The Warrior Laird

Prologue

Prologue

Glencoe, Scotland. February 13, 1692.

It was nearly dawn, not quite time for six-year-old Dugan MacIain to crawl out of the bed he shared with his brothers. But he was awakened by his mother’s urgent whisper to his father.

“Gavin, something is wrong. ’Tis just as old Sorcha said—the eerie quiet on a winter’s morn.”

The hair at the back of Dugan’s neck prickled. The village seer and her strange utterings never failed to frighten him, though neither he nor anyone else understood them. He heard the steady breathing of his brothers, Gordon, Robert, and Lachann. He knew his infant sister, Alexandra, must still be asleep between his parents in the bed they shared, else she would be squalling and demanding to be fed.

An ominous stillness came over the croft, and Dugan sensed something in the air, though he knew not what. His father slipped soundlessly out of bed and started to pull on his clothes.

Dugan crawled over seven-year-old Gordon and crept across the one-room croft to his father.

“Da?” he whispered. “What is it?”

“Dugan, lad,” he murmured. “Wake Gordon, and the two of you get yerselves and yer brothers dressed. I do’na know what it is, but yer ma is never wrong ... I want ye ready in case...”

Their family slept alone in the house, unlike most of the other members of the MacIain clan. Laird Argyll’s soldiers were billeted with nearly all the other families. To Dugan’s young mind, they’d been staying at Glencoe for a very long time, eating Glencoe food, drinking Glencoe ale, and sleeping in homes that were already crowded.

The soldiers wandered at will among the crofts and in the glen, their coats as red as blood, their boots shining like the black obsidian handle of his father’s small dagger, the sgian dubh.

Dugan had heard his father mutter disparagingly of the Sassenachs in their midst. His hatred and resentment of the men who would destroy their highland ways was clear to anyone who heard him, but he was as powerless as the laird to do anything about it.

Dugan woke Gordon and whispered their father’s instructions. “What, Dugan?” Gordon asked, rubbing his eyes. “What is amiss?”

Dugan shook his head as he roused his younger brothers and admonished them to be silent. “Da says ’tis a game,” he whispered to them. “The quietest one will win a prize.”

Excitement flared in Robert’s eyes, but two-year-old Lachann frowned, his expression wary. He was far cannier than any wee lad his age ought to be. His ma said he had auld eyes. “Da?”

Gavin came to his youngest son and lifted him into his arms. “Be a good lad now, Lachann, and do as yer brother says.” He gave him a quick kiss on his forehead before setting him on his feet.

Wee Alexandra gave out one short cry, and Dugan’s mother put her quickly to her breast to quiet her.

“Make haste, Dugan,” his father whispered. He slid his sword into his belt and turned to his wife, leaning down to plant a quick kiss on her mouth and then the top of Alexandra’s wee downy head. The infant was a mere eight months old, and even Dugan could see that his mother was rounding again with yet another bairn.

Gavin started for the door of the croft. “Stay here and stay quiet. I’ll be back as soon as I know what’s afoot.”

Dugan’s mother kept Alexandra in her arms as she slipped awkwardly from the bed and pulled a heavy woolen shawl about her shoulders. “Dugan, take yer sister.”

Dugan did as he was told and bounced Alexandra in his arms while his mother dressed Lachann. She wrapped each of her sons in their thick woolen plaids, and let out a startled cry when the first gunshot sounded. She gathered Lachann into her arms and stood trembling as Gordon ran to the door and darted out, screaming “Da!” as the second shot rang out.

Dugan put Alexandra on the bed and followed right behind his brother. He saw Sassenach soldiers crouched everywhere, their rifles at their shoulders, shooting at will. Some of the crofts were on fire, and people were running out of them, crying out and clutching their meager blankets ’round their nightclothes.

One of the Sassenach soldiers strode out of Laird Glencoe’s croft, reloading his rifle. Dugan’s father drew his sword, but yet another shot sounded and Gavin MacIain fell.

A jolt of pure horror burst through Dugan, and he stood frozen in place, watching as his father’s blood stained the snow on the ground. His stomach roiled and he turned away just as Gordon made a mad dash toward their father.

“No!” Dugan screamed for Gordon to stop, but his brother did not listen, running directly into the line of fire.

“Dugan!” his mother cried out, jerking him back into the house so he could not see. She clutched at the doorjamb as shots rang out. Her face drained of color and Dugan knew the worst had happened.

“Ma!” he screamed.

His mother crumpled to the floor in a dead faint. His wee brothers were crying, and Dugan smelled smoke–not the usual kind from the fireplace, and not from outside. He looked up, and his terror increased tenfold.

Dugan dropped to his knees and started shaking his mother’s shoulders. “Ma! The thatching is on fire!”

They had to get out, but even young Dugan knew they could not escape through the door. He could still hear gunfire, and was afraid they would be killed if they went that way, just like the others.

“Ma!” he cried, weeping like a wee bairn. “We’ve got to get out!”

He felt doom in his bones. They were going to burn, or be shot. Surely they had no chance at all unless his mother came awake and took them ... somehow got them away.

He ran to the largest window and shoved a chair beneath it. Climbing up, he pushed the shutters open and looked outside. No one was there. ’Twas safe. He could climb out. He could run far away from the soldiers, from the death and destruction in the village.

But he could not leave his brothers, could not leave his ma and Alexandra to burn.

He climbed down from the chair, hastened past his crying brothers to the cistern, and filled a ladle with water. He carried it carefully back to his mother, and though he knew what he was about to do was cruel, there was no time to waste. He tossed the water on her face and she sat up quickly, sputtering.

The room was filling with smoke, and there was even more gunfire than before. “Ma! The roof is afire! We must get out!”

She grabbed him and pulled him close, then took a deep, shuddering breath. “Aye. Come!”

Her tears did not abate, but she managed to pick up Alexandra and put the bairn in Dugan’s arms. “Hand her to me after I’ve climbed out, lad. Then help Lachann and Robert onto the chair and out the window.”

“Aye, Ma.”

He got Lachann out first, then Robert. By the time Dugan made the climb through the window, there was no air left in the croft to breathe.

The sun was just barely up, and Dugan tried in vain to shut out the sound of screams as what remained of his family kept to the shadows and headed for the hills that ringed the glen.