her relief upon seeing him was so great her knees fair gave out on her. The rapid pounding of her heart took on another meaning, too, for never had her husband appeared more handsome.
Minus his black mail and permanent scowl, and with the MacKenzie plaid slung proudly over his bare shoulder, the sight of him stole her breath away. Faith, he was even smiling at her.
“Praise the saints!” She dashed forward, pulling Robbie behind her. Mauger barked fiercely, but Linnet was blind and deaf to all save the magnificent-looking man before her.
All the conflicting feelings he stirred in her vanished in the face of the sheer terror that had consumed her mere moments before. Naught mattered except the comforting reassurance of his presence. “Sir,” she called, nigh breathless, “’tis glad I am to see you!”
Robbie tugged fiercely on her hand and the force of his strength surprised her. Spinning around to face him, she almost lost her balance. “’Tis your father, lad, do you not see him? There, by the path?”
The boy shook his head, edging backwards and trying to pull her with him. “He isna my papa. ’Tis him… the bad one. ’Tis Uncle Kenneth.”
Linnet’s heart plummeted, and the terror returned, more ominous than before. Turning slowly around, she saw that the smiling man who could pass for Duncan MacKenzie’s twin had left the cover of the trees and came stealthily toward them.
Still smiling, and still heartstoppingly handsome, much more so than her battle-worn and grim-faced husband could ever hope to be, but evil to the core.
His true nature was frighteningly apparent because, now that he’d stepped into the sunlight, Linnet clearly saw a sickly greenish black glow shimmer all around his body before it flared and disappeared.
A shudder skittered down her spine. She’d seen that shade only once before and had hoped never to see it again.
Unlike the darkness of despair she’d glimpsed once or twice about her husband, the dark marring Kenneth MacKenzie’s beauty was the mark of an evil man.
A murderer.
“The lad doesna want to believe it, but he is mine,” Kenneth MacKenzie said, pausing to fold his arms in a gesture that perfectly mirrored the favored stance of his half brother. “And you can only be the lady Linnet? I was told my brother had married a… healer, but no one informed me of your beauty, milady.”
He made her a gallant bow. “Kenneth MacKenzie, at your service,” he said with a silky tone and a knowing smile that didn’t quite touch his dark blue eyes. “’Tis good fortune indeed to make your fair acquaintance since Duncan did not extend me the courtesy of an invitation to your wedding.”
“I am sure he had his reasons for not doing so,” Linnet stated as calmly as she could. Beside her, Mauger growled his displeasure. His hackles rose again and he bared his teeth menacingly, but made no attempt to attack, only to protect and defend.
Linnet tightened her grip on the dagger she kept hidden in the folds of her gown. “You will excuse us. My husband’s guardsmen await our return.”
“Not if they’re sleeping as soundly as the one I passed on the footpath. ’Twas the tongueless Thomas, I believe. He may have been coming for you, but it seems the overgrown lad walked into a tree.”
The corners of his mouth twitched as if he meant to laugh, and he raised a hand to rub his chin. “At least I canna think of another reason for the nasty lump I saw on his forehead.”
Fear tightened Linnet’s chest, but she forced herself to remain calm. Her sixth sense told her their lives depended on her keeping her wits. “Then we must bid you good day and be on our way so I can assist Thomas back to the cart.”
“Ah, but ’tis such a fine afternoon,” Kenneth lamented, coming closer. “Surely you willna deny me a visit with my own son?”
Ignoring him, Linnet yanked Robbie closer and made to rush past the man, but he whistled sharply and a band of unsmiling, filthy men stepped from the trees around the clearing, successfully blocking any path of escape she’d hoped to take.
Kenneth smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “My men dinna mean any harm, milady, but you’ll understand they ken how much I’ve been missing my wee lad here.”
“You’re not my papa!” Robbie shouted, balling his fists and struggling to break free of Linnet’s grasp. “I’m not yours!”
“Of course, you are,” Kenneth fair crooned, the wild light in his eyes warning Linnet he wasn’t right in his head. “Just look at you, full of fire and ready to fight. Were you Duncan’s get, you’d be cowering behind Lady Linnet’s skirts, hiding the way my brother hides behind the walls of his keep.”
White-hot anger shot through Linnet with the speed of a lightning bolt, chasing away her fear. “And I say ’tis the mark of a coward who’d slander a man afore his wife and young son. Or would you spew such lies in the face of my lord husband?”
Kenneth steepled his fingers and brought them to his chin. “Ah… I see you’ve fallen under his spell. My late father suffered the same affliction, I’m afraid. Ne’er could he see my brother’s shortcomings whilst my own were e’er falling from his tongue.”
“My sympathies. Now st
ep aside and let us pass,” Linnet demanded, whipping out her dagger. “If you do not, you’ll give me no choice but to plant my blade between your eyes.”
Kenneth threw back his head and laughed. “What-ho! ’Tis not only the lady’s tongue what be sharp. So you would threaten me with your dirk?”
“Nay, Sir Kenneth, ’tis not threatening you I am,” Linnet said, dragging Robbie behind her. “’Tis warning you what I’ll do if you do not cease accosting us.”
A look of fierce anger flashed across his handsome face, but it vanished almost instantly as he swept low in another courtly bow. When he straightened, he wore a wolfish grin.
“You’ve no need to wax noble with me, Lady Linnet, for I canna claim the title of sir. My father, rest his soul, did not see the need to bestow knighthood upon me. Nor will any other noble capable of performing the deed. I bear the stigma of being baseborn, you see.” He paused and flung his arms up in the air as if for emphasis. “It matters naught, though, for an adubbement as knight isn’t necessary for a man to be chivalrous.”
“And it’ll matter less after I take aim at you,” Linnet shot back. “’Twill be hard to appear gallant with the hilt o’ my dagger protruding from the top of your nose.”
Kenneth laughed again, a full-bodied, rich kind of masculine laughter that would have made her laugh, too, did his mirth reach his eyes… and if her gift hadn’t let her look deep into the depths of his twisted soul.
“‘Protruding from the top o’ my nose,’ you say?” he roared, bending backward in his levity. “I vow that snarling beast at your side poses a greater threat. Fair lady, if you can land your blade anywhere within an arm’s length of where I stand, you, the lad, and his hell-dog, may leave this place unhindered.”
His fingers caressed the hilt of his own dagger, tucked jauntily beneath a wide leather belt. “Or mayhap I shall relieve you both of the wretched hound now? The cur’s barking sorely annoys me.”
“And if I can slice off a lock of your hair, will you give me your word that we—all three of us—may leave here unharmed?” Linnet challenged him, hiding her fear that he’d harm Robbie’s pet behind bold words, instinctively aware she must concede to his image of himself as a gallant if they hoped to gain a safe retreat.
“A lock of my hair?” His black brows shot heavenward. “Lady, if you can do that, you shall have my solemn word.”
“Then pray choose the lock of your choice and hold it high.”
An expression very much like admiration curved his lips in a smile that would’ve been irresistibly seductive to any other woman. Without taking his gaze off her, he raised his hand and lifted a portion of thick black hair from the top of his head.
“Take aim, but be warned,” he said, his voice smooth as sun-warmed silk, “if you lose, I shall demand a kiss.”
“I never lose,” Linnet countered. “My brothers taught me well.”
Concentrating, she focused her gaze on the man who looked so like her husband she almost had second thoughts about throwing a knife at him. But he wasn’t Duncan. He was a man whose envy and warped logic made him capable of unspeakable acts of treachery.
The colors of the darkness she’d glimpsed clinging to him when he’d first stepped from the trees revealed his true nature beyond a doubt.
The thought of Robbie falling into his hands was beyond unbearable. The lad’s grief should harm befall his beloved dog, a cruelty she must attempt to spare him. Her heart, too, would ache should Kenneth make good his threat against Mauger. She had no choice but to defend them all as best she could.
Grateful to Ranald for training her in the art of knife throwing, and to the saints for giving her the patience to learn, Linnet sent a quick prayer skyward, asking the divine powers to guide her hand.
Then she took a deep breath, narrowed her eyes, and let her dagger fly.
It seemed the blade had no sooner left her fingers, then a collective gasp erupted from Kenneth MacKenzie’s men and he stood gaping at her, one hand clamped atop his head. Then he bent and scooped up her knife… and his lock of hair… from the ground at his feet.
He stood for a moment, staring down at the two items in his hands, then turned his gaze on her. This time there could be no mistake about the admiration in his eyes. A look of sheer amazement replaced his flamboyant smile.
“You kept your word.” He came toward her, the dark lock of hair and her knife offered to her on the palms of his outstretched hands. “I shall do no less. You may go.”
Hoping he couldn’t see how she trembled inside, Linnet took her blade and tucked it beneath the band of her apron. She made to leave, but he stepped before her, blocking their way. “Please take this as a token of my admiration,” he said, holding out the lock of hair. “I should be vastly injured if you decline.”
Linnet accepted his offering with a curt nod. She’d dispose of it as soon as they were a safe distance from him.
Holding her head high, she led Robbie away, trying hard not to show the fear knotting her stomach now that the unpleasant encounter was almost over. Mauger trotted along beside them, casting wary glances over his shoulder as they went. At the edge of the clearing, just before they reached the path back to the road, Kenneth MacKenzie called out once more.
“Do not think you’ve seen the last of me, lady. I like a woman with fire in her blood,” he shouted. “Aye, lass, we shall meet again. Be certain of it.”
Many hours later, in the gray and quiet time between midnight and daybreak, Linnet stood before the narrow arched windows of her chamber and stared out at the night-darkened landscape. Far below, Loch Duich lapped gently at the sturdy castle walls, the lake’s surface tranquil and smooth at this late hour.
In the wan light of a slim crescent moon, the loch resembled a polished silver mirror set down and forgotten in the midst of the wilder landscape of rugged mountains rising around its shoreline.
Pressing her forehead against the damp coolness of the window’s stone tracery, Linnet closed her eyes and breathed in the sharp smell of sea tang that seemed to permeate every inch of her formidable new home.
How like her husband were his lands of Kintail. Cool and unruffled on the surface, yet beneath, she sensed a man of brute strength, capable of deep emotion. A man whose anger was no less dangerous to the unwary than scaling the peaks of Kintail’s mountains would be to a Lowlander unaccustomed to treacherous terrain.
Winning his heart, his love, would be a triumph as rewarding as reaching the summit of a high mountain after a difficult climb. A triumph she wanted, and one she’d fight to achieve.
Linnet smoothed the tips of her fingers along the cold stone at the window’s edge. Its chilled dampness was undeniable, a tangible thing, yet come a fine summer’s day filled with warmth and light, the stone would grow warm and glow beneath the transforming rays of the sun.
Hope burgeoned bright in Linnet’s heart. As the sun was always there, even on days turned gray and forbidding, so, too, thrummed the fire of her husband’s passion beneath the self-erected barriers he thought were so inviolable.
Resting her cheek against the molding of the arch-topped window, Linnet let the brine-laden night air cool her cheeks. ’Twas necessary, for anytime her thoughts turned to Duncan MacKenzie, fierce yearnings shot through her, boldly sweeping aside any maidenly reserve she may have possessed and flooding her with a need that demanded to be quenched.
A need the strong-passioned Black Stag seemed determined to ignore.
A burning urgency she suspected raged as strong as the raw sexual hunger that swelled her husband’s sex each time she’d had the intoxicating pleasure of glimpsing it!
Linnet blew out an agitated breath and pressed her thighs together in a fruitless attempt to suppress the intensely arousing tingles dancing over her woman’s flesh. Like a thousand fired needles, the sensations ignited a blaze of pleasure across her tender parts whilst, from within, came an equally exquisite heaviness, a deep pulsing ache.
Then, with slow but persistent su
ccess, irritation conquered the wild stirrings that bedeviled her. Irritation born of annoyance at her husband for not wanting her. Anger at herself for desiring him.
Gradually, another type of ache made itself known, too. Refusing to be further ignored, Linnet’s exhaustion bore down on her, but she welcomed its diversion. Reaching her arms high above her head, she stretched her entire aching body, seeking relief for the stiffness in her limbs and the red-hot knot of tension between her shoulders.
She’d spent the day and most of the evening tending to poor Thomas’s head wound and trying to offer solace to the Murchinson survivors. They’d arrived at the keep tired and shaken some hours past. The tales they’d told had unsettled Linnet more than she cared to admit.
Weary, she pressed a hand to the small of her aching back. ’Twas no wonder exhaustion robbed her of the energy to do more than stand and gaze out her window, engaging in fantasies. Elspeth and Fergus had fair dragged her to her bed, insisting she rest, contending she’d done more than she possibly could until the morn, but sleep eluded her.
And not because of her bone-aching fatigue. ’Twas worry what stole her rest and had sent her thoughts galloping full tilt toward her husband. Alarm had eaten away at her ever since she’d returned from the abbey and discovered that Duncan, Sir Marmaduke, and Eilean Creag’s best men had ridden in pursuit of Kenneth MacKenzie and his assemblage of undesirables.
She’d tried to use her sight, to focus on her husband and glean a sign of what had happened, but she’d been able to cull nothing. Her efforts continually met an impenetrable wall of reddish haze. A representation, she knew, of fury and outrage. Unfortunately, she could discern naught else.
And, having seen the crazed look in Kenneth MacKenzie’s eyes, and after having learned of the vile acts he and his followers had committed at the Murchinsons’ small holding, sheer terror had accompanied her every breath and still did.
She wouldn’t rest until she knew her husband and his men were safe within the castle walls.
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