“We must make haste,” Maria said, joining Marsaili in her efforts.
“Aye,” Marsaili answered with a grunt, and together, they moved the guard into the brush and covered him with leaves.
Once they were finished, they made their way over the jagged rocks and weaved through the twining branches at a clipped pace. They didn’t talk, the only sound between them the unison of their breathing until a wolf’s howl filled the night, setting both women into an all-out run. By the time they reached the edge of the loch that surrounded the land her father’s castle was built on, her side pinched fiercely. Behind them, the howling had increased to a cacophony of lethal noise.
Marsaili motioned toward the dinghy. “Get in!”
Maria glanced from the secured dinghy to the woods. “The wolves are coming!” she cried. “We have to swim for it.”
Marsaili’s heartbeat exploded as she lunged for the rope tied to a tree stump at the water’s edge and began to sever the bind. “I kinnae swim,” she said. “Leave me if ye must.”
Within a breath, Maria was beside her sawing at the same spot. Just as the rope broke, the first wolf burst through the woods onto the crest of the hill, and then another, and another. The women pushed the dinghy, heaving, until it slid into the water. They scrambled in, took up the oars, and swiped them through the water furiously.
“Wolves can swim!” Maria cried.
“Aye,” Marsaili said grimly, putting all her strength and her will to live into rowing. Halfway across the water, the wolves howling grew louder, causing her pulse to increase to a dizzying speed. The women worked to put distance between themselves and the wolves, but Marsaili feared that even if they reached land first, the wolves would simply trail and overcome them. She glanced behind her to see where the wolves were, and as she did, an arrow flew across her vision and lodged into one of the beasts. Another arrow followed, and another.
Marsaili feared taking her attention off the wolves, but she had to know who had shot the arrow. She had no friends in these parts, save Maria. She faced forward, as Maria gasped, to find five men standing on the bank at the other side of the loch. She couldn’t see their faces, but one man gripped a wooden pole that had a piece of material flapping from it. It fluttered several times in the wind before she got a good look at the emblem. She sucked in a sharp breath. “God’s bones. It’s the Black Mercenaries…”
Maria paled, as tension pulled her mouth into a stern expression. As she continued to row, she spoke softly. “We go from an enemy baring their teeth and who would eat us alive, to an enemy with no morals and who will nae even blink at using us.”
Marsaili nodded. She knew about the Black Mercenaries. They lived in the woods, or so it was said. No one knew for certain, as the men seemed to appear like mist from the sky and disappear much the same way. One minute they were there, and the next they simply were gone. They had fought for King David in his quest to take control of Scotland ever since he had been released several years prior from being held prisoner in England, but some of the Mercenaries had also fought for the king’s enemies—the Steward and the King of England. They had no loyalty to a king. Their only loyalty was to coin. She had no notion why they might be near her father’s home, nor did she want to know, but she feared she and Maria were about to discover why, whether they wanted to or not.
In taut silence, Marsaili and Maria paddled the brief distance remaining to the shore. There was nowhere to run. They could not return to the woods, so they had to go forward toward the five men awaiting them on the shore. Before the dinghy even banked, a tall man, built like a solid tree with hair cropped so short that Marsaili could only see it because the blackness of it seemed to shimmer beneath the skin of his scalp, leaned over, gripped the front edge of the dinghy, and brought it to a shuddering stop. Gray eyes pierced her before shifting to do the same to Maria, and then the man seemed to hold the two of them in his gaze at once.
“Ye have just made my task much easier and my pockets much fuller.” He grinned, but it was mirthless and twisted with a downturn of contempt. Then his gaze, probing and cold, settled on Marsaili. “Ye have an enemy, Marsaili Campbell, and I’ve been paid generously to see ye punished for yer folly.”
Marsaili’s heart thumped viciously against her ribs. “I’ve many enemies,” she said, pleased her voice sounded so calm when a storm of fear raged inside her. “Ye’re going to have to be specific, Lord…?”
“Ye can call me Lucan,” he said, yanking the boat forward so hard that she fell backward into Maria. Before they could untangle themselves, Lucan snatched her dagger out of her hand and had Marsaili firm in his grip. A shorter man with limp red hair and a long hawkish nose did the same to Maria. Lucan lifted Marsaili off her feet, plopped her on the ground, and before she knew what was occurring, he was winding binds around her wrists. She looked over to see Maria receiving the same treatment. The other three men had already turned away and were walking through the woods toward horses that Marsaili could see tethered some distance away.
Marsaili yanked back on her wrists to no avail as the man had bound them so tightly the rope cut into her skin. Immediately, the blood seemed to gather at the site and pulse. If she was kept like this long, she feared she would lose the use of her hands. “Who—”
“Euphemia Stewart,” he answered before Marsaili even completed her question. “Seems ye and yer sister, Lena MacLean, made quite the enemy.”
Marsaili frowned, casting her thoughts back to when she had gone with Lena and her husband, Alex, to the Steward’s home. Marsaili had been desperate to find out where her son was, but the only way her father would tell her was if she discovered what castles the king had planned to raid and when. She’d barely spoken to Euphemia while she had been at the Steward’s home, though Marsaili had not been overly friendly when they had spoken. The only thing Marsaili could even think of that might have prompted Euphemia to desire revenge was Lena doing something to the woman and Euphemia striking out at Marsaili simply because she and Lena were sisters. It must have been a well-placed blow by Lena for Euphemia to send this Mercenary after her.
“I did nae do anything to that woman!” she shouted.
He snorted. “I dunnae care if ye did or nae. My concern is for the coin I’ll receive once I’ve done as she’s bid.”
“Ye’re despicable!” Marsaili snapped.
“Aye,” he said with a wink. “And if ye dunnae forget that, we will rub along just fine until I give ye away.”
Marsaili gasped, jerking back reflexively. “Give me away?”
“Aye. That’s the thing about crossing someone twisted like Euphemia. She will nae be satisfied just to have me kill ye. She wants ye to suffer for a long time.” He laughed, as if he had relayed something humorous. “Come,” he said, yanking her farther forward. “We have a tourney to attend, where I’ll be finding the perfect man to lose ye to.”
“Ye mean to wager me and purposely lose?”
“Aye, ye’re rather quick. And I’ll choose the most despicable man I can find, too.”
Marsaili shuddered. She glanced at Maria and back to Lucan. “Release Maria. Ye came for me, nae her.”
Lucan’s answer was to grab Marsaili by the waist and hoist her onto his horse. He then motioned for the warrior who was holding Maria to do the same thing. “I consider yer friend a gift, lovely lady, and I’m nae a man to reject such a thing.” With that, he tapped his horse’s flanks and set them on the way to trouble.
Three
The flap of the Callum’s tent opened just as he tilted up his leather pouch to take a drink of mead. He swallowed the liquid as Brice strode in, a fierce scowl on his face.
Brice set his hands on his hips. “We’ve a problem.”
“What is it?” Callum asked, turning the pouch down to voice the question.
He’d been competing in the tournament for five days now, and today had been especially brutal. But every battle he won earned them much-needed coin, and it kept him so occupied he didn’
t have to spend much time with Coira. Her constant complaining defied belief and had become increasingly harder to tolerate with each day that passed. She also had stirred up trouble with the kitchen lasses. It seemed his future wife was cold but jealous. She’d tried to rid the kitchen of all the young lasses she considered pretty because she did not want them serving him. He’d had to intervene and tell her, in no uncertain terms, that he was the only one who held the power to dismiss a servant.
“Has Coira done something else?” he asked.
“Nay,” Brice replied, but his pacing did not set Callum at ease.
“What then?” Callum inquired.
“Cedric Ainsworth won two women as a purse in a passage-of-arms contest. The man who put out the call to fight him wagered the women instead of coin.”
Callum frowned. That was unwelcome news. Not only was the Earl of Ainsworth’s son known to treat women cruelly but Callum disliked the practice of wagering women. He forbade it in his own clan, though he knew it went on in some others and often among men with no clan allegiance. “Where is Cedric? I want to speak with him.”
“I thought ye might say that.” Brice paused a beat. “Now, ye ken we kinnae anger him or we risk the alliance with the earl.”
“I ken it,” Callum said. The Earl of Ainsworth had proven to be a fine man, honorable even, but it had become apparent since he had arrived here with Coira and Cedric that the earl indulged his son, ignorant to the fact that the man was immoral. “The women who were wagered, what do they say?”
“I dunnae. Cedric took the women to his tent for a rest before he faced his next opponent. He refused me entry to speak with them.”
As laird, Callum could demand entry to the tent, and he could even dispute Cedric’s “winnings” if the women protested it, but it would require treading very carefully. If it came down to it, he could simply take up the challenge that Cedric had issued. He felt confident he could beat his future brother-in-law, but it would make the prideful man angry. Yet, if he ordered Cedric to release the women, that would make the man angry, as well, and he likely would refuse to comply.
Callum picked up his sword, having learned long ago to always be prepared. “I’ll speak with him and see how best to sort this.”
“Ye’ll be fighting,” Brice replied with a shake of his head. “I’m certain of it. Ye must make it seem that one of the women he’s won has captured yer fancy, and ye can bid him to wager them both. He’s nae a man who would expect ye to be true to his sister. Trust me.”
“Ye’ve thought this through,” Callum commented, impressed.
Brice nodded. “Aye. As I came to find ye, I tried to determine the best way to free the women without Cedric kenning what ye were really doing.”
“The only problem with yer plan is Coira. She dunnae want me, yet she dunnae want me to so much as look at another lass. I believe she may fear I will lie with another lass,” Callum said, exiting the tent to a bevy of noise. The grassy plain to the east side of his home was filled with tents for the warriors who had come to compete in the tourney his clan hosted. Banners hung on poles in front of tents, fluttering in the wind, and identified which tents housed which clans.
“Mayhap she only has acted cold because she senses ye are nae open to caring for her,” Brice said, falling into step beside Callum.
He said nothing, just kept weaving his way through the narrow passages between the rows of tents. The smell of cooked meat filled the air, making his stomach growl. He saw his mother to his right, and he offered an obligatory wave. She stood near the earl’s tent, and Callum tensed at the prospect of seeing Coira. When they were well past the hill, he felt his shoulders relax.
Brice elbowed him. “This response is exactly what I mean. Ye scowl at the possibility of seeing yer future wife. At first, I felt sorry for ye, but now I’m feeling sorry for her.”
Callum made a derisive noise. “Ye have too much time to sit around contemplating my life, let alone Coira’s. I want ye to start training the men every morning with me. It’s quite apparent I have nae given ye enough duties.” He looked at his brother and raised a brow. “Now, let’s make haste. I’d rather get this done and ken the sort of trouble I face.”
“Get off me!” Marsaili snarled, kicking out and connecting her foot with Cedric’s gut. They were alone in the tent now, as he had ordered one of his men to take Maria to the place where he would fight any man who answered his challenge, to use her as an enticement as part of the prize. Marsaili, he had declared, he would keep for himself. She shuddered inside. She would not live like this, nor would she allow Maria to do so.
The journey to the tournament had been fast, bumpy, and hard, but at least the Black Mercenaries had a code of honor and did not use any woman they were to deliver for coin. It was a twisted sense of honor, but it had served to protect her and Maria from being ravaged. Now there was no protection. Upon arriving at the castle—she still had no idea which clan owned it—she’d asked Lucan where he had brought them, but he’d ignored her as he sought out the most despicable man he could find, just as he’d said he would.
It had all happened so fast, her head still spun from it. She needed food and sleep, both of which she had obtained little of over the past few days. Anguish for Maria, herself, and her son filled her chest, and as if Cedric could sense her weakening state, he shoved her foot away and pressed himself on top of her, covering her mouth with his. She did the only thing she could think of and bit down as hard as she could on his tongue, which had plunged inside her mouth.
He rose up with a roar and swiped a hand across his mouth, smearing blood over his lips. “You bitch!” he bellowed and pulled his hand back to hit her.
Fear sent a surge of strength through her, and she scrambled off the pallet and to her feet. She turned to flee only to knock into a hard, unrelenting, immovable wall of warm flesh and bone. Tears sprang to her eyes as she unseeingly brought her hands up to pummel the chest of the man who blocked her escape. He had to be one of Cedric’s guards.
“Ye kinnae keep me here!” she screamed.
Strong hands captured her wrists and deftly stopped her blows. A sob of despair tumbled from her lips. “Release me,” she begged, pulling on her wrists to no avail.
“Shh, lassie,” the man whispered, even as Cedric began to yell. “Dunnae fash yerself,” the stranger said under the roar of Cedric’s temper.
“Leave go of my woman,” Cedric demanded.
For a moment, there was a small glimmer of hope that the man holding her would be honorable and come to her aid, but he released her and her hope plummeted. And when the stranger said, “Dunnae get churlish over a wee wench,” despair threatened to overcome her. She could ill afford the weakness of such an emotion. She thought of her son, and anger burst forth.
“I’m nae a wench, ye blackhearted swine,” she growled, looking up into the man’s face. Shock hit her hard as her gaze met the soulful brown eyes of Callum Grant. Her lips parted with a jagged breath.
She gasped, her chest tightening with a storm of confusion, memories, and emotion. In the space of a breath, she careened wildly from disbelief, to anger, then to happiness, and back to seething anger. “Ye!”
For a moment, Callum simply stared at her, his own lips slightly parted. His fingers, still encircling her wrist, tightened as his chest rose with a sharp intake of breath. A crease appeared between his thick, dark brows but smoothed immediately when Cedric spoke. “Do you know my prize?”
“I’m nae yer prize!” Marsaili snapped, turning her head to glare at the odious Englishman.
When she felt Callum suddenly release her, she turned her attention to him once more, but he was looking at Cedric. “Nay, I dunnae ken the lass.”
Marsaili’s jaw slid open again. She knew three years had passed since they had seen each other, but a lifetime could have gone by and she would have known Callum Grant, even if age or warfare had ravaged him. He knew her, the foul beast! The only explanation was that he did not want to admit
he knew her. For the second time in her life, Callum Grant had managed to humiliate her so much that she wished she could disappear. To make matters worse, the betrayal that had nearly killed her soul pounded at her once more.
Damn Callum. She had never planned to seek his aid in finding their son, let alone tell him of the child. He was a liar and a betrayer, and she could not trust that he would allow her to keep the child. Still, it was like liquid fire beneath her skin to know that if she had wished to ask for his aid, he obviously never would have given it. She drew herself up to her full height, which felt rather pitiful at the moment, given she only came up to Callum’s shoulder.
“This is Marsaili Lamont—”
“Lamont?” Callum interrupted Cedric. “Are ye married?” His brow knitted, and a vein in his temple was suddenly pulsing.
She pressed her lips together. She was certainly not going to explain to Callum Grant how it came to be that she was perfectly fine going under the false name given to her by that clot-heid Lucan because he hadn’t wanted any trouble. Yet, he was boring a hole into her with his penetrating stare, and she did not get the feeling he’d let the question go unanswered.
“That’s an odd question,” Cedric replied, saving Marsaili from having to answer. “She’s not married, just a wench from a nameless family—no clan affiliation.” Callum narrowed his gaze upon her, but before he could say anything, Cedric went on. “Curtsy to the laird of the Grant clan, wench.”
She stood stiffly, her mind and her body refusing to curtsy to a man who had lied to her and used her. For one moment, confusion flickered in Callum’s dark-brown eyes. She was angry he had denied knowing her, but also glad. When she escaped Cedric—because she fully intended to do so—she would not have to worry about fleeing Callum, as well.
“Curtsy!” Cedric ordered again. He clamped his hand on the back of her neck and shoved her head forward. Pain shot from the point of contact to her eyes and made her hiss.
When a Scot Gives His Heart Page 7