Chapter 16
She was dragged back to the surface, gasping for air, staring furiously at David. He was soaked now, too, staring at her in amazement as they stood shoulder deep in the water.
“Are you trying to drown yourself?”
“Of course not! I’m trying to, I’m trying to…” She couldn’t speak suddenly. Her teeth were chattering.
“Let me go!” she demanded, struggling to free herself.
He wouldn’t let her go. He drew her hard against him, heedless of her wild struggling, until she became so exhausted that she just lay flat against him.
“I just want to cleanse myself of the dust, the cobwebs, the dead people!” she gasped.
“All right, all right!”
He eased his hold on her. She rubbed her arm with her fingers, then grew frantic again, stripping off her torn and dirtied robe and gown. She heard his words, soothing her, felt his fingers, moving in her hair.
Finally, Shawna felt as if she’d scrubbed herself enough. By then, she could barely stand, she was so exhausted. She lay still against him and began to shiver.
“We’ll freeze here,” he said softly, urging her forward.
“Aye!” she cried, pulling free from him to hurry from the water.
“Shawna!”
She ignored his voice, shivering and anxious to leave the loch. She staggered from the depths of the loch to the embankment, falling against the damp grasses there.
They would freeze. As she lay there exhausted, breathing hard, she realized just how cold the night was, and how wet she was.
Wet—and bare.
Only then did it occur to her that she couldn’t go walking back into the castle as naked as a newborn.
She was shaking violently when David drew up beside her, naked as she, but holding his rinsed clothing in his arms.
“My lady, if you run from me again, I swear I’ll find a leash—or put you in the dungeon in truth.”
“You said—”
“Come on, quickly,” he told her.
“Where?”
“Well, back into the water for a moment.”
“Nay, I am not going back into that water!”
“You were the one most eager to reach it.”
“And I did reach it.”
“And went running out, refusing to listen.”
“One can only leave the water by walking out of it.”
“Not true, my lady. Come with me, now. Quickly, because I am indeed freezing myself!”
He drew her to her feet. “Into the water!” he commanded, lifting her chin.
“No.”
“We must.”
“Why?”
“’Tis the only way to reach a selkie’s lair.”
She protested when he drew her back from the embankment to the lapping shore. “I can’t. It’s freezing.”
“Ah, my lady, you should have thought of that in your madness. This is the only entry when the tide is high.”
“The only entrance…I cannot go!”
“You’ve a better suggestion?”
“Aye, surely—”
“Lady, we cannot stand here longer! We might be seen.”
She gasped as he swept her up off her feet, carrying her into the loch despite her protests.
She gasped when he let her fall into the depths, but she then found herself swimming after him, and swimming strenuously to stave off the cold that gripped her so viciously, heading into what appeared to be solid rock on a cliff wall.
“Catch your breath!” David commanded her then. “At this time, there’s about a twenty-foot stretch beneath the rock. You’re all right with it?”
A fine time to ask her, she thought.
“Aye!” she snapped out, treading water.
She dove beneath the surface with him. They swam below the rock and stone, and the distance did not seem unbearably great.
They emerged into a cavern within the cliff.
As she stumbled to the rocky shoreline there, Shawna realized that this was where David had come when he had first returned.
Where he kept his clothing, where he came for refuge when he was not with her or haunting the secret passageways within the castle.
He rose from the water first, casting his soaked clothing down upon the earth and sweeping up a blanket from the ground to throw around her shoulders as she emerged from the water. From the top of a traveling trunk, he picked up a length of folded tartan, expertly kilting it around himself.
Cloaked in her blanket, Shawna just stood shivering and staring at the water’s edge.
David ignored her and went about the task of building a fire within a pit he had obviously used for a similar purpose many times before. Smooth, level rock surrounded it. David warmed his hands at his freshly made fire, then looked to Shawna with impatience. “Come. Sit. Get warm.”
She managed to move, coming to take a seat before the fire with the blanket wrapped around her. She set her hands before it, letting the warmth radiate throughout her body.
“That was horrible,” she told him.
“What shall be horror is just beginning,” he told her curtly. “They came for you, Shawna, and they will not give up. You must learn to be more careful.”
“I don’t understand any of this. Why try to kill me in the crypts? Someone could just as easily come to my room—”
“You bolted the door to your room. In the castle, where others sleep nearby. Many others—including my brother.”
“Why wasn’t I killed in the tunnels?”
David shook his head thoughtfully.
“Perhaps my brother is supposed to believe you’re trying to kill him. Then, when you are out of the way, the new ‘Laird’ Douglas can hardly regret the passing of a shrew who was trying to do him out of his inheritance.”
“But I’m assuming that Hawk is supposed to die as well.”
“I assume the same.”
“But my family discussed buying the property from him!”
“Perhaps it’s all deeper than any of us imagined.
The man spoke about others of his kind. What kind?
As to the tunnels, maybe they weren’t trying to kill you.
Maybe they were just trying to capture you, as I assume they’ve captured Sabrina.
You never saw that man before tonight, yet he very definitely felt that you are destined to die soon. ”
“He did say that Sabrina was alive,” Shawna said.
“We have to find her quickly. I’m concerned that there is a cult in action here.”
“Edwina’s group of witches are good women! I cannot believe that—”
“I accused Edwina of nothing. I said that I’m afraid a cult exists here. I am not accusing her of having a part in it. And I still believe that someone tried to make you appear guilty to my brother. Remember, I wasn’t with you in the tunnels, when Hawk was nearly killed, until the trouble started.”
Shawna fell silent. David opened his trunk and drew out a bottle of good Scotch whiskey. He took a seat upon the trunk then and offered the bottle to her.
“Straight whiskey,” she murmured.
“My lady, I do apologize. My offerings here are few,” he murmured. “I do have a castle of my own, but alas! It rests in the hands of others.”
“You, M’laird Douglas, are a sorry, wretched bastard. Not in the least nice. Straight whiskey shall be just fine.” She swallowed hard, gagged, coughed, but felt better. Then she shivered fiercely again.
“Oh my god, what is going on?” she demanded in a stark whisper.
“Think carefully, Shawna. You’ve really got no idea? No idea at all?” he asked her intently.
“I swear to you,” she said wearily, “I do not!”
David took the bottle and swallowed down a large draught of whiskey himself.
He set the bottle down and saw that she was still shivering.
He let out something like a growl of impatience and reached for her.
She stiffened against his attempt, then let out an aggravated cry of frustration as his strength outweighed hers, and she found herself seated between his legs, dragged down in front of him with her back to the trunk.
He rubbed his hands briskly with the blanket over her arms and shoulders, vigorously flooding warmth back into her body.
“Better?” he asked, his word against her ear, bringing a different kind of warmth along with it.
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. His body sheltered her. She was definitely warmer.
“They’ll know you’re here now. Alive. Whoever was in that crypt tonight will know.”
“I don’t think so,” he reflected.
“But the attacker who survived knows—”
“He—or she—might well think that it was my brother. We’re enough alike. And it doesn’t matter. I’ve decided I’m going to keep my presence a secret only a wee bit longer.”
“Oh?” She twisted around, trying to read his features.
David nodded grimly. “The laird of the castle is supposed to reign as royalty on the Night of the Moon Maiden. He is master of all that happens. I do think that I shall appear for the festivities.”
Shawna wondered why that announcement made her feel so uneasy. People—gentry and villagers alike—usually dressed in costume for the occasion. The night was wild with feasting, drinking, and ribald merrymaking. People went wild.
Perhaps dangerously so.
“David, I’m not sure—”
“You’ve wanted me to make it clear that I am back at Craig Rock. What more dramatic entry back into the world of the living could I make?”
“But—”
“I thought that I would find something—or someone— by keeping my silence. I’ve gone through the papers at Castle MacGinnis, and I’ve torn through the office at Castle Rock.
I’ve watched throughout the day, trailed the passageways by night.
I’ve eavesdropped on men in the mines, I’ve lived like a mole, seeking answers.
I’ve discovered nothing—except that evil designs most assuredly do still exist here.
There is very definitely a conspiracy afoot.
But it seems I can discover nothing further by keeping watch.
All that is left is for me to make my appearance and stake my claim to all that is mine.
Then seek to know exactly who tries to steal it from me and mine by any means, including murder. ”
“Perhaps we should tell the constable everything.”
“Right. Because he was so competent when my corpse was found after the fire? Shawna, I’ve already told you, we must solve this ourselves.”