by Willa Blair
“Who do ye fight for, Andrew?” Logen’s tone brooked no refusal, no hesitation, but the man held his silence.
Anger, cold and deadly as a winter storm, rolled off of him. Coira glanced at Ross, the guard who’d stayed with the women. He scanned the woods around them. Had he heard something she’d missed? She moved closer. He was tense, but not expectant. Doing his job, then, being vigilant while Logen dealt with the traitor.
“Who?” Logen’s sharp demand rang through the forest and echoed harshly back to them.
“Gareth. And Alasdair. Others.”
The man swallowed and Coira wondered how he’d avoided getting cut. Despite his anger, Logen must have lifted his blade just enough to grant the man the ease to speak. And swallow.
“There’s more of us than ye ken.”
Coira flinched at that, but Logen’s determination to find out what the guard knew remained a steady, inevitable, force, like the incoming tide.
“Who’s in charge? Who is willing to kill again and again to control the clan?”
“Ye’ll never see him coming,” the prisoner scoffed. “The others didna. But yer return to the clan disrupted his plan. He’ll remove ye in his own good time.”
“Ye’ll tell me who he is.”
Andrew pursed his lips, considering, Coira supposed, whether he had a choice.
“I dinna think I shall.” With that, he jerked forward against Logen’s hold, causing the dirk’s sharp edge to bite deep into his throat. Blood sprayed around the blade as Logen jerked it back, too late.
Andrew dropped his sword and sank to his knees as blood pumped from the slice in his throat.
Logen cursed and tried to put pressure on the wound. There was too much blood. His hand kept slipping off.
Coira rushed forward to help, but the man was already dead.
Logen waved her back, finally allowing the body to topple to the side. He wiped his hands and dirk on the dead man’s clothes and stood, staring at the body. “What just happened?”
His words were spoken so softly Coira doubted anyone but she heard them. “Logen.” She uttered his name just as softly, shocked at the turn of events, saddened by the grief quickly washing away the vestiges of surprise and anger in him. She’d been wrong to deny him her help. If his life was at risk from men who would throw themselves on his blade to protect their leader and their conspiracy, then she had no choice. No matter what it cost her, she must help him.
He turned to face her and the others, his expression grim. “He chose to die rather than give up the name of the person behind all the deaths, all the misery, in the clan since Flodden. Who among us commands that kind of loyalty, of sacrifice?”
Logen eyed the other guard. “Do ye ken?”
The man shook his head. “Whoever it is, they’re adept at staying in the background, laird. Pulling strings. I think he’s been studying ye, waiting, looking for weaknesses.”
“This is the second attempt on my life,” Logen answered. “Whoever is behind this has decided they’ve waited long enough.”
“I’ll be at yer back, laird. So will Darach. And a few others we’re sure of.”
“I’m glad of that. But how many does this puppet master have? Enough to divide the clan’s loyalties again?”
“I canna say...”
“No one can!”
Logen’s shout of frustration startled Coira into stepping back. The outburst, out of character for him, released some of his pent-up frustration. Given the circumstances, she couldn’t blame him, even though Elizabeth had flinched. The healer studied him through narrowed eyes.
“This clan is calm on the surface but deep currents run beneath it,” Logen continued quietly. “Rip tides. Much more and they’ll tear the clan apart. We must put a stop to this.”
“How, laird?”
“By rounding up the men this poor soul named. And their close kin and associates. Someone must be found to answer for what they’ve done to the clan.” He gave the dead man one more glance before gathering them with a gesture. “Come on, we’ve work to do.”
****
Coira studied the men lined up below where Logen stood at the high table. The men Logen had detained. Darach and the remaining guard from their escort into the woods, Ross, along with a few other trustworthy men, stood on either side of the accused men with weapons drawn, eyeing the suspects.
The rest of the clan listened to Logen relate what the guard who’d attacked him in the woods had revealed before killing himself on Logen’s blade.
The entire scene was a mummery intended to give Coira the opportunity to use her gift against each man. She could not walk past them in the dungeon without raising questions about her presence she did not wish to answer. Nor did Logen want her ability revealed, not before all this ended, and preferably never. So she stood to the side near the front of the crowd, struggling to sift the impressions she received while she protected herself as best she could from the uproar of emotions behind her.
Were these men the ones Logen sought? Her impressions might give Logen the leverage he needed. He hoped pressure applied to the weakest among them might result in confessions that implicated the others in their conspiracy and identified the leader. Otherwise, he wouldn’t know whom to trust, whom to believe, or how widely the conspiracy had infected the men of the clan.
One woman’s cries distracted her from the general sense of shock and anger piling up like a wall of storm clouds. She couldn’t be sure unless she heard the woman speak, but she got the sense it was the soft-voiced one she’d overheard in the garden. The one who seemed to know something. If she wept for one of the men now facing the clan, she had indeed known more than she had revealed to her shrill friend.
Coira shrugged off the distraction and rebuilt her dunes at her back, blocking the storm of emotions coming from the people behind her. Then she imagined a narrow beach between her and the surging sea of emotions coming from the men Logen accused, giving her some distance from their pain. She allowed their feelings to wash over her, one by one. A few were fearful, watching their guards and expecting, she supposed, to meet death at the hands of their outraged laird. Several were red-faced, their angry glances darting around the room. Angry at Logen? At being held captive before the entire clan? At being accused, though they were innocent? She couldn’t tell. A few more, whose eyes remained downcast, radiated shame. Some of those might be redeemable, if Logen chose to give them a second chance.
Only one man stood out. In appearance, he seemed little different from the others. He waited calmly, quietly, eyes cast down, but Coira sensed amusement bubbling within him. Beneath his passive surface, he hid arrogance, irritation, and condescension…and a cold calculation.
He had to be the leader. If he was accustomed to ordering assassinations and causing chaos, Coira imagined he would be confident of his men’s loyalty—or their fear of him—to protect his identity.
Coira caught Logen’s gaze as it passed over her and nodded minutely at that man.
Suddenly, one of the other prisoners crumpled. The distraction was all the man Coira suspected of being the leader needed. He shoved the men beside him toward the guards moving to aid the fallen man, then before anyone could react, he pulled the dirk from the nearest guard’s belt and dodged around a table, grabbing the lass nearest at hand out of the crowd.
Terror pierced Coira like the blade the man held to the lass’s throat, freezing Coira where she stood. The horror of seeing her own actions played out before her nearly sent her to her knees, but she forced herself to stay on her feet, wary, as the guards sorted out the other prisoners.
Logen jumped down from the high table’s platform and slowly approached the grim-faced leader. “MacMakon, what do ye think ye’re doing? Let the lass go!”
Logen’s voice cut through Coira’s shock. She took a breath.
Some women slowly pulled the remaining children away from the confrontation as the men in the crowd moved toward it. To Coira, it felt like a tide, surging and
receding. Logen waved them to stillness.
“Keep back!” MacMakon glared at the men near him, most of whom were fingering their weapons. Then he turned his attention back to Logen, who still stood too far away to reach him. “Dinna try it. I’ll cut her throat if any of ye takes another step.”
Coira closed her eyes to the scene before her and focused on MacMakon’s voice. What she sensed chilled her. He wasn’t afraid! He kept his excitement hidden, but it churned like turbulence deep below the surface. He was enjoying the confrontation with Logen and the rapt attention of the clan. Coira opened her eyes and studied the hand that held the dirk. Aye, she could see a fine tremor, evidence of his exhilaration.
“If ye dinna wish to die right here,” Logen told him, “ye’ll let the lass go.”
“I’ll let her go when I’m outside the gates.”
“Do ye think I’ll let ye leave? Or trust ye to release her? Nay, she’s just a bairn. Let her be.”
“Get my horse ready to ride. I’ll no’ tell ye twice.”
Coira took a step closer, dismay making her belly roil. Could she calm him? Lull him into dropping the blade? She would try anything to save the lass, but she had to control herself first—the very thing she’d been unable to do that awful night in the Lathan hall.
After a deep breath, she stepped forward before anyone else could react. “Let her go. Take me instead.”
She felt the spike of surprise of the people in the room like spray splashing off of rocks. And Logen’s fear for her—an arc of lightning in a stormy sky. His gaze cut to hers, then back to the man he faced.
“Nay,” Logen waved her back. “Ye willna. No one will leave here.”
She ignored Logen’s order. She would save this lass to make up for what she had done at the Lathan keep. Her memory of the horror of that night overlaid what she saw now with her own eyes. Her hands trembled as she reached out to the lass. “Come away. I will take yer place.” She locked gazes with MacMakon. “I will ride with ye until ye are a safe distance from the keep.”
She fought to keep her voice low and calm, to find the lassitude that might ease the tension in the room. If anyone else rushed MacMakon, the lass would die before Coira could free her. She pictured the sea, flat and calm, the cloudless blue sky, nary a breeze to ruffle her hair.
As her belly settled, MacMakon’s tremors stilled. The lass in his arms looked heavy-lidded, ready to fall asleep, where moments before she had been wide-eyed with terror.
“Coira…”
She kept her gaze on MacMakon. She dared not look at Logen. All her effort must remain focused on the man and the child.
“Please release her,” she pleaded. “Ye can take me. We’ll walk out to the bailey. I willna fight ye. No’ a man will stop us.”
She sensed Logen moving nearer to her, but keeping his distance, not threatening MacMakon. Aye, Logen remembered, and knew what she was trying to do.
“Ye’ll slow my mount. The lass is lighter.”
Logen’s voice broke the sudden stillness. “Ye lads, go saddle his horse,” he commanded. “Quickly now.”
“It’s being done,” Coira assured MacMakon, never taking her gaze from his. She felt his tension ebb as his shoulders dropped and the blade moved a finger’s width away from the lass’s throat. Coira took a slow step forward. When MacMakon failed to react, she took another. She got close enough to touch him. But dare she do that, yet?
“Let the lass go. I am here.”
Suddenly, MacMakon shoved the child aside and grabbed Coira’s arm, pulling her close and laying the dirk’s blade against her neck. “Verra well. If the laird doesna want ye to go with me, then ye must be important enough to him to ensure he’ll do what I say.”
Time seemed to stop. Coira shoved aside her fear, took a breath and touched his wrist, as though seeking to defend herself, where his sleeve slid back to expose skin. She had braced against the flood of emotions, so she was able to maintain her composure, at least on the surface. She exhaled and slowed her breathing even further, seeking to regain the calm the touch of cold steel against her throat had disrupted. Calm, flat water. Not a hint of air moving over the dunes. Bright sunlight in a cloudless sky.
She and MacMakon stood that way for several minutes, until one of the lads Logen had sent for the horse ran back into the room. “’Tis ready, laird.”
“We can go,” Coira said, so softly she imagined only the man at her back could hear her. She met Logen’s worried gaze with a slight nod, careful of the sharp edge at her throat.
“Move yer men aside, laird,” MacMakon said. “Ye have the lass. And I have this one. Which one would ye have preferred to lose?”
Logen tensed and Coira didn’t need her new sense to know he was poised to answer MacMakon’s taunt with a refusal. If he did, MacMakon would likely kill her. Logen knew it. She held Logen’s gaze, not daring to narrow her eyes at him where others could see and react when he did nothing.
“We’re leaving.” MacMakon’s sudden statement startled her, but she fought for calm and breathed. At Logen’s gesture, the clan stepped to either side of the hall, opening an aisle through the middle. MacMakon lifted the blade from her skin and nudged her forward.
Nudged. Not shoved. Coira tamped down on her elation. She moved slowly, as if fearful of jostling the blade near her throat, buying time to judge how well her attempt was working. MacMakon did nothing to hurry her along. As they approached the spot where Logen stood by, she held his gaze and inclined her head ever so slightly. Did he understand what she’d done? He mirrored her slight movement. Aye, he did.
As she came abreast of him, Logen struck, first knocking the blade from MacMakon’s hand then delivering another blow that crumpled him to the floor, out cold. It had taken only seconds. Then Logen’s arms wrapped around her, speeding her heart. He pulled her out of the way as Darach and Ross surged forward to haul MacMakon to his feet and hustle him and his fellow conspirators to the dungeon.
“Ye brave lass!” A woman’s declaration pierced the low rumble of voices filling the hall as the men were led out. “Aye, she saved the bairn,” said another.
“Brave, aye. And foolish.” Logen’s voice in her ear was a balm to her senses as the rising tide of approval threatened to bring her to tears.
She hadn’t done this for the clan’s approval. She’d done it to atone for threatening another lass, not so long ago. But the people cheering for her now must never know that.
“Ye couldha been killed,” Logen scolded softly as the noise in the hall increased.
“Nay, I dinna think so.”
“Ye calmed him like ye did those women outside the garden, aye? Ye didna need me. Ye wouldha escaped him easily once ye got away from other people.” Logen’s simple statement thrilled her. Not only his acceptance of her ability but his confidence in her.
“Aye. It worked. He didna even try to defend himself against ye.”
Logen touched her arm and gestured to the side, then remained silent as a woman led the lass MacMakon had threatened to Coira.
“Thank the lady,” the woman told her.
“Thank ye, lady.”
Coira nearly lost the girl’s high, lilting voice in the din, but her confusion was clear. She dropped to her knees and hugged the child. “All is well, lass. What is yer name?”
“Oona, lady.”
“Oona, the bad man will never come near ye again.” She took the child’s face in her hands and touched foreheads with her, doing all she could to project calm water, clear sky, peace. “Now, how do ye fare?”
“I’m sleepy.”
“That is as it should be. Go on to yer rest then. Ye are a brave lass, Oona.”
She stood and watched the woman lead the girl away. Had Aileana done something to soothe the lass Coira had threatened? Coira hoped so.
Finally, Logen called for order and the rumble of conversation quieted down. The mood in the hall seemed much improved. Even friendly. Coira wasn’t sure what to make of that. She found a s
eat on a nearby bench and listened as Logen assured the clan that those found innocent would be released back to their kin very soon.
Then the hall cleared as everyone scattered to their duties. Coira wondered what their mood would be when they returned for the evening meal, but perhaps by then, Logen would release some of the men. For now, she needed to tell Logen what she’d learned about the other men as well as what she’d discovered while in MacMakon’s clutches.
Instead, she made her way out of the hall into the bailey and around to the garden. When they’d planned for her to study each of the men, Logen had warned her not to approach him in the hall afterward and give others cause to suspect her of condemning the accused men. As it turned out, she didn’t think anyone would notice if she and Logen continued to talk. But she couldn’t take the chance of being overheard, so she kept to their plan.
She tried the gate’s latch and acted as if it still stuck, even though the smith had fixed it two days before. But appearing to wrestle with it gave her the excuse she needed to go back into the keep. Anyone who followed her would suppose she sought the smith, who had stayed in the hall with a few of the men, discussing the situation over a cup of ale. In truth, she would meet Logen, as they’d planned, in Mhairi’s private chamber next to the nursery. His solar would become a gathering place for those who wished to argue for the release of their kin. And she still felt he could not be seen near her chamber, so she would wait for him where her presence in the hallway was accepted and unremarkable. By the time Logen dismissed the petitioners, Mhairi would be watching over the bairns napping in the nursery, and they could talk privately.
An hour later, Logen slipped quietly through the door.