Plead Forgiveness (Loyalty Series) (9 page)

With Nicholas close behind, he tore through the woods
towards the unmistakable threat of a wild animal. Sword in hand, Gavin was
determined to slay the dangerous creature, yet was completely unprepared for
the sight he came upon a scant moment later.

Amidst the strong currents of the burn, Ella fought to
stay atop a boulder that peaked above the freezing water, while on the
riverbank two crazed boars ravaged her discarded clothing as they waited for
their next meal to come out of the water.

Sprinting to the burn, Gavin was confident he could
get past the beasts that instantly turned to attack him once he was in view. He
ran into the water, and was quick to realize why she had not stayed closer to
the bank.

Instead of gradually sloping as Gavin expected, after
a few steps the ground beneath the burn suddenly dropped away. Chest deep in
the water, he quickly glanced over his shoulder and spied Osgood and Tavish
coming up behind the boars. His men would make the kill quick and easy, which
is why he did not help their effort.

Gavin’s concern was for Ella, knowing that her body
would not last long in such icy water. Living in the Highlands of Scotland, he
was accustomed to such frigid temperatures. He was also an unusually large man,
which helped to insulate warmth within his body. Ella’s slender body would only
be able to withstand a few moments at most. Unfortunately, she had long
surpassed that short period.

With strong strokes, he closed the distance between
them, while cursing himself for not coming sooner. The fading sun provided just
enough light to see her naked upper body hugging the tip of a boulder that
protruded from the water surface, and her submerged lower body battling the
forceful current, threatening to pull her from the safe haven. The water was
too deep for her to stand, but not for him, he realized when he stopped
swimming an arm’s length away from her.

Then he froze, consumed by rage.

Gavin had seen scores of horrendous acts of brutality
and injustice throughout his life, but never had he seen a young girl, so
slender and small, flogged to the severity of drawing blood.

Long, bloody lacerations covered the length of her
ivory back, making the contrast as distinct as night and day. Fury heated the
blood coursing through his veins, as his mind accepted what his eyes did not
want to believe. Ella, the wee hellion, had been severely whipped.

The bloody crisscross lash marks from her shoulders to
just above her buttocks temporarily paralyzed Gavin, but he forced himself to
act with uncommon gentleness until he could later unleash his wrath on the man
responsible for this act.

He moved behind her, and with deft fingers, pried her
hands away from the rock.

“I’m here, little one, ye can let go. I will take care
of ye.” Hearing his own words, he realized how true they were, and how
possessive he felt for the fragile beauty.

He felt her small body tremble violently and saw that
her lips were pale blue. Although it caused her great pain, he curled one arm
around her back, the other under her legs, and then swiftly carried her from
the loch.

“Fetch me a plaid, now!” Gavin roared when he reached
the bank.

While Osgood and Tavish tore their own plaids from
their shoulders, he noticed that they had successfully killed the two boars.

Slowly lowering her feet to the ground until she stood
quivering before him, Gavin held her close as his men came running with their
plaids. When he heard her faint whisper, he bent his head forward to catch her
words.

“Gavin, pleeease,” she begged as her hands and
forehead rested on his chest. “Don’t tell yourrr men. Theeey will thiiink I’m
weak. Pleeeese.”

Hearing his name on her lips was sweeter than the
finest wine, but short lived when he absorbed her plea. Her ludicrous request
angered him for a moment, and then pride sunk in.
She would rather suffer
than appear weak.

Scots respected strength in body and spirit. Like him,
when his men learned of the flogging she endured, they would know the true
extent of her strength.

Unable to fulfill her wish, Gavin whispered in her
ear, “Shhhh. All will be well. Nicholas is learned in the healing arts, and we
will need his help to tend yer wounds.”

When Gavin lifted his head, Nicholas, Tavish and
Osgood stood before him, completely horrified by the sight of Ella.

Seeing the young woman’s slender back rich with newly
made bloody lash marks, Osgood cursed, “Merciful God!” Unfolding his plaid, he
quickly covered her nude body.

Hearing the Macleod warriors around her and feeling
their eyes on the torn flesh of her back, pierced Ella with humiliation. Her
eyes remained closed when Gavin wrapped her in a warm plaid and carried her
back to camp.

“Osgood, I will need plenty of hot water. Tavish,
clean strips of linen,” Nicholas called out as he kept pace with his incensed
laird.

Nicholas and Gavin wore identical expressions,
seething fury masked with calm determination as they laid Ella on a pallet
close to the fire and rolled her onto her stomach. The blazing fire illuminated
the small clearing and exposed her body to all before Gavin covered her
waist-down with a dry plaid.

 With Nicholas on one side of her, Gavin on the
other, she turned her head to look at the latter. He looked infuriated, she
thought, but also oddly concerned. She suddenly jerked when a cold wet cloth
began to bath her back, sending chills and pain up her spine.

Gave cursed, turned his gaze on Nicholas, and then
demanded, “I must ken what ye plan to do.”

Nicholas finished cleaning her back, looked at Gavin
with sorrow in his eyes, and then said, “Infection has set in, and her wounds .
. . her wounds will need to be cauterized.”

Ella flinched when Gavin suddenly jumped to his feet
and stomped away. She saw him move to the other side of the fire, silently
fuming. Moments later, he seemed to regain some balance of control, and
returned to kneel by her once again.

“Ella,” Gavin began, “do ye understand what we must do
this eve? Cauterizing the lacerations. . .” He paused to take a deep breath,
and then continued, “Nicholas is well versed in healing and familiar with this
type of. . . of method of closing wounds. I am sorry, but this is the only way
to kill the infection. Yer back has gone too long without care. Had ye told
us-”

Ella interrupted, and was barely coherent when she
mumbled, “Mmmy saddle baaag. Healing saaaalve, my . . . my . . . aunt. Yooou
must cauterize. Saaalve after . . . speeed healing.”

Utterly speechless by her acceptance, Gavin and
Nicholas expected her to become hysterical, to plead against having a searing
hot knife close her flesh. She was a complete contradiction to all English
women, to any woman in fact.

Gavin turned at the sound of twigs breaking under
heavy booted feet, and saw Osgood and Tavish approach; and their identical
expression indicated they too had heard Ella’s words.

Tavish raced off to fetch her saddlebag, while
Nicholas explained to Osgood and Gavin what he needed from them.

“I will use two daggers to quicken the process.
Osgood, ye will stay close by the fire to heat the daggers and give them to me
on my request. While I use one dagger, ye will heat the other, and then we will
exchange. Do ye understand?”

“Aye,” Osgood said strongly.

“Good,” Nicholas replied before he looked across
Ella’s back and saw Gavin gingerly smooth hair away from her face. With the
exception of his mother and sister, it was rare for his laird to be so openly
affectionate with a woman. Unfortunately, Nicholas had little time to reflect
on the matter.

“Gavin,” Nicholas began, “ye will need to keep her from
screaming. A piece of wood-”

“Nae,” Ella cut in. “I willll nae screeeam.”

Nicholas and Gavin exchanged a look of disbelief, but
they did not want to upset her further by denying her request. Turning to
Tavish, Laird Macleod gave his youngest brother the silent message to retrieve
a piece of wood.

Dropping the hares they recently killed, Edric and
Paen stood motionless, stunned by the sight of the English captive on her
stomach with jagged bloody lacerations running down her back. Edric turned to
Paen and saw anguish in its rawest form.

Memories of a time years ago assailed Paen as he took
in the scene before him. Gavin and Nicholas were kneeling on opposite sides of
the girl, while Osgood stood by the fire with two daggers in his massive hands.
Tavish appeared from the depths of the darkened forest, holding a small piece
of wood, and was now moving to sit beside her head. A pot of boiling water
suspended above the roaring fire. Its flickering lights danced upon the clean
linen strips strategically placed for intended use.

Paen knew what was to happen to Ella this eve. All the
signs were there, and he knew them well. He fought the wave of regret that
threatened to drown him without mercy.

Blackness clouded Paen’s vision when he heard Edric
ask the foolish question, “What goes on here?”

Gavin growled, “Two boars came upon her while she was
bathing, forcing her to remain in the water as they tore apart her clothing.
Clothing that was bloody from a verra recent flogging!”

Sensing his laird’s reluctance to clarify further,
Nicholas continued the explanation. “Her back will need to be cauterized.”

Edric and Paen approached slowly, and stared at the
damage done to her back. The ones who flogged her so ruthlessly had used a
thick leather whip normally used on cattle, and not intended for tearing the
flesh from a human’s back, let alone a small, young girl.

Nicholas asked her, “When did this happen?”

With teeth still chattering, she replied, “Yesterrrday
. . . afternooon.”

Gavin snarled, “Why?”

In a raspy voice, she managed to say, “I publicly
refused the maaan Greystone betrooothed me to.”

In a menacing tone, Gavin asked, “Who?”

“Roger Moreland, Baaaron of Montgommmery.”

Nicholas’s eyes flew to Gavin’s, but his laird was
staring intensely at Ella.

It was no secret that Roger Moreland killed his first
two wives. Noblemen now refused to sacrifice their daughters' to the sick
bastard. Gavin’s chest tightened painfully when he thought about what
Montgomery would do to Ella.
He would brutalize her body and destroy her
spirit until death would be a welcomed gift.

“Montgomery whipped ye,” Gavin assumed.

She nodded, and then whispered, “He and Greystone.”

Nicholas asked, “Why would Greystone want to harm ye?”

Warmth from the fire began to seep into her body,
lessening her shivers when she replied, “On the day I came to Greystone eight
years ago, Aunt Eleanor lost her child, sister and father. Philip told me I
bring only pain and suffering to those around me. First my parents, and then. .
.” Shamed washed over her, preventing any further words.

“Bollocks, all of it,” Osgood barked out. “Complete
and utter balderdash.”

Ella turned her head slightly to look at the fierce
redheaded warrior, and then gave him a weak smile for attempting to alleviate
her disgrace.

With gentle fingers, Gavin caressed her cheeks until
her attention was back on him. “I believe that is the general opinion of all of
us.”

“Thank you,” she said as tears blurred her vision.

Looking over his shoulder, Gavin saw that Paen and
Edric stood a few paces away in apparent shock or disbelief. The sight of
Ella’s injury affected Paen in a way he could not even fathom.

When Paen was just a boy, he fostered at Montgomery
and suffered years of brutal whippings at the hands of Roger Moreland and his
father Harold, the Baron of Montgomery. If it had not been for Nicholas, who
foster there as well, Paen would not have survived his first year with the
sadistic men who hated Scots.

Even though Nicholas was English by birth and was the
only son to Baron of Thornton, he too felt the sting of the whip, yet not as
severely as Paen. They endured hell in those years, which neither one ever
discussed.

Gavin’s men knew the cruelty inflicted on Paen and
Nicholas by Roger Moreland, and now realized the reason for Gabriel's kidnapping.
Roger wanted revenge against Gavin for killing his father. However, there would
be time later to confer over such matters. At present, all thoughts were on
Ella.

Holding her hand, Gavin nodded to Nicholas for him to
proceed.

Nicholas asked, “Lady Ella, are ye ready?”

“Aye,” she whispered.

Gavin was grateful she turned towards him. She did not
need to see the blazing dagger or Nicholas’s expression when he sealed the
wounds on her back.

When Gavin noticed Tavish holding her other hand, he
was pleased with the gesture of kindness displayed by his youngest brother.

He gave him a thankful nod before leaning forward to
whisper to Ella. “Be strong, little one. The pain may be great, but it will nae
last.”