Chapter 13
The barefoot man was glad he had personally come down from the castle. His initial thought had been to remain in the tower and let the key come to him.
He had listened to the reports from his scouts, the messages on the pigeons coming in thick and fast while he worked out exactly where Wallace and Natalie had gone.
He didn’t eat. He didn’t sleep. He just impatiently waited for news. Then the old hag casually dropped into the conversation that the two of them were hiding out on Knife Island. It was enough to make his blood boil. She couldn’t have told him that earlier?
It wasn’t fair for the balances to be tipped against him after so he had worked so hard and waited so patiently.
It had taken it out of him to send Wallace’s spirit forward in time. It wasn’t something that could be conjured lightly out of the air. Dark magic like that was draining.
It had been worth it to know that his chance was getting closer, that the key was getting closer. Soon his father would be free and together they would rule the world. Father and son.
The churches would close. The abbeys would empty. There was little point praying to a faraway God in the sky when a God on earth was in charge. Even with the cheating fools attempting to help them, he was going to win.
The excitement of the chase had gotten his heart pumping faster than it had in many years. He knew Wallace was having second thoughts about the deal.
That could be the only reason why he wasn’t bringing Natalie and the key straight back to the castle. He wasn’t sure where they were planning to hide but they should have known better. As if anyone could hide from him. The very idea was ridiculous.
The first time he set eyes on them both in the valley, he had to resist laughing. They had genuinely thought they could escape him.
“I must thank you,” he said, calling across to Wallace. “She will take your place in the chains as we agreed. You brought her all the way back to me and I am grateful. Now, girl. Give me the key.”
The men all watched him as he looked at her. She was pretty enough. Maybe he’d take her as his bride, have a child of his own. Imagine that. Three generations.
The entire known world would tremble at his feet. He could hardly wait.
She looked afraid. He liked that. “Where is the key? Give it to me.”
“I do not have it,” she replied before screaming, “Run Wallace!”
He hadn’t expected her to do anything but cower before him. Then she went and called out? The audacity! He would make her pay for that.
“The key,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “Hand it over and you shall see I’m not a bad person. I only want what is best for all of us.”
“I told you, I don’t have the key.”
“I know you’re lying to me. It brought you back from your time. It carried you to the island. You must have it.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Last chance.”
“I told you, I haven’t got it.”
“Search her.”
He stood back while his men ran their hands over her. He tapped his foot, waiting for the answer he knew was coming. She squirmed in place, trying to get away from the prying hands of his men. He enjoyed the sight.
“She hasn’t got it,” one of them said at last, turning to him and shrugging.
“Hasn’t got it?” he repeated, grabbing the nearest sword and thrusting it through the man’s gut. “You would bring me such news?”
The man slumped to the ground, holding his stomach, groaning as he took his last breaths. He looked at Natalie closely, watching the fear grow in her eyes as she kept glancing at the corpse by her feet.
“Wallace has it,” he said, turning to his men. “Don’t just stand there. Find him!”
They scattered across the valley. Where was he going with the key? He must know he couldn’t get away.
The men roamed far and wide, working their way up the surrounding mountainside as he stood and waited in the valley.
He paced up and down, waiting for news. “He must be somewhere,” he shouted at one of his personal guards. “He can’t have vanished into thin air. He has the key. He was right here. He can’t have gotten far. Find him or I will have your skull for a tankard.”
He turned back to question Natalie further. She wasn’t there. “Where is she?” he shouted, looking left and right. “Where is she?” The sound echoed off the mountainside. He roared with anger. “Find them!”
They had caught the two of them at last. It had all been in his grasp. And then what? They had slipped through his fingers. He cursed the name MacGregor, spitting on the ground and vowing that, when they were finally caught, he would make Wallace watch while he cut Natalie to shreds .
Something caught his eye high in the sky and he looked up in time to see a pigeon swooping down toward him, a note attached to its leg.
It landed on his outstretched hand, waited while he untied the note, and then flew off again.
Unrolling the slip of parchment, he read the contents quickly.
Return to MacCallister Castle. I slaughtered a pig. He meant for you to go hunting to get you out while W and N return to the door.
The note might not mean much to anyone else but to the barefoot man it meant everything. His mother had read the entrails of another sacrifice. He need not waste time searching for Wallace and Natalie.
They would come to him at the castle. He should never have left. Still, it wasn’t too late. He would get back there before them.
He was not hunted. They were. They would have to avoid the main thoroughfares and that would slow them down.
He gathered up his men and headed north.
The more he thought about it, the more it made sense.
No matter where the two of them ran to, there was no getting away from him.
The only way for her to return to her own time was to use the key in the same door that brought her here. That was the door in the dungeon.
Why had he gone after them? The only answer he had was that he had become too excited by the chase to think rationally. So their cheating helper wished for them to sneak back to the castle while he was out? Well, see how that worked out for Wallace and his little friend from the future.
If he planned things properly, he could get both of them there at once. What a joy that would be.
Take the key from her, lock Wallace back in the eternal chains, then take the key down the long stairs to free his father from his dungeon.
Maybe take him and introduce him to Wallace, see how much pleasure it would bring the old man to torture the last of the MacGregor lairds.
He would keep Natalie for himself. He had found the fear in her eyes pleasant enough and with work, he was sure he could make that fear turn into abject terror. Wouldn’t that be something?
Better news reached him a couple of miles into the march. A figure with hands bound was being dragged across open ground before being dumped at his feet by two men.
“Who is this?” he asked, yanking the hood from the stricken figure’s head. “This is not Wallace MacGregor.”
“It’s the captain who brought them to shore,” the man on the left said. “He was married to Scarlett.”
“Was he indeed?” the barefoot man replied, rubbing his hands together with glee. “Then he better join us on our stroll, hadn’t he?”
Under his feet, the ground trembled. Soon, he thought, as he began to march north again, giving the captain a good kick every now and then to keep him walking with them.
Soon the key will unlock the door that the druids said could never be opened again. Naive fools they were to think anyone could keep his father locked away forever.
Soon he would be free and Wallace dead. It would make all this running around worth it to know the MacGregors were gone for good.
Three generations of betrayal and subterfuge would be nothing more than a footnote in the annals of history. He would soon have the key.
It was almost over.