One #3
“Oh … I am sorry. My father did not know. I suppose he will want to discuss trade with your new chief.” The man remained silent and still. Rain dripped on Rachel’s head and she wiped at it.
“Do you have a horse?”
She took two stumbling steps past Alec before he placed his hands on her shoulders and gently turned her in another direction, laughing softly. Rachel ignored the thrill that shot down her arms at the solid hold.
She sniffed, irritated at his amusement.
“If you plan to help in my rescue at all, please lead the way.” Her words were terse and her frustration was growing to the point she just might choke on it.
She’d done the hard work of escaping a fortified castle without alerting the guard.
The least the Highlander could do was lead her to Munro Keep.
Alec’s hand slid down her sleeved arm, his strong fingers wrapping around her wrist. He stepped close as they walked along a twining path upwards into the forest. Rachel nearly screamed when she felt his warm breath against her chilled ear.
His words were quiet but as firm as his hold.
“I am not rescuing ye, Rachel Brindle.” Rachel’s breath caught in her chest as she stared out into the dark shadows flickering sporadically with brilliant lightning.
She shivered as his lip grazed her skin. “I am capturing ye.”
Three
The cave was cool and the lass even cooler, in body and in mood.
Alec Munro draped a wool blanket around the girl’s wet shoulders where she sat against the rough, curved wall.
She ignored him. He bent to the small pile of brush and scraped flint into it.
Sparks caught and soon a flame snapped upward. He blew gently, feeding the fire.
He glanced at Rachel. Even in her exhaustion she was bonny, her soft brown hair curling wildly as it dried around a heart-shaped face.
A lovely English lass, smooth skin, long lashes, small and delicate.
He smiled – “delicate”, but also able to escape Druim single-handedly.
His smile faltered. Able to heal the mortal wound he’d taken earlier in the woods.
When Alec had spotted the small group winding their way through Munro territory, he’d been surprised to see the two lasses riding with the English bastard who had been swindling his father for years.
Hamish Munro had fallen to a Macbain sword during a bloody battle at Loch Tuinn three months ago, leaving Alec, his remaining son to lead the huge Munro clan.
His father had never allowed anyone to view the family accounts, and now Alec knew why.
His father had been a mighty warrior, but he had no accounting education.
The books were a mess. Alec doubted that Hamish even realized that William Brindle had been giving him far less than promised for Munro wool over the years.
Rachel took a crumbly oat cake he offered. For a moment, Alec thought she’d refuse or even throw it at him. “Thank you,” she gritted out and took a bite. His eyebrows rose in silent astonishment. Manners, even to one’s captor. He shook his head. He’d never understand the English.
Alec spitted a skinned hare over the fire.
Wind and rain thrashed outside. Thunder rumbled and shook.
There was no journeying to Munro Keep tonight.
His horse was safe enough, tied farther down the mountainside in the shelter of another cave he’d found.
These three mountains running behind Druim all the way to Munro Keep held numerous caves and conduits.
He’d explored them as a child and still didn’t know where they all led.
“We’ll wait out the storm here,” Alec commented, though Rachel didn’t look his way.
Alec ran a finger over the puckered skin across his heart.
“So …” he watched Rachel closely. “I had a hole through my chest this noon.” Rachel’s bannock dropped into her lap.
“Yet it is healed and I’m alive.” He paused, but she didn’t answer.
“Not what I expected when that arrow took me down.”
“You hit your head.” Rachel met his eyes. “That is just one of many scars you seem to have received in the past.”
Alec shook his head. “A warrior knows each one of his marks.” He extended a leg and turned it so that his flexed calf showed.
He ran a finger down a six-inch scar. “The winter of 1501, raid on the moor before Druim.” He ran a palm along the jagged line down his side.
“Summer of 1503, Loch Tuinn.” Alec pushed his hair back from his forehead revealing a small divot.
“A rock from a Macbain slingshot, fall of 1508.” There were others, but he’d made his point.
Rachel stared. He reached over his shoulder to touch the matching hole on his back.
“Macbain arrow, Munro woods, noon today.”
Alec rubbed the back of his neck. “It would have been my last mark if ye hadn’t …” he gestured to her hands clenched in the folds of her green gown. “What exactly did ye do?”
Rachel looked at her hands. “I prayed,” she whispered. “It’s a gift from God.” She looked up, her eyes fiery. “I am no witch. I only do good.”
Alec nodded. He wasn’t superstitious but understood her concern.
Witch hunters revelled in finding anyone who was different – especially weak, unprotected lasses who they could brutalize and eventually kill.
“Praying is good,” he commented and watched her inhale slowly.
“So this ‘praying’ … it can heal injuries. Can it do anything else?”
Rachel shook her head, but then stopped. “Well I can tell if someone is ailing,” her voice lowered. “By touching them. So I know what to fix.” Her head was bent, but she watched him from under long lashes.
“A blessing.” She smiled just a bit. Alec’s breath hitched in his throat at the gentle curve of her lips. She was stunning. He cleared his throat and turned the hare. “I mean, that’s beneficial. Ye could save a lot of lives.”
She nodded. “That’s what I do. I try not to let anyone see, but I must help people when they are sick. It would be cruel not to.” The words tumbled out of her as if she’d held them back for a long time.
“Does anyone know about yer … praying?” Alec asked and then wished he hadn’t because her eager smile faded.
“My sister knows and cautions me. My father knows and commands me not to help people.”
“Yer mother?”
“She had the power, but she died. An accident. She fell from a horse and hit her head. She died before I could reach her.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. The shine of unacknowledged tears glistened in her eyes. There was a long pause. “Thank ye for your aid today.”
“I … I didn’t mean to distract you. It was my fault you were hit.”
Alec snorted. Her fault? “It was my own bloody fault for letting a bonny lass pull my attention from battle.”
She looked confused. “Why then am I your prisoner?”
Alec poked at the fire. “Because yer father has been cheating my clan for the last ten years, making the Brindles enemies to the Munros.”
Rachel’s forehead furrowed. “The wool?”
“Aye, William Brindle has promised a fair price, but then not delivered.”
Rachel’s eyes moved back to the fire. “Mother was always Father’s conscience. When she died …”
A low moan saturated the dark tunnel. Rachel’s head snapped around to stare into the darkness. Lightning splashed white light into the cave for a long moment, illuminating what looked like the long, ridged throat of a beast. Alec heard her gasp as the thunder ebbed.
“’Tis just the wind, let in through a hole to the outside somewhere down the tunnel.
” Rachel nodded but edged closer to him.
“Although some say,” he began and her wide eyes swung his way.
“That it’s the wretched sobbing of Lady Elspet as she weeps over the deaths of her two suitors, Jamie Macbain and Morgan Munro. ”
“Macbain and Munro?”
“Aye, ’twas the start of our feud nearly a hundred years ago.”
Rachel looked incredulous. “You are battling over … a woman … dead a hundred years?”
Alec’s anger simmered, narrowing his eyes.
What did this English woman know of loyalty and justice?
“I battle to avenge my father, my brothers, my grandfather, my great-grandfather, all the way to Morgan Munro who died because he loved a little Englishwoman. We’ve fought ever since, and one day we will be victorious. ”
Her lips were still tight. She shook her lovely head. “I’ll never understand men.” She snorted. “You create a tradition based on hate and death.”
“Of course ye doona understand,” he said.
“Ye are a woman, an Englishwoman, and a healer. My ways are foreign to ye.” He shrugged as if he didn’t care about the condemnation in the set of her lips.
Did he care? Bloody hell – no. He frowned and rose.
The lightning had moved farther off but the rain continued to pelt in slants.
Alec was tired of smelling like blood and death. He grabbed a thin slice of soap from his satchel and headed out to the mouth of the cave. “Doona try to escape through the caves. They are dangerous,” he spoke without looking back.
He pulled his kilt from his hips, dropping it at the edge of the dry cave, and walked out into the storm.
The cool rain felt good against his heated body.
The air refreshed him after sitting in the stuffy cave.
Alec rubbed the soap over himself and through his hair, scrubbing his own blood from his chest and limbs.
His own blood. If he’d died today, would the Macbains have considered it a final victory since he was the last of his father’s sons?
He grimaced. A distraction had nearly cost him everything.
He could easily blame the girl as she seemed ready to take it on.
But the truth was that she’d captured his usually unwavering attention simply with her presence.