Once a Warrior (37 page)

He did not realize Roderic would never let him leave alive.

“Bring Agnes and Catherine out here,” Roderic ordered, glancing at Gregor. “I would hate for them to miss this.”

Malcolm calmly watched as Agnes and Catherine emerged from their tent. He was careful to keep his expression bland, even when he saw the ugly bruise staining Agnes’s mouth.

“MacFane!” burst out Catherine happily. “You came back!”

“Aye, Catherine,” he said. “I came back. Now, return with Agnes to the tent. Ariella will fetch you shortly.”

Gregor looked questioningly at Roderic.

“Take them back inside,” he ordered, shrugging. “It seems he does not want them to witness his death.”

Malcolm waited until the two girls disappeared. “Actually, Roderic, it is the sight of your death I wish to spare them,” he informed him dryly. “Although,” he reflected, “I think perhaps Agnes will not find your pending demise overly distressing.”

Roderic threw back his head and laughed. “By God, Malcolm, you do have the most incredible ability to delude yourself. You have done so ever since that day Gavin dragged you home like a squashed insect, and you allowed yourself to believe you were actually fit to be laird.”

Malcolm shook his head. “I knew I wasn’t fit to be laird. I accepted the responsibility because it was my duty to do so. And because I believed one day I might be worthy of the honor again.”

“Well, you never were,” Roderic snapped. “You were pathetically weak and lame, and you couldn’t get through more than an hour without drowning yourself in alcohol. You scarcely knew what was going on in your own clan. When I offered to become laird, you should have accepted your condition and stepped aside. Even Ariella could see you’re unfit to lead her people,” he sneered. “She may have used you for your military knowledge, but she would never give you the sword.”

He was right, Ariella realized miserably. She had used Malcolm. Used him, then discarded him when she no longer needed him.

And, impossibly, he had come back for her.

She gazed at him despondently, wanting to plead for forgiveness, but Malcolm kept his gaze firmly locked on Roderic. His carriage was relaxed, and his expression bore an enormity of calm she found disconcerting. How could he not be enraged by Roderic’s cutting remarks?

“Once again, Roderic, you seek to take that which you have no right to,” Malcolm observed quietly. “It would appear you have learned nothing from your banishment.”

“I learned that I deserve more,” Roderic corrected him. “And finally I shall have it. I will be laird of the MacKendricks, a clan that, though of no military consequence, has immense potential for making highly profitable goods. With the money, I can create an army greater even than yours was, Malcolm. And with that sword,” he continued, his eyes raking hungrily over it, “I will conquer other clans, until I am the most powerful laird in the Highlands.”

“So you intend to enslave the MacKendricks and pour the profits from their labor into an army, which you will use to tyrannize others. How noble.”

“I’m not interested in being noble.”

“And you actually believe a mere sword can bring you all of this?”

Roderic smiled. “Give it to me, and let us find out.”

Malcolm moved as if to hand him the weapon, then hesitated. “I will have your word first that once you have the sword, you will not harm Ariella, Catherine, or Agnes.”

“You’re not in a position to make demands.”

“Perhaps not,” he acknowledged. “But I have brought you the sword, as you requested. You must honor your end of the bargain.”

“Give it to me, or I will bring Catherine back out here and cut her throat,” threatened Roderic, smiling. “You know I will, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Malcolm admitted quietly. “I know you will.” He began to raise the sword.

“Not like that,” Roderic snarled, quickly pointing his own sword at him. “You will fall before me on your knees and offer it to me, as I was forced to kneel before you the day you banished me from my clan.”

Ariella watched as pride battled Malcolm’s desire to see her safe. Finally, realizing he had little choice, he relented. Clutching the sword in his left hand, he awkwardly dismounted and began to limp slowly toward Roderic.

His carriage was dignified, but now that he was off his horse, he could no longer conceal his pain and stiffness. His gait was heavy and uneven, and it was obvious he was struggling to move without wincing. Despair welled inside her. Perhaps, with a few days of rest and gentle care, he might have been strong enough to face Roderic, at least for a brief fight. But Malcolm had been journeying to other clans for nearly two weeks, and had just ridden many grueling hours to return to her lands. The long days in the saddle and nights sleeping on the hard ground had demanded too much of his severely damaged body.

Roderic would slay him with the ease he would a helpless child.

Tears veiled her eyes as Malcolm stopped before Roderic. His expression resigned, he clumsily sank to one knee and held the sword before him. She had brought him to this, she reflected, her heart wrenching. If not for her, he would still be living in his hut with Gavin. He would be bitter, drunk, and lonely, but he would be safe. Instead he was here, about to be slain, because he erroneously believed that by sacrificing his own life, he might save her. What he must not know, she vowed, biting hard upon her trembling lip, was that once she refused Roderic the powers of the sword, she and Catherine would be killed anyway. In this final, unbearable moment, Malcolm deserved to believe, however mistakenly, that he had succeeded in saving them.

“What sweet retribution this is,” observed Roderic, his tone thick with contempt. “To think that just over two years ago, it was I who knelt before you. I swore then not to rest until you were destroyed. Your subsequent shame and banishment appeased my desire for vengeance somewhat. But nothing,” he continued, raising the point of his sword to the base of Malcolm’s throat, “compares to the utter perfection of this moment.”

Malcolm regarded him impassively, still offering his magnificent sword.

His face lit with triumph, Roderic reached for it as he drew his own weapon back.

Terror flooded Ariella. Without thinking, she grabbed her dirk and hurled it through the air.

In that same instant Malcolm swept up his sword and slashed a deep groove in Roderic’s arm.

A bellow of pain shattered the stillness of the woods. Roderic clamped his hand on the dagger protruding from his left shoulder and jerked it out. Then he stared in bewildered fury at the blood streaming from the gash Malcolm had sliced in his forearm.

“You destroyed me once,” said Malcolm, on his feet now with the sword flashing before him. “Did you honestly believe I would permit you to do so again?”

Stunned by this unexpected turn of events, several of Roderic’s men moved forward to help their leader.

“Stay back!” Roderic snarled. He grunted as he struggled to raise his sword. Pain shot through his bleeding arm, forcing him to lower it again. He cast Malcolm a look of unmitigated loathing. “Injured or not, I will slay you on my own, Malcolm.” Grimacing, he used both arms to raise his weapon.

The two blades met in a silvery crash, sending a puff of sparks into the filmy morning light. Malcolm instantly withdrew and thrust again, and again, but Roderic was a formidable opponent despite his injuries, and he expertly parried his attack. The two warriors began to circle as they fought, filling the air with the scraping and ringing of steel. Malcolm fought with deadly determination, fiercely rejecting his own weariness and pain. In this moment, he would not submit to the pathetic frailty of his body. He would fight Roderic with every shred of his strength and heart and soul, until the bastard lay bathed in his own blood.

Even if Malcolm had to die with him.

He moved clumsily, hindered by his leg, and unable to duck because of the rigidity of his back. He compensated for this by making his blows hard and rapid and sure, hoping to catch Roderic in an instant of weakness. Roderic was younger and far more fit, but the blood pouring from his right arm and the tight grip of his face told Malcolm his suffering was considerable. Like him, Roderic needed both arms to wield his weapon, making them more equally matched. Malcolm met him blow for blow, slicing up and thrusting down, his jaw clenched and his chest heaving as he struggled to open flesh. His right arm began to tire, slowing his movements. Roderic instantly sensed his advantage and made two swift jabs with his sword. Malcolm leaped back, but not quickly enough.

Pain blazed through his left arm where the muscle had been split.

“Give up, Malcolm,” taunted Roderic, his sword held before him. “You now have two useless arms instead of one. Surely you must realize this is a battle you cannot win.”

Malcolm inhaled, fighting to keep his concentration on the battle instead of on the warm stream leaking down his arm.
It is a minor wound,
he assured himself harshly, refusing to look at it.
It is nothing.

“There is something you are forgetting, Roderic,” he observed, his voice low and cold.

Roderic raised his brow with skeptical amusement. “And what is that?”

“I have the sword.” Malcolm’s mouth curved into a smile.

A flash of uncertainty shadowed Roderic’s features, which he quickly suppressed. “You may have the weapon,” he allowed dismissively, “but not its powers. The weapon alone will not help you.”

But you don’t know that for certain,
reflected Malcolm, watching a glimmer of anxiety twist the smugness of Roderic’s features. Seeking to take advantage of it, he summoned the dregs of his waning strength and raised the sword menacingly before him.

Suddenly a brilliant shaft of sunlight hit the jewel-encrusted hilt. An inexplicable heat began to radiate into Malcolm’s palms, as if the sword were somehow absorbing the light and energy of the sun. The heat penetrated his flesh and surged up his arms, soothing the weary, severed muscles and banishing the pain. And then it was flooding his entire body, like liquid fire racing through skin and muscle and bone, eradicating all sensation of weakness and suffering. In one glorious moment he felt powerful and whole, like the great warrior he had once been. The sensation could not be real, he realized blankly. It was some trick of his mind that caused him to feel so impossibly fit and well. Illusion or not, he straightened his back with fluid ease, then dared to adjust his weight until his injured leg supported him more fully. Roderic stared at him in confusion, as if he too could see that a change had overtaken him. Seizing the moment, Malcolm drew back his sword and raced forward, somehow trusting he would neither stumble nor fall.

Roderic crashed his blade defensively against Malcolm’s, then groaned with effort as he fought to throw him off. But a terrible, deadly determination burned in Malcolm. Summoning an awesome strength he had lost years ago, and not giving a damn whether it was real or imagined, he swiftly drew his sword back, then drove it with every fragment of his being into Roderic.

Roderic’s green eyes widened with surprise. He glanced down in horror at the jeweled hilt protruding from his gut, each magnificent stone still glimmering in the sun. Blood began to pour from him in a scarlet stream, soaking his shirt and his finely woven plaid.

“Christ, Malcolm,” he managed, his voice a rasp of sound against the stunned silence. “How the hell did you do that?”

Malcolm tightened his grip on the sword and pulled it out. A gush of crimson spurted after it.

“You had to die, Roderic. There could be no other way.”

Roderic stared at him blankly, clutching his belly. Blood pulsed over his hands and dripped down his front, then spattered onto the earth by his feet. Rapidly weakening, he sank to his knees. He gazed longingly at the sword in Malcolm’s hand. Then his eyes fell hard upon Ariella.

“It should have been me,” he said, his voice caught somewhere between an accusation and a whimper. He opened his mouth to say something more, but all that came out was a helpless, gurgling sigh. He cast her a final look of fury.

And then fell forward in a lifeless heap.

Ariella stared at his body in disbelief, as if she thought he might suddenly rise and threaten her again. Blood began to seep into the ground, forming an ugly, dark stain around him. She hesitantly raised her eyes to Malcolm.

His attention was fixed on something behind her. Ariella turned to see Gregor advancing toward them, his deadly ax raised.

“So, MacFane,” he growled as Roderic’s other warriors formed a wall around them. “Now it is your turn to die.”

“Perhaps,” allowed Malcolm, not appearing overly concerned. “As splendid a weapon as this is,” he reflected, indicating his sword, “I doubt I could kill all of you by myself.”

“You can’t,” agreed Tavis, smirking. “But don’t worry. After you’re dead, I’ll take good care of your pretty sword.”

Gregor scowled. “Why should the sword go to you? You’re not our leader.”

“And neither are you,” interjected Murdoch. “Now that Roderic is gone, I am in command. And I hereby lay claim to both the sword
and
the lass.” He cast a yellow, leering smile at Ariella.

“I don’t see why Murdoch gets to be the bloody leader,” grumbled a warrior from behind Malcolm.

“Neither do I,” added another disgruntled voice.

“We should choose a new leader.”

“And whoever we choose gets to kill MacFane.”

Murmurs of agreement rippled through their ranks.

“I hate to interrupt such an important discussion,” sighed Malcolm apologetically, “but I feel compelled to point something out to you.”

“What?” snapped Gregor, clearly irritated that he might not have the pleasure of killing him.

“If any of you move so much as one step, not one of you will leave these woods alive.”

Gregor regarded him blankly. Then he threw back his head and roared with laughter. “That’s a bold threat for just one warrior,” he remarked appreciatively.

“It would be,” agreed a pleasant voice, “were he just one warrior.”

Her heart pounding, Ariella pulled her gaze from Malcolm to search the surrounding woods.