Chapter 10
Every step Dionysus took jolted Lachlan, sending pain ricocheting through his body.
He had ridden his warhorse through battle, thundering over bodies and rough terrain without a second thought.
Now, even the steady rhythm of his gait tested Lachlan.
The only good thing about this ride was that it was no longer raining.
But the damp still clung to him. Tartan heavy against his skin, the scent of wet earth rising thick from the forest floor.
He should have asked Isabel to change his bandages that morning, but he’d been too stubborn. While Isabel mentioned progress in the healing, he still wished that it would go faster.
They rode in a line, with Mungo and Finley at the helm, and Caelan and Hamish at the far rear, the rest of them riding two-by-two in between.
Lachlan returned his attention to the road ahead.
The pathway was clear, but that did not mean enemies didn’t lurk just out of sight, or that they might stumble across any more bodies.
As it was, James nor any of the others had recognized the Scot they’d buried in a shallow grave on the side of the road, but they had recognized the coin in his pocket–English.
This felt like a message, knowing whoever had killed him could have found the coin as easily as they had.
With a keen eye to the forest ground, Lachlan also listened to every sound of every bird, every whistle of wind through the trees, every crunch of vegetation underfoot. The world spoke to him in small ways, and he took each whispered hint to heart.
There’d only been one time he’d been surprised in an ambush attack.
The night his father died. And Lachlan had vowed never to make that mistake again.
Lachlan rolled his shoulder where the arrow had pierced.
Despite the aches in his shoulder, his thigh, he would take down anyone who dared to surprise them.
That was, if another fever didn’t take him down to the ground like it had in the abandoned lodge.
By gods, but that was embarrassing. Even now he could feel her stare boring in the back of his head.
Lachlan led his horse out of the line, letting his men pass, and then slid in next to Lady Isabel.
“Was your nose itching?” she asked.
“Nay, but the back of my head bears your initials,” he teased. Lachlan watched as Isabel rode, noting first how well she sat her horse, balanced and steady, a skilled rider.
Isabel smirked. “How is your leg?”
“Ye’ll no’ hear me complain.”
She cocked her head to the side and gave him a look that said she thought him a liar. “A miracle, that.”
There was a note of mocking in her tone, mayhap a reminder to him that she never complained.
Not about the hard miles, meager meals, or indignities of the road that would have sent most gently bred ladies into protest. She had taken it all in stride—the cold, the hunger, even the necessity of seeking privacy behind a bush—with a composure that both surprised and unsettled him.
Much like the way she’d handled his wound and his stubbornness from the start.
Lady Isabel was stronger than most would notice at first glance.
Isabel turned from side to side, studying the landscape with an awareness that seemed too deliberate for idle curiosity. Was it possible she had overheard his exchange with his men about the body on the road?
“What have ye got up your sleeve?” Lachlan asked, taking note that she kept fiddling with her wrist.
“Oh.” Isabel licked her lips, taking a second too long to reply.
Was she going to lie to him?
Then she flicked back the cuff and showed him the brown leather bracer at her wrist, and he caught the gleam of a blade. “Just a wee sgian dubh.”
Lachlan had expected to escort a dainty lady.
To play nursemaid. Instead, he found himself riding in a caravan with a lass who adapted easily to uncertainty, and who, he suspected, noticed far more than she ever chose to say, and now to top it off, was armed.
What had she endured up to this point that made her the way she was?
All he knew of her was that she was the Bruce’s niece, his ward, and that he wanted to keep her safe. But where had Lady Isabel come from?
“Who trained ye to use it?” He would not deign to offend her by suggesting she was incapable. One thing he’d learned in the brief time he’d been acquainted with her was to never underestimate the lady.
And on that note, he was fairly certain she’d eavesdropped on his conversation about the body on the road. She was too cunning not to.
“My father mostly. And then my uncle was kind enough to have one of his men continue my training.”
“Have ye ever had need to use it.”
“Only twice.”
“Twice is two times too many.”
She raised a brow at him. “Well, the first time I had cause to use it was actually to save a fawn.”
He imagined her lunging at a wolf.
“The wee thing had its leg caught in a snare, so I cut him loose.”
“And the second?”
“Well, I’m afraid that one was a bit more unsavory.
A man, Angus, same as your man’s name, so deep in his cups that he was blinded by the ale, thought me to be his wife.
Despite the fact that Wilma is twice my age, much heavier in the bosom and well, her bottom.
We look nothing alike. Well, he was trying to drag me off, threatening to put a scold on me for being such a shrew, and I had to give him a little poke with my wee sgian dubh.
His wife heard the commotion and his howl from inside their croft, came out and boxed his ears. ”
“Was he punished beyond that?”
“Nay,” Isabel sighed. “Angus was harmless when he was sober. I promised no’ to tell my uncle of the unfortunate incident if he quit his cups, and guess what? He hasn’t had a drop since.”
“Well, I’m impressed, lass. I would have punished him something fierce, but ye took it upon yourself to give him a better life.”
She shrugged. “Dinna confuse my kindness for weakness. If I’d truly been in danger, I’d no’ hesitate to use my weapon for deadlier force.”
“I’ve no doubt.”
Isabel made a little tsking noise with her tongue, drew in a deep breath and then said, “Who do ye think turned on my uncle at Falkirk?”
It was unnerving and frustrating that they had no idea who the enemy was. “I dinna know whether ’twas an Englishman or a Scot’s. Maybe both. There are some who doubt it can be one of our own countrymen, but I’ve witnessed firsthand what happens when men grow greedy.”
“Aye.” There was a sadness to her tone. “There are always those who would bend the knee to Longshanks if it meant gain.”
“And some clansmen who dinna agree with the politics of Scotland. They trick themselves into believing England might bring them a prosperous bounty. That Robert the Bruce isn’t the right man to lead this country, as if they have any right to grant or deny his position.
” Lachlan’s jaw tightened. To consign their kin to death? He shook his head. That was pure evil.
“Wallace has taken it hard,” Isabel said. “Hard enough to speak of stepping down, of surrendering his guardianship of Scotland to someone deemed more worthy.”
“Truly tragic. Wallace is the heart behind this entire war for independence.” There was something about talking with Isabel that made him comfortable enough to share his thoughts.
“I’ve followed Wallace from the beginning.
Fought beside him. Won beside him. To see a man like that falter, not just in battle, but in spirit, too, is something I dinna know how to reckon with. ” His grip tightened on the reins.
William Wallace was a great soldier, a great warrior, a great strategist, and to have failed so miserably and taken that to such heart that he would give up such a position to someone more worthy that he believed was disconcerting and disappointing at the same time.
“Ye must find the traitor and present his head to my uncle and to Wallace.”
“Aye.”
The forest floor sloped ahead, the sound of water growing louder as they approached the river crossing. That, at least, offered some advantage. The current would break their trail, muddle what tracks remained, forcing any followed to guess at their path. If they were still being followed.
As they approached the riverbank, the ground softened beneath the horses’ hooves, the mud thick and slick from the night’s rain runoff. Lachlan shifted in his saddle, already bracing for trouble.
“Careful,” he called to Isabel, his gaze fixed on the uneven slope as her horse picked its way down the embankment.
His men approached the bank with caution, and Isabel followed suit.
Her maid, however, either wasn’t as good with a horse or didn’t heed his warning, and took the decline at too fast a pace, her mount’s footing faltering.
Then the horse lurched to the right, its hooves scrambling for purchase and getting sucked into the muck.
One unbalanced step and then another, and with each lurch, Elsa slipped further off her saddle.
“Help!” she shrieked, holding on for dear life.
“I’ve got ye!” Angus who was closest, surged forward on his horse.
“Elsa!” Isabel, too, whirled to help, her own horse also slipping.
“Isabel!” Lachlan spurred his horse forward.
Everything happened all at once: Elsa pitched sideways, losing her grip; Isabel started to slip; Lachlan reached Isabel, catching her at the waist and hauling her back before she could fall on top of her maid who was fortunate enough to miss being trampled; Angus leapt from his horse into the muck, and finally, he pulled Elsa, now covered in mud, from the sinking ground; Freckles escaped her bosom cage and climbed on top of Isabel’s head, leaping into Lachlan’s lap.
Lachlan shifted his balance back into place, wishing it was Isabel on his lap, and not the ferret.
They moved to steadier ground, the lot of them, and dismounted to stretch their legs, and Isabel to help her maid clean herself up.