Chapter twenty
I woke half-lying against a log, my face pressed into cold mud, my cheek freezing where it touched the earth, and a thunderclap of pain radiating from the back of my skull.
The world spun wildly when I tried to lift my head, so I stayed where I was, blinking at the wet darkness beneath me.
Each breath I released stirred small ripples in a puddle just beyond my nose.
Something warm and thick was crusted in my hair above my right ear.
Blood. A memory crashed in. I’d taken a blow to the head from Conn.
My ribs screamed as I shifted my weight to push myself up, one palm sinking deep into the mud as I forced my body upright. I pressed my free hand against my side, grimacing at the sharp pain that shot through me with each breath. From how I’d woken up, I surmised I’d fallen on my injury.
The world tilted nauseatingly before steadying.
I shook my head once to clear the fog from my thoughts, and immediately regretted it.
Pain lanced from temple to temple, and for a moment the path beneath rose and fell like a birlinn caught in a storm.
I braced my hand against the ground and drew a breath, fighting the dizziness back.
“Conn,” I said, his name coming out flat and hard, not a question but an accusation.
The path around me was empty. The ancient oaks loomed overhead.
Water dripped steadily from the leaves, each drop striking the mud with a tiny splash that seemed unnaturally loud in the silence.
I swept my gaze around, looking for Katreine, but she was nowhere to be found.
By the darkness that had descended, I knew I’d been out for a long time and that she should have returned by now.
Had Conn found her, or was she still with the witch?
I suspected Conn had taken her, but I would make my way to the witch’s cave to ensure she wasn’t there before giving chase.
I pieced it together slowly, the fragments of memory slotting into place with each throb of pain in my skull.
I’d been waiting at the edge of the path where Katreine had told me to stay, watching for any sign of her return, when footfalls had resounded behind me and a hard blow had struck my head.
As I’d fallen, I’d heard Conn’s voice just before I lost consciousness.
“Sorry about this, James,” he’d said. “But only one of us can win.”
I shook my head, acknowledging he’d gotten the better of me.
I’d known he was a cheat, and I’d failed to stay vigilant.
How long had he been tracking us, waiting for us to be separated, waiting for the chance to strike?
There was no way to know, so I forced myself to my feet, one hand braced against the rough bark of an oak until the dizziness passed.
My hand went automatically to where my sword should be sheathed, and I let out a relieved breath when I found it there.
Conn was a cheat, but at least he was a nice cheat.
He’d left me my weapon to defend myself.
I looked down the path to where mine and Katreine’s destriers were tethered, then toward the trail to the cave.
Without hesitation, I started running, though my head and my wound protested.
But thoughts of Katreine drove me forward.
I needed to ensure she was safe. It was a pressing need, like breathing to survive.
The thought caught me like a blow and almost made me stumble.
By the time I reached the cave, my wound pulsed, and the pounding in my head had grown to epic proportions.
I stood at the entrance of the cave, and disappointment crashed over me. It was empty.
“Katreine!” I called, but the only answer was my voice echoing back to me. I called again and again, then I tried the witch. “Morgana! Morgana! Morgana, do ye have Katreine?”
“Nay,” came a sharp retort that seemed to come from above me. I glanced up, feeling foolish, expecting to see the witch floating there, but there was nothing above me.
“Do ye ken where she is?” I called out, turning in circles now, looking for the witch.
“Mayhap,” came another sharp reply.
“Will ye tell me?”
“If ye can answer my riddle.”
I nodded.
“Ancient is she, yet her skin is unlined. She cares for many, but she is nae a mother. She’s bound by invisible strings that she tied around her heart. What is she?”
I frowned. “I do nae ken. Some sort of god?”
The witch snorted. “Men are so blind,” she said. “Go away. Ye had yer chance.”
“Please,” I said, not above begging to find Katreine. “Give me another riddle.”
A long silence stretched, and then she spoke. “I possess no coins, I own no land, yet hold the world within my hands. Who am I?”
“I do nae ken what game ye are playing with me,” I said, irritation crawling up my spine, “but I ken well yer cunning little riddle is meant to be about me.”
A loud cackle cut through the silence. “Go to the king’s court, Highlander. She was taken, as ye already suspected.”
I turned to race to my horse, and behind me, the witch called out, “Think on my riddles while ye ride!”
I sprinted down the trail to my horse, finding Siward’s beast that Katreine had ridden gone.
That did not surprise me. I untethered my horse and mounted in one swift motion, grunting at the unexpected pressure in my ribs as my arse found the saddle, but I settled onto the destrier with my jaw clenched against the pain.
Conn would have a head start of several hours, but he’d be moving more slowly with Katreine.
She’d fight him. I knew that with bone-deep certainty.
She’d kick and scratch, making his journey as difficult as possible.
The thought should have made me smile. It didn’t.
Instead, I felt a hollow ache between my ribs that was more than just worry for her safety.
Conn wasn’t the sort of man to hurt Katreine.
He’d restrain her somehow, truss her hands, perhaps, or bind her to the saddle, but he wouldn’t strike her.
He’d offer smooth words and false promises, trying to persuade her to come willingly rather than waste his strength dragging her.
And when that failed, he’d use enough force to control her, but no more.
What pricked me now wasn’t just concern for her safety, or the thought that I had imagined a future with her, or even the loss of my prizes. An emotion swelled within me that I’d felt before but had been unable to name.
During many sleepless nights, I’d imagined what my own stronghold would look like, what it would feel like to command my own men, and to hear them call me laird by the name of the clan the king bestowed upon me.
But I had never imagined who the woman might be beside me until Katreine.
Her face was in my mind, and the hollowness in my chest came from the thought of losing her.
I saw our future with perfect clarity: a stronghold to share, my plaid on the wall and wrapped around her shoulders, my men at the gate to protect her.
And Katreine as my wife, a healer with golden eyes and a warrior’s courage.
God’s blood. I loved her. I did not know when it had happened, but I suspected it had begun the moment I’d first seen her caring for the wee little lass.
I could not lose her. I urged my destrier to go faster, not caring for my safety, only for the chance to reach her.
The witch’s riddles filled my head as the landscape flew by.
I possess no coins, I own no land, yet hold the world within my hands.
By the gods, I was a fool. What good were a title, a stronghold, and warriors to have for a woman if I lost the only woman I had ever loved?
I wanted those things to give her, but above all, I wanted her, if she would have me, and I thought she might.
She had given me her body, knowing I possessed none of those things.
Had I thrown the gift back in her face? I considered the distance I’d felt after we’d joined, and I told her of the prizes I would receive for taking her to the king, and I groaned.
“Ye are a bloody clot-heid!” I thundered, my voice filling my body, my lungs, my mind with regret.
I feared I had made her feel that her worth to me was in what she would bring me, not that I’d wanted those things above all to be worthy of her.
I had to reach her, to explain, to tell her of my heart.
As I rode on, I considered the other riddle Morgan had given me. Ancient is she, yet her skin is unlined. She cares for many, but she is nae a mother. She’s bound by invisible strings that she tied around her heart. What is she?
As the path widened gradually and the ancient oaks of the Dark Woods gave way to scattered pines and then to open moorland, I tried to find an answer to that riddle, but I suspected the witch had been toying with me as a cat toys with a mouse, so I shoved the riddle out of my head.
For a while, the rhythm of the horse beneath me and the cold air against my face were enough to keep my mind fixed on the road ahead, but my thoughts turned to Katreine once more.
I missed her sweet voice peppering me with questions about the geography and the weather, and thinking on that made me groan again.
No doubt, she had been planning to escape me, because I was a fool and had made her feel like a lamb being delivered to slaughter and not like the woman I loved and wanted to do these things to give her as she deserved.
I missed the way she hummed to herself and did not even realize she was doing it.
I pressed my heels into the horse’s flanks and rode faster, thinking of her.
Since I had found her, I had watched her face as she slept, listened to her voice as she told me stories of the Summer Walkers and their travels, felt her clever hands tending my wounds, and endured her sharp tongue, which put me in my place.
I witnessed her fierce courage when she was hurting and when she faced Siward.
She had slipped under my skin and taken my heart, and I wanted to make her mine.
I began praying to the gods that Katreine would forgive me and give me the chance to show her what was in my heart.