Chapter 27
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The sharp, copper clang of the iron alarm bell shattered the early morning calm, its frantic iron-on-bronze peal echoing off the stone walls of Castle Strathglass.
Nandag bolted upright from the grain sacks in the lower vaulted buttery, her heart slamming against her ribs.
Through the narrow slit of the arrow-loop above, the gray dawn was pierced by the orange glare of torch fire spilling over the outer curtain wall.
Shouts echoed across the upper courtyard, punctuated by the dull, bone-rattling thud of a heavy timber battering against the rear oak postern.
Robert had not waited for the King's peace to settle.
In the courtyard, chaos reigned, but Duncan’s roared commands cut through the din. "Archers to the wall-walk! Bring the pitch kettles to the timber gate! Secure the lower doors!"
Villagers, woken from sleep, scrambled across the slick cobbles. Blacksmiths hauled bundles of iron pikes, while women guided frightened children down the narrow spiral stairs into the safety of the stone vaults beneath the keep.
Nandag pushed her way through the crowded corridor, her hand tight around a heavy wooden bar as she helped a weeping mother steer three small boys into the wine cellar. "Inside! Deep against the stone walls, the timber willnae hold if they drop fire from above!"
"Nandag!"
A hand snatched at her wool sleeve. Nandag turned to find Mòrag, her blonde hair tangled, her face ghost-pale in the torchlight, her eyes wide with unadulterated terror.
"He’s here," Mòrag gasped, her fingers digging so hard into Nandag’s arm the bone throbbed. "I heard the men shouting at the gate, it’s Robert’s mercenaries! Nandag, he came fer us! He’s going tae kill Fearchar’s men and take us both!"
"He takes naething," Nandag said, her voice dropping into a hard, fierce quiet as she grabbed Mòrag by the shoulders. "Listen tae me, Mòrag. Ye stay down here with the families. Dinnae go up intae the hall."
"Nay! I’m nae leaving ye!" Mòrag’s voice cracked, tears spilling down her soot-stained cheeks. "If he finds ye alone—"
A deafening crash reverberated through the stones beneath their feet. Screams erupted from the Great Hall above, followed by the wet crunch of steel hitting bone and the heavy thump of iron boots over oak planking. The rear postern had failed.
"They’re through!" a Chisholm guard bellowed from the stairwell before a crossbow bolt caught him in the chest, sending his body tumbling down the stone steps in a heap of blood and tartan.
Robert’s mercenaries poured into the narrow passage like a black tide, their dark steel blades flashing in the torchlight. At the head of the breach stood Robert, his face smeared with grease and ash, his eyes dark with unhinged malice.
Nandag shoved Mòrag behind her back, her fingers locking around the heavy wooden bar she held.
Suddenly, a war cry roared from the outer court—a deep, thundering howl that vibrated the very masonry of the wall.
"Strathglass!"
Fearchar.
He burst through the far archway, his broadsword clearing its scabbard in a single, terrifying arch of cold iron.
Behind him, twenty lathered, dust-caked horsemen crashed into the rear flank of Robert’s men.
Fearchar fought like a man possessed, his heavy blade shearing through leather jacks and shield-bosses, carving a path of blood and iron straight toward the center of the hall.
His grey eyes swept the bloody corridor, locking onto Nandag standing near the cellar vault.
"Nandag!" Fearchar bellowed, kicking a falling mercenary aside as he drove his blade through another man's chest. "Get intae the cellar! Stay with Mòrag! Lock the iron grate!"
"I am nae leaving her!" Nandag screamed back over the clash of steel, her knuckles white on her club as two mercenaries lunged toward the stairwell.
Before Fearchar could break through the wall of men separating them, Robert saw his chance. He cut down a Chisholm guard and lunged across the blood-slicked stone floor straight toward the cellar entrance.
"Get the lasses!" Robert roared to the three mercenaries trailing him. "Grab them both!"
Mòrag let out a shriek and stepped directly in front of Nandag, raising a small iron fire poker she had grabbed from the hearth. "Keep away from her!" she screamed, swinging wildly.
Robert ducked the clumsy stroke effortlessly.
His iron-gloved hand shot out, catching Mòrag by the throat.
He yanked her hard against his chest, pulling her back until her heels kicked uselessly against his boots.
With his right hand, he unsheathed a jagged hunting dagger, pressing the flat of the steel directly against the pulse in Mòrag’s neck.
"Hold!" Robert roared, his voice echoing fiercely over the clash of swords in the hall. "Hold yer steel, Chisholm, or I cut her throat where she stands!"
The room went deathly still save for the heavy, ragged breathing of men soaked in blood. Fearchar froze five paces away, his bloody broadsword raised, his grey eyes turning to pure, icy death as he stared at Robert’s knife pressed into Mòrag’s skin.
"Put the steel down, Robert," Fearchar said, his voice dropping into a low, terrifying vibration. "The King has ruled. The clan is mine. Ye kill the lass, and I’ll tear ye apart with me bare hands."
"The King is three hundred miles away!" Robert spat, a wild, copper-stained grin breaking across his face. He pressed the blade tighter; a hairline thread of red bloomed on Mòrag’s pale neck. She let out a choked, whimpering sob, her eyes wide with terror as she looked at her sister.
Nandag’s blood ran ice-cold, but her feet moved before her fear could anchor her.
She dropped the wooden club. It hit the stone floor with a dull clatter.
"Let her go, Robert," Nandag said softly, stepping clear of the vault door, her chin lifted, her hands held open at her sides. "It’s me ye want. Fer ye want the keep. Let Mòrag go, and I will step forward."
"Nandag, nay!" Fearchar growled, his chest heaving as he took a half-step, but Robert’s blade twitched against Mòrag's skin, stopping Fearchar in his tracks.
"A touch closer and she bleeds!" Robert barked at Fearchar, his eyes darting hungrily toward Nandag as she took another quiet step forward. The madness in his face flared bright and victorious. He gestured with his chin to the two broad-shouldered mercenaries standing beside him.
"Seize her," Robert commanded, his voice dripping with dark satisfaction. "Bind her tight. We take them both intae the hills, and we see how much the Chisholm laird values his paper kingdom when his bride is in me camp."