Highland Wrath

by Madeline Martin

“I dinna like yer plan, but I know better than to dissuade ye,” he said.

  She looked up in a long, tender glance before drawing a deep, pained breath. “Then it is time.”

  •••

  Sylvi threaded through the narrow alleyways of the city toward its busy heart. Somewhere in the distance Liv, Percy, and Ian followed behind her, hidden in the shadows. She would not have them placed at risk, not until it was time for war.

  The humming buzz of the market came into awareness before she met the wall of people jostling in the heavy crowd. Scents of sticky sweet buns and roasted meat flavored the air and made her glad she’d eaten earlier. She would not have herself distracted.

  Her senses sharpened, and she darted her gaze around the crowd, searching for faces she might know. There had been no instructions. Would someone come to her? Was she to find something?

  A sense of doubt nagged at her. What if whoever was supposed to find her didn’t think to look for her since they assumed her to be dead?

  But then, she knew she was a woman who stood out. She needed only to peruse the gawking stares of every passerby to confirm as much. Not only did the fairness of her braided hair set her apart from others, but her man’s attire and the weapons she wore drew attention.

  She would not be missed.

  Her gaze sifted through the throngs of people, and frustration raked over her nerves. Damn it, what was she looking for—?

  A flash of brilliant red hair caught her attention.

  Her heart lodged itself in her throat. Isabel?

  She pushed her way through the wall of people to where she’d seen the glimpse of red hair. Nothing. A pebble skittered near her foot. Sylvi glanced up and found Percy’s hooded face peering from the alley. She jerked her finger to the left. Sylvi turned at once and caught sight of red hair in the distance.

  The crowd was so damn thick. Still, she managed to keep her stare fixed on the woman while heading in her direction. The redhead moved surprisingly fast despite the crowd.

  The red hair disappeared behind a cart and did not emerge. Sylvi hissed a breath of irritation. What the hell was this stupid game they were playing?

  She stood for one helpless moment in the center of the square and looked around her. A clacking bang sounded from a nearby alley. Liv peeked out and nodded behind Sylvi.

  She turned and found the redhead in the distance. It wasn’t until she was on her way toward the woman that a realization struck her.

  Reginald no doubt suspected only one of them would be coming to the market and wanted to know how many had arrived to fight. One by one, Sylvi’s army was revealing themselves from the shadows to their enemy in her attempt to find Isabel in the crowd.

  If that were indeed the case, they’d played right into Reginald’s trap.

  Sylvi pushed through the crowd now, heedless of civility. Offended shouts rose around her, but she paid them little mind. She would get to Isabel before she lost her again. Before Ian could reveal himself.

  The redhead stopped abruptly, and Sylvi realized immediately why with a sinking stomach. Ian stood in the woman’s path, his charming grin doing its magic.

  “Isabel,” Sylvi said.

  The woman spun around, her eyes wide and scared.

  And not Isabel.

  “I have a note.” She held a bit of parchment between her fingers. The corners of the paper fluttered frantically in her nervous grip like the wings of a moth.

  “Who are ye?” Ian asked, his expression no longer so inviting.

  “I’m no one.” Her cheeks tinged red. “A baker’s daughter. I was told people would follow me and I had to run from them, but when they caught me, I had to give them this.”

  She shoved the note at Sylvi with determination.

  Sylvi took the parchment. “And how much did they pay you?”

  “They won’t kill my family,” the girl said with large, wet eyes.

  “Then we’ll go save yer family first,” Ian said.

  The redhead shook her head ferociously. “They are watching. You cannot. Please let me go.”

  “Go, but do not trust their word,” Sylvi said. The girl’s family was most likely already dead.

  What is unseen hasna been done.

  The words from when her family was slaughtered slid icy in her mind. She suppressed a shudder. She could not think of such things now.

  “They were luring us out of our hiding places.” Sylvi opened the parchment.

  Come to the abandoned monastery north of town, and don’t bother hiding. We already know where you are.

  Sylvi balled the note in her fist. “Damn it. I was right.”

  But what was the point of knowing where they hid? They already had known their numbers—they would have gotten that from Isabel.

  A sliver of something cold edged down Sylvi’s spine. She turned abruptly and ran to the first alley, where Percy had been. Her heart slammed hard in her chest.

  Not Percy. Not her girls.

  The alley was empty. Sylvi’s rapid breathing echoed off the high walls of the surrounding buildings.

  “Percy,” she called.

  No answer.

  Ian gripped Sylvi’s shoulder. “She’s no’ here. Let’s go check for Liv. Together.”

  They skirted the perimeter of the crowd and checked where Liv had been. Nothing. Not even Fianna lingered in the area.

  “Liv?” Sylvi called. No sound emerged.

  Sylvi’s heart crumpled in her chest. “Ian, I’ve lost them all.” No matter how hard she breathed, she could not seem to draw sufficient air. “I’ve lost everything.”

  He grabbed her to him and held her there for a long moment, so strong and real against her, she could not pull from the embrace. Not when it was possibly the only thing keeping her together. “Ye’ve no’ lost me.”

  Too late did the blare of warning prickle in the back of her mind. Something cold and pungent pushed against her nose and mouth, at the same time a figure from behind Ian snaked an arm around him with a square of cloth.

  Sylvi exhaled as hard as she could to free her body of the poison she’d already inhaled. Her nostrils burned and her chest ached.

  Ian’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he slumped backward. Sylvi reached behind her, trying to grapple whoever it was holding her in place. Her body moved slowly, her muscles thick and weak. The hand pushed firm against her face, jabbing the wet cloth into her nose and making her eyes sting.

  Her body screamed for breath, and finally she had no choice but to drag in a chestful of tainted air.

  Everything waned in her vision, and her world went dark.

  Chapter 20

  A hollow clunk echoed in Ian’s head. He groaned against the pain radiating inside his skull and rolled his head to the side. Another hollow clunk.

  Another.

  Ian forced his eyes open and winced against the daylight streaming in from above, where a portion of the roof was missing.

  The clunk sounded again. Ian followed the noise to where a man sat in the middle of the room, an open sack laying in front of him. He pulled a fist-sized clay pot from it and set it to the ground with the familiar clunking sound.

  Ian tried to sit forward and found his wrists and ankles bound to a very uncomfortable wooden chair. He narrowed his eyes to better fix his bleary gaze more steadily on the man.

  The man’s long, graying hair fell in waves over his face. He shook it free, and the half of an ear became visible.

  Reginald. A man so cold and cruel, he could order the death of a child and kill a mother trying to protect her babies. Disgust rolled through Ian, and then another thought hit him.

  Sylvi.

  He immediately looked beside him and found her bound to a chair in a similar fashion, her head still slumped forward, blocking her face from his view with the length of her pale blonde hair. Beside her were two other women, one with the same curling golden hair as Percy and the other with the copper locks o
f Liv.

  But where was Isabel?

  Ian turned back to Reginald and found him returning everything back to the bag. He looked up abruptly and grinned when his small black eyes lit on Ian. “I figured ye’d wake before the lasses.” He hefted the bag up for a moment before letting it thunk back to the ground. “The archer had some good stuff in here.”

  “Where’s Isabel?” Ian asked.

  Reginald tugged his belt into place under his large belly and sniffed. He was as Ian remembered him, his body thick with the effects of a gluttonous life, his bulbous nose red with it.

  “The red-haired slut? She’ll be by in a minute to gloat, no doubt.” Reginald scoffed. “I dinna know how ye ended up with these women, but ye’ve gotten yerself into a mess of trouble, lad.”

  “Because ye paid them to kill me.” Ian lifted his fingers from the arm of the chair in a helpless gesture.

  Reginald gave a high-pitched exhale that was more wheeze than laugh. “Aye, that I did. Apparently death dinna take.”

  “Mayhap I’m too good for death.” Ian smirked. “Dinna think ye could do it on yer own, eh?”

  “Something like that. Anyway, these lasses were a quieter option.” Reginald tilted his head back and forth. “Until we realized she dinna kill ye. Then it only complicated matters.” He strode forward and bent over Sylvi. “And now the two of ye have been rutting?”

  Reginald grabbed Sylvi’s hair with a meaty fist to pull her head back and regard her face. “She looks wild.” He threw Ian a grin so wide, it revealed several more gaps in the back of his mouth where molars had been lost. “I bet being with this one is like riding an unbroken horse.”

  Ian’s body tensed, every part of him screaming to protect Sylvi. And every one of those parts was hopelessly tied down.

  Reginald released her hair, and Sylvi’s head flopped back into place, where it hung over her chest. “Dinna worry, lad. She’s still alive. For now. After the heartache this bitch has cost me, I’ll be making her pay later on.” He nodded to Percy and Liv. “Those others too.” He scowled down at his hand, where angry red scratches showed against a smattering of black hair.

  Cat scratches. Liv’s cat must have tried to protect her.

  Ian did not ask after the brave creature, not when he feared the answer.

  Ian’s hands squeezed hard on the wooden arms of the chair. They needed to escape.

  Obviously, fighting was currently not an option. But if he could get Reginald to untie him, maybe even trust him, he might stand a chance at being able to attempt a rescue.

  He would do anything to save Sylvi and her ladies. Even if it cost him his life. At least it would be the one good thing he ever did in his miserable, over-privileged life.

  “What about me?” he asked.

  Reginald put his hands on his hips, squaring his massive belly between them. “That’s what’s been giving me the hardest time with all this. What do I do with ye?”

  Ian shrugged as if the decision mattered little to him. “Take me back.”

  “The others dinna take so kindly to yer meddling last time.”

  Ian scoffed. “Gregor’s dead, and I’m guessing the two others were the ones with him when Sylvi left me in the cart—they’re dead.” He looked at Sylvi. He couldn’t help it.

  Her body was still. Too still. Her lack of movement threaded fear through his heart, but he couldn’t think on that now. Not when so much was at stake.

  “Ye’re a crafty devil.” Reginald looked thoughtfully through a gaping window and scratched at his crotch. “How do I know I can trust ye?”

  “Ye dinna.” Ian chuckled. “But I’d rather be on the winning side. I know about the coins now. I could help. And I can help ye lose the two king’s men who have been tracking ye too.”

  Reginald stare intensified. “How do ye know about them?”

  Ian smirked as though he didn’t care. In truth, he’d only just remembered the brilliant red suits beneath the black cloaks the men had worn when he’d seen them. “Because ye’re no’ as quick and stealthy as ye think. The king’s arm is coming for ye, and ye best know how to get out of it.”

  “And ye can do that?” Reginald asked, skeptical.

  “I can talk my way out of anything.” Ian puffed out his chest.

  Reginald smirked. “What about this one?” He nodded toward Sylvi. “Ye take a fancy to her?”

  Sylvi’s forefinger shifted. She was waking. If she wasn’t already awake. Ian’s stomach tensed. Of all things for her to have to overhear …

  He only hoped she was not yet aware.

  “Of course I’ve no’ taken a fancy to her. She was no’ more than something warm to fill a lonely night.” Ian winked.

  The room they were in was large, with massive arching windows lining either side. Perhaps a dining hall, a place where monks once ate.

  Regardless, it was the perfect place to keep them all captive. Away from peering eyes on the outskirts of town in a room devoid of any debris to use in freeing themselves.

  “So, ye dinna mind if I have her then?” Reginald asked.

  Ian gave an easy smile despite the wave of nausea rolling through him. “Have her.”

  He kept his face impassive despite the hot rage boiling through his veins. God help Reginald if he so much as laid a hand on Sylvi—for Ian sure as hell wouldn’t.

  At least if he did attempt something, it would get Sylvi alone in a room with Reginald. If anyone could still manage to kill him, it’d be her.

  Reginald gave Ian a wide, companionable smile and pulled a blade from his belt. He sawed at the ropes binding Ian until they fell to the floor in broken coils. Ian rolled his wrists and elbows. His skin and joints tingled after having been immobile for so long.

  He pushed to his feet, and the room spun around him, dizzying and fast, like when he’d had too much drink.

  “It takes a while to wear off, lad.” Reginald patted him on the back with an endearing gesture that made Ian’s skin want to slither off him. “Ye better be right about getting those jackanapeses off our trail. Ye’ve got a lot of making up to do.”

  It was just the two of them now. He could take him. Kill Reginald and save the women. As it was, something wasn’t right. All this had been too easy.

  Ian straightened and took an unsteady step. He certainly wasn’t in his best fighting shape.

  The not-so-subtle clatter of shoes on the stairs echoed through a dark corridor on the right. Someone was coming.

  Ian’s heart sank with his hopes. There was no time. He would be lucky to disable Reginald. He couldn’t take on more than one person. Not like how he was.

  Isabel emerged through the entryway with another man. She was not black and blue and bleeding from the torture they all expected she had endured, but looking bright and merry in a green gown encrusted with gems.

  Reginald turned to her, and his mouth slid up in a lascivious grin.

  She sauntered their way. “Oh, Ian,” she purred. “Don’t you wish you’d had me when I gave you the chance?”

  Her steps faltered, and her catlike grin melted off her face. “Is she still alive?” She nodded at Sylvi. “I thought you killed her.”

  Ian looked beside him and saw Sylvi’s head lifting. She was definitely awake. He pulled in a deep breath to prepare himself for the pain of having her realize Isabel’s betrayal.

  And also his own.

  He only hoped she truly had enough faith in him to see through his ruse.

  •••

  Sylvi had been awake long enough to hear everything she needed. The coarse language, the deception. Ian was gladly handing her over to Reginald. Her head swam in a swirl, and her stomach rolled with the need to retch.

  She shook her head to clear the hair from her face, and the room swayed from the effort. She clenched her fists and let her nails dig painfully into her palms. The pain. She needed to focus on the pain and stay sharp. Especially in a room so full of enemies.


  Ian had sided with Reginald. After all they’d been through, after everything he’d promised. More lies. She gritted her teeth and tried to move.

  Her wrists were bound to the arms of a solid wooden chair, as were her ankles. The rope was thin but strong, and the wood beneath her of good quality. Neither would be easy to be free of.

  Her gaze settled first on Reginald, and a dagger of hate jabbed into her gut. The small dark eyes, the blubbery lips, the ear her own mother had mutilated in an effort to protect her child. Suddenly none of it mattered. Not Isabel or her reason for betraying them all. Not Ian and his lies.

  When Sylvi stared at Reginald, she saw violent death. Her father’s, her mother’s, her siblings’, who were far too young to die, My Lady’s, who fought so hard to live, and then Reginald’s. For he would die. And by her hand.

  Her heart beat deep and smooth, like in battle, and the room sharpened with clarity. She was aware of everything suddenly, including the slow shifting of Percy and Liv at her side as they slowly came to.

  “I want her dead.” Isabel’s tone was petulant.

  “No’ as much as she wants me dead.” Reginald chuckled. As if Sylvi were a jest. “Look at how she stares at me.”

  “Isabel? What?” Liv’s words slurred slightly. “You’re all right.”

  Isabel scoffed. “Of course I’m all right. Especially now that I’m free of all of you.”

  “You were never forced to stay,” Percy said.

  Sylvi knew she ought to look at the other women, to ensure they were all right, but she could not pull her eyes from Reginald. He drew her, all the hate and ugliness a beacon for her need to exact vengeance and rage.

  She breathed, and she watched, and she planned.

  “I wasn’t forced to stay … but I was.” Isabel still spoke with a whining tone, her voice distant in the background of Sylvi’s thoughts.

  “I had nowhere else to go,” Isabel said. “Of all places to end up, I was in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of women who only cared about fighting and couldn’t keep me company. You made me work for my keep.”

  “You want Sylvi dead for making you work?” Liv asked dryly.

  Reginald was looking at Liv, then his gaze slid to Percy. Sylvi’s heart jerked. She knew exactly what he thought when he saw Percy. What so many other men thought. A fresh burst of energy flashed through Sylvi. She twisted her arms against her bonds. The sharp edges of the chair bit hard into her skin, but no matter how hard she struggled, she could not so much as loosen the ropes.