Chapter Twelve
Constantine sat atop his warhorse with thirty-seven of his men around him, excluding Lachlan, mounted and ready for a fight. Facing them were MacKintoshes, sixty strong, swords polished and ready to stain Glen Loy with blood.
To Constantine’s left, Lewis laughed, eager to fight. Constantine also was eager to fight and get back to the castle.
“Lochiel,” one from the MacKintosh clan called out. “Where are my cattle? Where is my son?”
This was John MacKintosh, the chief coming forward.
Constantine watched him with contempt in his eyes.
“Yer son took a woman from my care and meant to rape her. He is with the devil where he belongs. As fer yer cattle, ye were warned no’ to bring them through my land.
Yet ye sent one of yer sons to the task.
What? Did ye no’ care if I killed that son? ”
“Who is this woman ye claim is in yer care?” MacKintosh shouted, ignoring his question.
Constantine was not about to tell him. There was only reason the MacKintosh chief wanted to know who she was. Constantine frowned at him from across the unseen barrier. Alas, here was the threat he had hoped his enemy would refrain from making.
“Allow yer other sons free rein to go anywhere near her and ye will find oot before ye put them in the ground.”
“Ye’re a bastard, Cameron!” the chief bellowed and pointed his sword at him.
Constantine drew his claymore. All around him his kin readied for battle.
It was what MacKintosh wanted all along.
He knew Constantine well enough to know he would not get the apology he desired.
The Lochiel always kept his word. If he said he would take their cattle for herding them through Lochaber, then he would.
Everyone knew the Cameron chief would not hesitate to kill a man if the man was fool enough to try to take what belonged to him.
But Miss Ismay Drummond did not belong to him. The thought of it somehow angered him enough to flick his reins and send his horse into a full gallop.
Though his eyes were fixed on the MacKintosh chief, thanks to years of riding in the middle of stampeding cattle, he was acutely aware of everything going on around him. Lewis and Fionn reached the first of the MacKintoshes and brought down their swords while blocking with their shields.
Blood and splinters flew everywhere from the melee. Constantine took down six opponents, careful not to kill them. He liked fighting. He did not always like killing. Sending men back to the homes wounded and broken was sometimes much more satisfying.
He broke through the small group of men protecting the MacKintosh chief and finally reached him. He brought the flat of his sword down hard across his enemy’s belly and almost knocked him out of his saddle. But the MacKintosh held on to his reins and remained seated.
Affording him no time to catch his breath, Constantine flipped his blade in his hand then caught it by the hilt and smashed it into MacKintosh’s head.
Finally, the enemy chief fell from his saddle. Constantine leaped the ground beside him, and before any other man could reach them, he pummeled his fist into the MacKintosh’s face until blood spewed out.
One of the MacKintosh’s sons jumped on Constantine’s back, another reached them and swung his sword close to the Lochiel’s belly. Constantine whacked his heavy claymore at Will MacKintosh, the chief’s third son, then cracked his elbow into the nose of Will’s brother Kenneth.
Reaching them, Geoffry sprang from his saddle and sliced the air—and Kenneth’s forearm with his already-bloody sword.
Four more men arrived on the MacKintosh side, cutting the air with axe and dirk. Constantine and Geoffrey held them off. He managed to knock two of the chief’s sons out cold with fists to their jaws.
He spotted Lewis fighting off his horse, hurling men left and right with his sheathed claymore.
But when Lewis’s gaze found him, his eyes went dark, and he ripped his sword free.
Constantine noted the terror in his cousin’s expression an instant before he felt the stinging sensation in his belly. He looked down and saw the hilt of a dirk sticking out of his middle.
Damnation, he thought. Miss Drummond may never forgive him for this.
It was his only thought as he sank to his knees.
His eyes took in the vision before him of the MacKintosh chief’s youngest son, Hamish’s head flying from his shoulders and rolling on the ground.
*
Constantine woke several hours later, but only for a few moments, and only long enough to feel a cool cloth on his head and gentle fingers curled around his much larger hand.
He did not know where he was, nor did he care overmuch.
At first, he thought he had died and this was his Alison tending to him.
but her image did not even form in his mind before Ismay Drummond appeared before him, real or imagined, he was not sure.
She was engulfed in flames around her head, but they didn’t harm her. He thought he reached out to touch them, but she still held his hand.
“Ye have finally come back to me.”
Leave it to her to remind him of his promise.
He was glad he kept it. He smiled—almost chuckled.
And then she was gone again. She did not leave him alone though.
She visited his dreams, returning over and over into various scenarios.
Contrary to him, stubbornly pulling smiles from him, chipping away at the memories that darkened his soul.
He started out protecting her, feeling pity for her, then slowly feeling his heart giving over to more.
If any lass had the mettle to keep him alive, ’twas Miss Drummond.
She even infiltrated his guarded thoughts, the ones where he secretly dreamed of kissing…of kissing her.
He saw her so clearly, her eyes so vividly fastened on him. He mustered all his strength to lift his arms and take her by the shoulders. He summoned his strongest resolve to pull her down and press his mouth to her delectable lips.
She pulled away, using hardly any strength and touched her fingers to her lips.
He tasted her, breathed in her slightly lavender scent, and felt her heart beating against him. Had he dreamed of their kiss?
He did not dream again for the next twelve hours.
The first thing he became aware of was the faint aroma of lavender. The second thing was the guilt and shame overwhelming him at the memory of where he had smelled the lavender before.
What kind of husband and father was he that he did not even mourn his family for a full five years before he let another—
“Constantine?” Her lyrical voice played across his ears, shattering his shame and guilt. “Chief? Are ye awake, this time?”
As opposed to another time? he reasoned.
He opened his eyes. Ah, like a kick in the guts, her bonnie face knocked the breath out of him. “I believe so.”
“Do ye remember what happened?” she asked as innocently as a lamb.
“Aye,” he lowered his gaze. “I dinna usually behave so—”
“Ye were stabbed,” she clarified. Was that a crimson streak shooting across her face? “The wound was deep. Yer castle physician didna know if ye would recover.”
“But ye decided I would.”
Like the radiance of a summer sunrise, her smile washed him in warmth. “Nae, Lochiel. I never doubted that ye would do what ye said.”
He was so relieved that she did not bring up them kissing. It meant it did not happen. Strangely, he was not sure how he felt about it. Had his body betrayed him? Or was it his heart?
He wouldn’t bring it up if she didn’t.
“Wait,” he said and clasped his fingers around her wrist when she moved away from—his bed. In his room. The room no other woman save Alison had even been. “Where are ye goin’ already?”
“Hugh wants me to keep him informed when ye awaken.”
“Inform him later.” He pulled her back while memories of pulling her over him to kiss flooded his thoughts.
He released her. “Fergive me, Miss Drummond, I didna mean to manhandle ye.”
Her gleaming eyes widened. “When did ye manhandle me?”
He closed his eyes, grateful to be so forgiven so easily.
When he felt her tug on the sleeve of his tunic, he opened his eyes.
“Were ye falling to sleep again?”
He shook his head gently, careful not to fall into unconsciousness again. “I was feelin’ grateful fer bein’ fergiven.”
“Chief,” she began, covering his hand with both of hers. “There is something—”
The door to his bedroom swung open and Geoffry and Fionn came barreling in. When they saw him with his eyes open, looking at them as if they had just interrupted something potentially life threatening, they hurried to the bed.
“The Confederation has declared…” Fionn began and then stopped again when Constantine turned to him. “… they have declared war against the Camerons and the MacDonalds.”
Constantine took in the news without changing his expression. Even when Miss Drummond scolded them for barging into his room with such fretful news, he kept his expression stoic, though he wanted to smile at her. Again. God help him.
“Some of the men are concerned that ye willna be able to fight with us,” Geoffry let him know.
Now, Constantine turned to them with a dark scowl. “Why are they afraid of such a preposterous thing? Of course, I will fight.”
A little sound ripped out of Miss Drummond. “What? Dinna be a fool, Chief! Ye were stabbed. Will ye only cease when ye’re dead?”
Fionn and Geoffry cast her angry looks. “Why would ye speak of the Lochiel being dead when he has just recovered?”
Constantine was not surprised when she did not back down. She rested her fist on her hip and glared right back at them. “I want him to stay recovered. I thought ye did as well.”
“We do!” Fionn defended.
“Then how could ye tell him this news knowing full well that he would want to fight! Especially when some of the men are concerned that he will not be able to fight with them?!”