My Scot, My Surrender (Lords of Essex)

by Howard, Amalie

  Brandt’s humor stayed with him until he descended into the crowded courtyard. A path cleared for him to the middle where Rodric stood, sword in hand. Someone handed Brandt a sword, which he examined for nicks and cracks in the steel and hefted for weight. It would do. No sooner had he nodded than Rodric rushed toward him with his own sword leading the charge. Brandt managed to fend off the strike, his blade clashing into Rodric’s. The duke was strong and, though fleshy from a life of excess, he still had enough bulk to bolster a heavy swing. They struck and parried, feinted and thrust, each of them trying to find weakness in the other.

  Where Brandt was faster, the duke was bigger, and the duel continued as the crowd watched in rapt silence. But Brandt was also younger by a full score of years, which gave him a marginal advantage. After another bone-jarring round, his muscles sore, and a shallow gouge on his forearm seeping blood, he noticed that the duke was beginning to tire. A thin sheen of perspiration coated his brow. Brandt was tiring, too, which made his window of opportunity smaller. He had to end this sooner rather than later. He spun in with his sword, but miscalculated as Rodric leaped aside, his sword coming down hard toward his shoulder.

  There was no time to avoid the blow. It was either risk his neck or show his back. He chose the latter. Brandt managed to lurch out of the way, but not before the tip of the sword traced a path of hellish flame down his upper right shoulder and then whipped upward to carve its twin up the side of his ribs. His body was on fire. He could smell blood thicken the air, and dully, from somewhere behind him, he heard a scream.

  Rodric grinned. “Dunnae concern yerself about yer lady wife,” he said. “Malvern will take good care of her.”

  They circled each other. Though Brandt was bleeding, Rodric had not escaped unscathed. He was limping and holding one arm close to a few bruised ribs. Brandt knew that Rodric was clever. He wasn’t about to do something stupid by not paying attention. He drew a deep breath, ignoring the stinging pain of his separating skin and the burn of open tissue beneath. Sorcha’s salve would fix him once he’d thwarted Rodric. Brandt could sense her in the courtyard and, though he couldn’t see her, he guessed she would be standing beside Lady Glenross near the steps.

  “Mayhap I’ll let the men have a turn with her first,” Rodric drawled. “Malvern won’t mind, ye ken. After all, he lets that animal, Coxley, do what he wants.” His grin was ugly. “What do ye think they’re going to do to her?”

  Brandt set his jaw. “Are you going to fight or blather on like an old woman?”

  “Speaking of old women, mayhap I’ll even let them have yer worthless mother.” Brandt felt a muscle leap to life in his cheek. Sorcha, he knew, would fight tooth and nail to the last, and with her skill and tenacity, she might even be able to escape. But not his mother, and the image of any man attacking her made him sick with rage. The duke pounced upon his weakness like a wolf upon a lame rabbit. “Do ye ken, she came crawling to me like a tavern whore when yer father died? She begged me to take her like the dog she was.”

  Brandt didn’t know where his torrent of strength came from, only that he was propelling forward and then colliding with his uncle. With a howl of rage, he swept the duke’s feet out from under him and followed down with the top of his sword. He hovered over the man, grunting with exertion. It would have been so easy to slip the steel through his throat, but Brandt could not kill his uncle in cold blood.

  “Do you yield?” he growled.

  Rodric’s eyes overflowed with humiliated venom, but he nodded, knowing he was beaten. “Aye.”

  Brandt stayed where he was, poised above his uncle, and exchanged a long look with the quietly waiting Feagan. After several tense moments, Feagan nodded. The battle—and clan loyalty—had been fairly won. “Restrain him and escort him off Montgomery lands,” Brandt commanded.

  “Yes, laird.”

  “He is no’ yer laird,” Rodric hissed. “Do ye want yer laird to be the seed of a weakling who couldnae even fight for his life?” He laughed cruelly, madness glinting in his eyes. “The poor sod would no’ lift a hand against me, no’ even when he knew he was going to die. Ye remind me of him. Ye have his weakness.”

  “Empathy is not weakness,” Brandt said. “You don’t understand it because you have none. Your brother believed in the best of you, and you killed him for it.”

  “Aye, he was no’ fit to be laird.”

  The admission hung thick and heavy in the courtyard.

  And then, a keening wail rent the air. It seemed to come from the depths of his mother’s body even as she shoved through a stunned crowd to slap Rodric in the face. “Ye bloody bastard, I kenned ye killed him!” she screamed.

  His answer was calm. “Of course I did. I wanted what he had. Ye and the clan.”

  “Ye’re not fit to call yerself a Montgomery.”

  She slapped him again, but not before Rodric wrenched free of his captors and wound a tight fist into her blond hair. He brought her up to his face before wrapping his other hand around her throat. “I am a Montgomery, ye deceiving bitch. And ye’re still my property to do with as I see fit. Death will suffice for yer disloyalty.”

  As his mother’s eyes dilated and her mouth slackened, Brandt prepared to tackle the man, but a blur dashed past him with a roar that shook the hills. He blinked. It was Patrick. With a wild yell, he pushed his mother into Brandt’s arms and shoved his father to the ground. Straddling him, Patrick pummeled him with his bare fists, grunts punctuated by growling sobs. No one moved, until the only sound in the courtyard was one of bones meeting wet flesh.

  Handing his mother off to Sorcha, who stood nearby, Brandt moved forward, his hand going to his half brother’s shoulder. “Patrick, enough.” The younger man slowed and obeyed, his face contorted with pain. Brandt knelt beside him. “All will be well, my brother, I promise.”

  They stood together, and Brandt indicated for Rodric to be restrained once more. “Give him a horse, and take him to our borders.” He eyed his uncle, who had one eye swollen shut and a puffy lip. “You are never to return. If you do, you will be killed on sight. Is that clear?”

  He and Patrick watched as Feagan led Rodric away, and after a while, his brother turned to face him. Confusion and horror warred over his features, but something else shone there, too. Relief. It was an odd thing to see. Brandt frowned. Patrick had been groomed his entire life to be chieftain. There was no reason that he would want to willingly give it up. And despite his claims, Brandt was still a stranger.

  “Do you wish to challenge me?” Brandt asked softly.

  He was wounded and bruised, and any future duel would have to wait until Sorcha’s magic salve could do its work. His brother’s conflicted eyes met his, and Brandt sucked in a breath. Patrick’s gaze flicked from Lady Glenross to Brandt and back again. She held out her hand to him—love, gratitude, and pride shining in her eyes—and he kissed her knuckles.

  Finally, Patrick nodded. “If my mother says it to be so, then ye are the true heir by succession. My own father stole that which was no’ his, so until ye have an heir of yer own,”—he glanced at Sorcha who stood with his mother—“I will remain yer heir and the next in line.” He inclined his head in a somewhat stilted way as if uncomfortable with showing any emotion. “Yer Grace.”

  Relief shook through him, and his sore limbs were suddenly heavy with exhaustion.

  “Good,” Brandt said, clasping his brother by the shoulder. “Because I’m going to need your help.”

  “Ye have it,” Patrick said as they walked back toward the keep where Callan and Aisla were waiting. News of Brandt’s victory and their father’s defeat would have traveled like wildfire through the clan. Brandt wasn’t worried his half siblings would be upset over their father’s banishment. In fact, he suspected they would show the same relief and approval as Patrick. “Aye. And ye will need my help, as well.”

  Brandt eyed him, detecting an odd note in his voice. “Why is that?”

  “My father sent an invitation to Malvern
to fetch his bride two days ago.” Patrick’s face was grim. “He and his army will be here inside a week.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Sorcha had never sweat so much in her life. As she stood in the courtyard of the Montgomery keep, the noon sun beating down on her and the rest of the men as they skirmished in pairs, she wondered at the unnatural heat of the spring day. It wasn’t out of the ordinary to have an early May swelter, but this one had an oppressive edge to it. It made her feel a stone heavier, and it seemed every man and woman in sight was walking and moving a little bit slower, too. It could have been the heat. Or, she reasoned, it could have been the knowledge of an imminent attack on their clan and keep.

  Fergus’s broadsword came sweeping at Sorcha’s head, and she grunted as she blocked it and then struck back before her opponent could take another stab. Her blade came down near his hilt, knocking it from his hand entirely. The Scot stared in wonder at his sword, lying on the muddied ground. He then broke into a wide grin.

  “Impressive, Your Grace,” he said.

  “You won’t be smiling like that when it’s one of Malvern’s men knocking your weapon away,” she replied.

  He propped one dark brow and nodded, accepting her censure humbly.

  “Pick it up,” she said, this time a little less brusquely. She’d offered to work with the men, teaching them some of the fighting skills she’d learned at Maclaren, and it had been no small feat that these men had accepted. It wouldn’t be wise to shame them for not being entirely up to snuff when it came to battle.

  “When an enemy blocks your strike, swivel toward your opponent’s sword arm,” she said, a bead of sweat rolling off her brow and stinging her eye.

  The strikingly handsome Scot she’d been training with the last quarter hour frowned. “Toward my opponent’s sword?”

  “Aye. My brother, Ronan, taught me that. Your enemy will have to turn in order to swing at you again, and you’ll gain a moment to prepare.”

  A few other men had overheard her and mumbled their agreement, and then they started clashing swords again. In the fields, another grouping of men were practicing with bows and arrows, and yet more men were out reinforcing the main gate and setting up hidden watch posts in all directions leading into Montgomery keep. They had a natural defense system in the keep’s positioning among the craggy hills, but more defenses would not be unwise.

  Sorcha had seen Malvern’s men in action before, and they were brutish fighters, a high challenge for even Ronan and his men. There were a handful of vicious warriors here, like Feagan and Seamus, but for the most part, the Montgomerys had never been put to the test. Most of the men had never fought a life or death battle. And now, because of Malvern, they would.

  Because of her.

  She’d led Malvern here. She was the reason these men were about to put their lives in danger, and as their new laird’s wife, they would never complain or turn away from the fight. But that didn’t make her feel any better about the situation. In fact, it made her feel only guiltier.

  “Ye should take a break, Yer Grace,” came a feminine voice from behind her. Sorcha turned from Fergus to see Brandt’s mother sitting in the shade of a yew tree. Its branches were low and long reaching, and many of the men had hung their shirts upon them as they trained. For that reason alone, there were many lasses, both young and old, who’d come outdoors to do their washing and mending. And then there were some shamelessly gaping at the men’s sweaty torsos as they swung their swords.

  Catriona had a long length of faded plaid in her lap, and she was using a pair of shears to cut out long rectangles of the fabric. Sorcha nodded to Fergus, who bowed his head and went to find another partner.

  “What are you doing?” she asked Brandt’s mother as she stepped out of the direct sun and into the shade.

  “Bandages. They’ll be useful for the surgeon, should Dr. Kinnick need them.”

  A lump plunked down like a stone in her throat. Should Dr. Kinnick need them, it would mean Montgomery men were bleeding. That some might have been killed. It was a bitter pill to swallow…the knowledge that she had brought this upon them. But it was done now. Malvern was coming, and it was the least she could do to help them be prepared.

  She looked over to where Aisla was practicing her archery with Patrick and Seamus. They would need every able-bodied fighter if Malvern breached the keep, even the women, and Aisla had shown a natural ability for the bow. She could help from a vantage point of relative safety. Several other Montgomery women had volunteered to learn, and it had floored Sorcha at how loyal they were to the son of their previous, beloved laird. She glanced to Brandt’s mother. Their loyalty was largely due to Catriona, she knew.

  The lady in question patted the grass beside her. “Sit for a minute,” she said.

  “I really should help,” Sorcha said.

  “I’m sure Fergus will appreciate the time to soothe his sore pride,” she replied with an arch of an elegant eyebrow. Sorcha peered over her shoulder to where Fergus was demonstrating some of the new moves he’d mastered to a few Montgomery soldiers. Considering he’d spent most of the morning on his arse, he had picked up the techniques well enough. The man was a fast learner, she’d give him that. And he was easy on the eyes, if the sighing of all the Montgomery women around them was any indication.

  There was nothing quite like the sight of a man in a kilt, wearing not much else while covered in sweat and swinging a sword. Although Sorcha appreciated that Fergus was a handsome man, he wasn’t the one who made her pulse race. No, that would be the man on the other side of the training field, also swinging a sword.

  Her very virile, very indefatigable husband.

  She didn’t need to see him without a shirt to have her wits scatter. A secret smile touched her lips—she’d seen more than enough of his beautiful naked body earlier that morning. With that shameless thought, she felt her cheeks burn, along with other unmentionable parts of her.

  Unlike the other Scotsmen, he wasn’t shirtless. A fact for which she was very grateful. She didn’t much like the idea of other women gawking at her husband.

  But they did anyway.

  Sorcha had to admit Brandt wore a kilt well. When he’d asked that morning for her help to don the Montgomery plaid, she’d understood how momentous an act it was for him. So had his clansmen. Glimpses of his strong thighs were visible above his boots, sinewy and thick with muscle, with each twist of his lithe body. His handsome face was flushed with exertion, his powerful arms swinging his broadsword with deadly grace. He moved like a dancer on the battlefield, with calculated finesse. Much like he did everything else, including lovemaking. Her knees trembled slightly.

  “I was in labor with him for three days,” Catriona said softly, following her stare.

  A rush of heat scoured Sorcha’s skin. Christ tossing a caber. She’d been caught ogling her own husband by his mother. She composed herself, though her face felt like it was on fire. “Was it a difficult birth?”

  Catriona patted the grass again, and this time Sorcha sat. The promise of learning anything about Brandt was too good to pass up.

  “The delivery was quite easy, but the hours leading up to it were no’.” She smiled in memory. “The midwife wanted to force the birth by attempting to turn him, but I told her that the babe would come in his own time when he was ready. And he did.” Her fingers shook over the shears. “I held him for only a scant few minutes, but I could already tell what kind of man he would be. He wasnae sleepy, and he didnae wail. As a babe, he was so alert, so focused and quiet, observing everything around him.”

  “He hasn’t changed,” Sorcha said smiling. “Stoic to the core.”

  “I already kenned that one day he would be a great laird.” Catriona’s voice broke slightly. “I only hoped that by sending him away, I would be giving him a chance. I still dunnae ken if I made the right decision.”

  Sorcha reached for Catriona’s hand and squeezed. “You did. If you hadn’t, your son would have met with an e
nd much like that of the late duke’s. You saved Brandt by letting him go, and now he has returned, as you had hoped.”

  The duchess smiled sadly. “No’ quite as I’d hoped. I didnae expect that Rodric would force me to remarry so quickly, and to him.” She glanced apologetically to Sorcha. “Forgive me, I am sure ye dunnae want to hear such things.”

  “No, I do,” Sorcha said, guessing that Catriona had never spoken to anyone of what had happened. She’d kept it all inside for so many years, harboring the secret silent hope that one day the son she’d given up would return. “Did he give you a choice?”

  “Yes,” Catriona said. “To stay as his duchess or leave. Though it wasnae a choice, no’ really. I could have gone back to my father’s clan in the south, but if Brandall returned to Montgomery, how would I have ever kenned? In setting him free, I had closed my own cage.” Her agony was a tangible thing. “So I married Rodric, even though my heart would always belong to another.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “’Twas the bed I made,” she said. “I hoped and prayed for Brandall to return. I love my children, ye ken, but Rodric was no’ the man he pretended to be. Even I didnae ken how deep his hatred of his brother had run all those years. He wanted to erase the memory of him from Montgomery.”

  “Brandt told me about the portrait in the gallery. The covered one.”

  Catriona nodded. “’Twas all he left of him, though he ordered it draped. I suppose he wanted to appear as if he mourned. But Rodric broke clan alliances and dismantled everything Robert had built. Montgomery became an isolated fortress, and he was its sovereign.” She swallowed. “We were forbidden to speak Robert’s name, to even reminisce of him. Those who did were punished.”

  “Punished?”

  She shrugged. “Whipped, beaten, humiliated. I was the worst transgressor, of course. But the pain was worth it. I couldnae let my husband’s memory be erased from history. My children ken their brave, kind uncle.”

  Sorcha felt a pulse of rage course through her veins. Any man who beat defenseless women deserved a special chamber in hell. But not everyone thought that way, she knew. There were still many clans who believed it was a man’s right to do as he wished with his wife. Including the marquess to whom she had been betrothed. “I truly wish Brandt had not let him go, for it would give me great pleasure to smash my fist into his cowardly face.”