Chapter 21 #2
Ronan offered no resistance as they bound his wrists and marched him away from the bridge and into the trees on the far side.
A neat camp had been set up there, rows of small tents in orderly formation, surrounding a much larger one.
The men marched him to this larger tent and held him outside whilst the leader ducked through the tent flap.
He emerged a moment later and nodded to the others.
The guards pushed Ronan through the tent flap and into the large, sparse interior.
He found his eldest brother waiting for him.
Bryce Campbell, the Earl of Newborough, was sitting on a stool, one knee crossed over the other.
“Ye always were a tenacious bastard weren’t ye?” he snapped without bothering with a greeting. “And attacking my men is quite the novel way to get yerself into my presence.”
“What else was I supposed to do?” Ronan growled. “When ye wouldnae even deign to speak to me?”
“And why should I?” Bryce replied, surging to his feet.
“I could scarcely believe it when my scouts reported seeing ye heading this way. But they were right. After all these years ye turn up on my doorstep with yer own personal army! Ye are lucky I havenae had the lot of ye arrested and thrown in jail!”
“They’re not an army.”
Bryce gave a humorless smile. “That’s what every army says.”
“They’re refugees.”
“They’re armed.”
“For defence only. They’re frightened people with nowhere else to go.”
“They’re on my land.”
“No, they are on the road and have every right to be there.”
The tent fell silent and Ronan and his brother glared at each other. Bryce dismissed the soldiers with a wave. “Leave us!”
Reluctantly, they withdrew and Ronan found himself alone with his eldest brother for the first time in years. The first time since he’d...
He shied away from the thought. Neither spoke. For a long moment they simply looked at one another.
“Ye’ve aged,” Bryce said finally.
“Havenae we all?”
Bryce folded his arms. “What do ye want, Ronan?”
Ronan drew a slow breath. “I came here to take back what is mine. To reclaim my lands. I—”
“So that’s it!” Bryce snapped. “I might have known! Yer lands? Ye gave up any right to them the moment ye—”
“I havenae finished!” Ronan cut his brother off.
“I came back here to reclaim my lands but now I realize that was only ever a dream.” He met his brother’s hard stare.
“Now all I want is sanctuary. Not for me. For my people. Whatever lies between us, Bryce, they have no part in it. Let them cross the river. I offer ye my life in payment. Imprison me. Hang me if ye wish. But let them cross. Please.”
Bryce’s composure cracked a little. He stared at Ronan and his cheek twitched.
“Ye would trade yer life?”
“Aye. For what it’s worth.”
Silence stretched between them. Bryce studied Ronan for what felt like an age.
Then Bryce laughed softly and something in his expression hardened. “Ye always did this.”
Ronan frowned. “I always did what?”
“Make yerself the hero and everyone else feel like the villain.”
“I never—”
“Father always said ye had the softer heart.” His laugh was bitter. “Mother adored ye for it. Ye were always her favorite.”
Ronan blinked, shocked at the bitterness in his brother’s voice. “Bryce—”
“No!” Bryce snapped. “By every law in Scotland I should arrest ye.” He suddenly pulled up his shirt. A puckered scar marred the skin just above his hip. “I should see ye hang for trying to kill me.”
“Bryce, I never meant—”
“Enough! I dinna want to hear it!”
He marched towards Ronan and drew a dagger from his belt.
Ronan swallowed, a sliver of fear slicing through his gut, but he forced himself to hold his ground.
Bryce halted a mere inch from where Ronan stood.
They were of a height and Bryce glared at him, face right by his own.
The dagger gleamed between them. Something dark and feral flashed in Bryce’s eyes.
Hatred? Ronan wasn’t sure but he braced himself, waiting for the cold, sharp pain of steel sliding into his stomach.
But it never came.
Instead, Bryce cut the ropes binding Ronan’s wrists and then backed up a few steps. “Ye may return to yer people.”
Hope flickered for an instant before Bryce extinguished it.
“But I willnae help ye. It was yer choice to bring yer people here, to my lands. Nobody invited ye. I owe ye and them precisely nothing.”
The words were like a punch to Ronan’s gut. “The Murdochs are tracking us. Ye know what they will do when they find us.”
Something flickered in Bryce’s eyes again, quickly extinguished. He looked away. “That is none of my concern. If ye attempt to cross my bridge—” He met Ronan’s eyes. “My men will defend it.”
Ronan stood motionless, feeling sick to his stomach. He rubbed his freed wrists. He had failed. Again. He turned towards the entrance but as he reached it, Bryce spoke again.
“Ye should have stayed away.”
Ronan paused. Without looking back he answered quietly, “I tried.”
Then he walked out, wondering how he was supposed to save his people now.
THE CAMP HAD NEVER been so quiet.
It wasn’t the peaceful silence Elodie had grown used to during evenings at the Steading, when tired people settled after a day’s work and the crackle of fires mingled with distant laughter. This silence felt heavy, expectant. Afraid.
Everyone was watching the bridge. Waiting for Ronan.
Elodie stood with Faye near the foremost wagon, her arms wrapped tightly around herself against the evening chill.
Beyond the broad river, Bryce Campbell’s banners fluttered in the breeze, blue and green against the gathering gray of dusk.
Men paced along the opposite bank with muskets resting on their shoulders.
“Why did he sneak away without telling anyone?” she murmured. It must have been the tenth time she’d asked that question.
Faye said nothing. She kept her eyes fixed on the bridge.
Then Bran barked and Elodie’s head whipped around, eyes straining against the gathering dusk. A lone figure emerged from the far end of the bridge.
Ronan.
He didn’t look injured, thank God, but even from this distance she could tell something was wrong.
He looked...defeated. His shoulders slumped in a way she’d never seen from him and rather than looking alert and focussed like he normally did, his gaze seemed fixed on the stone before his feet as though he wasn’t seeing anything around him.
“Ronan!”
She ran towards him, reaching him as he stepped down off the bridge. He looked up just as she cannoned into him, throwing her arms around him and holding him close. He grunted with the impact then pulled her to him, his arms as strong and reassuring as ever as they closed around her.
“What the hell were you playing at?” she demanded. “We were all so worried when we realized you’d gone! Don’t ever do that to me again!” When he didn’t respond, she stepped back a pace. “What is it? What happened?”
He looked down at her and she was shocked by the look in his eyes. He looked deflated, as if all the fight had gone out of him.
“I thought if I gave Bryce what he wanted, he would grant us passage.”
“What he wanted? I don’t understand.”
He met her eyes. “I offered him my life. He refused. I dinna have anything else left to bargain with.”
The words landed like a stone in Elodie’s gut. His life? Ronan had marched over there—without even telling her—and offered his life?
For several seconds she couldn’t speak. She wasn’t sure if she was furious or terrified. Both, probably.
But before she could give Ronan a piece of her mind, others came crowding around, firing questions at him.
“What did they say?”
“Will they let us cross?”
“How far away are the Murdochs?”
Ronan let it all wash over him for a second then held up his hand for silence. “Naught has changed,” he announced to frightened murmurs. “We willnae be crossing that bridge any time soon. We will meet the Murdoch threat when they get here.”
The crowd broke into an explosion of frightened babbling. Everyone converged on Ronan. Elodie watched as Ronan answered question after question, keeping his voice steady, somehow managing to keep his patience.
“We’ll keep the children near the wagons and any more of our people who canna fight. Our fighters will take first watch. We’ll double the guards.”
His words stuck in her mind. Our fighters. Our people. Ronan had always described the inhabitants of the Steading that way. Not my men. Not my soldiers.
Our people.
Ronan had never spoken about the Steading or his ancestral lands as though they belonged to him. He’d always spoken about responsibility. About people, not property or power.
Her thoughts drifted back over their many conversations.
He hadn’t wanted to train his people to fight because he refused to create an army.
He’d built the Steading because people needed somewhere safe.
He’d given away an inheritance because he couldn’t bear more bloodshed.
Everything he did was about protecting people.
I thought if I gave Bryce what he wanted, he would grant us passage.
Ronan had assumed that Bryce wanted his life, wanted to take revenge for Ronan’s attack on him all those years ago. But what if that wasn’t what Bryce wanted at all? And if it wasn’t, could they give him what he did want?
An idea began to form. She glanced across the river at Bryce’s banners then turned abruptly, looking for Faye. She spotted the healer over by the wagons, checking on David and some of her other patients. She walked over.
“Can I ask you something?”
The older woman straightened, stretching out her back. “Aye.”
“When a nobleman inherits from their parents what actually happens?”
Faye gave her a puzzled frown as though wondering why she was asking these questions, but she answered anyway. “The eldest inherits the title.”
“Right. And the younger siblings?”
Faye shrugged. “That depends on the will left by their father. Sometimes everything will go to the eldest. Sometimes it will be split and lands will be settled on all of them.”