The Highlander's Stronghold (Searching for a Highlander Book 1)

by Bess McBride

  “Thank you.”

  He dipped his head and left.

  I returned to my seat, propped my legs on the opposite chair and covered myself once again.

  “Are ye tasked with tending to me throughout the night then? Ye must take rest. Andrew should sit with me, if need be.”

  John’s raspy voice startled me, and I bolted upright and looked at him. His eyes, albeit heavy lidded, were partially open.

  “Oh no! I want to!”

  I turned toward him, noting that his lips were dry.

  “You need hydration. Can you drink some water?” I asked, throwing a skeptical look at the bucket of unfiltered water.

  “Nay, but I would have some ale.” His lips attempted to curve into a smile, but the creases between his eyes suggested he was suffering.

  “Are you in pain?” I said, looking down on him as I rose.

  “Aye, a wee bit.”

  I poured some ale and brought it to him. Dropping to my knees at his bedside, I slid my arm under his uninjured side and attempted to lift him to drink, but I couldn’t budge him.

  “I am a heavy carry, lass,” he said. He pushed up on the elbow on his uninjured site to lift himself slightly from the bed. He winced but did not cry out. I would have been screaming my head off. I handed him the ale, hoping he would sip it like a good patient, but he downed the cup and held it out for a refill.

  “Are you sure you should have more? What if this isn’t good for you right now?”

  “I dinna have an injury to my gut, lass, only my head and back. And they pain me. Is there whisky about, by chance?”

  I shook my head.

  “Andrew said he thought Mistress Glick might prescribe some in the morning for pain. Maybe she thought you would sleep through the night. I’m so sorry you’re hurting, John.” My mouth drooped. “Andrew is just outside. I could go wake him and ask him to get some whisky.”

  “No need to bother the lad. Let him sleep. I can wait until morn. These are no the worst injuries I have suffered.”

  He held out his cup for another refill, and I gave it to him. John, the sixteenth-century Scottish warrior, knew more about his body and his condition than I did, so who was I to cut off his intake of ale?

  He gulped the refill quickly before handing me his cup and lowering himself to the bed. He eyed me drowsily.

  “Ye must take some rest, lass. Those chairs dinna seem verra comfortable. My sister will share her bed with ye. I ken she is angry with ye, but she is a charitable lass. She will put her feelings aside. And the bairns will be pleased to have a visitor.”

  My heart dropped on hearing his words. I wasn’t about to tell him that Mary and the children had been kidnapped. No, someone else could do that. This wasn’t the time.

  “I’m fine right here,” I said softly. “Sleep.”

  “As ye wish. If I were truthful, I would say that I am glad to see ye here by my side—safe and unharmed. I would no forgive myself if harm had come to ye when ye could have been safely away from here.”

  “So does this mean you’re going to give me the dagger?” I asked, teasing him more than anything. I wasn’t about to leave John in this condition.

  “I feel verra weary,” he mumbled, closing his eyes. A lift of his lips revealed that he pretended not to hear me.

  I watched him with affection. Only when his breathing deepened and I knew he’d fallen asleep did I close my own eyes.

  I slept fitfully throughout the night, rousing myself often to check on John. The ale had done its job, and he slept soundly. So soundly that I put a hand to his forehead on more than one occasion to see if his skin was warm or ice cold.

  It was on one such occasion, as the faint light of dawn crept through the window, that John awakened. He tried to turn over before I could stop him, and his gasp of pain tore at my heart.

  “Wait!” I exclaimed softly. “Don’t turn over. I’ll send Andrew for Mistress Glick and some whisky.”

  “Aye,” John said. He raised a hand to try to touch his back wound but winced and gave up the effort.

  “Stop moving!” I directed. I hurried to the door, pulled it open and peered out into the keep. Light from above filtered down, and I saw Andrew lying on a tartan on the floor. The peat fire in the center of the room continued to burn, but low.

  “Andrew,” I called out.

  He came instantly awake and scrambled to his feet.

  “The laird?” he asked in a thick voice.

  “He’s fine, but he’s in pain. Could you go get Mistress Glick and hopefully bring some whisky back with you? I gave him ale last night, but he needs something stronger.”

  “Aye, mistress!” Andrew turned and headed for the tower door, and I returned to John’s bedside.

  “I must rise, lass,” John said. He pushed himself up on his elbow with effort, seemingly with more difficulty than last night.

  “Are you in pain?” I asked.

  “Aye,” he said, “but if I dinna tend to the needs of nature, I shall wet the bed.” He smiled crookedly.

  “Oh!” I eyed him wildly. “How can I help?”

  “Nay, lass. Ye can no help me with this. Where is the pot?”

  I pulled it out from under the bed, humiliated that I hadn’t thought to empty it in the night.

  “If ye would step outside for a moment?”

  I watched him try to push himself to a sitting position, his brow furrowed with obvious pain.

  “Oh, John. Are you sure I can’t help? Can you wait for Andrew to return?”

  “Nay, lass, I can no wait. Please go!”

  “Okay, call out when you’re done!”

  With a last worried glance, I turned and fled, closing the door only partially behind me so I could hear if he needed help or if he fell.

  I heard a few grunts of pain, but I steeled myself against the urge to run back in and help him. The sight of a man urinating was hardly going to shock me, but I understood that John couldn’t tolerate having me in the room.

  A few moments later, I heard John’s voice.

  “Ye may reenter, lass.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Andrew returning, a bottle of dark-brown liquid in his hand.

  “Mistress Glick is preparing some food and will come soon,” he said. “She said I am to give ye this.”

  I took the bottle and entered the room, Andrew in my wake.

  “Here you go! Something to add to your next donation to the pot!” I said brightly to John, who was sitting up on the edge of the bed, wiping at a bead of sweat on his forehead, a testament to his pain. The pot had disappeared back under the bed.

  John looked up at me with a quirked eyebrow. Andrew’s cheeks reddened, and I regretted my foolish joke as soon as I’d said it.

  “And a welcome donation it will be,” John said, his mouth curving into a crooked smile.

  I grinned back and poured him a small cup of whisky.

  “Mistress Glick will come soon,” Andrew said. He reached under the bed and removed the chamber pot. I looked away as he left with the room with it.

  “Andrew said she’s coming with food, thank goodness,” I added, concerned that John needed to eat more to soak up the alcohol. Andrew returned in moment, indicating he hadn’t taken the pot very far at all. I grimaced.

  “That is kind of Mistress Glick,” John continued. “I hate to trouble her to cook for me. Is Mary about?”

  Andrew threw me a look of surprise, and I met his eyes with a shake of my head. The time had come, and I couldn’t let Andrew bear the brunt of the disclosure.

  “John,” I said softly. I sat down across from him, our knees touching, and I took one of his hands in mine.

  He looked down at our joined hands before raising widened eyes to mine.

  “What is it? Where is Mary?” He looked beyond me to Andrew.

  Chapter Ten

  “Angus Macleod took her and the children last night,” I said softly.

  “No!” John ground out. “No!” His grip on my hand
tightened painfully, and before I realized what was happening, he had pushed himself up to a standing position.

  I jumped up, steadying him, and Andrew rushed in to support John as he wobbled.

  “No! I must dress. I must find them. Where is my shirt?”

  Well-defined chest muscles flexed as he fought to stay upright.

  “Ye can do naethin for yer sister or the bairns today,” Mistress Glick said as she entered the room, carrying a tray. She set the tray on the table and approached.

  “Ye are too weak, lad. The Macleod will no harm them,” she said.

  I marveled that John continued to stand, but my jaw dropped when Mistress Glick spoke next.

  “It is good to see ye up and about though. Perhaps Mistress Borodell can accompany ye on a short walk after ye eat.”

  Walk? In his condition?

  I dropped my supporting hands and let Andrew take his weight.

  “Wait! He needs rest. What about his wounds? Won’t they open with strain?”

  “He walks with his legs, no his back or head, lass.”

  “I can no wait! I must go for Mary and the bairns. I dinna ken whether Angus will take them to Ardmore Castle or spirit them away to his own lands, or perhaps to the Macaulays.

  “Is that my shirt?” he asked, nodding toward the tattered and blood-stained white linen cloth on the floor where Mistress Glick had dropped it the night before.

  “Aye, and in good need of scrubbing and mending afore ye wear it again,” she said. “Let me see to yer wounds, and ye can dress, but ye will no be leaving the dun today.”

  John’s jaw firmed, and I suspected he wasn’t planning on taking orders from Mistress Glick. And I wasn’t planning on letting him out of my sight.

  “Andrew, if ye could pull a clean shirt from my chest under the bed, there’s a good lad.”

  I hadn’t realized there was a chest under the bed, and I watched curiously as Andrew retrieved a small, flat, wooden-and-brass trunk and pulled a shirt from it. He handed the shirt to John as Mistress Glick inspected her patient’s wounds. I picked up my chair, returned it to the table and sat down, more to get out of the way than any need to rest my legs.

  Despite my worry about John’s plans, I couldn’t help but admire the muscles in his arms and chest and the six-pack abs visible just above the belt of his kilt.

  I suppressed a smile as Mistress Glick batted at John’s arms when he impatiently tried to slip them into his shirt.

  “When will ye cease, mistress?” he growled crankily.

  “When I have finished.” She checked his head wound and then dropped her hands.

  “Now I am finished, and ye may dress.”

  I watched in horror as John thrust his uplifted arms into his shirt again and dropped it over his shoulders.

  “Doesn’t that hurt?” I squeaked.

  “A wee bit,” he said. The sweat on his forehead belied his words because the room was quite cool. He wobbled a bit, and I jumped up, but Andrew and Mistress Glick steadied him.

  He lowered himself to the bed.

  “My boots, lad,” he said. “I would welcome another dram of whisky, lass.”

  Andrew fetched John’s boots and helped him into them while I poured out another glass of whisky and handed it to John.

  “Do you have any other painkillers besides whisky, Mistress Glick?”

  The older woman clucked and shook her head.

  “Alas, no. I have no had hemlock since last year. We can no readily leave the dun to barter for such for fear of capture by the Macleods or Macaulays. No one wishes to visit us to trade for fear of retribution.”

  Her face drooped.

  “It is no matter, Mistress Glick. The whisky works well. I hardly feel the pain.” John’s pale face indicated something different, but there was no point in arguing with him. I suspected these sixteenth-century Scots were a hardy lot, tolerating pain far better than I might. Far better than I might, a small voice repeated in my head. I gave myself a shake. The issue of whether I could tolerate pain in the sixteenth century was a nonissue. John was bound to send me home sooner rather than later.

  As if Mistress Glick read my mind, she commented.

  “I dinna ken if Mistress Borodell told ye, lad, but Angus Macleod tried to carry her off last night as well. He was no successful, thanks to Andrew.”

  “What’s this?” John’s head shot up, and he pushed himself to his feet again, leaning heavily on Andrew.

  “Is this true?” he asked of the room in general before focusing his attention on me.

  I shrugged my shoulders.

  “Aye, Laird. The Macleods dragged the mistress as far as the gate and would have taken her from the dun had I no stopped them.”

  John, throwing a reproachful look in my direction, reached up to tousle Andrew’s curly red hair.

  “Ye stopped them? How is this? Well done, lad. And why did ye no tell me yerself, Mistress Borodell?”

  I guessed I was to infer John’s displeasure by his use of the more formal title. I gave him another shrug.

  “What good would it have done? I’m still here. Andrew saved me. He attacked the two men dragging me away!”

  John ruffled Andrew’s hair again, and Andrew ducked his head in embarrassment.

  “That Angus Macleod tried to take ye bodes no good,” John said in a husky voice. “I thought ye safe and sound. I thought my sister and her bairns were safe and sound. Now, I ken neither is true. I must go after her, and I must send ye home, mistress!”

  My heart thudded, once, loudly, before dropping to my stomach. Home!

  “Lad, ye can no send her home. Two of our lads were killed. Others injured. We have no men to spare to escort Mistress Borodell back to her home. And ye can no send her out alone!”

  John threw a harried look at Mistress Glick before returning his gaze to me.

  “Ye can no stay,” he said pointedly, “but we will speak of this later.” He turned to Andrew and Mistress Glick. “Who was killed? Who injured?”

  As they discussed the names of various people who had been injured or killed in the previous night’s raid, my eyes wandered to the dagger clearly visible on Andrew’s hip. I settled back into my chair and stared at the weapon that was likely to tear me away from the man I loved. My throat ached, and I rehearsed various arguments I was prepared to have with John against returning to the twenty-first century.

  I felt his eyes on me, and I looked up. His tanned face was pale and taut, his forehead still wet with perspiration. He followed my glance to the dagger before returning his attention to my face. Blue eyes bored into mine, and I lifted my chin, unwilling to burst into tears. I hadn’t cried when the Macleods had carried me off, and I wasn’t about to cry when John Morrison sent me home. I wasn’t!

  I swallowed hard and met John’s gaze.

  “Andrew, I will have the dagger now,” he said. Andrew untied his belt and handed John the sheathed dagger. I wondered if John was about to slap it into my hand and forcibly close my fingers around the hilt. Because that was what it would take for me to touch the dagger at the moment. I wasn’t leaving! Not yet!

  But John merely loosened his belt and tucked his shirt inside the waistline of his kilt before sliding the dagger onto the belt.

  I watched the threesome for a few minutes until Mistress Glick nodded, and she and Andrew left the room.

  “Well, Mistress Borodell, will ye assist me in walking?” John stood, feet wide, steadying himself in the absence of something to hold on to. I rose and hurried to his side, slipping an arm around his waist. Given the vast difference in our heights, that was about as high as I could possibly support him. I still marveled that he was up and standing.

  He dropped his arm over my shoulder, but when I anticipated the weight of his upper body, I felt very little. Obviously, he meant only to use me as support.

  “You can lean on me,” I said.

  “Nay, lass. Ye are but a wee thing. It is enough that ye are willing to accompany me.”

/>   “I can’t believe you’re up and walking. I really can’t!”

  “To lounge upon the bed would only allow the wound to fester.”

  We shuffled toward the door, and I checked his face anxiously. Still pale, sweat continued to bead his furrowed brow. He was obviously in a great deal of pain, but I knew I couldn’t convince him to rest.

  We made it outside of the keep and stopped to survey the dun. A far cry from the dark terrors of the previous night, the scene looked almost pastoral. Sun shone on the island, highlighting emerald-green grass and the sparkling-blue scenes of the sea to the north.

  With my help, John moved on, heading toward Mary’s croft, as I had suspected he would. On closer inspection, much of the grass was trampled and muddied, and about half of the crofts showed burnt turf on their roofs.

  Several men approached. I recognized Torq among them. John dropped his arm from my shoulders and stood without support, his feet braced wide. The men spoke in Gaelic while I studied the aftermath of the Macleod raid.

  A resilient little fort, the stone walls of the crofts stood firm, and the roofs, though charred, remained intact. Men, women and children moved about repacking the turf on the roofs and clay in the walls.

  I noted several men manned squint holes in the perimeter wall. They turned and watched us but did not leave their posts. Nor did the two Highlanders guarding the gate.

  Torq seemed particularly loud and guttural in his speech. I had no idea what they were saying, but he seemed more upset than even John.

  John’s voice rose in response, and I looked up to see a muscle working in his jaw. That he was angry with Torq was obvious, but why? The other men shuffled uncomfortably, saying nothing as the two tall men squared off. There was no evidence Torq was going to smack John—otherwise, I would have stepped in between the two six footers with my five-foot-three-inch frame.

  John’s voice deepened, and he placed a hand on Torq’s shoulder. The redheaded Highlander calmed. There was nodding throughout the group, as if the men had reached a consensus, and John turned away. He took two faltering steps, clearly forgetting he had sustained life-threatening injuries over the past twelve hours. Before I could slip an arm around John’s waist, Torq rushed in to support him.