The Guardian (Highland Heroes Book 1)

by Maeve Greyson

  By all the saints in heaven, Duncan had never realized how stifling the everyday tasks of leading a clan and keep could be. Whilst he loved his brother and swore fealty to him without question, he was more than glad to bid Alexander and Clan MacCoinnich a fond farewell and set about seeking his own fortune. Adventure. Intrigue. Excitement. Aye, that’s what made a man’s blood pump and kept his heart beating strong.

  He resettled himself in the saddle and glanced around. The peaceful wooded glade this side of Inverness stood in direct contrast with the heightened suspense churning inside him. Whilst he felt certain he had the wit and potential talent to excel at this newest venture, he had to admit, he had much to learn about the intricacies of the successful smuggling of goods and eluding the ever watchful excisemen.

  No matter. He forced the worry away with a roll of his shoulders. He fidgeted in the saddle with a stretching arch of his back. A nagging tenseness had set in, no doubt brought on by the long journey from Skye and his impatience to get to Inverness. The exciting unknown that lay ahead had him wound tighter than a bow string. Aye, but that was the sheer beauty of the thing. The pleasure of it. The reward. He urged his mount to a faster trot. He would reach Inverness by late afternoon. At last, this newest quest was about to begin.

  Sern MacDonald waited for him in Inverness. Sern was a good man. Smart. Fearless. Canny. Duncan couldn’t find a better teacher for the ways and hows of the fine art of smuggling; and Duncan liked the man. Looked forward to working with him again—this time to learn smuggling rather than watching each other’s backs whilst fighting. The MacDonald of Skye had promised a healthy return on this investment of Duncan’s time, even paid him a generous sum in advance. With so much gold weighing down his pockets, the future looked promising indeed.

  Duncan’s empty stomach clenched and growled. He took a deep swig from his half empty waterskin and did his best to drown the gnawing reminder he hadn’t stopped for a meal in a while. A fast pace and getting to Inverness had been his driving priority—not food. Another groaning gurgle sounded from his middle, his angry wame complaining about receiving nothing more than water. Duncan belched and made himself a promise. First order of business upon reaching Inverness: locate the best pub, down several pints, and have a good meal—in that order.

  A woman’s scream shattered the stillness of the afternoon.

  Duncan yanked his mount to a halt. Senses piqued; he scanned the woods for the source of the sound.

  A blistering stream of shrieked cursing ripped through the trees, pinpointing the woman’s location.

  Spurring his mount off the hard-packed dirt road, Duncan charged around the trees, pounding toward the sound of the distressed lass.

  She screamed again, closer this time and to the right, an angry, keening sob of hopelessness drowned out by laughter—loud male laughter. Sounded like several men. The woman’s panic filled the air. Palpable. Alarming. Urgency drove him forward harder. Duncan threaded his horse in and out between the trees at a faster clip.

  Up ahead. An opening in the trees. A flash of familiar red. British uniforms. The sight triggered the deepest of Duncan’s battle instincts. He hated the English. Raucous jeers and shouts echoed along with the woman’s enraged sobs, cursing, and shrieks.

  Rage spurred Duncan onward. He drew his pistol and leaned forward in the saddle, hugging low against his horse as he slowed the mount to a stealthy easing through the trees. He promised himself by all that was holy, by the time he finished, a deeper red, a bloody red, would shade the bastard’s scarlet coats and their own shite would stain their trews.

  Three redcoats surrounded the girl. Two of them crouched on either side of the lass, squatting atop ropes they had lashed across her to hold her tight to the forest floor. Chemise and bodice torn. Skirts shoved up around her waist. The young woman screamed and cursed at the men, flailing away from them as much as the bindings allowed. The third bastard towered above her, standing at her feet. The man was tall and wide of girth, so drunk that drool dripped off his chin. The scoundrel looked the filthiest sort of lowlife. With his trews shoved down around his knees, he staggered to the space between the lass’s ankles whilst the other two guffawed at him and shouted lewd suggestions.

  “Enough!” Duncan shouted as he spurred his horse forward. His agile mount cleared through the last cluster of trees and burst into the clearing.

  All three soldiers jerked their attention toward Duncan as he thundered into the space. As natural as breathing, Duncan took aim, and fired.

  The man with his trews tangled around his knees gaped at Duncan. Eyes wide and fleshy jaw gone slack, he clawed at his chest as a red stain spread across the grubby, white cloth of his shirt. The blackguard’s head sagged to one side in a slow tilting motion. His thick shoulders crumpled inward as he collapsed, his heavy frame hitting the ground knees first. The man’s great rounded belly pulled him forward, tipping him in the steady motion of a felled tree. With a hard flop, he landed across the girl.

  The lass shrieked out an ear-splitting scream, struggling in vain to shift out from under him. The two soldiers on either side of her, shook themselves free of their shocked stupor, then scrambled backwards, arms and legs digging in the dirt in their effort to escape.

  “Bloody Hell!” one shouted. “No bit of skirt worth this!”

  “The bloodiest of hells for the lot of ye!” Duncan shook the woods with a guttural battle cry as he shoved his spent pistol into the holster of his saddle and pulled its mate free of his belt. He fired again, clipping the second soldier with a glancing shot as the man dove into the bushes. Damn it all to hell and back. The bastards were escaping. Duncan’s rage burned hot and fierce as the fools disappeared into a patch of thick undergrowth running alongside a ravine.

  Duncan leapt from his horse, and gave chase, determined to kill them both for the girl’s sake and because the whoresons had the audacity to try and escape him. Bloody Sassenachs. Bastards thought they could take whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted, however they wanted. He’d witnessed their cruel brutality before. By damned, he’d send all of them to kneel before their Maker in judgement of their vile ways. He waded into the bushes, hacking away at the leaves and smaller branches with his sword. Both men had disappeared into the overgrown ditch faster than a pair of damned rabbits.

  Duncan chopped away at a cluster of saplings and clumped sedge, then gave a hard look around the area. Nothing met his gaze but dancing leaves and the gentle soughing of the wind through the trees. “Show yourselves, ye bastards.” Teeth clenched, sword at the ready, he turned in a slow circle, scanning the ground for signs. Damned if the arsworms hadn’t managed to slip away. Determined to find them, he strode into the ditch, cutting and slicing his way forward through the tangle of vines, grasses, and knotted bushes. Senses attuned to the slightest noise, he watched for the faintest movement or signs that would reveal his prey.

  Erratic shuffling through the leaf mold caught Duncan’s attention. He veered to the right, chasing the sound, straining to keep it focused in his senses and sorted away from the usual woodland sounds. He spotted signs of blood splattered across the long, feathery fronds of a fern clustered at the base of an oak. Good. The man he had wounded was bleeding steady. With any luck, the evil bastard would do Duncan the courtesy of bleeding death.

  Sharp, keening gasps and shrieking sobs for help came from the woods behind him. The lass. Back in the clearing. He stared at the way the men might have gone then looked back where he knew the poor woman still lay trapped beneath the corpse of the devil who had been about to brutalize her. The thrill of the hunt warred with the responsibility of taking proper care of the girl. He growled out his frustration. With any luck, the wounded man would die, and the other bastard would make the sorry mistake of crossing Duncan’s path again some other day. Another piercing shriek peeled out from the trees. Best get back to the lass and see to her.

  Jaw set, he sheathed his sword. He didn’t relish the unpleasantness of the task ahead. Who k
new what the poor lass had endured nor what her state of mind might be? His priority: her torn and tattered state would need covering and then he needed to get her to a healer, or someone to help her. She had to have a home or kin nearby. He tromped through the woods, heading first to his horse. He removed his sword from the scabbard at his side and sheathed it to his saddle. No sense scaring the poor woman with such a weapon. He retrieved an extra tunic from his saddle bag then unbelted his kilt. He shook it down off his body and yanked on a pair of trews. The woman would need the warmth of his plaid—and the covering of it. ’Twas also important he secure his man parts well away in a pair of breeks. Make them less accessible than when he wore his kilt. Such a simple gesture might offer the poor lass a little peace of mind. He’d dealt with brutalized women such as her before. Their handling took the utmost care. Their minds’ healing warranted as much care and consideration as their physical trauma.

  As he eased his way into the clearing, Duncan held up his kilt in one hand and the extra tunic in the other. “I have coverings for ye, lass. Ye’re safe now. I swear I willna hurt ye.” Tossing the garments to the ground beside her, he grabbed hold of the massive dead man sagged across her and yanked the fool away. “Bloody bastard.” Duncan dragged the scoundrel to the side of the clearing and heaved him to the base of a tree.

  Eyes wild, the girl hiccupped out a sobbing scream and tried to roll away, yanking at the ropes binding her arms and legs. She gagged and coughed as the noose around her neck tightened. Her face turned blood red. The veins in her throat bulged as she wheezed and fought for air.

  Duncan rushed to her side, tossed his kilt and spare tunic across her, then drew his sgian dhu from its sheath in his boot. “I mean ye no harm, lass, I swear it. Still yourself, afore ye strangle so’s I can cut the rope away, aye?”

  Gasping and coughing, the girl panicked, struggling to breathe as she pulled the ropes tighter in her hysterical distress.

  Duncan slashed through the ties restraining her arms and legs hoping by doing such that the one around her throat would gain some slack. It failed. If he didn’t hurry, the girl would soon be dead. He dug his fingers around the one tied tight around her neck. If he cut her, he cut her, he had to get her free. He sliced through the last of the frayed binding and yanked it away, flinching as he set eyes on the raw, bleeding rope burn left around her throat. The poor lass would carry that scar the rest of her life.

  She wheezed in great, coughing gulps of air. Curling into a tight ball around the kilt and tunic, she rolled to her knees and scrambled to take cover in the bushes. As the lass flailed her way behind a cluster of saplings, she shot a terrified look back at Duncan.

  Duncan held up both hands and backed away to the edge of the clearing, heart aching for the poor woman and all she must have endured. Terror from this horrible trauma trapped the wee lamb slicker than a snare. The blessed girl couldn’t be in her right mind and understandably so. At the moment, the lass didn’t know who she could trust or not. He had seen this before. The terrible results of such cold-blooded attacks ruined many a life.

  “I willna hurt ye, lass,” he said in a soft, coaxing tone, lowering himself to a kneeling position whilst keeping both his hands where she could see them if she bothered to look. “I am alone. No others travel with me so ye dinna have to worry. I shall sit right here until ye feel ready to tell me where I can take ye to get ye some aid.”

  Her rasping, hiccupping sobs grew softer behind the wall of trembling leaves and bushes. Duncan glanced around the clearing. Where had the bastards took hold of her? Had they kidnapped the woman and brought her here to defile her? Where were their horses? This clearing wasn’t that far out of Inverness but was certainly too far for three drunken sods such as those men to carry away as strong a fighting lassie as this. He wished he could search the area for their mounts, but he’d promised the girl he’d stay put. He wouldn’t break his word, not even over something as small as that. To her, his word, meant all the difference between trusting him or not and the chore that fate had set before him would be much easier to accomplish if she trusted him.

  “My name is Duncan,” he called out. “Duncan MacCoinnich at your service, m’lady.” He knelt there, knees thunked into the soft, loamy ground, the cool dampness of the thick leaf mold soaking up through his trews. He looked around the woods and tried his damnedest to come up with something to say to put the lass at ease. “My brother is chieftain to Clan MacCoinnich. Alexander MacCoinnich be his name. Married Catriona Neal, he did. Do ye ken the keep and the small clan what was once the Neal stronghold over on Ben Nevis? ’Tis Clan MacCoinnich now. They raise the finest horses.” Horses. Shite. What the hell was he thinking? Why in God’s good name would the poor bedeviled girl care about horses? Duncan huffed out a frustrated snort. He didn’t fare well with the calming of poor frightened lasses. Charming them? Aye—at least, most the time. Lessening their fears? Not so much. What else might he say to put her at ease and get her to trust him?

  The screen of leaves and saplings behind which the lass had hidden ceased their trembling. Either she was listening to everything he said, or she had fainted dead away. Duncan feared it was the latter. “What be your name, lass?”

  A hard, stabbing point poked him right between his shoulder blades with enough thrust to arch his back and encourage him to lift his hands into the air. He risked a glance back, regretting that decision as the steel point jabbed him harder.

  “Tilda Mackenzie,” came a weak whisper from behind him. “Hold ye fast for now, aye?” The girl’s voice rasped worse than a rusty hinge. With all her screaming and the damage to her throat, ’twas little wonder she could speak at all.

  “Tilda Mackenzie,” Duncan repeated, taking great care not to move nor to look back at her again. The lass’s state of mind could be hazardous to his own well-being. “’Tis my honor to meet ye, Mistress Tilda Mackenzie. A fine, courageous lassie, ye are. I only regret that I didna find ye sooner and save ye from such vile distress. I regret it sorely, I do.”

  “Ye may call me Tilda,” she whispered, still keeping the cutting point of whatever weapon she had found stuck hard into his back. “Pray tell did ye kill the other two rogues?”

  Duncan considered lying and telling her yes to save her from worrying but it had been his experience that such untruths always came back and bit him in the arse. That and the fact that the wee lass still held a very sharp weapon shoved into his back, and he had yet to discern her mindset or her intentions. “Nay, Mistress Mackenzie. The bastards slipped away. ’Tis sorry that I am, m’lady. I fear I failed ye.”

  “Tilda. My name is Tilda, ye ken? Not milady.” She poked him in the back once more for good measure at the reminder. “At least ye killed the one,” she rasped out, and the point digging into the center of his back slid away. She shuffled a wide arc around him, weapon held at the ready. She took up a stance in front of him, wearing his tunic pulled down over her ripped clothing, and his kilt wrapped around her shoulders. A British bayonet clenched in one hand, she white-knuckled the other hand to her chest, clutching his plaid tight around her. “For that task I thank ye and owe ye greatly.”

  Still keeping his hands aloft and well in sight, Duncan rose to his feet and gave her a polite nod. “Ye owe me nothing, m’lady. No gentleman wouldha turned his back on a lady in such distress.”

  “Call me Tilda, ye ken?” Her bottom lip, split and bloody, quivered as she hitched in a sharp breath. Her eyes, a rare turquoise color, rendered all the more startling by their red rims, shimmered with renewed tears. “’Tis my true dismay to inform ye that gentlemen are few in this part of Scotland. Or at least, that has been my experience of late.” She wavered to one side, stumbling as though about to fall.

  Duncan reached out to catch her.

  “Dinna touch me!” She reeled to one side, holding the bayonet at the ready.

  He took a step back and motioned toward his horse. “I have water. Not verra much but some. Tied to my saddle. Pray let me fetch it for ye,
aye?”

  The lass looked about to faint. Her dark hair, more than likely once pulled back in a braided bun but now ragged and frazzled, hung down across one of her shoulders. His tunic, overlarge for her small yet curvy frame, reached to the hem of her skirts that peeped out from under the edges of his plaid she held hugged around herself. A bruised swelling was forming high on one of her pale cheeks and the raw mark around her throat was oozing fresh blood. She needed a serious settling before they set off to find her help.

  “Water, lass,” he repeated in the gentlest tone he could manage. “Sit ye down whilst I fetch it for ye, aye?”

  She shook her head with a quivering jerk, her troubled gaze shifting over to the dead man. “Nay. Dinna leave me here.”

  He held out his hand, “Then come, Lady Tilda.”

  Her attention pulled away from the dead soldier and shifted to Duncan’s extended hand. Her entire body shook. Duncan prayed she’d find the strength to take his help. The poor lass sorely needed it.

  “Just…Tilda, aye?”

  “Aye.” He nodded, waiting with his hand held out. “Tilda.”

  With a hitching intake of breath, she kept the bayonet clutched in one hand and hugged to her chest whilst she slid the bruised and bloodied fingers of her other hand into his. “Your name again?” she whispered as she eased closer but still kept an arm’s length of distance between them.

  “Duncan.” He gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “Duncan MacCoinnich at your service.”

  With the gentlest of pulls, he led her to his horse. “And this fine lad is Rab.”

  At the sound of his name, the beast tossed his head and grumbled out a friendly whicker. The horse resettled his stance and nudged his nose into Duncan’s hand, snuffling for a treat.