The Devil of Dunakin Castle (Highland Isles)

by McCollum, Heather

  “You have enemies who must be frightened with such horror?”

  He grabbed up her herbs in the cloth. “Skye is divided between three powerful clans, any of which would benefit from ruling the entire isle. We have an uneasy peace, which was broken a month ago by the clan meeting us at the shore. Those are MacDonald heads, which may be reclaimed by their clan if they have the courage to come and take them. So far, they have not.”

  “It’s barbaric,” Grace said, following him to the door.

  Keir looked down at her. “Have ye been to London, lass?”

  Grace’s lips pinched tight. “I know, King Henry displays heads of traitors on London Bridge. That doesn’t make it any less barbaric.”

  Keir walked out the door. “Aye, but it’s effective. Come. Lachlan’s room is on the second floor, near my brother’s.”

  Grace kept close to Keir as they made their way along the shadow-filled corridor and down the stairs. All seemed quiet, Dara having retreated to wherever banshees withdraw when they aren’t screaming. “Your sister said she cut off one of those heads.” Grace slid her hand along the rough wall to help her balance on the narrow steps.

  “She did. ’Twas the raging son of a MacDonald chief who thought she’d be an easy target, since she was a woman. She’s quite proud of the kill.”

  Grace stared at Keir’s back, silently shaking her head. Lord, she’d come very far from Somerset Estate in York. “She’s like no woman I’ve ever known or even heard of.”

  Keir turned to her as they walked down the second-floor corridor. “Have ye heard of Jeanne d’Arc?” He said the woman warrior’s name in a perfect French accent.

  In the candlelight, Grace watched Keir’s eyebrow rise slightly, giving him an almost teasing appearance. She frowned. “You are annoyingly educated.”

  He exhaled long as they stopped outside a door. Pressing the handle, he pushed into the door, releasing a wafting of stagnant, hot air. Grace coughed into her fist. “What is that stench?”

  “The boy lost his bowels,” a woman said from the other side of the bed where a small form in the middle looked merely like a wrinkle in the blanket. “I had to change everything.”

  “Seanmhair,” Keir said. “This is Grace. She’s a healer. Grace, this is Fiona Mackinnon, my grandmother.”

  Keir’s grandmother nodded, her face tired and bleak. “I hope ye be skillful, lass.” She shook her head, a long gray braid hanging down the back. “The lad’s taken a turn toward death.”

  Grace tried to inhale through only her mouth and walked across the small room to the shuttered windows. “We need some fresh air, first of all. I’ve found that excessive heat doesn’t help the ill.” Nor did the overwhelming stink of dung.

  “Ye seem too young to be an adequate healer,” Fiona said, following behind Grace.

  Grace cracked the shutters, letting in a tendril of cool outside air, but Fiona slapped it shut. Grace turned to the old woman, remembering that Keir had said Fiona had been a warrior and knew very little of medicine. Grace kept her smile neutral. “And you seem too old not to be an adequate healer.”

  Fiona frowned at her. “I was a warrior.”

  Grace raised one eyebrow, her temper worn as thin as wet parchment. “Which does nothing right now for your great-grandson.” Still meeting the woman’s fierce stare, Grace pushed the shutter back open. “Keir, open the second window an inch to allow adequate circulation. Then bank the fire to keep the room warm enough.”

  Keir moved without hesitation, making his grandmother’s frown turn his way, but she remained silent.

  “I would like to see Lachlan,” Grace said, waiting for Fiona’s permission. After a pause, she nodded, leading Grace over. “More light, please.”

  Keir moved around the room, lighting five oil lamps, bringing them to sit on tables near the bed. The room was small with scattered furnishings: a trunk, wardrobe press, privacy screen, and several small tables. A few books splayed knocked over on the hearth mantel, and a stick horse leaned against the wall with a wooden sword. Curtains around the bed were tied to four posters.

  Grace sat in a chair on the boy’s right side, leaning over him. If she didn’t see the slight rise of his chest, she would have guessed he was dead. Good Lord in Heaven, guide me to help this child. She wished her sister, Ava, were here, or Joan, Ava’s mother-in-law. Both were truly gifted healers. Grace inhaled slowly. She was this child’s only hope.

  She touched his head, stroking up gently through his hair. Some of the light-colored strands came away, covering her fingers like spider webs. “He’s losing his hair?”

  “It started today,” Fiona said, sitting on the other side. “But no fever.”

  “But he’s wet, damp,” Grace said.

  She nodded. “He sweats. I can’t keep enough fluid in the boy. He sweats it out or vomits it up.”

  Keir stood braced at the foot of the bed like a sentinel ready to slay whatever demon Grace found to be killing the boy.

  “You’ve been trying to give him food?” she asked. “Has he eaten anything?”

  “Mostly broth. Dara brings it up from the kitchens three times a day and sits with the lad while I rest and check on my livestock,” she said.

  “The two of you have done well to keep him alive,” Grace said. She took the boy’s limp hand from under the blanket. It was thin, skeletal. She flipped it over and stared at the skin on his palm. “Has he always had these freckles or flecks?” She held his hand to the light to show where small dark circles spotted all over his skin.

  Fiona picked up his other hand, turning it this way and that in the light. “Nay. This is new.” She met Grace’s gaze, her eyes large. Worry and guilt mingled there, as if she condemned herself for him getting worse under her watch. “I will ask Dara if she noticed them this afternoon or morning.” Fiona hurried out the door.

  Keir sat opposite Grace in a chair and studied his nephew’s hand. Lachlan’s little hand looked like a thin piece of linen in Keir’s large palm. “Ye know what this is?” he asked.

  “Perhaps,” she said, not wanting to cause more alarm. She leaned over the boy, his small face closed in heavy sleep. She pinched his lips gently, making his mouth pucker, and inhaled his breath. A garlicky smell wafted out on a shallow exhale. “Check his feet for the same spots,” she said.

  Keir yanked up the tucked blanket. “Aye, not as many, but there are spots here, too.”

  Grace checked Lachlan’s nearly lifeless body, where more brown spots marked him. She took his hand again, inspecting his fingernails. “White ridges across the nails, spots on hands and feet, hair loss, diarrhea, sweating…”

  “Ye’ve seen this disease before?” Keir asked.

  Grace met his gaze. “He’s not infected with disease, Keir.” She shook her head. “He’s being poisoned.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Poison?” The word shot through Keir like a battle cry. “How? What poison?”

  Grace sniffed Lachlan’s breath again and took his pulse. “I saw it once at Aros. A woman came from Oban to see Joan Maclean, because she was weak and had spots. Her breath smelled of garlic even though she said she hadn’t eaten any. She was weak but without fever, was losing some of her hair, and sweated terribly. And the white ridges on her fingernails looked the same as Lachlan’s. The woman’s brother had experienced the same symptoms and had died. Joan said it was from arsenic poisoning, probably in their well.”

  “But no one else here has these symptoms,” Keir said, already knowing the answer to his unasked question.

  Grace met his gaze firmly. “Someone must be adding it to his food or drink. Has been for a while if he’s had slowly worsening symptoms.”

  “The lad would have said something,” he argued, feeling the fury within him gather like an advancing storm. He grabbed onto one of the four posters, squeezing the hard wood.

  Grace shook her head. “It is odorless and tasteless. Joan told me it was the weapon of kings. They used it to kill off anyone threaten
ing their reign.”

  “Gòrach pìos de cac.” He swore, the words coming from the tight, nauseous boulder sitting in his gut. “The only people near the lad’s food are kin and the cook. Rab, Dara, Seanmhair.”

  Grace walked closer. “You don’t know that for certain, since you haven’t been home, and when you were, you didn’t know to be guarding him.” She laid her hand on his arm, her touch suddenly an anchor in the churning of his fury. “Why would someone want to kill your nephew?”

  Fiona walked back in with Dara on her heels. “I thought the spots were nothing. They were faint this morning.” Dara stopped, her worried expression hardening as she spotted Grace. “Ye must be the coward hiding behind Keir’s door.”

  “Not now, Dara,” Keir said, barely holding on to the violence within him.

  Grace squeezed his arm, and he glanced down at her. She gave a small shake of her head and looked to the two women inspecting Lachlan’s limp hands. “I’m fairly sure I know the sickness.”

  “Can we help him?” Fiona asked, her eyes alert, determined, like Keir had seen in the faces of warriors on a battlefield. If steel could fight Lachlan’s illness, his seanmhair would surely take up her dusty sword.

  “I believe so,” Grace said. “But we will have to watch him closely. I will supervise all he has to drink and eat. He will need more chicken broth, fresh ale or water—”

  “Which I will get from the falls inland,” Keir said. Grace nodded.

  “Once Lachlan is conscious, he needs to eat mashed apples, fresh fish, eggs, and oats. If you have any fresh lemons, that would be of help. And garlic should be infused in the broth.”

  Dara frowned but didn’t say anything. Fiona nodded after each item.

  “What is it called? This sickness,” Dara asked, her arms crossed before her.

  “Spotting sickness,” Grace said confidently. She met Dara’s stare without wavering.

  “I haven’t heard of it,” Dara said.

  Keir studied his sister. Was she suspicious of the name because she knew it was poison and not a disease? Dara had always been obstinate, wishing to be a warrior like their seanmhair rather than a lady. But what motive would she have for poisoning Rab’s son? Her own nephew?

  Grace shrugged. “Have you read many physician texts or helped to heal more than a hundred people during the last year and a half?” She didn’t wait for Dara’s answer, but went instead to the pitcher of water on the table next to Lachlan’s bed. She carried it behind the privacy screen, the sound of her pouring it in the jakes obvious. She walked back around, handing it to Keir. “Let’s start with fresh water in a new pitcher. And I need a pallet brought in, so I can sleep next to the boy.”

  “I will stay by him,” Keir said. No one would get near his small nephew without him there to watch.

  Grace smiled, but it wasn’t her genuine smile. “Let me. Women heal while men kill.” She rolled her eyes. “Men and Dara, I suppose.”

  Dara cursed in Gaelic. Grace ignored her. “I would also like to give him a sponge bath, wipe his skin with warm, clean water.”

  “I will get that as well,” Keir said. Before going to the door, he walked up to Dara. Leaning in, he spoke in Gaelic, his words succinct. “Do not threaten the healer in any way, or expect the wrath of the Devil.” His sister was brave, obstinate, and easily annoyed, but she wasn’t a fool.

  “Then hurry back, brother.” She turned toward the lifeless form of their nephew.

  With a quick glance at Grace, who shooed him with her hand, he strode out the door into the dim corridor. Would Dara poison Rab’s son? Keir wouldn’t become chief if something were to happen to Rab. The position of the Devil of Dunakin wasn’t something he could give up. He had been raised to be the executioner, the brutal leader of the warriors and vicious protector of the clan. Did Dara believe she could fill the seat of chief if Lachlan and Rab died? It would be an impossible feat for any woman except one who had the support of the Devil of Dunakin. But she was a fool to think he would back her if she killed Lachlan, unless she sought to make it look like the boy had succumbed to a disease. Would she then kill off Rab?

  Keir traipsed down the hall toward the steps and looked to his brother’s door. He hated that room, the chief’s room, and rarely went inside. After the death of his parents ten years ago, it would always smell of fresh blood to him.

  He paused before it. Had Rab already given up on his son? He should be in Lachlan’s room to see what the healer might think. About to turn away, a noise inside made him lean toward it. Retching?

  “Rabbie?” Keir called and knocked. More retching.

  Bam! Bam! “Rabbie, let me in.”

  Keir had been concerned with Grace’s swoon earlier, but now that he thought about it, his brother had seemed pale and blotchy merely an hour ago, leaving the hall in his haste to return to bed.

  Rab’s voice was terse, as if annoyed by his own sickness. “Best not to come in, Keir. Seems I’ve caught what Lachlan has.”

  “If ye don’t open this door, I will kick it in,” Keir warned, feeling his muscles tense. Maybe his brother was too weak to lift the bar. “Stand away.”

  “Shite, Keir, I’m coming,” Rab said. Seconds later, the bar scraped along the inside of the door.

  As soon as it hit the floor, Keir pushed inside. Rab stood there, his shoulders bent as he leaned his hands on his knees. Keir grabbed him under the arms, catching him before he fell.

  “Mo chreach. I said I’ve got what Lachlan has, Keir.”

  Keir ignored his weak outburst and set him on the bed, grabbing his hands. “Spots. Sard it,” he murmured. “When did the spots start?”

  “This morning.” Rab coughed. “Get me some ale.” He gestured to the pitcher near the window.

  “Rabbie,” Keir said and waited until his brother looked at him. “Don’t drink or eat anything in here. Grace looked at Lachlan. He’s got spots all over him now. Rab, she says it’s poison, arsenic poison.”

  “Bloody hell,” Rab whispered, his face pinching. “Why hasn’t anyone recognized it?”

  “Lachlan started with the spots today, ye too.” Keir’s hands fisted at his sides. “Are ye two the only ones sick?”

  Rab nodded, opening his mouth to draw in a labored breath. “As far as I’ve heard.”

  “Then someone is poisoning Lachlan and now ye, too.”

  Rab grabbed his stomach, hurrying behind the privacy screen to retch. His voice came weak but with determination. “I want their heads, Keir. And their bowels. The Devil will find them and slaughter them.”

  …

  Grace dozed on the hay-filled pallet that Keir had dragged to lay beside Lachlan’s bed. When he’d come back with freshly boiled water and weak ale from a newly tapped barrel, he’d sent both his sister and grandmother to their beds. He’d helped Grace wash his nephew down and drizzle untainted ale into his mouth. He barely stirred but managed to swallow. Now Keir sat near the fire, staring into the flames.

  “You should sleep, too,” Grace said, her words thick with exhaustion.

  “I will sleep when I’m dead,” he said.

  Grace rolled her eyes, although she knew he couldn’t see her. “That is such a foolish male thing to say.”

  “I am male,” he answered. “And the fact that someone has been poisoning my nephew and brother, right before me without notice, certainly paints me the fool.”

  She pushed up on an elbow, watching him poke the fire. “Small amounts of arsenic imitate a long, drawn-out illness. It’s very difficult to detect until the later stages when the spots appear.” She sighed when he didn’t respond. “You won’t be good to anyone if you’re falling asleep in your pottage tomorrow. If there’s an assassin about, I need you alert.”

  His face turned, his dark eyes meeting her. “We should keep the treason a secret. I’ve warned Rab not to say anything. I’m to spread about that he has a mild illness. The assassin will know what it truly is and will try to complete his evil deed.”

  “Come
sit with me,” Grace said and sat with her back against the rock wall. He set another square of peat into the flames and walked over, lowering his large frame slowly as if he might ache. He leaned next to her, his shoulder brushing her arm.

  She kept her voice low. “That is why I told Dara and Fiona that it was called Spotting Sickness. We must watch anyone who comes close to either Lachlan’s or Rab’s food or drink.” Grace could see Keir’s jaw clenching. “You are worried it is Dara?” she asked in a whisper.

  “She’s had access to both, especially Lachlan. Or perhaps Seanmhair.”

  “Your grandmother?” Grace tried to keep the disbelief from her hushed tone. “I don’t see it in her, Keir.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest and raised one hand to rake through his hair. “She’s Aonghus Mackinnon’s mother. Madness runs in the family.” He stared out at the side of Lachlan’s bed.

  “Aonghus was mad?” she asked, feeling the brittleness of Keir’s underlying pain in the way he held himself.

  “Aye, he was mad when…he died. Seanmhair raised him.”

  “He died ten years ago?”

  “Aye,” he answered.

  Grace thought back to the concerned elderly woman and shook her head. “She is too worried about Lachlan. My instincts tell me her fear for him is genuine, Keir.” She patted his leg under the blanket. “I have very good instincts when it comes to people.”

  He looked down at his lap where her hand rested beneath. Grace yanked it back to her side. Blasted. With the treason and worry, and for her, the horror of a ring of heads around the bloody castle, she was having a difficult time remembering her anger. Sitting so close, the threads of their passion drew her. Maybe it was her fear that eroded her fury at Keir. He was the only one at Dunakin whom she somewhat trusted.

  She looked toward the bed, her pulse picking up when she felt his leg shift against hers. “What do your instincts say about me?” he asked, his voice a soft burble of Scots accent, pulling her gaze back. Question and doubt filled the deep shadows and lines of his face. “Am I mad, too? Brutal and cruel as the Devil of Dunakin?”