Chapter Eight
Katrina was prepared to fight for the cloak—her summer shift did not obscure any of the important bits that she would prefer to hide from the world—but after ordering her onto the horse, MacFarlane went back to ignoring her.
This bothered Katrina more and more as the morning wound on, and she started to wonder if, in addition to being a giant and a brute and a monster and all the things she knew him to be, Blake MacFarlane wasn’t also a genius.
Because what kind of tactic told him to be kind to her—even if only intermittently and in between bouts of curtness and rudeness—when she was entirely in his power?
It was baffling. It was alarming. But also, it was not nearly as terrifying as it ought to have been, and she absolutely could not figure it out.
It was giving her a headache.
The sun was growing warm, making the heavy cloak a bit uncomfortable, when they reached the small village. She didn’t recognize it; more was the pity, though she hadn’t expected to. The stupid bloody Bloodhound was too smart to let her meet with a potential ally.
“Here,” he said when he’d lifted her down from the horse. She was getting mighty tired of not being able to mount and dismount herself, but even with her hands unbound, she didn’t feel confident getting off this massive creature.
She reacted just quickly enough to catch the pouch of coins he tossed at her.
She looked at the purse. Then she looked at him. Then, back at the purse.
“Have ye never seen coins before?” he asked, all false sympathy. “Ye see, what ye do is ye take them and use them to buy clothes so that ye arenae going about the countryside half dressed. Does that make sense, or do ye need more guidance?”
“Ye are letting me go alone?” she asked suspiciously.
What was he doing? Men were supposed to be simple. That was one of the very short list of qualities they had in their favor.
He smirked at her. “I dinnae see how I would be of any help in purchasing lady’s clothing.” Then, quick as a viper, he shot out a hand and pulled her forward until his face was only inches from hers. “Oh, and lass?”
Her breath caught as he reached up and tucked a tendril of hair behind her ear, his fingertips skimming ever so lightly against the curve of her jaw.
“If ye run, I will hunt ye down… and next time, I willnae be so gentle.”
For one endless moment, his touch hovered there, the connection between them so faint that she couldn’t be entirely sure that there was even true contact between his skin and hers.
But it didn’t quite matter, not really—she could feel the sparks between them even with a hairsbreadth of distance, the effect made all the more remarkable by the featherlight brush that connected them.
Her chest rose shakily as she fought for air under the intensity of that stare.
When he released her, she could still feel his fingers on her arm.
At least she fought off her shiver until she’d moved far enough into the market that he wouldn’t be able to see.
When she stole a glance over her shoulder at him, however, she saw him staring at his fingers as though they had acted without his permission.
It was strange, but there was a little smile on her face as she let herself get absorbed by the throng of marketgoers.
There were several stalls where merchants were selling clothing from the fine to the roughly made. Katrina trailed her fingertips over the different options, feeling for something that wouldn’t irritate her skin no matter how long she was forced to ride with the Bloodhound.
Besides, there was something about being abducted that erased any guilt she felt about spending his coin.
There were plenty of lovely dresses for sale, things that she would have been perfectly content to wear back home. But her eyes landed on something entirely different.
A grin lit her face—the first one in days.
Aye, those would do. They wouldn’t irritate her…
But they would definitely irritate MacFarlane.
“I will take these,” she told the shopkeeper, hefting the garments in her hand.
The vendor, an elderly man with a craggy face, smiled at her.
“Of course, miss,” he said cheerfully. “I promise ye, I have the best quality and the best prices—”
She waved him off and pressed the entirety of the purse into his hand.
“For ye,” she said.
He peered into the purse, as though he half expected it to be weighed with rocks, then shook his head at her when he saw there truly was coin inside.
“Lass, I cannae—”
“Ye can,” she said. “If ye offer me a place where I can change my clothing.”
Even with the bag full of gold—which was enough to buy twenty times as much as she’d chosen—he recoiled briefly.
“Those are for… ye?”
“Aye.”
He considered the coin, then shrugged.
“As ye say. There is a room in the back that ye can use.”
She went into the back space, which was crowded with bolts of fabric, and shimmied her way out of the voluminous cloak and her shift, which was scarcely good for rags at this point.
And then she pulled on the breeches and shirt that she’d purchased.
Lord above, this was comfort. Why had she wasted so many years on heavy skirts? She rubbed the dark fabric happily, loving the way it soothed the remnants of her rash.
She strode out into the market, feeling extraordinarily pleased with herself.
She hadn’t made it far back into the street when a whistle grabbed at her attention. Her head jerked up, looking for any source of danger.
And then she saw it—the same farmer she’d seen at the first market day. Goodness, that felt like it had happened years ago.
Quickly, she strode over to the alley where the man had disappeared, then ducked deeper into a thicket of foliage that separated the small business area of the village from its farms and valleys.
“Are ye mad?” she hissed at Arran and Kenna, her words cut off when Kenna threw her arms around her. “Ye cannae be here. The Bloodhound is looking for ye.”
“Aye, we ken that,” Kenna said. “Why do you think we are following ye? To get ye away from him!”
Katrina tugged herself out of Kenna’s grasp, even though part of her wanted to fall into that hold and never let go.
But Kenna had come after her, even though it was dangerous. Katrina couldn’t reward that loyalty with selfishness.
“Nay,” she said, gathering her courage. “Nay, I cannae go with ye.”
Kenna’s face transformed into a mask of alarm.
“Why not?” she demanded, her head jerking between Katrina and Arran, as if certain that one of them was about to inform her that she was actually dreaming. “Of course ye can. Katrina. Of course ye can.”
But Katrina was shaking her head. She clenched her hands into fists to stop them from shaking as well.
“Nay, I cannae,” she said. “If I do, he will ken that I left with someone. He will suspect right away that it’s ye. The only way that he doesnae discover that ye are here is if I go back.”
Arran finally spoke.
“I dinnae like it,” he said. “Ye cannae let him get ye to MacFarlane lands. Once he does, there will be no way to get ye back.”
“If we flee now,” Katrina protested, “we willnae get even a full league away before he catches up. And far be it from me to doubt your abilities, Arran, but I’ve seen the way he fights. We…” She swallowed, pushing back thoughts of blood and swords and dead mercenaries. “We willnae get away.”
Arran’s jaw set, his eyes narrowing.
“Ye are right,” he said after a moment. Kenna opened her mouth to protest, but Arran laid a hand on his wife’s shoulder.
“But Kenna, ye arenae wrong, either. We cannae leave Katrina here. But we need a better plan.” He looked at Katrina.
“I need ye to meet us again. Midnight tonight. I will have something to help us by then.”
“He willnae stay that long,” Katrina protested. Even now, she could feel the time she’d been given to shop had more than run short. If Blake wasn’t already looking for her, he would be soon. And then they would leave.
Arran reached into his pocket, producing a small packet that Katrina knew on sight—it was too similar to the packets of herbs that she used in her healing practice to be anything other than a dose of something.
“Make him stay longer,” Arran said, pressing the packet into her hand. She lifted it to her nose, wrinkling it at the telltale scent of valerian.
Her herbs hadn’t worked on MacFarlane before, but that had been a partial dose, thrown into his face. If she could get this whole packet into his food, somehow, or better yet, his drink…
“Verra well,” she said, slipping the packet into her new breeches. “I’ll make sure of it. And I’ll meet ye tonight.”
Kenna bit her lip anxiously, clearly reluctant to let Katrina out of her sight again.
“Be careful,” she pleaded.
Katrina nodded, but she knew it for a lie. If she was going to get the best of the Bloodhound, she was going to have to be brave and decisive. Playing it safe had not gotten her—or her family—anywhere.
“I will meet ye tonight,” she said again, less to convince Kenna and more to convince herself that somehow, she would make it so.