CHAPTER ELEVEN #4
Macleod awoke abruptly. He was breathing hard, and for one moment, he smelled the fires consuming Blayde’s great room. He was in shock. He had been dreaming of the boy prisoner, Coinneach—and the boy had turned into him.
Coinneach had been helpless to prevent his father’s murder.
He had been helpless to prevent William’s murder, too.
The rage took him by surprise. It suffused him and the entire bedchamber shuddered. And with it came so much hatred, not for his enemies but for that damned fourteen-year-old boy!
That boy had failed everyone!
Her hand covered his clenched fist.
He jerked, aware of Tabitha for the first time, as she lay in bed beside him, their bodies touching. Her golden eyes were wide, warm and concerned.
Let me help you.
He knew he was recalling that long-ago voice. He jerked free of her, sliding from the bed.
“Are you all right?”
“I am fine,” he lied, too late realizing that he was covered with sweat and trembling. Damn that stupid boy. He had failed….
Tabitha sat up, holding the covers over her chest. “That must have been a nightmare.”
The room was still shuddering. He took a deep breath. “I dinna ken. I dinna recall.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked softly.
He paced to the fire. Let me help you. He whirled. “Are ye usin’ yer magic on me now, Tabitha?”
She tensed with alarm. “No, I’m not.”
Perhaps her soul was familiar with his. Too much was strange in this world, and he did not dismiss the idea. “I dinna need help.”
Her eyes widened. “Okay,” she said carefully, pulling her knees up to her chest. “But you do seem upset. Are you sure you don’t remember that dream?”
“Women dream,” he snapped. “Men dinna bother to do so!”
“That is such bull,” she said as softly.
He whipped his brat from the chair and wrapped it around his waist. Coinneach was bothering him, he decided. Maybe he should be hanged tonight to end this insanity instantly.
“Why are you angry?”
He trembled. The shutters rattled. “I said I dinna need yer help.”
She was silent for a while, and he was relieved.
He poured two goblets of wine. When he handed hers to her, her golden gaze played over his features, lingering on his eyes, searching there.
“I can imagine you’re dreaming of war and death,” she said.
“This is such a violent time. You’ve probably lived through hell, many, many times. ”
He actually spilled wine on the sheets as he jerked away. “War doesna bother me.”
“I can’t believe that. War is horrible. Nobody likes war.”
He faced her now. “The Highlands would be better without war.”
She smiled just a little at him. “But war doesn’t frighten you, does it?”
He almost smiled because, finally, he was somewhat amused. “I fear naught, Tabitha.”
“Everyone fears something.”
He drained the wine, feeling better, the disturbing dream receding now. “I fear women who speak too much.”
She gave him a look. “You’re afraid to share your nightmare with me.”
He tensed, dismayed. The dream he’d just had returned full force. So did the pain, the despair, the rage—and now, the guilt. “’Tis nay fear.”
“Really?” She smiled skeptically at him. “I think you cannot control your dreams—and that must be a bit frightening, to a big, bad, macho man like you.”
He twisted and writhed and the deamhan laughed, urging him to watch his own father’s death. Helpless, he screamed….
“Ye need to stop,” he shouted at her.
She sat up straighter.
He fought for composure. It eluded him. “Aye, I had a dream—a nightmare, as ye say. ’Tis done.”
She wet her lips. “I keep seeing that fourteen-year-old boy—you were dreaming about him.”
He was disbelieving. “That boy is gone, Tabitha, an’ I am sorry ye keep thinkin’ about him.
Mayhap he needed yer help that day. But ye werena there—except as a spirit or an apparition.
He chased the intruders away. He buried the dead.
He did what he had to do.” He spoke so harshly and swiftly that he couldn’t breathe.
“I think that boy lost more than his family that day,” she said softly, sadness in her eyes. “It sounds like he lost his childhood—that overnight, he became a man.”
“Leave the boy alone!” he roared.
And he thought of Coinneach again.
He thought of Coinneach’s cowardly father, who had died begging for his life. He thought of Coinneach’s fear and bravery. He suddenly imagined the boy’s head on his pike and his face changed—he saw his own head there.
Tabitha stood up, taking a cover with her. “Maybe you’re too tough and macho for me to help, but damn it, I want to help that boy.”
He whirled, irate as never before. “Then ye’ll have to use yer magic to go back to 1201, aye?”
She shook her head, paling.
He became wary as never before. “Tabitha?”
“I think that boy is here, now, standing right in front of me.”
It took him a moment to understand her. And when he did, his rage erupted and the timbers above their heads started cracking. Stone fell from the ceiling but Tabitha stood as still as a statue. He did not move, either. “That boy isna here, Tabitha. That boy is dead!”
She cried out.
“Ye leave him buried, buried at sea with the rest o’ them. God damn ye!” He stormed from the room.