He followed her eyes down to the knife, which he had forgotten about, and then back up to her face, which was drawn and white, her eyes enormous and despairing. She stood in his grasp, all resistance gone.
“I can’t bear it any more, Alex,” she whispered. “I haven’t got the courage to do it myself. If you won’t let me go, for God’s sake show some mercy and put me out of my misery.”
He stared at her for a long moment, his eyes wide with shock as he realised what she was asking him to do, and that she meant it. Then he let go of her arm and slowly backed away from her, two steps, three, before turning and walking silently away.
She watched him go without really seeing him, then she sank down onto the frosty grass, wrapped her arms round her knees and stared blindly at nothing until, finally, the tears came.
She had no idea how long she sat like that, hugging her knees, rocking back and forth, the tears pouring silently down her face, but when she finally recovered enough to struggle to her feet, she knew she could not face anyone else, not yet. Instead she set off walking aimlessly across the moorland, taking no note of the direction she was heading in.
She did not really want to die. But neither did she want to live, not like this. She couldn’t have what she truly wanted, and he wouldn’t let her leave him, although surely he must know that would be for the best? Surely he must be hurting too? She had seen a flicker of pain in his eyes before he had let her go. Or maybe she had just imagined it. She looked around. The sky was grey, the clouds threatening snow, the landscape brown, the distant hills dark and brooding. The cause was lost. There was no point to anything any more. They would all just keep marching through the snow until they died, or until Cumberland caught up with them.
She looked down at her feet, at the worn leather shoes, and focussed all her attention on just putting one foot in front of the other, as she often did in the last miles of a long day’s march when she was tired. She was not tired now. Just weary, unutterably weary, and heartsick. She walked away from the stream, over a frozen field and into a sparse woodland, the dead leaves sodden underfoot muffling her steps.
So it was that she came upon the two poachers before either of them were aware of her approach. She stopped, and stared for a minute at the thin dark-haired man dressed in rags who was expertly skinning a deer, his arms covered to the elbows with blood. The other man, equally ragged but with lighter hair, was relieving himself against a tree. The three of them stared at each other for maybe five seconds before the danger signal reached Beth’s leaden brain, galvanising her limbs. She turned and started to run, fumbling at her waist for her knife, remembering belatedly that Angus had taken it to the cutler to be sharpened. Then her legs were swept from under her and she hit the ground with a force that drove all the breath from her lungs.
The light-haired man flipped her over, then sat down heavily on her legs, capturing her wrists when they were mere inches from his face, her fingers rigid as she sought to gouge his eyes. Then, confident that he was in no more danger, he sat back to observe his prize, which stared defiantly back at him. His eyes lit up with appreciation, then he glanced across at his companion, who once he was sure they were safe, was continuing with his task.
“What dae I do now?” The light-haired man asked.
“Kill her,” the other man answered without looking up.
Beth’s captor looked down at her, running his eyes over her breasts.
“That’d be a shame. She’s awfu’ bonny,” he said regretfully.
“Fuck her then if ye want, and then kill her,” the skinner said impatiently. “But be quick about it, whatever ye do. I need ye to help me wi’ cutting up the meat.”
The light-haired man transferred both Beth’s wrists to one hand, then, very gently, he stroked her cheek and smiled. He seemed a little simple-minded. Her mind raced.
“Please let me go,” she said. “I won’t say I’ve seen you, I promise.”
The skinner froze and looked across at her.
“Jesus Christ!” he said, rising to his feet. “She’s a Sasannach! Tae hell wi’ fucking her. Kill her now, and let’s away.” He looked around as though expecting an army of redcoats to come charging through the trees at any minute.
“No!” she cried. “I’m not…”
Her protest was cut off abruptly by her captor’s hand, which closed over her mouth. She fought like one possessed, desperately trying to free her hands, but while the light-haired man might be weak of mind, he was far from weak in body. The other man walked across and standing above them looked down at her dispassionately as she struggled, her chest heaving with the effort. Her scarf had come untied and the man bent down, winding a strand of her hair round his bloody fingers.
“Aye, ye’re right,” he said, “she’s bonny. But we havena the time. Here, I’ll do it, if ye canna.” He lifted the knife, still dripping blood from the deer, and Beth closed her eyes tight and waited for the death she now realised she did not want, not at all, even if Alex never spoke to her again.
There was a strange low-pitched whistling sound, followed by a dull thud and a low moan. Something warm and wet spattered across her face, and her mouth and hands were suddenly free. She opened her eyes in time to see the light-haired man topple slowly sideways onto the grass, his lower body still trapping hers, his mouth working silently. For a moment she thought he was having a fit of some sort, and then she sat up and looked around and saw his companion’s headless body lying nearby, blood still spurting from the neck. The head was a few yards away, the eyes staring sightlessly up at the grey sky.
Beth turned her face away and was very sick into a small pile of leaves by her side. Then she wiped her face with her hand, saw that it was red and realised what it was that had pattered across her face, and was sick again.
By the time she had finished Alex had reappeared, emerging silently into the clearing, bloody sword in hand, his eyes scanning through the trees.
“It’s all right, there were only two of them,” she said shakily, sitting up properly now. The light-haired man was trembling slightly, his legs jerking. Alex stepped lightly across to her and wiped his sword on a corner of his plaid before sheathing it. Then he bent down and heaved the wounded man off Beth’s legs before drawing his dirk and cutting the man’s throat, calmly and efficiently.
There followed a moment’s silence during which Beth thought she would be sick yet again, though there was nothing left in her stomach to bring up, and then Alex was kneeling at her side, wiping her face and running his hands over her body, feeling for wounds, for broken bones.
“Where are ye hurt?” he said sharply. “What did they do to ye?”
“I’m not. Nothing,” she said. “They were going to… but then…and so I closed my eyes…and…and…” she looked up at him, and he stopped his examination as though her words had made perfect sense.
He ran his hand through his hair then looked at her, his eyes wild, his breathing shallow and fast.
“When I saw the blood, I thought…Oh Christ almighty,” he said, “I thought I’d lost ye.”
He wrapped his arms suddenly around her, crushing her to him in an embrace that was far more painful than anything the poachers had inflicted on her. Her neck was pulled back awkwardly, her arms trapped against his chest, her lower body twisted to one side. He buried his face in her hair, muttering incoherently and tightened his grip still more, so that she could hardly breathe. The ridiculous thought occurred to her that if he maintained this embrace for long he would kill her unintentionally, and if she could have drawn enough air into her lungs, she would have laughed out loud in pure joy. It didn’t matter if she died now. All that mattered was that he did not hate her. He could not hate her and behave so.
Duncan had been right. There was hope, after all.
After a while, too long and at the same time not long enough, he released her and sat back, his eyes damp, his breathing still ragged. She looked at him uncertainly, wanting to say something but terrified of s
aying the wrong thing. She began to shiver, from reaction and cold.
“Beth,” he said, “is there anything else ye havena tellt me that I should ken?”
Her heart sank at the harshness of his tone. She opened her mouth, but he laid his finger on her lips before she could speak.
“Because if there is, ye tell me now, whatever it is. If ye dinna and I find something else out later, I swear to God I’ll kill ye. I canna go through that again, d’ye understand me?” He took his finger from her lips and waited.
“Yes, I understand you,” she said calmly. “There is nothing else. There never will be anything else. You wouldn’t need to kill me if there was. I’d kill myself before I ever hurt you like that again. I couldn’t go through this again either, Alex.”
She looked into his dark blue eyes, the beautiful eyes with the flecks of gold hidden in their depths that were scrutinising her intently, searching for any sign that she might be lying to him. Then the long lashes fluttered down and when he lifted them again his expression had changed.
“Why did ye no’ tell me about Richard before, Beth?” he asked.
She looked away, saw the lifeless body of the light-haired poacher sprawled in the grass, and looked hurriedly back at Alex.
“I should have, I know,” she began.
“Duncan tellt me it wasna Richard ye were trying to protect by no’ telling me, but me. Is that true?”
“Yes,” she said. “I thought you might kill him in a rage and be hung for it. But Duncan told me you don’t kill on impulse.” Her eyes flickered to the bodies again and away.
“Aye, Duncan’s right,” Alex said. “I kill when there’s need. Or to protect those I love, or for revenge when I’m justified, but never on impulse.”
“You’re justified in killing Richard,” she said.
He nodded. She wanted to reach out to him again, to feel his arms around her, be sure that this was not just a dream, but she was still nervous, afraid he would reject her if she did.
“How did you find me?” she asked instead. “I’ve no idea where I am. I just went wandering off after…after the river.”
“I came back,” he said. “To tell ye that I’d have words wi’ MacIain, tell him ye could go to him. Ye left tracks that a three-year-old could see. I followed ye. Ye went in a circle, more or less.” He looked at the two corpses. “Ye’re telling me the truth, that they didna interfere wi’ ye? I’ll no’ be angry wi’ ye if they did.”
“No,” she said. “I think the younger one wanted to, but he was a bit slow in the head. I told him I wouldn’t say anything if they let me go, and the other one heard I was English and panicked. I think he thought I was a redcoat’s wife or something. He was going to kill me, when you came and…stopped him.”
“Aye. I’ll bury them, as best I can, in a minute,” said Alex. “D’ye still want me to talk to MacIain? I will if you want.”
“No,” she said. “I don’t want that at all, unless you do. I want you to forgive me, for us to forget this ever happened, and for things to be like they were before. That’s what I want.”
They looked at each other for a long moment.
“I’m cold,” she said.
He reached across the space between them and took her in his arms.
It seemed only a very short time before Beth looked up and saw the small group of clansmen standing silently in the trees. She had surely only been cradled in Alex’s arms for a few minutes, absorbing his warmth, inhaling his unique masculine scent mingled with the smell of linen and wool. Yet the clouds had dispersed and the sun had moved across the sky, and her legs and feet were so cold she could no longer feel them.
The men looked at each other, at the two corpses, at the couple sitting in the grass, and then started to silently back away. Beth buried her head in Alex’s shoulder again.
“Seeing as ye’re here,” he said suddenly, startling her, “ye might as well make yourselves useful. Kenneth, Alasdair, ye can bury these two. And there’s a deer needs skinning and butchering. Angus, ye can do that, and Duncan.”
The men moved forward again, none of them questioning how Alex knew which of them was there when he had his back to them. He stood, lifting Beth with him, and turned to face them.
“Nae point in wasting good meat,” he said, nodding at the deer. “We can eat it tonight when we’re celebrating.”
Kenneth paused in the act of lifting the poacher’s head from the ground and grinned. He looked from Alex to Beth and back to Alex again, the head dangling from his enormous fist by its hair.
“Thank Christ for that,” he said. “Now if ye’ll stop being such a miserable bastard, we can stop walking on bloody eggshells whenever we’re near ye, and get back to normal.” He shifted his gaze from his chieftain to Beth. “Welcome back, lassie,” he said softly. “We’ve missed ye sorely.”
Beth blushed, and glanced past him to where Angus and Duncan were crouching over the deer, but looking at their brother and his wife. Angus grinned and Duncan winked at her. Then a smile spread slowly across his face which was reflected on Beth’s, before Alex carried her off through the trees to the clutch of MacGregor tents and a desperately needed warm fire.
She was come home. And it was the most wonderful feeling in the world.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
January 1746
Prince Charles Edward Stuart, having expressed the same sentiment six months ago, no longer felt he had come home and that it was a wonderful feeling to have done so. Nothing was going as he would have wished it to. Firstly they had turned back from Derby which had torn him apart, then the hoped-for encounter with Cumberland at Lancaster had not materialised. Now he had learnt that Carlisle had fallen to the duke. And to top it all, just when it looked as though there was finally going to be some action after all, his health had given way. It was unbearable.
Sitting in the cosy drawing room at Bannockburn House, sipping cinnamon-laced tea and staring moodily into the fire, Charles, unaccustomed to illness and weighed down by the depression that often follows a bout of influenza, cursed the fates that had given him such an obstinate, disrespectful lieutenant-general as Lord George Murray. That he was an experienced commander was beyond doubt. He had forgotten more about military strategy than Charles would ever know. The prince was under no illusions regarding his own inexperience in this field. But he could not understand why Lord George seemed determined to avoid battle at all costs. He just did not appreciate that sometimes you had to throw caution to the winds in order to gain victory. Maybe it was because he was old. The old did not have the imagination or vision of the young. They were set in their ways, cautious and arrogant. It was most trying.
There were compensations for being ill, though. One of the main ones being his nurse, the sweet-natured and attentive Clementina Walkinshaw, who had devoted the previous ten days exclusively to him. In the last two days he had felt recovered enough to repay her with small presents and chaste kisses inspired initially by gratitude for her devotion to him, but which had quickly flamed into more, and which this morning had become far from chaste.
But if he had hoped to divert himself from his problems in the compliant arms of Clementina, he had reckoned without his nemesis. During the period of his illness Lord George had burst in on him at regular intervals, even accosting him as he lay sweating and shivering in his bed, demanding that he do something about the decision-making process.
“If ye willna call any more councils, Your Highness,” he had said, “at least let me set up a committee of the regimental commanders, who will be empowered to take decisions at times of emergency such as this, when Your Highness isna fit to.”
His tone had made it very clear that he considered Charles unfit to make decisions at any time, whether sick or not, and the prince had felt incensed enough to rise from his bed and pen a lengthy response to what he considered to be an attack on his divine right to rule his men. He would always seek advice from Lord George, he had written angrily; but he would never resign h
is authority. To show he meant business, he had ordered that Stirling Castle be laid under siege, before returning to his sickbed and the tender ministrations of Clementina.
The siege commenced; trenches were dug and the heavy artillery brought up the Forth from Alloa with great difficulty, in driving rain and with diminishing provisions, and with the added threat of a possible landing from the Hanoverian army, now under the command of General Henry Hawley, the Duke of Cumberland having been temporarily recalled to London.
Deterred from landing at Alloa by the concentration of Jacobites there, Hawley, stationed in Edinburgh, prepared to move overland instead, sending some of his cavalry ahead to Linlithgow where there was a supply depot full of food and ammunition. The Highlanders were becoming increasingly restless, bored, and in consequence dangerous, having no interest whatsoever in the tedious business of siege warfare, so Lord George took the opportunity to relieve their boredom by staging a raid on Linlithgow, driving off the dragoons and taking possession of the much-needed supplies. In spite of this success it was clear that the rest of Hawley’s army was on the march and was not far behind. Lord George raced back to Stirling with his men.
It seemed the time had come, at last, for battle.
* * *
Plean Muir, 16th January 1746
“Christ,” said Robbie Og, sniffing miserably. “If I’d kent that this is what battle’s all about, I’d have stayed at home.”
For the whole of the previous day eight thousand Jacobites had stood in strict battle order on Plean Muir, south-east of Stirling, eagerly and fruitlessly awaiting the arrival of Hawley and his army. Today they had done the same, Prince Charles having recovered enough to review his troops that morning before leaving them to stand for yet another day, waiting for an enemy which showed no sign of appearing. It was an exhausting, tedious, nerve-racking business, even for the formidable Highlanders, and towards sunset of the second day the men started to coalesce into small groups, sitting down and chatting.
The Storm Breaks (The Jacobite Chronicles Book 4) Page 27