Rory was stunned by his uncle’s proposal. Surely Hector would not agree to go so easily.
“I give ye three days to accept my offer and leave MacKenzie lands,” Hector said. “If ye don’t, the blood of MacKenzies will be on your head.”
“I came here to discuss the terms under which my uncle will cease his rebellion,” Rory said. “If it takes bloodshed to end it, then so be it.”
Rory was furious that Hector and the bishop had brought him here for nothing.
“Wait,” the bishop said when Rory started to leave. “I believe Hector of Gairloch has brought evidence bearing on the question of who is the rightful MacKenzie chieftain.”
“I am the MacKenzie, the 9th of Kintail.”
“By what right,” Hector said in a voice that carried to every corner of the cathedral, “do ye claim that honor?”
“Ye know verra well by what right,” Rory said. “I have been chosen by our clan, and I carry the blood of chieftains from my father and his father and his father for as long as there have been MacKenzies.”
“Your mother was not wed to my brother when ye were conceived,” Hector said.
“Their marriage may have been irregular, but my father claimed me, as you and everyone in the clan knows.”
“My brother was so bedazzled by Agnes Fraser that he was blinded to the truth,” Hector said. “She was with child by another man before she ever went to my brother’s bed.”
Rory’s vision was tinged with red. “That is a lie!”
“Your mother was a whore,” Hector said.
Rory lunged for him, but Alex and several other men rushed between him and Hector.
“This is hallowed ground!” the abbot shouted, holding his hands up. “Any man who sheds blood here commits a sin against God.”
“Not here,” Alex said as he held Rory’s arm. “Not unless ye want yourself and the whole clan excommunicated.”
The bishop appeared to motion to someone behind Rory. He turned to see the figure of a hunched woman emerge from one of the chapels built into the south aisle. He did not recognize the woman at first. But when she stood in the light of the candelabra next to the bishop, he knew who she was.
“Isn’t that Mother’s old servant?” Alex whispered.
“Aye. She’s also a wise woman.” Rory felt as if a hole was opening beneath his feet. “And a midwife.”
Rory knew what was coming. He should leave now, but something compelled him to stay and watch the disaster unfold.
The bishop made the old woman hold the large, heavy cross he wore and swear by the blood of Jesus Christ that every word she spoke was true.
“My mistress,” she began in a soft voice.
“Louder,” the bishop told her.
“My mistress, Lady Agnes, was with child by one of the stable lads in her father’s castle and was frantic not knowing what to do about it,” the old woman said, glancing several times at Hector. “When the MacKenzie chieftain laid siege to the Fraser castle and demanded to wed her at once, Lady Agnes believed her prayers were answered, and readily agreed.”
“How do you know this?” the bishop asked.
“I was her personal maid, and she confided in me,” she said, with another furtive glance at Hector. “I’m a skilled midwife as well and helped her deliver the child. She confessed to me again then that the babe was her lover’s babe, and I agreed to say he was born early.”
Hector had coerced the poor woman to say these lies. Rory should have foreseen this. The damage was done now.
“And who was this child?” the bishop prodded her.
“It was him, Rory.” The old woman looked at him for the first time, and there was sorrow in her eyes. “He was a fine, fine boy and always her favorite.”
“I forgive you,” Rory told her in a soft voice.
A tear trickled down the old woman’s cheek.
“I am the MacKenzie,” Rory said, locking gazes with Hector. “And one day ye will answer for this.”
Then he turned and walked out of the church.
“You can never be the true chieftain when ye don’t have chieftain’s blood!” Hector shouted after him. “You’ll bring bad luck to yourself and the clan.”
Rory kept walking.
“You’ve no right! I warn ye, you’ll lose everything and destroy the clan.” Hector’s voice rang out through the cathedral. “Everything ye touch will turn to ashes.”
CHAPTER 41
The river was swollen from the winter rains, and the rushing water drowned out other sounds as Rory and the Grant lad walked the trail along its bank. He was glad to be away from the demands of the castle for a couple of hours. Between his troubles with Sybil and yesterday’s meeting at the cathedral, he needed the chance to clear his head and think.
Kenneth picked up a rock and threw it into the water.
“Mind ye don’t go near the edge,” Rory said, pulling him back. “The ground is slick with mud and the current is fast. If ye slipped and fell in, you’d drown long before I could get ye out.”
The lad nodded and looked up at him with his usual serious expression. “I won’t fall in.”
Farther up the trail, Rory caught sight of a flash of brown through the trees and signaled to Kenneth to keep quiet. Moving silently into the wood, he stalked the animal for several yards until the stag, sensing danger, paused and lifted its head, ready to bolt.
Holding his breath, Rory drew back his bow and took aim. Ach, this fellow was a beauty. Just as he was about to release the arrow, a child’s scream rent the air and echoed off the hills.
Rory dropped his bow and ran through the woods toward the boy’s shouts. He’d gone farther from the path than he realized, and it seemed as if he would never reach the river. When he did, he caught sight of the boy a hundred feet downstream, his head bobbing in and out of the water. Jesu.
“Kenneth!” Rory shouted. “I’m coming!”
His heart was in his throat as he raced down the path. The fast current was carrying the lad downstream toward the falls. Just like my mother.
This was not the same river, not the same falls, but Rory felt as if he was in the nightmare he’d had a thousand times, in which he watched her body being swept over the falls and battered by the rocks. He could not let that happen to the boy.
He flew over the ground until he was just past where the boy was in the river. In an instant, he jerked off his boots, stripped out of his heavy clothes, and dove in. The icy cold hit him like a wall of ice.
He looked around frantically. God have mercy, he could not see the lad anywhere.
“Kenneth! Kenneth!” He could hardly hear his own voice over the rushing water. “Kenneth!”
He feared the lad had been sucked under and drowned when Kenneth’s head popped up some distance ahead. The current was pulling him downriver, ever closer to the falls.
He was only thirty feet away, but it seemed a mile. Rory closed the distance to twenty feet, then ten. Kenneth’s head sank and popped up and then sank again. Rory swam as hard as he could toward where the boy had gone down. A heavy tree branch rammed into him, knocking him sideways, but he kept his eyes fixed on the spot where the boy should be.
The roar of the falls grew louder, pounding in his ears. In his mind’s eye, he saw the boy’s battered body at the base of the falls. He had to reach him now.
“Kenneth!”
The lad’s head broke the surface just beyond his reach. Rory lunged and caught hold of his shirt. Wrapping one arm around the lad, he swam like hell for the shore. The fierce pull of the current was like a giant beast trying to drag them over the edge. He could see the drop of the falls on the edge of his vision.
With his free arm, he caught hold of a low-hanging branch. He pulled himself and the boy along the branch toward the riverbank until he gained purchase with his feet. The stones were slippery with algae, and he went down, banging his injured leg, but he managed to keep the lad’s head above water and regain his footing.
Finally, he
climbed out and crawled onto the bank.
He was on his hands and knees, gasping for air. Water streamed into his eyes as he looked down at Kenneth’s still form. Jesu, he was not breathing. Quickly, Rory turned him on his side and slapped him between his shoulder blades.
Breathe, Kenneth! Breathe! Rory thumped his back again. Breathe!
The lad’s small body convulsed, and he coughed and choked as water gushed out of his mouth. God be praised. Rory sat back on his heels and let out a shuddering breath.
The boy rolled onto his back and looked up at him with wild eyes.
“You’re going to be all right,” Rory said as he wiped Kenneth’s face off with the edge of the lad’s sopping shirt.
The lad’s skin was blue, and he was shivering like a frozen leaf in a winter storm. Rory scooped him up against his chest, heaved himself to his feet, and started down the path.
“I left my plaid up the trail,” he said, talking to reassure the boy. “We’ll get it and dry ye off.”
When Rory reached his pile of discarded clothes, he stripped the boy of his wet clothing and wrapped him in his plaid. Then he held him and rubbed his back and limbs until Kenneth finally stopped shaking.
The lad was bruised and bleeding, and his face was so pale that the sprinkling of freckles across his nose and cheeks stood out. He could have worse injuries Rory could not see. Rory had to get him back to the castle quickly. When he lifted him in his arms again, he seemed so small and fragile.
Sybil’s words came to him. The lad needs you. Ye must protect him.
She was right. His life could be extinguished in a careless moment. And nearly was.
Rory had tried to ignore this child, to deny the blood tie that would take everything away from the son he hoped to have with the woman he loved, the son who should be his heir. Sybil had been wiser, and certainly more generous, and embraced the truth.
Holding this child in his arms now, he needed no proof. He felt their blood bond. He could no longer deny that this copper-headed lad was his. And he did not want to. He prayed it was not too late.
“Ye don’t need to carry me,” Kenneth said in a voice that was so weak it sent fear pulsing through Rory’s veins. “I can walk.”
“Water that cold takes a toll,” Rory said, pretending calm as he raced down the path. “We can’t have ye slip and fall into the river again, now can we?”
“I didn’t fall,” the lad murmured.
His head lolled against Rory’s chest, and his breathing was dangerously shallow. Panic choked Rory as he ran faster and faster to save his son.
CHAPTER 42
Sybil left her drawings on her table and went to look out the window again. As long as Kenneth was with Rory, she knew he would be safe, but she was anxious to hear how their outing had gone. She should not have pushed Rory so hard to accept the boy. Left alone, he would come to it in his own time.
She regretted her harsh words even more. She had blurted out the hateful words because she had been so frightened after Kenneth was thrown from his horse. Perhaps she was wrong about that too, and it was only an accident.
The breath left her lungs when she saw Rory come through the gate at a dead run. He was stark naked, his hair was streaming wet, and his leg was covered in blood. A moment passed before she noticed he was holding something wrapped in his plaid.
Oh, Mary, Mother of God, it was Kenneth.
She ran down the stairs to the hall screaming for help. The next hour was a blur. Grizel took charge, ordering Rory to take Kenneth to an upstairs chamber, sending a servant to fetch her bag of medicinal herbs and ointments, and directing others to build up the fire and bring extra blankets. Then she shooed everyone but Sybil out of the room.
“Comfort him while I work,” Grizel ordered.
Sybil held Kenneth’s hand and spoke softly to him while the older woman mixed a salve and applied it with quick, practiced hands to the countless cuts and scratches covering the lad’s body. She gave Sybil a worried look as she wrapped a strip of clean linen over the deep gash on Kenneth’s forehead. The boy was pale and too quiet.
“There’s nothing more we can do for him now,” Grizel whispered after they got a tincture down his throat. “Go fetch your husband so I can see to him. That looked like a bad cut on his leg.”
Sybil wiped her forehead and tried to calm herself before opening their chamber door. Rory was pacing when she entered but came to an abrupt halt. He had put on a léine, the knee-length shirt Highlanders wore, but his skin was still damp beneath it.
“How is Kenneth?” Rory asked.
“Grizel has done what she can and says he’s in God’s hands now.” Sybil looked down at the long jagged cut on his leg that tore open the newly-healed arrow hole. “She wants to bind your wound.”
“That can wait.” He made an impatient wave of his hand. “She must give all her attention to the lad.”
Something caught Sybil’s eye, and she turned to see that Rory had found the sketches she left on her table and spread them out over the bed.
“You’ve a talent for drawing.” He picked up a sheet on which she’d drawn several side-by-side images of Rory and Kenneth and shook his head. “I’ve been so blind.”
“So ye see the likeness now?” Hope stirred inside her.
“I can see it now.” He turned and met her gaze. “But I felt it in my heart first when I carried him in my arms.”
Tears filled her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. “I’m so glad.”
“You were right all along,” he said. “I’m sorry I’ve been so blockheaded—and not just about the lad. Can ye forgive me?”
She stepped into his arms and rested her head against his chest. “If you can forgive me as well.”
“I love ye so much,” he said against her hair. “Promise ye won’t leave me.”
“I won’t,” she said. “Not ever.”
Before they could say anything else, Grizel poked her head through the doorway. Sybil held her breath, fearing Kenneth had taken a turn for the worse.
“Perhaps the laird will let me take care of his wound now,” Grizel said, a smile playing on her lips. “The lad’s alert and hungry. God be praised!”
Sybil and Rory rushed past her and up the stairs to the chamber above. Though Kenneth had cuts and bruises on his face and arms, he was sitting up propped by pillows. Malcolm, who had come into the room since Sybil left, gave her his chair next to the bed.
Sybil smiled at Kenneth and squeezed his hand. “How are ye feeling?”
“I’m starving.”
The adults laughed with relief. Hunger was a very good sign.
“Only broth for now.” Grizel handed a bowl and spoon to Sybil. “Don’t let him eat too fast.”
While Sybil spooned the broth into Kenneth’s mouth, Grizel tsked over the jagged cut on Rory’s leg, slathered a smelly poultice on it, and bandaged it. He escaped her ministrations before she could start on his lesser injuries and came to stand beside Sybil next to the bed.
“That cut on your forehead will make a manly scar,” Rory told Kenneth with a wink. “But a knock on the head can make ye feel a wee bit confused for a time. Do ye remember what happened?”
Kenneth gave him a solemn nod.
“You remember falling into the river?”
“I didn’t fall,” Kenneth said. “I did just as ye told me and stayed away from the edge.”
“Then how did ye end up in the river?” Rory asked. “Ach, don’t tell me ye jumped.”
“Lads!” Grizel said behind them. “’Tis a wonder any of them live to be men.”
“I didn’t jump,” Kenneth said.
“Hmmm,” Rory said. “Then I suppose ye must have glided down to the river on a faery’s back.”
Rory and Grizel were taking the boy’s denials with humor, but a cold chill of premonition went up Sybil’s spine.
“There’s no shame in admitting a mistake,” Rory said, turning serious, “so long as ye learn from it.”
“But
I didn’t fall or jump,” Kenneth said in a stronger voice. “I was pushed.”
***
“He was pushed!” Rory shouted, raising his hands in the air. “Who would do such a thing to a bairn? And on MacKenzie lands!”
Sybil watched Rory pace up and down their bedchamber, where they had retreated after Grizel told them Kenneth must rest.
“So ye do believe someone meant to harm Kenneth?” she asked.
“Harm him? Nay, they meant to kill the lad,” he said, his eyes blazing. “And they had the bollocks to attempt it while he was with me,” he said, ramming his thumb against his chest. “Right under my damned nose!”
“Now that ye know the threat exists, ye can protect the lad.”
“I’ll give whoever did it his just desserts and drown him in the river,” Rory said, squeezing his hand as if he were holding someone by the neck. “I’ll hold his head under and watch the life go out of him.”
He looked so fierce that Sybil had to brace herself not to take a step back.
“Ye can’t drown whoever is responsible until ye know who it is,” she said. “Ask yourself who would gain by Kenneth’s death—that is, besides you and me.”
“Besides you and me?” Rory said, his tone full of outrage.
“People will assume I want my own son to be the heir,” she said. “As for you, ye made it clear to the Grants that you didn’t want to claim him and resented being pressured to keep him here.”
“That doesn’t mean I’d harm him.” Rory scowled at her. “For God’s sake, he’s just a bairn.”
“I know ye wouldn’t.” She rested her hand on his arm. “But if Kenneth died under suspicious circumstances while living under your care and protection, the Grants would be sure to cry foul and blame you.”
“And who would benefit from that?” he said, echoing her question. “I see what you’re saying—and who must be behind this.”
Sybil nodded. “It’s got to be Hector.”
CLAIMED BY A HIGHLANDER (THE DOUGLAS LEGACY Book 2) Page 28