Chapter 37
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Robert’s knife remained pressed beneath Elspeth’s ribs. She could feel its point through the cloth of her gown, cold and exact against the place where her earlier wound had barely begun to heal. Each breath threatened to drive it deeper.
Across the ruined chapel, Colin stood utterly still. His sword remained at his side. His hands were empty. Only his eyes betrayed him. They held hers with such fierce attention that the men surrounding them seemed not to exist.
Elspeth understood the command in his gaze.
Wait.
Trust me.
She tried.
Robert’s arm tightened around her waist. “Ye still dinnae understand, dae ye?” he asked Colin. “Ye believe this is about land, pride, some quarrel between lairds.”
Colin’s expression did not change. “Then explain it.”
Elspeth heard the purpose beneath the words. He wanted Robert speaking. He wanted his attention divided. He wanted time for whatever plan moved unseen among the trees.
Robert smiled as though Colin had begged. “Yer maither was meant tae be mine.”
Something altered in Colin’s face. Elspeth felt it more than she saw it.
Robert continued, his voice roughening around an old wound he had polished into hatred. “I loved her before yer faither ever laid eyes upon her. She laughed with me. Rode with me. She promised she would wait.”
The knife shifted as his hand trembled. Elspeth held herself motionless.
“Then Alastair MacKenzie wanted her,” Robert snarled. “And what a MacKenzie wanted, he took.”
Colin’s jaw tightened. “Did she choose him?” he asked.
Robert’s face twisted. “He had land, a name, men who frightened her family intae agreement.”
“That wasnae what I asked.”
“She was stolen from me!”
The answer came too quickly. Elspeth understood then that Robert had told this story so often he no longer permitted it to contain any truth that contradicted him.
“He took her intae that cursed keep,” Robert continued. “He broke her. He humiliated her. And when she couldnae give him more sons, he killed her.”
The words struck Colin like a blow. Elspeth saw it. His shoulders remained straight. His face stayed hard. But pain entered his eyes, naked and young, belonging not to the laird before her but to the boy who had once stood helpless beneath his father’s cruelty.
Robert laughed bitterly. “And what remained of her? Ye.”
Colin said nothing.
“His blood in her son. His face. His name. Ye are everything he did tae her made flesh.”
Elspeth’s horror changed. Robert had not looked at Colin and seen a man. He had seen a grave that continued breathing.
“So ye attacked the cathedral,” Colin said.
“Aye.”
“The village. The feast. Me guards.”
“I wanted tae take yer clan from ye piece by piece, every man who trusted ye, every family beneath yer protection.” Robert lowered his mouth near Elspeth’s ear. “And then yer wife.”
Colin’s eyes darkened.
“She was tae die first,” Robert told him. “Slowly, once I learned what she meant tae ye. I wanted tae leave ye with nay land worth holding, nay people left tae command, and nay woman beside ye.”
Elspeth’s stomach turned.
“Then,” Robert finished, “I meant tae kill ye.”
Silence filled the chapel. A stone shifted somewhere beyond the broken wall. Robert did not appear to hear it. Elspeth did. So did Colin.
His gaze flickered past her for less than a heartbeat.
Ready.
Robert pulled her backward until the knife bit enough to sting.
“I wonder,” he murmured, “whether yer faither begged when she died.”
Colin’s face emptied. That frightened Elspeth more than fury would have done.
“Release her,” he ordered.
Robert smiled. “Nay.”
“Take me instead.”
Elspeth’s heart stopped. “Colin.”
His eyes found hers. She shook her head. He looked back at Robert.
“Ye wanted MacKenzie blood. Mine is the blood ye blame.”
“And hers is the blood ye love.”
Colin stepped forward. “I will kneel.”
Robert’s smile widened. Elspeth stared at Colin. He unfastened his sword belt. It fell onto the grass with a heavy sound.
“Nay,” she whispered.
“Let her walk away,” he pleaded. “And ye may dae whatever ye wish with me.”
Robert’s breathing quickened. He believed him. Elspeth believed him, too. Colin was not pretending. He would let Robert bind him, wound him, kill him, if it gave her even the smallest chance to escape.
Colin looked only at Elspeth. “Naething matters more than she daes.”
The words broke something inside her.
“Colin, dinnae.”
His gaze softened. It was not the look of a man expecting rescue. It was farewell.
Robert laughed triumphantly. “Kneel.”
Elspeth began to struggle. Robert dragged the blade tighter against her side.
“Stop,” Colin commanded.
Tears burned her eyes. He had already chosen her life over his, her safety over vengeance, pride, duty, and every acre of land he had bled to defend.
Robert stepped forward, pulling Elspeth with him.
“Kneel!”
At that moment, a voice came from the broken chapel wall. “I believe that is quite enough!”
Robert froze. Sir Malcolm Douglas emerged from the shadows with two royal soldiers behind him. The Crown’s representative held Robert’s written message in one hand and a drawn sword in the other.
“I heard yer confession, Laird Munro,” he declared. “The attacks. The murders. The abduction of Lady MacKenzie.”
Robert’s face changed. For the first time, fear entered it. He dragged Elspeth backward. Men rose from the ridge. Niall and Domhnall appeared above the ruined wall with archers beside them. Breac’s men emerged from the trees. Murdoch came through the lower ravine with his sword already drawn.
Robert’s soldiers shouted. The hollow erupted. An arrow struck the man nearest Colin, and he moved before the body reached the ground. He seized his fallen sword belt, drew the blade, and drove himself toward Elspeth.
Robert tried to pull her in front of him. Elspeth stamped hard upon his foot and threw her weight sideways. The knife cut through her gown but missed flesh. His grip loosened. She tore free. Someone caught her bound hands and dragged her behind the broken altar.
“Down, me lady!” Breac urged.
Elspeth fell as steel rang above her. She saw only fragments: Niall fighting near the wall, Domhnall striking one man aside, royal soldiers surrounding two of Robert’s men who had dropped their weapons.
Then Colin reached her. He cut the ropes at her wrists with one violent stroke.
“Are ye hurt?”
“Nay.”
His hands moved over her face, her arms, her ribs, searching for blood.
“Colin, behind ye!”
Robert came through the chaos with his sword raised.
Colin turned and steel met steel. Robert fought without discipline now.
His grief and fury stripped away everything but the need to kill.
He swung hard, forcing Colin backward across the uneven ground.
Elspeth scrambled away from the blades. Robert struck Colin’s injured shoulder and Colin staggered.
“Nay!” she shouted.
Robert lifted his sword again. Colin caught the blow, twisted beneath it, and drove his blade forward. The point entered beneath Robert’s ribs. Robert stopped.
For one moment, the fighting around them seemed to quiet. Colin stood close enough to hold him upright. Robert looked into his face. Perhaps he saw Colin’s father. Perhaps, at last, he saw only Colin.
Colin pulled the sword free. Robert fell before the ruined altar. No one moved.
Sir Malcolm stepped forward and looked down at the body. Then he turned to the surviving soldiers.
“Robert Munro confessed before a representative of the Crown,” he announced. “Laird MacKenzie and his clan acted in defense of Lady MacKenzie and under direct threat.” His gaze moved to Colin. “The Crown will receive the truth.”
The words should have brought relief. Elspeth felt none until Colin crossed the space between them.
Then she ran to him. His arms closed around her with enough force to lift her from the ground.
Elspeth buried her face against his neck, gripping his coat as the fear she had held back finally broke through her.
“I thought ye meant tae die,” she whispered.
“I did.”
She struck his chest. Colin barely flinched.
“Ye impossible, monstrous man.”
“Aye.”
“Ye offered him everything.”
“I offered him me.”
“That was everything tae me.”
Colin went still. Then his arms tightened. Around them, men gathered weapons, bound prisoners, and tended the wounded. The Crown’s representative spoke with Niall and Domhnall while Breac began counting the living.
Elspeth heard none of it clearly. Robert was dead.
The Crown witnessed his guilt. Colin’s name and clan were cleared.
But all she could understand was the man holding her.
Colin had laid down every weapon. He had been willing to die without resistance because her life mattered more to him than his own.
Elspeth lifted her face. “Ye will never dae that again.”
Colin looked down at her. “I will if I must.”
“Then I shall never fergive ye.”
His expression softened with exhausted tenderness.
“Aye,” he murmured. “Ye will.”
Elspeth kissed him while blood, smoke, and the last of Robert’s war settled around them. For once, Colin did not attempt to argue.