Chapter 1
The wind whipped through Caroline’s light-brown hair. A terrified expression marred her beauty. A fierce sense of protection filled her heart. Flanking her were her younger sisters. Nessa was nineteen, two years Caroline’s junior. Her hair was a shade darker than Caroline’s.
All the sisters shared the same sapphire eyes, with subtle distinctions.
Caroline’s were as pure blue as the sea, shimmering with mystery.
Nessa’s were flecked with hints of brown and green, reflecting the lush, natural world around them.
Tara’s eyes were bright and dazzling, filled with youthful hope and curiosity.
Her hair was auburn, hair of smoldering heat.
It was Tara who stumbled over a fallen log. She gasped. Caroline reached out instinctively, grabbing her arm, preventing her from hurtling to the ground.
“We need tae keep moving,” Nessa hissed, her eyes flashing with panic as they stopped momentarily.
Caroline twisted her neck to look at the brooding Keep behind them. Formidable against the wan light of the Highlands, clouded in what seemed like a perennial mist, it filled her with dread. No longer was it their home.
“Give her a wee moment,” Caroline snapped. She didn’t want to scold Nessa, but tensions were running high.
From their vantage point, they could see the entrance to the Keep.
It was a yawning mouth, and from it poured guards that obeyed their new master.
How fickle loyalty was, Caroline mused. Only yesterday they had obeyed her father, the true Laird of the Gilmour Clan, but then he passed on to the next world and his brother took over.
Caroline shuddered. The man had always given her a sense of evil.
There was a certain look in his eyes, as though malevolence had taken residence there a long time ago and had festered since then, rotting the man from the inside.
Her father had been kind, generous, and good-humored.
His brother was the complete opposite. It was as though at birth the good and the bad of the world had been split between the two brothers; the glowing, shining qualities pouring into her father, while the nasty qualities were given to her uncle.
This man, the most powerful man in the clan, now strode out of the Keep with a glowering menace in his eyes.
His long cloak, as red as blood, billowed behind him.
The clan emblem rested upon his chest, near his heart.
It had been stripped from Caroline’s father as soon as the last breath had been taken.
Everything that had been his now belonged to her uncle, and that included her.
It had always been her father’s wish for her to marry a neighboring laird.
At twenty-one years of age, she had been excited to do her duty for her family and establish an alliance with another clan.
She imagined herself meeting a striking laird, youthful in nature, as powerful as the elements themselves, that would sweep her off her feet and cause her heart to tremble with excitement.
They were the dreams of a naive young girl, and reality was swiftly forcing her to dispel these notions.
“Can we dae this?” Tara panted, clutching her chest.
Nessa rolled her eyes and put her hands on her hips.
“If we dinnae keep moving, then they’re gaeing tae catch us.”
“But would it… would it be such a bad thing tae leave? It’s our home,” Tara said weakly.
Caroline pressed her lips together, forming a thin line. The delicate features of her face were hardened by grim determination. While she pitied Tara, this decision was not a selfish one.
“We cannae stay there, nae now Da is dead. There is nae protection for us. Ye know what he wants from us,” Caroline said, meaning their uncle.
“We know what he wants from ye,” Tara replied, a dark look in her eyes.
Caroline felt tension rush through the core of her body. While she felt pity for her sister, it only went so far. She approached Tara and grabbed her wrist tightly, enough to make Tara gasp. She hissed her words directly into Tara’s ears, hoping that her youngest sister would see sense.
“Aye, he wants tae marry me off, but what dae ye think awaits the two of ye? Even if I left alone he would simply move on tae the next one, and then the next,” Caroline shifted her gaze between her two sisters.
Nessa shuddered at the thought of marrying her uncle, wrapping her arms across her chest, while Tara dipped her head, subdued.
“And even if I stay, he will only marry ye off tae the highest bidder. He dinnae care for treaties, only gold. And one of ye might even be saved for Ken.”
The thought was like a curse. Ken was their cousin, brooding and distant, he was more like a presence that haunted the castle than a man.
Caroline had found him once when they were younger, standing above a toad.
It had been cut down the middle, the guts spilled out.
Ken had been holding a sharp stick. Pieces of the toad clung to the tip.
It wasn’t the gruesome sight that had chilled Caroline the most, but rather Ken’s reaction.
He looked oddly calm, as though nothing was out of the ordinary.
When she asked him what had happened, he replied that he just wanted to see what the toad looked from the inside, as though the toad’s wishes meant nothing to him, nor did he care that his curiosity had taken a life.
Sons were often reflections of her fathers, and Caroline dreaded what her life would have been like as Laird Gilmour’s wife.
The thought of those spindly fingers caressing her hair, the yellowed teeth breathing foul breath upon her, the weight of his ghoulish body insisting upon her virtue…
She clamped her eyes shut and forced the thoughts from her mind before they could become too vivid.
She would rather have died than suffered the fate of being his wife.
“It’s nae our home any longer,” she continued.
“I know it’s hard, but we cannae stay here and be safe.
There is naebody tae look out for us. Everyone is loyal tae him now.
It’s his clan, nae ours. We can only look out for each other.
Come on, we need tae keep moving,” Caroline said this more gently than Nessa.
While still holding Tara’s hand, she broke into a gentle run.
The guards were spilling out of the Keep.
Dogs followed, barking madly. Caroline’s heart was in her throat.
She curled her hands into fists and grit her teeth.
Pain flared in her legs, her ankles—in fact, every inch of her was suffused with pain.
She ignored it all, though, because if they hesitated for one moment, then they would be dragged back to their Keep, and she could not imagine their uncle giving them another chance to escape.
Chains would await them. They would be prisoners in their own home, shackled to a grim destiny without any hope of escape.
Caroline was not going to let that happen, at least not for Nessa and Tara.
She glanced towards her sisters. Nessa had always been the swiftest of them.
She broke out ahead. Caroline slowed to keep pace with Tara, who needed more encouragement.
The sounds of the hunting party were getting closer and closer.
“This way,” Nessa said, pointing to a nearby stream. The girls splashed through the cold water. It soaked their legs and dresses, the chill seeming to seep into their skin. Caroline bit down on her tongue to suffocate a gasp. They scrambled up the opposite banks.
“The dogs will lose our scent,” she replied.
No doubt it was a lesson she had learned from their father, Caroline thought. He had often taken Nessa hunting. In fact, he had tried with all three of his daughters, but Nessa was the only one who took to it naturally.
“Up here, we cannae outrun them. We need tae wait for darkness tae fall,” Nessa said, gesturing to a tree.
She ran towards the trunk and jumped up, taking hold of a gnarled branch.
The leaves were thick and leathery. She pulled herself up, legs swinging, until she was straddling the branch. Caroline turned to Tara.
“I cannae.” Tara was shaking her head.
“Ye must,” Caroline urged.
She put her hands against Tara’s hips. Nessa reached down.
Tara was sniffing and sobbing. It was hard for her, Caroline thought.
It was hard for them all. In the distance, the dogs were barking, horses whinnied.
Deep voices rolled through the forest like thunder, calling their names.
The fine hair on the back of Caroline’s neck prickled.
“Ye can dae this, Tara,” Caroline said, and used all her strength to lift Tara up.
She jumped and Nessa grabbed a hold of her wrists.
Tara dangled for a moment before kicking out against the trunk, using it to climb up.
She was shaking her head and muttering to herself as she did so.
When she was hoisted up to the branch, she began adjusting her disheveled dress and smoothed down her hair, backing away to the far end of the branch that flowed into the trunk.
She drew her knees into her chest and breathed heavily, her eyes wide with fear.
Nessa was still dangling from the branch, stretching out her hand.
Caroline fixed her face in determination and hitched up her dress.
The damp clothes were cold against her palms. Water trickled from her boots, quickly absorbed by the hungry soil.
She summoned all her might and jumped up, pressing her foot against the trunk, using it as leverage. She clung to Nessa’s hand.
Nessa strained and pulled Caroline up with a heaving exhortation. Caroline was draped over the branch like clothes drying on a line. She pulled herself up into a sitting position.
“We need tae get higher,” Nessa warned. Caroline nodded in agreement, for they were on the lowest branch. Tara groaned.