Born to Bite Bundle

by Hannah Howell

  That last word nearly stopped her heart beating. Just thinking the possibility that Gybbon had fallen into a trap made her tremble with fear for Gybbon. Alice could not claim that she had the sight, even if she did have the occasional dream that gave her a timely warning. What she did know was that she had very keen instincts, and every one of them was telling her that Gybbon was in grave danger. In the years she had been running and hiding she had learned to heed those instincts. They had saved her more times than she cared to count. Now she felt sure they were trying to save Gybbon with their alarums.

  Grabbing Nightwind’s reins, Alice began to follow Gybbon’s trail. The man was careful not to leave enough sign of his passing for the Hunters to see, but her eyesight was far keener than their enemies’ and the blood Gybbon had been making her drink in the wine had made them even keener. She knew he would be angry with her for following him but she did not care. Far better to be lectured by him than to discover much later that if she had just done something, she might have saved his life. Alice did not want those chains of guilt dragging her down for the rest of her life.

  And when they reached shelter this time, she would conquer the last of her fear, she silently vowed. It had lessened with each one of Gybbon’s kisses, with each stroke of his hand. It was past time to vanquish the last of it. The fear that something had happened to Gybbon had made one thing very clear to Alice. It was far more than lust that kept her returning to Gybbon’s arms, kept her risking the chance of recalling the horror of Callum’s attack every time she felt the hard proof of Gybbon’s desire press against her. She had no intention of allowing Gybbon to get himself killed until she had discovered just what that more was. He had started the seduction and he could damn well stay around until he finished it, she thought crossly.

  Gybbon echoed every move the Hunter made as he waited for the man to strike. This man was not going to be a quick kill. The Hunter had not only refused to flee, he had been cocky in that refusal. Considering how many of the man’s companions had already died, that made no sense to Gybbon. He doubted the fool considered himself a far more skilled fighter than his dead companions, although such arrogance was a possibility. This man did not have the same look of religious fervor in his small dark eyes, either.

  Bait.

  The word whispered through Gybbon’s mind and he cursed. He did not want to believe he had been foolish enough to step into a trap but every instinct he had was suddenly screaming that that was exactly what he had done. This man had not been caught; he had done the catching. And if Gybbon did not break free of the trap soon, Alice would be left alone. The thought chilled him to the bone.

  He had not even told her how to get to Cambrun, he suddenly thought. In his arrogance, he had assumed he would be the victor of this battle and would take her there when it was all over. Gybbon quickly pushed aside what tasted too much like fear, a fear for Alice’s safety. He could not allow himself to be distracted by concern for her. He had to worry about himself. If luck was still on his side, he could escape this trap. The fact that he was already hoping for luck to save him did not make Gybbon feel much better.

  A heartbeat later he knew there would be no escape for him, that he had allowed his thoughts to distract him enough to miss someone creeping up behind him. Pain crashed through his head. Gybbon tried to turn and face whoever had struck him from behind, but staggered and fell to his knees. A second blow fell and the cascade of agony laid him out on the ground, bringing him down so swiftly that he had no chance to even put out his hands to ease his fall. His last clear thought before he was dragged into blackness was of Alice and how he had failed her.

  Gybbon instinctively smothered a groan as he woke up, slowly dragging himself out of the dark he had been plunged into. The pounding in his head was so fierce his eyes hurt, felt as if they were trying to escape his skull. For a moment he wondered what was wrong with him and then the memory of two hard blows to his head seeped into his mind. The fact that his head still throbbed told him the injury done to it had been a serious one. He started to lift his hand to his aching head and froze.

  He was tied down. All reluctance to open his eyes fled. Gybbon ignored the increased ache in his head as the soft light of dawn struck his eyes like a blow, and looked around. He was staked out on the ground just inside the woods surrounding a small clearing, his arms and legs tethered to four thick tree trunks. A brief tug was enough to let him know those ropes were thick and strong, the knots tight. His strength had been too badly leeched away by the injury to his head, and the others he was beginning to feel, to allow him to snap the ropes quickly. The way the four men moving toward him were watching him, he would have to break his ties very quickly to have even the smallest chance of escape. At his full strength he could have done it, and leapt into the fight before the fools even knew he had freed himself. At the moment, just the thought of leaping anywhere was more than he could bear.

  The man Gybbon now knew was Callum stopped barely a foot away. A snarl rose up inside Gybbon and rumbled in his throat as he met the cold gray gaze of the one who had so badly hurt Alice. The way the three men with Callum took a slight step back would have pleased him if his attention had not been so fixed upon Callum. The beast that lived inside every MacNachton wanted this man’s blood and was enraged by the weakness that prevented him from tearing out the man’s throat.

  He would not feed from him, Gybbon decided coldly, only taking enough to let the man know he had been right about some of what he had believed about the MacNachtons. Enough to make the man fear for his soul just before he died. As far as Gybbon was concerned the man’s soul was already damned for what he had done to Alice and what he yet planned to do to her and his own child. Unfortunately, he knew a man like Callum would not see what he had done or wanted to do as a crime.

  “They say the sun kills demons like ye,” Callum said.

  The man’s voice was rough and unusually hoarse. Gybbon wondered why he had not noticed that when the man had spoken that night Gybbon had found Alice. Fighting to see clearly despite the faint haze of pain clouding his eyes, Gybbon studied the man closely. After a good long look, he finally saw why the man’s voice was so unusual. A ragged scar marred his throat, a mark he recognized as having been made by an animal or, he almost smiled, a MacNachton. Alice had nearly killed the man. With either her teeth or the lethal claws her fingernails could become, she had tried to tear out the man’s throat. His Alice was a strong fighter, he thought with pride.

  His Alice? Gybbon silently cursed. She was that and more. He wondered what twist of fate made him realize that now. It was a poor time for such a revelation. He had no time to sort through his feelings or question just why he had marked her. If nothing else it would probably only add to the pain he felt, for there was a very good chance he would never see her again. Telling himself that if she found her way to Cambrun his clan would care for her only brought him small comfort.

  “They say a lot of foolish things,” he replied, not surprised when his calm, faintly derisive words caused Callum to narrow his eyes in anger. “One has to question the wit of any who would listen to such mad talk.” Gybbon hid his pain when the man kicked him in the side. “Ah, time for the gentle persuasion, is it?”

  “Ye willnae be so cocky soon. Despite the shade the trees offer, the sun will soon be shining down on ye.”

  “Aye. A rare sight in this land and one to enjoy the few times we are blessed to see it.”

  “Mayhap that talk of the sun killing them wasnae right, Callum,” muttered a short, thick-set man. “And werenae we supposed to try to catch us one of these demons?”

  “We have caught one, Duncan,” said Callum.

  “I was meaning catch one to be taking back to the laird so that he can be made to talk and all. The laird badly wants one of these demons so he can look them over. Has him some questions for the beastie, aye?”

  “This beastie has killed four of our men. And we will be answering a few questions by watching what does ha
ppen to demons like him once they are forced to meet the light of day, aye?”

  Duncan scratched his weak chin. “I be thinking the laird has more than one question he is wanting answered.”

  “Then he can hunt down and capture one of these thrice-cursed beasts himself. This one is ours. There is also one more of his ilk creeping about, isnae there. Mayhap we should take the lass to the laird. Aye, there is a thought. I suspicion the laird would like to see what a female demon is like.”

  A chill rippled through Gybbon. He could not halt the memories of what had happened to his cousins Heming and Tearlach when they had been captured by Hunters from swamping his mind. Their tales of captivity had enraged every MacNachton alive and sent the icy chill of dread he felt now down many a spine. The thought of Alice enduring such tortures made his heart clench with fear for her, but he kept that fear hidden from Callum and his men. It would only please them and could even add to the danger Alice would face without him at her side. Reminding himself of how long Alice had escaped these men, even with the added burden of four children, made swallowing that fear a little easier.

  “Ye have been trying to catch and hold fast to Alice for six years,” Gybbon said, “and ye have failed. Why do ye think ye can do so now?” When those words earned him another kick in his side, Gybbon had to fight even harder to hide how much pain it caused him, for he was certain he had felt his rib crack under the blow.

  “Because ye are going to tell us where the bitch is.”

  “Och, nay, I dinnae think so. She wasnae too pleased with your hospitality the last time ye had her as your guest.”

  “She and that loathsome whelp she bred need to die, but how long it takes them to do so isnae my concern. They will be caught and I will take them to the laird.”

  “Which laird do ye mean to give your son to?”

  “That beast she bore isnae my son! And I am nay fool enough to give ye the laird’s name just so that ye can lay some curse upon his righteous head. Just think on this as ye die, demon. Soon your woman and her wee bastard will be in the hands of your enemy, and I think ye can guess how much she will be enjoying that mon’s hospitality.”

  Gybbon watched the man walk back to the fire burning in the center of the clearing, his men shuffling along behind him. There was a confidence behind the man’s words that deeply unsettled Gybbon. Why, after six long years of chasing Alice all over Scotland, did the men believe she would soon be caught? It made no sense.

  Then he almost cursed aloud, barely stopping himself from wildly fighting against his bonds as an icy panic seized his heart. He was bait. Just as they had used a lone man to draw him in and capture him, they planned to use him to draw Alice into a trap. It had been hard enough to think on how Alice would be alone, unprotected because he had foolishly stumbled into a snare. Now he added the fear that she would be taken captive. Gybbon had not thought there could be anything worse than thinking Alice could die because of his carelessness, but Callum had just shown him that there was.

  He fought to smother the ugly memories of all his cousins had endured when they had been taken prisoner, but they refused to leave his mind. Only it was not Tearlach or Heming he saw in chains. It was Alice. It was Alice’s soft skin marred with bloody lash marks and bruises from repeated beatings.

  Even more horrifying was the thought that, if the men who had caged his cousins had told anyone of their assumptions about the value of MacNachton blood, Alice would spend her long years in chains while her blood was used to give those monsters the strength and longevity of a MacNachton. Even if the men who held her did not have that knowledge, they would still make her life a hell on earth as they used her to try to discover every strength and weakness the MacNachtons had. And such prodding, such long study, could easily reveal that secret the MacNachtons themselves had only just fully understood and wanted no Outsider to ever know—that drinking MacNachton blood could heal, could strengthen, and could lengthen an Outsider’s life by many, many years. The secret they had hoped had died with Heming’s captors. That realization brought Gybbon’s thoughts right back to the chance that Alice could be held as a source for that blood for a very long time and he nearly bellowed out his pain and rage at the thought.

  For the first time in a long time, Gybbon found himself praying. He prayed that some miracle would occur and that he would regain enough strength and luck to escape so that he could slaughter these men who thought themselves so much more blessed than he despite their plans to hand a woman and child over to ones who would torture them for years. But mostly, he prayed that Alice had the good sense to stay very far away.

  Chapter Six

  Sweat trickled down Alice’s spine as she inched her way closer to Gybbon. When she had first seen him tied down she had nearly charged the Hunters’ camp, blindly eager to free him and slaughter his captors. She had needed several moments to quell that urge. The good sense to know that it would be an utterly foolish thing to do had been slow to come and cool her blood.

  Still shaking from the need to kill the men who had hunted her for so long, who now left Gybbon staked out to suffer a slow bleeding away of his strength and his life beneath the slowly rising sun, she had taken her bow and arrows from her saddle. The weapon was one of the few things she had rescued from her home before running for her life. Her father had made the bow to suit her small hands and taught her to hunt with it. Unable to buy, make, or steal any new arrows, she had treated each one she had like gold but she was willing to lose a few now if they finally rid her of these men and saved Gybbon.

  As she continued to creep closer to Gybbon, Alice tried to plan exactly how she would free him. She knew she could take down at least one man with an arrow, possibly two, before the Hunters even knew she was there, but then they would be on her. Freeing Gybbon as much as possible had to come first. Then all she could do was hope that the threat of being taken down by an arrow would be enough to hold the Hunters back. As she held them at bay, Gybbon could finish freeing himself.

  If he still had the strength to do so, she thought, glancing up at the sun. Its light was already eking through the trees to touch him, each shaft of its light slowly sucking the strength from his body. If the amount of blood she could see on his now dirty, tattered clothing was anything to judge by, he had wounds that would also steal his strength. She could tolerate a lot more sun than he could, but it was still vital to get him to some shelter as swiftly as possible. For that to happen he had to be able to ride, and that took strength. She certainly did not have the strength to drag him about for miles if he lost consciousness.

  Her stomach cramped with fear as she moved the last few inches to where one of the ropes holding him down was wrapped around a tree. She kept her gaze fixed upon the Hunters as she sawed at the thick rope with her dagger. Each faint rasp of the blade against the rope made her heart skip with alarm but she did not hesitate. Even if she got only one of Gybbon’s arms free before she was discovered, that would still give them some chance to flee. She could put the dagger in his hand and hold their enemies back as he finished cutting himself loose.

  “There be sun on him now, Callum, but he doesnae act like he feels any pain,” said one of the Hunters, a tall, too-thin youth with pockmarked skin. “I thought ye said they were supposed to burn.”

  “That is what we will soon discover for certain,” said Callum.

  Alice fought the fear that rough voice stirred inside her, a fear so deep her muscles tensed with the need to run. Instead she concentrated on the fact that his once fine, deep voice was ruined because of her. The memory of how she had escaped him gave her strength. Even so, she felt a dizzying surge of relief when the blade of her dagger finally cut through the rope, for it meant she was now a little closer to getting far away from Callum. Still keeping her gaze on the men by the fire, she began the slow, exhausting crawl toward the tree that Gybbon’s other arm was lashed to.

  Gybbon looked toward the Hunters when the youngest of them spoke. The youth’s words proved t
hat the rumor that MacNachtons caught fire in the sun’s light had not died. Although the result was wrong, the men obviously knew, or had been told, that the light of day was dangerous to the people they hunted. Gybbon had to wonder what idiocy made the men continue to track MacNachtons at night if they believed that. It could be as simple as the Hunters not knowing where their prey would hide, but Gybbon could not help but think that some of it was a simple following of the rules of war. Striking at night often gave the attacker an advantage. Since striking at MacNachtons in the full light of a sunny day could cost his clan dearly, he prayed these men and the ones sending them out to hunt remained so blindly foolish.

  A faint tug on his wrist startled him but he hid his surprise. He also swallowed a sudden wave of hope. It might not be a rescue. It could just be some woodland creature testing the rope for food or nesting material. Gybbon took a slow, deep breath to restore his calm and his nose filled with a light scent he knew all too well. Alice was near. He had the wild thought that he should have left the need of bloody retribution out of his prayers.

  The urge to shout at her to run was hard to beat down. At full strength he and Alice could take down all four men, but neither of them was. He suffered because of his wounds, that weakness only added to by the sun’s effect on him, and she had not yet regained the strength six years of running for her life had stolen from her. Her reluctance to feed only made her recovery take longer. If she was seen, she could be captured, and the thought of that was nearly more than he could bear.

  When the pull of the rope on his wrist went abruptly lax, Gybbon struggled to remain still. He did not give in to the temptation to see where Alice was moving to next. Instead, he concentrated on how she moved without making a sound, silently slipping from shadow to shadow, and how none of their enemies appeared to be aware of her presence. To ensure that they remained ignorant, he attempted to keep their attention fixed firmly on him.