Chapter 5
Chapter Five
When Theon and Noah entered Noah's cabin, the two other Broken Blades were already inside.
Keir was pacing back and forth, his expression dark, and Graeme was sitting at the makeshift desk with an uncharacteristic frown on his face.
Theon felt the heavy weight upon them all and his skin prickled with irritation.
They did not have time for this sort of infighting and sulking, not when they had Cameron's daughter right there in their camp.
It hadn't been Theon's intention, but now that she was here, they needed to take advantage of every moment.
"What happened tae ye?" Graeme asked, alarmed, as he took in Theon's face. "Did ye get intae an argument with the horses?"
Theon didn't answer, moving toward Noah's washbasin.
He methodically cleaned his face until there was no blood left, pressing hard against his nose and relieved to find that, while he would soon have a painful bruise, it was not broken.
He wasn't angry at Noah for hitting him.
He'd have done the same if Keir had succeeded in attacking Briana yesterday or if he'd come back to camp to discover a woman he'd once cared for being taken hostage.
The three others were completely silent until Theon returned to the center of the room and sat down at the edge of Noah's bed.
Graeme remained at the desk while Keir leaned back on a chair, but Noah remained on his feet, pacing back and forth in fury.
Dark anger was pulsing from the usually gentle Noah, and Theon's own instinct flared in response.
He would rather not fight his brothers, but he would if he had to.
"Well?" Noah demanded as soon as Theon sat, placing the game bag on the table and then folding his arms. "Explain."
"She explained what happened already," Theon replied steadily, carefully keeping all emotion from his voice.
"Dinnae give me that, Theon!" Noah shouted.
"Why is she here? Briana is innocent in all of this.
Her father is a monster, and her brother's grown tae be much the same, but since when do we punish the faultless for the crimes of their blood?
Are we the villains they think we are, that we threaten unarmed women? "
"Innocent," Keir scoffed. "She's a Cameron, ye fool. The whole clan is rotten tae the core, nae matter what ye claim."
Noah shot him a look. "I was a Cameron by clan, if not by name," he reminded Keir sharply. "And now ye call me brother. Briana was always a sweet lass, one who cared—"
Keir jumped to his feet, letting his chair clatter to the ground.
"Enough of this. I dinnae want tae hear ye extol the virtues of a spoiled Cameron brat.
Do as ye will, but leave me out of it." He stormed over to the table and snatched the bag of game, then stomped out of the cabin, slamming it tight shut behind him.
Theon let out a frustrated sigh. Keir was right that they could not trust the Camerons, any of them.
Briana was the Laird's only daughter, the heir's only sister, and would soon be a MacFarlane bride.
Her family had destroyed everything he and Keir had known when Keir had been only fifteen years old.
Even Keir's mother, Laura, a woman servant who had been their father's mistress since a year after the death of Theon's mother, had not been spared the slaughter.
Their whole clan had burned and the Camerons had danced on the ashes.
He could not allow himself to forget that.
But Noah's eyes were burning into him, and Theon could not dismiss his words either.
How much did Briana know of her father and brother's machinations?
He dimly remembered encountering her once, very briefly, when she was just a girl.
It had only been a few days before that moment when everything was destroyed forever.
He hadn't taken much notice of her then, but he remembered that she'd snooped on the meeting with her father.
Why had she been snooping? Perhaps Laird Cameron coddled his daughter and kept her out of the complex world of political intrigue.
If that was the case, then she likely didn't know anything of use to them. But that didn't matter.
Graeme stood too. "I'll leave the two of ye tae talk. I'll go check on Briana. Nae doubt ye've scared her further with yer fightin'."
He left too, and the silence between Noah and Theon stretched out, both of them staring at the other without flinching. After some time, Noah was the first to look away, sinking into the chair that Graeme had abandoned.
"How could ye do this?" Noah asked, his voice quieter and heavier with disapproval.
"It wasnae the plan!" Theon insisted, his own tone sharp. Noah's quiet judgment rankled him more than the punch or the shouting had. "If it was, dinnae ye think ye would have kent it? But when we realized who she was, I had tae make a choice. What else would ye have had me do?"
"She's an innocent lass! A bride on the way tae her weddin'!" Noah protested.
"She's leverage, Noah!" Theon snapped. "Dinnae ye understand?
Her weddin' would have been another nail in the coffin of everythin' that Scotland once was.
It would have been more power in the hands of a monster—a demon who is her father.
Ye ken that better than anyone. Better than even me.
Ye ken him and what he's capable of. Would ye really see him with an even stronger alliance?
And would ye really like tae see the lass wed tae Malcolm MacFarlane? "
Noah flinched and his fists tightened in his lap.
Conflicting emotions warred on his face, then he shook his head and pressed his lips together.
After a moment, he spoke again in precise, measured words.
"So this is who we are? We take hostages now?
We hold people for ransom? I see we really are everythin' they say about us, then. "
Hot anger, the same pulsing rage that Briana had brought out with her insults the night before, flooded through Theon at that.
He knew that the world thought him a monster, and he had accepted that crown.
Perhaps even reveled in it. But to hear such disdain from Noah, from his own sworn brother, was more than his temper could handle.
He stood, his voice biting as he responded with barely contained bitter rage.
"We are outlaws. We are exiles. Do ye understand that, Noah?
There's nae returnin' tae how things were ten years ago.
We dinnae have a permanent home because there's nae place for us in this world.
Why is the line drawn for ye at ransom? We steal. We threaten. We kill."
"Only when—" Noah started, but Theon did not pause.
"We are hunters, and we are hunted as well!
" he reminded Noah with a furious gesture of his arm.
"We are hunted like animals! Any one of the lairds in that so-called alliance would hang, draw, and quarter us at the first opportunity.
How many times have we had tae tend to each other's wounds?
How many times have we feared each other lost?
" He glared. "If we want any semblance of our old lives back, we need tae take it back, nae matter what the cost. With Briana, we can force Cameron and MacFarlane to listen.
We can finally make a difference. I thought ye understood that. "
"So ye'd kill an innocent woman tae get yer clan back?" Noah demanded bitterly. "If yer plan fails and they dinnae obey yer demands, we cannae simply let her go free. Would ye kill Briana tae make yer point?"
Dark heat flashed across Theon. He tried not to think of the tears he'd wiped from her face just that morning as he said, "Aye. If that's what it takes."
Noah stared at him. He stood, obviously unsettled. "Ye're nae the man I thought ye were, then. I cannae believe this is true."
Theon scowled. "And ye arenae the man I thought ye were if ye'd let the life of one woman threaten the safety of all of us."
"What woman? Dinnae act like ye see her as a person. Ye've told me she's only leverage," Noah snarled.
The two of them glared at each other, tense fury burning from both. There was no telling what might have happened next, but the door burst open and Graeme entered, his mouth in a deep frown visible even through his thick red beard.
"If ye two are quite done thinkin' about murderin' each other," Graeme said. "It may interest ye tae ken that our leverage has long since fled intae the woods."
"What?" Noah and Theon demanded in tandem.
"She's gone. Nae doubt she ran the second ye left her," Graeme replied. "I've searched the whole camp. There's nae kennin' where she might be now."
Theon's jaw clenched and he uttered a low, furious curse. He should never have left her untied, but there was no way they could simply let her go. Not now that she'd seen them all. Not now that she knew who and where they were.
"Stay here," he ordered. "I'll fetch her back."
"Theon—" Noah started.
Theon shook his head and held up a hand to silence him. "Stay here," he repeated even more firmly. "This is me hostage. Ye've already caught yer game for the day, brother. Leave me tae me own prey."
Briana's lungs burned and her skirts tore as she ran as fast as she could through the thick trees.
She had no idea in which direction she was going or if she would even survive long enough to find a road or anyone to help her, but it didn't matter.
She couldn't stop, not now. She would just keep going until she'd put as much distance between her and her kidnappers as she could.
She was bleeding from a dozen tiny cuts all over her face and arms from passing branches, and her feet and legs ached more deeply than she'd ever experienced before.