Chapter 29
The stench of blood hit him before he saw the first body.
Rhys stepped over the threshold of his keep and into chaos.
The once-familiar courtyard was a battlefield fraught with muddy scars across the lawn, blood streaked across the stones, bodies scattered like broken chess pieces. O’Donnell men fought against their once brothers-in-arms in vicious clashes that left no space for mercy.
The clang of steel on steel rang through the smoke, and the shouting made it feel like hell had opened beneath their feet.
He drew his blade, still bloodied from the ambush in the woods, and surged into the fray.
His sword found the ribs of a man before the traitor could even raise his axe. Rhys twisted the hilt sharply, sending the body crumpling.
Another came at him from the side, and he ducked, rolled, and slashed upward, severing the man’s hamstring and then his throat. There was no room for hesitation. This wasn’t war, it was survival.
His castle, his kin, his daughter were all under siege.
“RHYS!”
He turned to see Myles charging through the side gate, sword in hand and blood streaked down one cheek.
“Where the hell have ye been?” he shouted, deflecting a strike with a growl.
“Murdoch. Trap. We’ve been betrayed,” Rhys explained through the chaos.
“Nay bloody shite,” Myles barked, driving his sword into a traitor’s chest and kicking him off with a grunt.
William appeared next, breathless and wild-eyed, half-covered in soot. “They’re all safe.”
Relief slammed into Rhys’s chest like a hammer, nearly buckling him. But he had no time for it.
“Where’s Finn?” he demanded.
Myles grimaced. “He’s in the gardens. Top side. West of Cookie’s herb plants. He’s holdin’ ground with a handful of men. Sent for reinforcements — mercenaries, I think.”
Rhys’s mouth went dry. “I’ll kill him.”
William glanced at Myles before offering the strategy, “Quickest way there is through the keep, and down to the kitchen courtyard."
“Aye, let’s go.”
Together, the three men plunged through the battered doorway into the belly of the keep.
Inside, it was worse. Fires crackled against the stone walls where torches had been ripped down and furniture overturned for barricades. The tapestries Rhys’s father had collected burned in corners.
Loyal men lay dead alongside the traitorous bastards who had once sworn fealty to him.
They moved down the stairwell, Rhys leading the charge. Certain than none of his loyal men would ever raise their hand to him, “Anyone who puts up a fight against us, is an enemy, aye?”
“That’s how I’ve been managin’,” Myles said with each stride.
“And the mercenaries all have the foolish red armbands, I’ve gathered,” William said, keeping pace but lifting it to show Rhys.
The armbands were red with a blue O’Donnell crest stitched. A stark difference from the blue and green of the true O’Donnell colors. It stopped him in his tracks.
“Murdoch?” Rhys managed, chest heaving with anger.
“Aye,” William said, pulling the armband from his grip and tucking it back into his pocket.
Rhys growled and turned, taking the stairs two at a time. Every blow will be a punishment. Every step will be me vengeance.
They reached the lower floor and were met with a wall of resistance.
Three mercenaries blocked their path, shields raised, spears bristling.
Myles didn’t slow. “I hate shields,” he muttered, and launched himself into the wall of them, creating just enough distraction for Rhys to vault into the gap and gut the one on the right.
William hacked at another’s legs, and Myles bashed the last into the wall until his head cracked against the stone.
“Up!” Rhys growled, chest heaving.
“Ye daenae think he’s runnin’?” Myles panted, wiping blood from his face.
“He’s waitin’,” Rhys said. “He’s wantin’ me to find him.”
Billy grunted, “Aye.”
They reached the landing outside the kitchen, and Rhys could hear a distinct barking of orders and a low crashing of metal behind the thick door. Finn wasn’t in the garden. He was just beyond where they stood. In the courtyard.
Rhys adjusted his grip on his sword. “Cover me.”
Billy and Myles flanked the door.
Rhys kicked it open.
The heavy wood burst outward, cracking on its hinges, and silence fell in the small courtyard.
Finn stood at the far end, atop a makeshift stage. He wore his leathers, his blade drawn, and his expression unreadable.
In front and beside him, half a dozen men stood at the ready. Mercenaries — rough and already bloodied.
“Rhys,” Finn said, voice cool. “Good. Ye’ve made it.”
“I always do,” Rhys answered.
“Took ye long enough. And I’ve see ye’ve brought yer pets.”
They stared at each other. Two cousins once raised under the same roof, now on opposite sides of a firestorm.
Rhys stepped into the courtyard, slow and deliberate. He didn’t have to look to know that William and Myles slipped behind him, positioning to protect him.
“This ends now.”
Finn didn’t move. “Aye. It does, cousin.”
“Why?” Rhys asked, voice quiet but shaking with fury. “Why betray me?”
Finn tilted his head. “Is that what ye think this is? Betrayal?”
Rhys’s eyes darkened. “Ye sold us out. Lied. Turned Murdoch against his own daughter. Threatened me daughter’s life. Turned me home into a battlefield. Smells a lot like betrayal, if I had to name it.”
“I did what had to be done,” Finn said, stepping closer. “To take back what was rightfully mine.”
“What? But ye were never meant to be Laird.”
Finn’s mouth twisted. “Was I nae?”
Rhys blinked. “What the hell are ye talkin’ about?”
Finn’s smile was bitter. “Ah. So ye daenae ken the full story.”
The room seemed to tighten.
“Then allow me to explain,” Finn said softly.
Rhys didn’t lower his blade.
He didn’t breathe.
He didn’t blink.
“This keep. This clan. It should’ve been mine. Me faither was the firstborn. But when your da came along, full of charm and bluster, everything shifted. Always the golden son. And when the time came, yer faither’s name was carved into stone. Nae mine.”
Rhys took another step forward. “All of this is about succession?”
“This is about everythin'!” Finn roared suddenly, veins bulging at his temples and in his neck. “Me whole life, Rhys. I spent years watchin' from the sidelines, pullin' strings, doin’ what I could to prove meself. But nothin’ was ever good enough. Nae for him. Nae for them. Nae even for ye.”
“Ye had yer place,” Rhys said coldly. “Ye had yer family. Ye had yer damn honor.”
“I had shackles,” Finn spat. “Tied to a clan that never saw me for what I was. So I broke free.”
“And the night I was taken at Murdoch Keep? It wasnae capture, Rhys. It was a meeting. An agreement.”
Rhys felt fire in his lungs.
“With Murdoch,” Finn continued. “He offered me a chance to reclaim what was mine. Said we could rewrite what was owed.”
Billy barked a humorless laugh. “So ye bartered with a madman for a seat that was never meant for ye?”
Finn turned to him. “I did what I had to. Ye think I could ever best Rhys Adams in open combat? Ye’d gut me before the first strike. So I had to be smarter. Subtler.”
“Ye betrayed every soul in this keep,” Myles said. “What did ye sell us for, Finn? Silver? Land?”
Finn’s gaze settled back on Rhys. “I sold nothin’. I took what should’ve been mine. Slowly. Quietly. I planted doubts, whispered truths, dug into the past.”
“What truths?” Rhys’s voice was rough now. “What else have ye done?”
Finn exhaled, shaking his head. “Oh, just twisted the truth a bit. Told him that yer precious Amara wasnae even his. That she was sired by Leighton. That yer da and hers had plotted their own alliance behind both our faithers’ backs. An affair, Rhys. And a daughter born from it.”
The courtyard went still.
“Is it so far from the truth, cousin?”
“Enough.” Rhys’s voice thundered through the chamber. “I’ll nae hear another word against her or her late maither.”
Finn said smoothly. “He believed it so much that he joined me in this. Sent his men to intercept ye. It was all arranged. Because he and I saw the same truth.”
“And what truth is that?” Rhys snarled.
“That ye were never meant to laird.” Finn’s smile was cold. “Ye were meant to die the night of the truce. Murdoch and I planned it together. Yer da was to die first.”
William’s blade clattered with another’s to his right.
“What did ye say?” Rhys whispered.
Finn’s eyes glittered. “We killed yer da. At the table. Same knife I used to gut that boar for the feast.”
The sound that tore from Rhys’s throat wasn’t human. He surged forward, blade raised, but before he could strike, mercenaries poured in from behind them, armed and shouting.
Finn dove behind the stage like a coward. “Kill them!” he roared.
Rhys didn’t hesitate. He plunged into the fight, Myles and William beside him. Steel clashed against steel. Rhys drove his blade through the first man, parried the second, and shoved a third back with a roar.
“Get to Finn!” William shouted, blood spattered across his cheek.
But the mercenaries kept coming.
Rhys cut down another, and another, fury in every blow. His side ached from the earlier wound, but he couldn’t feel it now. Only rage. Only betrayal.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Finn slipping past the melee into the training grounds.
“Coward!” he bellowed, but another man blocked his path.
He hacked through him with a vicious strike.
Myles’s voice rang out again. “Go! We’ve got this!”
Rhys locked eyes with him, nodded once, and tore down the hall after Finn.
And all he saw was red.
The courtyard blurred around him as he ran.
Rhys’s boots pounded stone of the training grounds, blood slicking his side where an earlier cut had reopened, but he didn’t care. He didn’t feel it. Not really. All he could feel was the white-hot fire screaming in his chest. Every breath was a roar. Every step a drumbeat of vengeance.