The Runaway Highlander (The Highland Renegades Book 2)

by Syme, R. L.

  ~ Dedication ~

  This book is dedicated to my writer’s group.

  Jill, Carol, Mary, Jen, Shaun, Perri.

  When I deleted an entire novel, it didn’t faze you. When I wanted to write romance instead, you encouraged me. When I made my first sale, you threw me a party. When I couldn’t meet a deadline, you gave me a strategy. When I read you the first chapter of this book, you couldn’t wait to read the rest. Every writer should have such steadfast support.

  Thank you.

  Chapter One

  March 1297 – Berwick, Scotland

  Anne de Cheyne beat her fan against the heat of the fire and closed her eyes against her mother’s honeyed words echoing off every hard surface of the council hall. The insufferable woman hadn’t stopped talking since the Sheriff had entered the room.

  The man’s gruff howl followed hurried whispers and Anne gritted her teeth. She could turn to speak the harsh comments she held back, but that would mean watching her mother play a courtesan to this old, slimy fat man.

  And while her father lived.

  It would only be for a time, she’d said. Yet they’d been in Berwick going on a month. Lady Milene de Cheyne, self-styled Countess of Caithness after her husband’s defection to the enemy, enjoyed the English comforts of her title far more than any Scot should.

  Anne stared into the dancing flames and imagined her mother roasting there. Since the reassignment of the Sinclairs’ English title for their supposed treason against the crown, Mother had engaged in this excruciating game intended to press her daughters into favorable marriages.

  Perhaps she realized this English King could take away favor as quickly as he bestowed it. That would be the wise lesson. But Anne feared there was a more monetary motivation and squirmed at the thought of the many fat, bald, smelly old men she’d been thrown at since they left the Highlands.

  Not sufficient men of quality in the Highlands, her mother had said. Best to leave her father and brother to watch over things at home and come to Glasgow, then Edinburgh, then Berwick, to find husbands. And if that failed…

  Anne swallowed against the fear that parched her throat.

  London.

  If only Broccin Sinclair hadn’t disappeared. She might have made a quiet marriage to a man she had loved and been done with it.

  More giggling from the dais. The stone floors carried not only the cold, but also the noise, and Anne suddenly found herself wishing for their cramped quarters. The Sheriff’s home was large. Drafty and cold. Yet Anne couldn’t get far enough away from her simpering mother to suit her.

  And even with several feet of room between the raised dais where the Sheriff lingered with Milene de Cheyne, even over the crackle-snap of the fire, even over Elena’s mumblings, Anne could hear her mother’s flirting. If a person didn’t know their situation, one might think it was Milene de Cheyne on the hunt for her own mate, and not securing a rich purse in exchange for her daughter.

  Of course, if Elena continued her antics, Anne might be saved from the slithering, pig-faced lordlings after all. Very few men wanted to marry a woman with a deranged family member—in case the sickness was contagious, no doubt.

  “Don’t let her ruin our lovely night.” Elena’s brown eyes blinked with foolish delight. “After all, what would we have to poke fun at in our freezing bedclothes if we didn’t hear every idiotic word?” Her sister quirked a smile and glanced up at their mother.

  “I’d as soon freeze in that bed as listen to her.”

  “Don’t say that, dear, or God might grant your wish. It has been a frightfully long winter, even for the coast.” Elena sat back against the chair and rocked at its square legs with childish persistence.

  “God doesn’t have time for my trifling wishes.” Anne increased the frequency of her fanning as the heat of the fire flared. She was close to overheating, but the only good way to escape her mother’s prying was to feign a chill and sit by the hearth.

  A crack sounded from somewhere deep inside the house and both girls started, wide-eyed and shallow-breathed. One glance upward told Anne that Milene was oblivious to the noise, being completely engrossed in the Sheriff’s story of some victory or another.

  “Did you hear that?” Anne asked.

  Elena’s hand went to her naked throat and she nodded. “It could have been the wind. Knocking down a decanter.”

  The two knights standing at guard near the giant doors had heard it too, by Anne’s estimation. They bent slightly at the knees and their spears came forward just a foot or two. Not enough to rouse the Sheriff.

  “Or a clumsy servant.” Elena’s voice shook.

  Anne glanced around at the knights asleep on the big, wooden tables that sat perhaps twenty feet from the fire, nearer the dais. Most of them lay passed out in their food, or just near their drink.

  “Should we say something?” Elena’s eyes were still fixed on their matchmaking mother. “It could be bandits. Or worse.”

  “What’s worse than bandits?”

  Elena considered for a moment, her fingers flitting along the velvety arm of her dress. “What about ghosts?”

  “Do you think the guards would be able to fight ghosts?”

  “Perhaps the apparitions will take corporeal form.”

  Anne placed a calming hand on Elena’s arm. “Clearly, you’ve spent much time considering such an attack.”

  At the doorway, one of the guards had disappeared and the other looked after him, down whatever dark hallway they’d passed through to get here.

  The dining chamber itself was quite large, with high ceilings and empty tables set below the dais in rows. On the elevated platform at the end of the room, the large, solid table was adorned with the remains of a lavish feast. The Sheriff wanted a wife to befit his new station. The daughter of a Countess was perhaps higher than he should aspire to, but Milene was only after his sizable fortune.

  Another crack cut the air, closer this time.

  Elena’s breathing quickened audibly and Anne increased the pressure around her sister’s forearm. “It’s nothing, sister. Slow your breath or you’ll overheat.”

  Across the expanse of the hall, Milene de Cheyne cackled and threw her head back like a horse. This kind of behavior frightened Anne perhaps more than the sounds of conflict in the hallway. She closed in on the man. Her trap had been set and she was ready to bleed him.

  One of the Sheriff’s men lumbered from his table, across the long hall, over to the main doors with his hand on his sword hilt. The remaining guard came to attention and the man whispered to him, then disappeared into the flickering dark.

  Anne grasped Elena’s hand and readied herself to make a break for it if enemies approached. No one guarded them, nor paid them any heed, and after one guard withdrew, then a soldier after him, Anne was sure that sinister plans awaited.

  The Sheriff’s household had proven to be more of a target than any of them anticipated. Always someone wanting justice or angry with a judgment they’d received. Berwick was a border city and a volatile mix of sympathies, not to mention corrupt and notoriously violent. Anne longed for the quiet, sprawling green countryside of home. Small though their castle was, it was theirs, and surrounded by the most brilliant beauty of God’s own creation.

  She never would have left the Highlands if it could have been helped.

  A clash of metal set her teeth on edge and a cluster of men burst through the doors, taking the extra guard with them as they sprawled onto the floor, a collection of limbs and dirty clothes and stringy hair and weapons.

  The Sheriff and her mother looked up from the dais, their pink faces round with f
ear. The men at the lower table wiped their greasy faces and put down whatever slop they’d been about to consume.

  In the center of the fallen group, one man stood first and finest. His stance claimed him as battle-hardened, all sinew and muscle and readiness. Sun-darkened skin glimmered with a sheen of moisture that said he’d been out in the rain. A sword stood erect in his hands, ready to cut a swath of death around him. Dark hair swung around his face and his shoulders heaved with his slow breaths.

  Anne gaped, marveling at his chiseled profile, and felt a giddy breath bubble up through her insides. She almost laughed at the feeling, and the warrior turned his head fully to her.

  While her eyes wanted to follow the pattern of the jagged scar that covered most of the left side of his face, she was transfixed by his dark, searching gaze and couldn’t move, think, breathe.

  “Oh, God,” gasped Elena from beside her. A soggy hand gripped her own and Anne dragged herself away from the stranger’s eyes long enough to see the fear in her sister’s. She must have seen the scar, too.

  “Hush,” Anne whispered.

  The scarred man turned back to the Sheriff and looked as though he might charge the whole lot of them. The men around him slowly began to stand and under the pile, one remained on the floor. A thick ooze of blood drained into the cracks in the floor around him.

  With a growl, the scarred man grabbed the body by its neck and hauled the man to his feet. The Sheriff stood and held out his hand for silence.

  “Aedan Donne.” The Sheriff wiped at his fat face with a cloth and left it on the table while he came around to the floor. He passed through the tables of staring drunkards and came to stand in front of the scarred man. “What have you brought me today?”

  The warrior sheathed his sword with one deft stroke, keeping a hold on the injured man at his side, who had finally found his feet, if not his wits. “I found the last of de Moray’s renegades for you, sir.”

  Andrew de Moray. Freedom fighter. Scottish hero. Broccin’s closest friend.

  The Sheriff approached the pair, stepping carefully around his men as though they might have plague. Not one for getting himself dirty, apparently.

  “You work miracles, my boy.”

  The scarred man, Aedan Donne, smacked his captive soundly on the back and the man looked up, coughing and spewing. Anne couldn’t help herself as she stood, even with Elena pulling at her.

  Her breath stilled. This might be Broc. He was about Aedan’s size, and while not quite as strapping a young man as she remembered, had his fair hair and wide shoulders. She shook off her sister’s pliant grip and moved toward the Highlander. Anne shivered in the cold center of the room as the warmth of the fire receded.

  The Sheriff ignored her and poked at the fair-haired captive. “He seems barely alive.”

  “’Twas not my sword that wounded him, sir.” Aedan turned the man to the side and showed something to the Sheriff. “His wound is deep, but not fatal. One of your guards came upon us as he attempted escape. He took the guard’s sword and tried to fight me. Your second soldier stabbed him, despite my protest.”

  “No, no.” The Sheriff circled the captive and cast spiteful glances at his men. “I need these people alive. I must have de Moray himself if I’m to placate the King.”

  “I can help, my Lord.” Anne stepped in front of the captive, seeing the cut of his jaw and hoping to see a familiar face. The Sheriff glared at her, raising his hand.

  “And who do you think you are?” He sidestepped the captive and recognition fell upon him, relaxing his stance. “Ahhh, Miss de Cheyne. I don’t see how you can help.”

  “I know this man.” Anne placed her hand on the captive’s warming skin and walked around, next to the Sheriff. As she did, she watched his face with a nervous bubble growing inside her. How she longed for the familiar and welcome features of Broc’s handsome face. She needed an ally.

  But when she finally stood at the Sheriff’s side, the face of the captive was fully revealed to her, and she knew it not. After claiming to know him, she couldn’t stop. She had very little knowledge of how to treat wounds. Scrapes and cuts only. But if she could convince the Sheriff she knew the man, she might be able to secure a way out of this horrid place at last.

  *****

  Aedan noted the blank look on William’s face when the girl circled around. But once she got a good look at the hunched man at his side, she seemed surprised and then went blank as well. So despite what she claimed, she did not know William, after all. What was her game?

  If it was to get close to the Sheriff, she’d certainly done that. As she stood beside him, looking innocent and delectable as she did, the fat oaf slid her body up and down with the filthiest look Aedan could have imagined on the pig’s face.

  He would have cut the man down if he didn’t need the bounty.

  The girl continued to stare at William, her eyes moving back and forth between Aedan and his blond captive, likely thinking of a way to save her plans.

  “You know William Campbell?” Aedan supplied the name for her and hoped William was as close to passing out as he seemed.

  “You don’t speak to my guests, Donne.” The Sheriff practically spat his disdain all over Aedan’s face, stepping forward to put his body between the young beauty and Aedan’s scars and smells.

  “I apologize, my Lord.” Aedan bit his lip near enough to draw blood as he bowed to the fat Englishman. What he wouldn’t do for the ability to free his family from his father’s debt. He’d previously thought the line drawn somewhere before having to bow to an English pig.

  He’d been wrong.

  Aedan stayed low in his bow, keeping his seething at least out of view of the Sheriff. William stayed on his feet, still wobbling, still hunched over. He needed care or he would die. That wound would drain him soon.

  “You say you know this man?” the Sheriff said.

  Miss de Cheyne offered a curtsy, but as she sank into it, Aedan could see a loathing on her lowered face that almost matched his own. He couldn’t remember her name, not for his life. He’d been off collecting renegades when they arrived, and he’d only been back in the Sheriff’s household once since the entourage had taken up residence.

  She leaned in to the Sheriff to whisper something, her eyes flickering between Aedan and William. He kept waiting for her to stare at the scar, but she met his eyes each time. Her gaze was so quick, as though something moved with purpose behind it. She couldn’t have been more than eighteen or nineteen, but her air and sharpness made her seem older.

  Everyone knew that her mother planned to match her with Simon Alcock, Sheriff of Berwick. English puppet. Poor girl.

  She’d already shown more spirit and intelligence than he deserved, and was far too beautiful to be stuck with a pig like Simon.

  “What do you think about that, Donne?” The Sheriff clapped him on the back. “Miss de Cheyne says this man is a friend of Broccin Sinclair.”

  “Who’s that?” Aedan stood and took William by the arm.

  “One of those renegades down in the dungeon. According to de Moray’s wife, he was the leader of the whole group, not de Moray. His title now belongs to de Cheyne, so you might say I have a… family interest.” Simon Alcock leered at the young woman in her lush blue dress.

  Aedan stifled the urge to knock the fat fool’s teeth from his lecherous face.

  “I did not question the man as to his specific allegiance. Only that he is one of the outlaws you seek.” Aedan entertained no desire to bow again, but the Sheriff was exceedingly wary of men who would not show proper deference, and the old man began to get that twitch in his eye. “What would you like me to do with the man, sir?”

  “I can help with his care.” The girl spoke again, careful not to address Aedan directly. She was a fast learner.

  Simon Alcock squinted, as though thinking required obfuscated vision. William leaned a little more solidly on Aedan’s arm and groaned. “We must do something with the man.”

  The gi
rl stepped forward again and Aedan held his breath. When beautiful women got too close to him, he couldn’t help the response. All revulsion affected him, but women’s especially, and the pretty ones most of all. Their disgust was a constant reminder of what he would never have.

  Instead of recoiling, she smiled. “Let me help.”

  The Sheriff jumped as though he hadn’t noticed her presence until that moment. He eyed her with furrowed brows and crossed arms. “You’re not a healer.”

  “I know enough to be helpful.” She approached the captive and examined his side. “It is so late and surely your physician will be far away or asleep.”

  “Or drunk in his cups,” whispered one of the guards by the door. The two big lunks laughed and punched one another. Aedan hadn’t considered that, not knowing Berwick well enough to have considered from where the help would come.

  “Surely, Sheriff, you have another healer we can send for. A noble lady in the dungeon… it would—” Aedan stopped when the Sheriff’s hand came up to silence him. The fat man stood, staring at the beauty before them and chewed at his lips.

  “She may tend him in the guard’s storeroom, outside the dungeon,” he finally said. The fat man leaned in and put his stubbled, sweaty cheek to Aedan’s scarred one. “I want you to watch her, closely, and report back.”

  Aedan nodded, suppressing the desire to wipe away the evidence of his collusion. Instead, he took William’s arm and led the limping man out of the giant, echoing room. The sweat that remained from the Sheriff’s face stung in the cold air of the passageway.

  The girl followed, her footsteps like feathers behind him on the stone. When the door closed at last, Aedan turned to her and bowed. He gestured to the stairs. “After you, my lady.”

  She nodded curtly and brushed past them. Aedan watched her lift her skirts and descend into the dungeon. She may be pretty smiles and polite words while she wheedled a plan, and a better-looking man might have fallen for it, thinking he might have a chance with her, but Aedan was wise to her ways. He’d find out her game and beat her at it.