Chapter 10
Cameron heard the sound of a sword cutting through the air before it occurred to him that he was being attacked. He ducked, pulling Sunny down with him. He shoved her toward the protection of a wall behind them, then rose.
“Whoresons,” he spat, pulling his sword from the sheath. “Let the wench go.”
There was no response. Cameron didn’t expect it from two of the lads, for he’d just slit both their throats with a single mighty swing, but the others certainly could have offered an opinion.
“Take one of the knives,” he barked at Sunny.
He felt her pull one out of his boot. He drew the other quickly and threw himself into the fray. He called for aid, but no one came.
He was somehow not surprised.
Damnation, but he should have taken more care in the forest. Well, at least here there was some cover available.
He tried to keep himself close enough to Sunny to protect her, but he was continually drawn forward.
He had no idea how many were coming against him.
There seemed to be an endless stream of lads eager to engage him.
And still no one came to help him.
He fought with sword and knife and curses. He felt more anger than he ever had in battle before. These lads weren’t Fergussons come to avenge their dead. They were lads he didn’t know, but he knew what they wanted, and he knew who’d hired them.
Giric would pay dearly.
By the time the sun had set, there was no one left standing and he was covered in blood. Very little of it was his own, fortunately. He dragged his sleeve across his face to rid himself of the sweat that dripped down into his eyes, then turned and felt terror slam into him.
A man stood pressed against Sunny. He could see one of her hands spasmodically clutching the wall.
He couldn’t move. He could only stand there and shake.
Then the man began to fall backward. He landed in the mud at Cameron’s feet with Cameron’s knife sticking out of his gut. The front of Sunny’s dress was covered in blood. Cameron met her eyes. They were wide with terror.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked weakly.
She shook her head in a jerky motion.
He bowed his head briefly, then took a deep breath and put the moment behind him.
He pulled his knife free of the man’s belly, shoved it back in his boot, replaced his other knife, then grabbed Sunny’s hand and pulled her into a stumbling run with him.
He didn’t bother to resheath his sword. He had more business to do with it that night.
He ran with Sunny up to the keep and wasn’t sure if he was surprised or not to find a handful of his kin milling about there. It wasn’t possible that they hadn’t heard his calls. He marked each of them, then continued on his way to the door. He would repay them later.
He walked into the great hall to find Giric lounging in a chair in front of the fire with his feet up on a stool. He looked up tranquilly.
“Been out in the wet, Cam?” he asked.
“I told you to not call me that,” Cameron growled. “And this is blood, not rain, you whoreson.” He left Sunny standing against the wall, then walked over to the hearth. He put his foot on the front of his cousin’s chair and shoved, sending Giric flying backward onto his arse.
Giric scrambled to his feet, swearing. Cameron waited, bouncing on the balls of his feet, more than ready to take a few last frustrations out on his cousin.
Giric drew his sword and Cameron felt the first crossing of their blades rattle his bones.
A pity it would be no more interesting than that.
His cousin was boastful, but he was not skilled.
Cameron dragged the whole affair out far longer than he needed to only because he had several things to repay his cousin for.
Even after what he’d just been through, he had more than enough energy to humiliate the man standing in front of him.
The only reason he didn’t kill the fool was because it had been Giric’s suggestion to go fetch the MacLeod witch.
He beat on his cousin’s sword until it fell from his fingers. He slid his own sword back across the floor to Sunny and continued his instruction with his fists.
By the time Giric was a bloody heap at his feet, his own fists were bloody and he was shaking with weariness. He looked at Gilly standing in the circle of torchlight.
“Enjoy him,” he said, his chest heaving, “but you’d best brush up on your swordplay. You’ll need someone to protect your bairns given that it won’t be this fool here.”
Gilly said nothing. She only walked across the hall and looked down at Giric lying there, senseless.
Cameron found that his men had gathered to watch the spectacle, as well. He swept them with a very cold look. They all bowed their heads, one by one, then turned and melted back into the shadows.
Cameron turned and walked over to Sunny.
She leaned against the wall near the hearth with his sword resting point down on the floor in front of her.
The sword was taller than she was and she had to lift her arms to hold on to the hilt.
He took it from her, resheathed it in the scabbard on his back, then took her hand.
“I think we’re due a bath,” he said pleasantly.
“Together?” she squeaked.
He laughed. “Nay, lass. You’ll go first.”
She looked insultingly relieved. He smiled again and pulled her toward the kitchen.
“Cam, look at your arm.”
His heart sighed a little at the sound of that name from her, but he supposed it didn’t serve him to show it.
He looked down at his left arm and saw the slice that ran from his elbow to his fingers.
It was nothing he hadn’t seen before, but it burned like hellfire so he supposed it would need to be seen to.
“You can have at it—after I’ve had something to eat. ”
She nodded and walked with him into the kitchen. Cameron fetched Sunny a stool and put her near the fire, requested a tub of hot water be prepared, then went to look for some sort of cousin to help him in a little endeavor. He retrieved Brice and brought him back to sit at the cook’s work table.
“Taste,” he invited.
Brice looked up quickly. “What?”
“I’m hungry and I want to make certain Giric hasn’t been adding his own spices to my stew. I can wait for a bit before I eat, just to make sure my supper hasn’t killed you.”
Brice blanched. Cameron drew the bloody knife from his boot and gestured with it toward the things on the table he thought Brice should try. Brice was not an enthusiastic taster and he completely refused to drink any wine. Cameron put his hand on a cup and looked at his cousin purposefully.
“And if I help a bit of this to find its way to your gut?”
“I beg you, cousin, nay,” Brice whispered.
“Is all the wine poisoned,” Cameron asked, “or just what you and Giric have been trying to give me?”
Brice closed his eyes briefly and swallowed with difficulty. “There’s a barrel with your name scratched near the base.”
Cameron allowed his cousin to rise. “I won’t tell Giric you told me,” he said quietly, “but I imagine he’ll find out. You’d best watch your back, hadn’t you?”
Brice apparently couldn’t find anything useful to say to that. He stumbled from the kitchen and disappeared into the gloom of the hall.
Cameron put him out of his mind and set to a quick meal with Sunny. When the tub was filled with moderately warm water, he looked at her.
“Here’s your chance for a wash,” he said.
She looked down at her dress, then at him. “What good will it do?”
“You wouldn’t be bloody anymore. If we wash your dress tonight and set it by the fire upstairs, ’twill be mostly dry by tomorrow. ”
“And what am I going to wear in the meantime?” she asked uncomfortably.
“You could wear my plaids,” he said. He pulled her up off her stool and bent his head to whisper in her ear. “Besides, I’ve already seen you without your clothes, lass.”
“But you don’t have to look now—and neither do the rest of your kitchen people, do they?”
He laughed at her. “I won’t, though I should, just to show you who is laird.” He turned his back on her, waved away the kitchen lads and shot his cook a warning look, then folded his arms over his chest. “Make haste, wench, before the water grows cold.”
He felt her toss her dress over his shoulder, heard her get into the tub with a groan, splash a bit, then get out. She took his plaids off his other shoulder.
“Finished,” she said a moment later.
He turned and looked at her, hastily wrapped in his plaids. He rearranged one to pull it up toward her neck. She looked so miserably uncomfortable that he left her alone.
A maid. Why wasn’t he surprised?
He pulled his sword free of the scabbard and rested it against the side of the tub, then stripped. He looked, just to see if Sunny was watching, but she had turned her back to him. He tapped her smartly on the shoulder.
“Hold my gear,” he invited.
She turned around, but her eyes were closed. He smiled as he put first his knives, then his clothes into her hands. He shucked off his boots, then sank down gratefully into still-warm water. He leaned his head back against the edge of the tub and sighed in pleasure.
“Let me know if anyone else wants to kill me,” he said lazily. “I’ll see to them after I’m finished here.”
“I think you’re safe for the moment,” Sunny said, setting his things down on the table and pulling a stool up next to the tub. “Let me see your arm.”
He could see the slice needed tending, though he couldn’t say he was looking forward to it.
He waited while Brianna was found and sent to fetch what was necessary, then closed his eyes whilst Sunny sewed him up.
She was quick and deft, but it wasn’t comfortable.
When she was finished, he reached up and pulled her down where he could kiss her briefly.
“Thank you,” he said with a smile.
“It could stand a poultice and a wrapping about it, but I don’t suppose you care about the scar.”
“Add it to the others,” he said with a snort.