Highland Destiny

by Hannah Howell

  “Because she is in pain, ye great fool. Why, she might even die if she doesnae get some help.”

  “What matter that? The lass is for the scaffold in but a few hours.”

  Maldie inwardly cursed. She had not considered that complication. At Donncoill no one had wanted her harmed, so they had been more than willing to get her all she needed to stay hale and happy. Here everyone knew she was soon to hang, that she was as good as dead, and a dead woman did not need any pampering. Then Eric began to speak in a cold, commanding voice, and she decided she needed to have more confidence in the boy.

  “I think Beaton would want her to still be alive when he hangs her,” Eric said. “Aye, alive and fully aware of her impending death. He wants to send her to hell and he willnae be verra pleased if he learns that ye sat by, idle and uncaring, whilst she took herself to that blighted place. If ye value your ugly hide at all, ye had best fetch her a woman to tend to her.”

  Maldie heard the guard curse, then hurry away. She waited a moment before looking to be sure he had gone. When she finally looked straight at Eric his eyes widened as he stared at her. She knew she would not have to waste much time in explanations.

  “I am not ill, Eric,” she reassured him, watching and listening closely for the guard’s return. “This is how I got out of Donncoill. He will be bringing me a maid in a moment and when he unlocks the door to let her in, we must be ready for him.”

  “’Twill be two against two,” Eric said, frowning slightly as he considered their chances. “That is a verra big mon, and neither of us is verra large.”

  “’Twill be us against him. The maid will do naught. All we must do with her is make sure that she doesnae get free and cry out an alarum. The guard must be rendered useless enough so that we can get past him, out of this cursed cage, and lock him up within it.”

  “I understand.”

  “Good, for he is returning.”

  Maldie wished they had had more time to make a plan. Neither of them really knew what the other would do. It was going to take a great deal of luck to get free. She took another deep breath and firmly told herself not to worry as she returned to her act of being in severe pain. Eric was a clever lad. Even in the short time they had been together, he had proven that time and time again. She would put her trust in his instincts.

  The door opened, Maldie heard the soft rustle of skirts move toward her, then heard the guard bellow. She looked up, saw that the plump young maid was not watching her, and moved quickly to take advantage of that. She grabbed the maid by the arm and, when the woman turned toward her, punched her. The woman grunted once and started to fall. Maldie shoved the maid toward the cot, let her slump over the thin, hay-stuffed mat, and then turned toward the cell door.

  Eric was clinging to the guard’s back like a tenacious child. His slim arms were wrapped tightly around the man’s thick neck and his long legs encircled the guard’s soft waist. Beaton’s man was trying desperately to shake free of the boy, slamming him up against the thick iron bars and the stone walls and clawing at Eric’s arms. One look at the pale, strained expression upon Eric’s face told Maldie that the boy would not be able to hold on much longer.

  It was not easy to get a clean swing at the man as he thrashed around the tiny cell, waving his arms to keep her at a distance and then trying yet again to loosen Eric’s grip. Then the man began to stagger, Eric’s tight hold on his neck finally making it too hard to breathe. The guard’s eyes closed as he gasped for air and frantically tore at Eric’s arms. Maldie made her move. She hit the guard on his very prominent jaw as hard as she could. She heard Eric curse as the man stumbled backward and hit the wall, but he did not go down. She hit him again, echoing Eric’s curse as pain shot through her arm, but this time she succeeded. Eric barely got off the guard in time as the man took a few steps toward a rapidly retreating Maldie, then reeled and fell, banging his head on the filthy stone floor with a loud, sickening thud.

  “Are ye alright, Eric?” she asked as she hurried to the boy’s side.

  “I dinnae think there is one part of me that doesnae ache, but ’twill pass,” Eric replied, wincing as he looked over the torn sleeves of his shirt and his badly scratched and bruised arms. “Some clean water to wash in wouldnae be amiss, either.”

  “True, but that will probably be a long while in coming.” Maldie gently flexed the fingers of the hand she had hit the guard with. It was going to be livid with bruising, but she was sure it was not broken. “He was a hard mon to knock down.”

  “Do ye think he is dead? He hit the floor dangerously hard.”

  Cautiously, Maldie approached the prone man and checked him for any signs of life, finding a strong pulse in his throat. “He still lives. Come, we had best get out of here.”

  Eric groaned softly as he followed her to the door, his body protesting every move he made. “Are we going to lock them in here?”

  “But of course,” Maldie answered even as she picked up the key the guard had dropped when Eric had jumped on him, then shut the heavy door of the cell. “We cannae be sure how long either of them will be resting.” She locked the door and tossed the key aside then looked up the steep, narrow stone steps that led to the great hall. “I just wish that we kenned another way to get out of here.”

  “There is probably some bolt hole only Beaton himself kens about,” said Eric, as he crept up the stairs and listened at the thick oak door at the top. “I cannae believe the mon would leave himself without some way to escape his many enemies. I fear I havenae been able to learn of it, so we must take our chances this way.”

  When Eric suddenly tensed, then looked at her with wide eyes, Maldie felt her heart skip with alarm and she hurried up the steps to stand behind him. “What is wrong?” she whispered.

  “I think we may have more to worry about than who might be lurking in the great hall.”

  Maldie quickly became aware of the sounds coming through the door. Even muffled by the thick wood, the clash of swords and the screams of wounded and dying men were easily recognizable. “A battle, and ’tis within the keep itself. Do ye think it is Balfour?”

  “We had best pray that it is, or we shall be in as much danger from Beaton’s foes as from his followers.”

  Her heart pounding loudly with fear, Maldie squeezed past Eric and eased the heavy door open enough to peer inside of the great hall. No one was there, but the sounds of battle were certainly coming from some place close at hand. Then she heard a bellowed war cry and felt her heart stop briefly with hope and anticipation. She looked back at Eric and could see from the stunned look upon his face that he had also heard that exhuberant Murray yell.

  She had asked Eric to pray that they could get out of their cell and that Balfour would choose today to attack, but the request had mostly been made in jest. Fate was clearly smiling widely on her and Eric today. Maldie tried not to grow too sure of success or safety for they were still within the keep and, although she could hear Balfour and his men and knew that they had a good chance of victory now that they had entered Beaton’s very walls, they were nowhere to be seen. There was a lot of Dubhlinn surrounding them, and there might well be a lot of Beaton’s men between the great hall and the safety of the Murray camp.

  “’Tis Balfour,” said Eric as he followed Maldie into the great hall. “The Murrays have actually gotten within the gates this time. Victory is assured. We are free!” He hugged Maldie and laughed.

  “I think I must ask ye to pray for things more often,” she teased and returned his quick grin. “Hold,” she ordered, and grabbed him by the arm when he started to hurry away from her.

  “But ’tis the Murrays out there. We will be safe now.”

  “Aye, we will be once we can get to one who isnae fighting for his life and can set us somewhere safe. We must tread warily for now, however, for we dinnae ken what lies between us and them.”

  “Weel, now, everyone told me that ye were a clever lass,” drawled a deep, raspy voice that chilled Maldie’s blood
, and she turned to face one very large, sword-wielding obstacle between her and Eric and the doors leading out of the great hall.

  “It seems I should listen to ye more often,” murmured Eric, “for ’tis clear that ye can often be right.”

  “Weel, this is one time I really wish I wasnae.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Ah, ’tis George,” Maldie said, and tried to smile at the scowling man. “Have ye come to surrender to us then?”

  “Surrender?” George bellowed as he moved toward her and Eric. “I have come to kill you, ye black-haired bitch. This is all your doing.”

  “My doing? How can that be? I am but a wee lass, George. I cannae command an army.”

  “Nay? Ye arrive at Dubhlinn and, for the first time in thirteen long years, the Murrays get in through our gates. It all seems verra clear to me. This be all your fault.”

  Maldie wondered how long she could keep the man talking. His attention was fully fixed upon her, and she could feel that Eric was cautiously moving away from her side. As long as she could hold all of George’s interest, Eric had a chance to do something to hinder the man’s clear intent to kill her. Although she was not sure what a slender youth could do against a man the size of George, she was more than willing to give Eric a chance to try. And if they were truly fortunate, a Murray might just happen by to rescue them. It sounded as if there were plenty of them around.

  “Now, George, I dinnae think that ye are seeing too clearly,” she continued, catching a glimpse of Eric sidling toward the weapons still hanging on the walls, evidence that the Murrays had indeed caught the Beatons completely by surprise. “I was here once before, if ye recall, and the Murrays were soundly defeated, sent back to Donncoill like whipped dogs. If I was truly the one behind this defeat, why didnae I help the Murrays the last time they rode against you?”

  George frowned and hesitated, then vigorously shook his head. “Nay. Ye try to trick me. Ye werenae here when the Murrays were beaten back. I ken it weel, for ’twas when we stole the laddie. Ye werenae here then, for I had been searching for ye the whole day. Everyone I asked told me that ye had gone away. Ye went away to help the Murrays.”

  A soft screech of surprise and alarm escaped her when George suddenly charged straight at her. She darted out of his way as fast as she could, but he was still able to slash at her skirts with his sword. Running was not the most clever of defenses but, since she had no weapon, Maldie decided it would have to do for now. Using the tables, chairs, and benches in the great hall, Maldie tried to always keep something between her and the heartily cursing George. Eric was still trying desperately to get a weapon off the wall that he could use, and she needed to gain him the time to do so.

  Maldie leapt upon the huge head table and watched as George stood at the side of it, glaring at her and breathing heavily. She suspected it was not the safest place in the great hall, but she was also out of breath. She had already stumbled twice and knew that a fall could prove fatal. Each time she had tried to get to the doors, George had been between her and them. Each time she had tried to reach one of the weapons on the wall, George had been there. For just a moment she needed to stand still. If she watched him closely, she was sure there was enough room upon the table for her to elude his sword.

  “Ye should be out there with the others trying to save Dubhlinn,” she said, “not in here chasing a wee lass and a young boy.”

  “I am nay interested in the lad,” George replied. “He is Beaton’s brat. If a Beaton sword doesnae cut him down to keep him from gaining Dubhlinn, then as soon as the Murrays ken that he is a Beaton and not one of their own, one of them will end his life. And this battle has already been won by the Murrays. Once they got within the gates, Dubhlinn was doomed to fall. I will linger here only long enough to kill you, and then I shall search for safer lands.”

  It took Maldie a moment to grasp the full importance of what George had just said. “Ye ken that Eric is Beaton’s child?”

  “Aye, he carries the mark.”

  “How would ye ken that? Were ye his nurse or midwife?” She quickly pressed her lips together. It was not wise to insult a man with a sword.

  “I was one of the men told to leave the bairn on the hillside to die.” He shrugged. “I kenned that Beaton had a mark and was curious to see if he was right about the child.”

  “But Beaton doesnae ken the truth.”

  “Nay, the fool. He was too enraged to e’en look at the bairn. Once he kenned that his wee whore of a wife had bedded down with the old Murray laird, he was blinded to the truth. Ere Beaton took it into his head to claim the lad as his own, even a whisper about the boy could get ye killed. I decided to hold fast to what I had learned. Only the lad’s mother kenned the truth, and mayhap the midwife, but neither of them lived long enough to tell anyone. Beaton made verra sure of that.”

  “Of what use is it to ken such a truth and keep it to yourself for all these years?”

  “I was waiting for that bastard Calum to slip from favor with our laird, and then I would have used it to take his place. Now, it doesnae matter. ’Tis useless. Both Calum and our laird will soon be dead, and I shall be back to selling my sword to whoever has a wee bit of coin. I had a good life here, and ye stole it all away from me, ye bitch.”

  He swung his sword at her and Maldie barely escaped having her feet cut off at the ankles. As he prepared to strike at her a second time, she did the only thing she could think of. She kicked him as hard as she could, bringing her foot up under his chin. George screamed, dropping his sword as he clutched at his jaw. Blood trickled out of the corners of his mouth, and Maldie wondered if he had lost a few of his teeth or even a bit of his tongue. She kicked him again, full in the face.

  George was thrust back by the force of the blow. An odd look of horror and surprise crossed his face, and he looked down at his chest. Maldie followed his gaze and gasped. The tip of a sword blade was protruding from his thickly padded jupon. He started to fall forward and she heard a soft curse from behind him. The sword point disappeared and George fell to the floor. Behind him stood Eric, pale, wide-eyed, and holding a bloodied sword in his two hands.

  “Oh, Eric,” she murmured as she hopped down from the table and took the sword from his hands.

  “He was going to kill you,” Eric whispered, wiping the sweat from his brow with a shaking hand.

  “That he was. Now, set that truth firmly in your mind and ye willnae suffer for doing this.” She started to gently pull him toward the doors, eager to escape the great hall before anyone else arrived.

  “I shouldnae suffer at all for killing one of the enemy. I am to be a knight when I am one and twenty. I believe they must kill the enemy from time to time.”

  She was glad to hear that hint of his sharp wit, even though there was still a tremor in his voice. He would recover from the horror of killing George. It was a shame that he had had to kill his first man before he had even really begun his training as a knight, but there had really been no choice at all. George had seen that all he had built was falling down around him, and he had decided she was the reason he was losing everything. He had needed someone to blame, someone to pay for that loss with blood. If Eric had not killed the man, George would have killed her. She was sorry for the shock and pain Eric was suffering, but not for the fact that he had killed that man.

  “Beaton killed my mother,” Eric said quietly.

  “So George said,” Maldie answered, keeping a close watch for any armed Beaton as she headed for the iron-studded door that led to the bailey.

  “And George was the one who left me out to die.”

  “Aye, on Beaton’s orders.” She knew he was simply saying aloud all of the reasons why it was simple justice to kill George. “And George did it even after he learned that there was no reason to, that ye really were Beaton’s son.”

  Eric grunted as, once outside of the door, Maldie shoved him up against the wall. She was sorry to add to the many bruises he had, but the bailey was crow
ded with fighting men and, until she could see a clear path to the gates, she wanted the youth protected and unseen in the shadows near the high walls of the keep. After only a moment of watching the battle, one the Beatons were clearly losing, she decided that there was no safe way to get to the gates. They could not continue to cower near the door either. She cursed.

  “What is wrong?” asked Eric, looking around the bailey and trying to see if there was anyone he recognized and could call out to. “’Tis nay easy to ken who is who in this melee, is it?”

  “Nay. ’Tis nay easy to see a clear and safe path to the gates either.”

  “We cannae stay here.”

  “I ken it. It may be sheltered now, but with so many armed men about, ones who are eager to kill and others who are desperate to flee the killing, it willnae be safe for long.”

  “Then we had best run for our lives.”

  Before she could stop him, Eric darted around her, grabbed her by the hand, and ran toward the gates. Maldie held tightly to the sword she carried and prayed she would not be forced to use it. It was madness to run straight through the heart of a fierce battle, but she had had no choices to give the boy, and no time to think of any. She noticed that they were not the only ones fleeing either.

  When Eric abruptly halted, she bumped into his back and cursed. They were only feet from the gates, but set firmly between them and freedom stood a bloodied Calum. He smiled and she felt her blood run cold. Ignoring Eric’s sharp protest, she yanked on the boy’s arm and set herself between him and Calum.

  “I am no coward to hide behind a lass’s skirts,” Eric muttered.

  “This lass holds a sword and ye are unarmed,” she said, not taking her eyes off Calum.

  “Ye can barely lift the weapon, child,” Calum said. “’Twill be too easy to cut ye down and then the boy.”

  “If it will be so easy, then why do ye hesitate?” she asked, aiming the sword at him and feeling the weight of it all the way up her arms. Maldie was not sure she could even swing such a large weapon, and the coldly amused look in Calum’s eyes told her that he did not think so either.