The heavy force with which Angus barreled toward Alec may have slaughtered a lesser warrior, but Alec was quicker than the Cameron chief. Muscles and sinew, honed from hours of swordplay and tactical practice, threw Alec into defensive action. He lowered, dodged the man’s bulk, and knocked his sword away as he turned, but Angus held onto the weapon. Alec spun and raised his boot, kicking Angus in the back with his heel. The force threw the man to the ground. He grunted as his round chest hit. Alec lifted his sword to strike, but the barking of his two hounds signaled for him to turn, lifting his sword in a defensive pose just in time.
George Macrae brought his blade down in a vicious, silent arc meant to cleave Alec at his shoulder. Instead, steel met steel, clanging loudly to add to the shouting of men and crackling of fire. Alec let the Macrae chief’s sword continue downward, controlling the impact. With a twist of his sword and bend of his arms, Alec brought the bastard close until they stared at each other between crossed blades.
Macrae’s teeth were gritted as he snarled at Alec. “’Tis your day to die, MacNeil, ye and your kin. Barra will belong to the Camerons and Macraes.”
His kin? Alec’s inhale battled past the tightening of his stomach at the man’s words. Behind him, Angus cursed as Alec’s large wolfhounds surrounded the man, snapping, barking, and biting when given the chance. Taking turns, they crashed their massive frames into him as he tried to rise. “Bloody beasts,” he yelled, but Alec was caught in a staring contest with Macrae. The bastard waited for him to glance at Kisimul, the place where he’d locked his only kin up safely.
“They’re dying right now,” Macrae said, his words seething out of his teeth like the hiss of a snake.
“Kisimul will never fall,” Alec said, and the recitation gave him strength. He turned, letting the man’s press fall forward past him, and spun to slice toward Macrae, but Macrae managed to get his sword up in time to block. Alec kept his feet locked in the sway of momentum, as if the ground tilted like a tossing ship. A lifetime of riding the waves gave him unbeatable balance.
“Kisimul will be ours, along with Barra,” Macrae said.
“Impossible,” Alec said as he parried back and forth with the obviously talented swordsman. “Kisimul is impenetrable.”
Macrae’s frown turned into an evil smile. “Kisimul is inescapable.”
A deep emotion washed through Alec, one that he’d never felt fully before. Fear. It rolled through him like an icy poison, threatening to numb and weaken him. He wanted to look toward the fortress in the bay. Only his discipline kept him centered on his foe. Even the sound of his dogs finding flesh on Angus, making the man scream as they continued to rip into him, didn’t pull Alec’s attention.
“Macrae, get them off me,” Angus yelled between curses, but his coconspirator ignored him, making it very clear that George Macrae aspired to control Barra by himself. Out of the corner of his eye, Alec saw Kenneth run up, his claymore bloody.
Macrae struck again, his sword ringing out and sliding down Alec’s blade. Without breaking his stride, shoving Macrae backward, Alec whistled twice, high-pitched blasts to scatter his lethal hounds so that Kenneth could advance. One deep yell from his cousin, the whoosh of his blade through the air, and Angus Cameron’s head thudded to the ground.
“Kisimul,” Kenneth yelled, but still Alec battled George Macrae, knowing the man needed him unfocused to win, but Alec parried each thrust, and Kenneth took off toward the docks. Men ran everywhere, and the slip of Macrae’s confident smile showed that the tide had turned.
With a growl born of might and fury, pushing past the fear that threatened to crumble his strength, Alec advanced, faster, harder, legs braced and arms burning with the heat of use. He slashed forward, practically chasing the bastard Macrae. Look away, and you are finished.
The man blinked, wiping an arm across his forehead as he blocked Alec’s blade. Alec felt him falter under his strength and changed the direction of his next thrust at the last second. His mighty sword clanged hard against the very top of his foe’s blade, sending it scattering across the rocks. “Camerons and Macraes are no more!” he yelled and lifted his sword high.
“And your family is no more,” George Macrae yelled back, making a last effort to throw himself along the ground toward his sword, but Alec’s blade caught him across the neck, slicing deep. He rolled to the side, his hands gripping the flowing wound. Only then did Alec look to Kisimul.
Fire. The very center of Kisimul glowed orange against the blackness of the night. Like when Cinnia had set the kitchen ablaze but a hundred times larger. Alec’s gut sunk deep inside. “Nay,” Alec yelled, his voice booming out in the destroyed village center. Fire still smoldered some of the houses, as well as many of the boats that had been tied at the dock, including the ferry. It was a conscious effort to prevent them from returning to Kisimul.
Alec ran, his hounds at his sides, as he searched the dock for a seaworthy vessel. “I need a boat,” he called to the warriors standing there, watching fire spark up in the sky over Kisimul. “My children,” he yelled. “Mairi.” He scanned the men but didn’t see Tor Maclean or Cullen Duffie. Out in the bay, the two MacNeil ships flanked two others, at least one of them belonging to George Macrae.
“The seaworthy ones have been burned,” Kenneth said, running up to Alec.
Ian hobbled after him, his face grim. “I should have stayed back.” His eyes reflected the flames.
Alec ran toward the far end of the dock where the broken boats, ghosts of his past, sat tethered. The Camerons had burned Joyce’s boat and his mother’s, but the decades-old rowboat, which had belonged to his father, lay half wedged under the boards. He yanked at it, desperation empowering his muscles as he brought it forward. “Oars,” he yelled, and Daniel ran up carrying some that were only partly singed. Behind him Kenneth was ordering boards to be nailed together. He’d have a boat built shortly, but Alec wasn’t waiting.
He climbed into his father’s rowboat, and Daniel pushed him off into the bay. Water immediately began to seep into the bottom, but Alec just rowed, putting every bit of his remaining strength into his back and shoulders, pushing forward with his feet braced. Gurgles came up from the wormholes in the sides and the cracks of neglected wood. Smoke on the light breeze gave a haze over the water, as if he moved through an otherworldly, ashy mist. Halfway across, he heard the frantic barking of a dog. He’d left four on Kisimul with Mairi, Cinnia, Weylyn, and Millie. And Bessy Cameron. His face swung around toward the horrible scene of fire spitting up over the turrets of Kisimul. Could Bessy Cameron have started the fire? Been part of her brother’s plan to take over Barra Isle?
Seawater flooded the bottom of the boat, making it sluggish. At this rate, it wouldn’t make it to shore. “Mo chreach,” Alec cursed and dropped the oars into the rusted holders on the sides. He grabbed his boot, tugging until it released. Dropping the second one, he stood in the foot of water in his father’s doomed boat. Without a thought of anything but reaching Kisimul, Alec dove into the black sea.
…
“Use the iron bars,” Weylyn called up to Mairi. “They’re a ladder down.” He’d been the first to venture into the dark, narrow hole of the freshwater well. Mairi kept Cinnia before her as they faced the damp wall. Their heads were just below the upper edge of the well, where the air didn’t scorch her throat with every inhale as it had in the room. When she looked up, the glow of fire filled the rectangular opening, spurring her to slide Cinnia and herself down, her foot kicking, searching for the next rung.
“Hold on, Cinnia,” Mairi said to the quietly weeping girl. “The well will keep us safe.” The girl shook in Mairi’s arms. Or was that Mairi shaking? Flashes of light appeared to the sides of Mairi’s vision, and she realized her breathing was much too fast. And if she fainted, she’d drop Cinnia, and the two of them would fall into Weylyn, probably killing them all when they hit the bottom and drowned. The thought sped her pulse even higher, but she made herself count to four with her inhale and th
en to five with her exhale.
Mairi’s foot caught the rung, and she and Cinnia lowered another head-length down into the hole.
“It’s cool below and not smoky,” Weylyn called, his voice small. He must be far below.
“Are ye to water yet?” Mairi called, her toes finding another rung. She pulled the two of them lower, kicking at her own skirts that bunched up around them. She guided Cinnia’s foot to occupy the same iron rung, rooted to the wall, and slapped at both of their skirts that were lifted to expose their legs to the cool air filling the long, tight space.
She heard the echo of a plop as if Weylyn had dropped a pebble in. “Almost,” he called up. “I’ll stop here. Ballocks, it’s dark.”
Although his voice was naturally high since he was seven years old, the inflection reminded Mairi of his father. Alec. Where are ye? Hurry. I’m trying.
She felt the press of desperate tears and blinked. She inhaled against Cinnia’s hair, the sweet scent of soap covered by the bitter tang of smoke. Shivering, her fingers curling around the cold, wet iron, and a small whimper broke from her lips.
“Are ye afraid?” Cinnia asked, her face toward the wall. They were far enough down now that the fire raging above didn’t light the mossy walls. It was good to hear the girl speak.
“Kisimul will protect us,” Mairi echoed the words she’d heard Alec say.
“Ye’re shaking,” Cinnia said.
Mairi lowered them another rung. “I don’t do well in dark, small spaces.”
“Why?”
Oh Good Lord. Mairi didn’t talk about her time at Kilchoan, under siege by her absent husband’s lecherous son, Normond MacInnes. She preferred to stuff the experience deep inside where it couldn’t hurt her, but being trapped in the well, feeling her elbows touch the sides and her back brush the wall behind her… It was bringing the memories to the surface like air bubbles released under water.
“I was trapped once,” Mairi said and took another inhale of cool air to feed her aching limbs. The two of them lowered as one to the next rung.
“Tell me,” Cinnia said. “If he survived then perhaps we can, too.” Her voice was faint against the sounds of flames eating away at the wood above them, and Mairi could hear the tears in her words.
She kissed the back of Cinnia’s head. “Of course we will.” She inhaled and exhaled a long breath. God, please let us live through this. Swallowing against the burning grit in her throat, she released the tight hold on her nightmares. “I hid inside a trunk once, to escape a bad man. He’d been certain to find me in my chambers and was quite surprised to see I’d eluded him. But I was still there, locked in a dark, small wooden trunk. Problem was, I couldn’t get out. So, when he left, I had to sit in the trunk until someone noticed me.”
The words resurrected the memories of being crunched down in the chest. They beat at Mairi, making her heart pound and her hands tingle. Hours crawled by, nearly a whole day, before one of the kitchen maids brought up her meal, and she pounded on the trunk before the woman left. Hours of praying, crying, aching.
“Ye’re breathing really fast,” Cinnia said. She reached her hand to lay on top of Mairi’s. “Don’t worry. We aren’t trapped. Kisimul is protecting us with its walls.”
We are safe. The top is open. We will get out. Mairi repeated the words in her head and concentrated on slowing her breath. Flames danced above, licking at the walls. Mairi could almost hear the click of teeth in the crackling, like the fire was a great beast biting the hay and the beams holding up the ceiling. She glanced above at the bright light of orange, swirling and undulating as if the fire were truly alive. The heat traveled down the well, prickling against her cheeks, their bodies the border between the cold underneath and the fiery burn above.
“We should sing,” Weylyn called. “Da says it helps to keep one brave.”
“Good idea,” Mairi said, forcing her voice to sound cheerful as she watched the dark beam engulfed in flames directly above them. Crack!
Weylyn’s young voice echoed up the well toward her as she watched the beam, her breath stuck in her wildly beating chest. Crack! The beam was going to give way, and if it hit the well, flaming wood could shoot right down the hole.
“Lower,” Mairi yelled, already bending her knee, her toes searching for the next rung. “Cinnia, move, we need to go lower.”
The girl gasped at the loud popping and groan above. The whole room was about to crash down on top of them. “Climb down past me,” Mairi said. Perhaps she could block the flaming debris from going farther.
“I’m afraid to fall,” Cinnia said, clinging to the iron rungs in the wall.
Mairi stepped down below her two rungs. “I’ll catch ye if ye fall, but ye have to move. Now!”
Part of the beam fell across the mouth of the well, sending sparks showering down the tube to fall on their heads. “Cinnia!”
The girl stepped down, her sobs open now. Mairi stroked her leg and felt her shaking. She grabbed the girl’s foot. “I’ll guide ye to the lower rung.” Together the two of them traveled farther down toward Weylyn. “Keep singing, Weylyn, so we know when we’ve caught up to ye.”
His voice grew louder as he sang the words of a Christmastide carol. Mairi gasped as he grabbed her foot. “I’m right here,” he said.
She looked back up at the blazing rectangle about twenty feet above them. It truly looked like the gateway to Hell. “Cinnia, climb down past me,” Mairi said, pulling her one foot and hand off the rungs for her to pass. If falling wood made it down, hopefully she would block it from reaching Cinnia and Weylyn. If she were going to die tonight, she would do it trying to save the two children. God, give me strength. Please. Shield us.
As if reading her thoughts, Cinnia began to say a prayer in Latin. Her whispers added to the ominous sound of cracking and snapping above. The beam was totally consumed by flames, just a dark mass of char suspended above them. “Flatten against the wall,” Mairi instructed, her breath coming in desperate pants. Her gaze fastened to the beam, half of it broken free so it hung like a flaming sword, pointed down the throat of the well. A resounding crack and snap sent lit wood down the shaft just seconds before the entire flaming ceiling fell on top of the well. The sound of their screams filled the core of Kisimul.
Chapter Twenty-One
Alec’s toes dug into the rocks surrounding Kisimul as he hauled his frozen, sopping body onto the shore. Even in summer, the North Atlantic water was known to freeze men, drowning them with numbness. But when his limbs began to slack, he kept them cutting through the water, the bright glow of the fire inside Kisimul his constant beacon.
For an instant, Alec’s hope flared. There, on the outside of the wall, leaning against it, were two women. Daisy and Weylyn’s dog, Ares, barked at him, jumping into and then out of the water. The two other dogs barked next to the women. He drew himself up to standing and ran toward them. Millie, a bleeding cut on her forehead, and Bessy Cameron.
“What have ye done?” Alec asked, and Bessy clung to Millie. The old woman’s eyes blinked open, and she shook her head, patting Bessy’s back as the younger woman sobbed. Millie made the sign of the cross with two fingers and then the sign of the devil with horns on her head.
“The priest? Is the devil?” he asked.
Millie nodded and ran a finger across her throat, then pointed to Bessy. Bessy had killed the priest? Maybe he wasn’t understanding Millie’s signals, but he didn’t have time to waste. “Where are the others, the children and Mairi?”
Bessy wailed, her piercing voice reaching inside Alec to twist his heart. Millie’s eyes were wet, and she slowly shook her head. A chill sparked inside him, running down his spine. “Nay,” he yelled, turning from them to run to the gate. Daisy followed on his heels. He looked down at the dog. “Where are they? Where is your mistress?” Alec yanked off his sopping shirt and threw his arm to point into the smoke-filled bailey. “Find her!”
The dog ran in through the arch, and Alec followed, holding the wet sh
irt loosely over his nose and mouth. All the buildings seemed to be ablaze, with the worst coming from the great hall. He almost stumbled over the body of Father Lassiter where he lay, a knife sticking out of his throat, point forward. Bessy had stabbed him from behind. Was he responsible for the fire?
Daisy’s barks cut through the suffocating haze. Alec crouched lower where the air was fresher. As a breeze cut down from the night sky, it cleared enough that he saw Daisy standing before the charred door of the great hall. “Nay,” Alec whispered, his lips brushing the wet shirt before his face. “Nay. God, don’t take them.”
He’d left them on Kisimul because he’d thought them safe. Kisimul would never fall, but a traitor had imprisoned them inside to die. He used his wet shirt to beat against the flames, hitting the charred side of the door. The glowing wood collapsed to ash near his feet. The heat burned his nose, and the smoke wound down his throat, making him cough. “Nay,” he yelled and hacked. Daisy kept trying to leap inside, but the flames wouldn’t allow it. Inside was a furnace like he’d never seen before. How could he reach them? How can they be alive?
“MacNeil!” Tor Maclean ran into the bailey, arm over his mouth. “Mairi? Is she here?” Behind him Cullen Duffie, Kenneth, and Ian followed, all of them covering their faces with arms and shirts. As they gathered in the center, they crouched lower.
Wild desperation mixed with fury inside Alec. He shook his head. “I don’t know. Mairi.” He looked to Kenneth and Ian. “Cinnia and Weylyn. I…I don’t know where they are.” The words threatened to crack Alec wide open. If they died…he would die. “We have to reach them, and the dog thinks they are in there.” He pointed to the gutted great hall, fire still eating up the wood inside like a ravaging beast.
“In there!” Tor shouted, standing.
Cullen grabbed his arm, stopping him from running inside. “Water. Form a bucket line. Buckets, MacNeil. Where are they?”
Alec looked at the flames. Run inside. Could he reach them before he died? How far would he get? Someone grabbed his shoulders, dragging him backward onto the ground from right before the door. “Alec,” Ian yelled in his face. “Alec MacNeil.” Alec finally moved his gaze to Ian. His best friend looked ravished with anger and bitter desperation. “They aren’t dead until we see it. They are still alive right now. Let’s get this fire out.”
The Wolf of Kisimul Castle (Highland Isles) Page 18