Sarah Gabriel (20 page)

Alec was schooled in Italian, German, and French technique as well as traditional Highland swordplay. His three challengers had obviously not studied any Italian manuals, but they were instinctive and ferocious fighters. Alec was hard-pressed to keep pace with all three at once. He had practiced often enough with multiple opponents, for his father and uncle, who trained him with his brother long ago, had insisted on it for sharpening awareness, agility, and for learning to think quickly.

What he had not learned, and what his opponents had mastered, was fighting on uneven natural terrain. The Highlanders were agile and swift on the slope, moving easily over rocks and tufts of heather and gorse. Alec had to glance downward now and then to avoid the natural hazards underfoot, a necessity he knew could be a fatal flaw in this fight.

The clash of steel echoed on. One of the younger men leaped on a boulder, and the other circled toward Alec’s other side. Facing the old man between them, Alec beat back a volley of powerful strikes and lunged forward. His sword tip caught the thickness of the man’s plaid, sliding into flesh, and the gray-haired Highlander stepped back, turning ashen.

The lads descended on him now, two at once. Alec danced back, his glance wary and his sword slashing at air, stabbing and missing. They were nimble devils, weaving back and forth, while their companion clutched his side, blood darkening his hand.

Then Alec saw her. She stepped out of the hillside and through the mist as if she stepped out of a fairy mountain, looking like a queen indeed in her scarlet gown, her hair like melting gold. If she had any touch of fairy blood in her, he saw it now, dazzling around her. For an instant, he stared—then turned back to the fight.

The Highlanders came at him from behind and beside, and Alec whirled, turned. When Kate ran toward him, Alec shouted for her to stay back. One lad swept his blade downward while Alec angled his to block it, while reaching his other hand out to push Kate away. In that moment, his opponent’s heavy blade caught his arm.

He felt the strike more than the pain, and looked down in surprise to see that a cut to his left forearm had sliced through wool deep into flesh. Blood pooled in the gap. He felt oddly stunned, while the world around him began to tilt crazily.

The Highlanders dropped their swords, and Alec released his own. He stepped back, hand clapped over his arm, pressing against the warm gush that continued.

Kate ran to him, reaching out. Then Alec saw that the Highlanders were not her enemies, but her men. Like a fairy host, the warriors of the queen, they came behind her.

He sank to his knees suddenly. Kate dropped down with him to kneel in the muddy turf. Her men came closer.

Strong hands grabbed him just as the ground slanted upward.

C
lick, clack, click-click.

He lay with his eyes closed, half-dreaming, images in his mind forming, the bed warm and comfortable, the pain in his arm receding.
Click, clack, click-click.

Days, nights unmeasured in a big, deep bed, curtained in sumptuous green damask, the coverlets fine and warm, the linens soft. Quiet whispers, gentle and capable hands, hot soup and cool cloths, the pungent aromas of ointment and hot compresses.

Click-click-click.

All the while he struggled against draining weakness and fever. The wound on his arm had turned fierce, he knew. Someone had cleaned it, sewn it,
cleaned it again. He remembered whiskey burning a path down his throat, the searing fire of the cauterizing iron, and the oblivion that followed.

And Kate was there through it all, amid the blur of unfamiliar faces and voices. He was aware of a plump, dark-haired woman with kind hands, and others, including the Highland men who had tried to kill him. A lovely woman had been there, too. She looked like Kate, but was with child. Or was she Kate in his fevered imagination, while he dreamed of life as he wished it could be?

Click, clack, click-click.

Kate’s presence was security to him, was safety and love incarnate, and he clung to that, watched her when he could do little more than open his eyes and had no breath to thank her. She could have left him so easily. He did not know why she stayed.

Yet he knew he would have stayed for her. His feelings were very clear to him, as if emotions and hopes had been burned clean by the fever. Why had he not seen it before? It was so simple, so right. He loved her.

He turned his head. She sat by the fire, haloed in the golden light, head lowered, attention centered on a task. Her hands moved quickly, busily, over a small pillow in her lap. He heard the light tapping again.
Click-click-click.

Thread bobbins, he suddenly saw, made the sound. A finespun web covered the little pillow she held, while she formed a web of thread; tiny pins fixed the design, and the pale threads were wound tight on a dozen or more slender bobbins that dangled over the slopes of
the pillow. Kate moved the bobbins back and forth, plaiting and twisting, her hands graceful, adept. He had heard the noise throughout his illness.

“So you weave your fairy spells on a fine silken pillow,” he said, his voice hoarse.

She looked up, smiled, so that his heart ached to see it. “It’s lace,” she said. “I love you.”

At least he thought she said that before he slipped back into slumber. Fairy magic or none, he was in her thrall.

“We’ll let your brother decide what’s to be done with him,” Neill Murray said. He was her brother’s friend and ghillie to her sister’s husband, Connor MacPherson, and he often spoke freely to the MacCarrans.

Beside him, Kate’s cousin Allan MacCarran nodded grimly. “Rob will want to send him away.”

“He cannot do that,” Kate replied. “Captain Fraser could die if we move him now. Two days he fought fever and blood loss from that cut on his arm, and he is still weak. Your own wife helped me nurse him back to the land of the living, Neill Murray. He’ll not go back.” She dipped a cloth in a bowl of rose water that Mary Murray had brought, and dabbed at Alec’s brow. The fever was gone and he slept, but she knew it could return without warning. “He’s had a serious wound, and must recover.”

“What about my wound?” Neill said, touching his side.

“Mary said it was only a deep scratch,” Kate said. “How are you faring with it?”

“He’s fine,” Allan said. “Tough as rock, but whines when he takes a small hurt.”

“Small! That lad’s got a fierce sword hand, for all he’s a king’s man,” Neill said, indicating sleeping Alec. “And he should not be here. He’s a red soldier.”

“What of Highland hospitality?” Kate asked sternly. “I, for one, am glad we have the care of him here.”

“Aha,” Neill remarked, glancing at Allan.

“What’s this?” her cousin asked. “You never cared about an officer before. You could not wait to shake free of them, and with good reason.”

She set down the cloth, and looked at the men who had entered the room not long ago. Standing, smoothing the covers over Alec as he slept, she turned and led the others out of the room and into the corridor, then turned.

“It seems we need a little privacy for this discussion,” she said. “And you know I do not relish harm to any man, regardless of the color of his coat or the slant of his politics. There’s nothing particular about that man in there.”

“I am thinking he’s very particular to you,” Neill said. They all looked around as Roderick, one of Neill’s twin sons, came down the corridor toward them. Black-haired and beautiful, he gave Kate a dimpled smile.

She nodded in return. She liked Roderick and his twin very much, and knew they were good friends of her sister Sophie and had been helpful to her when she had been stolen away by Connor MacPherson.

“Padraig has gone to find Duncrieff to tell him that Katherine has come home,” Roderick said, “and he will
let him know there’s a red soldier with her. Other red soldiers will be out looking for them, so we must beware if he stays here.”

“He’ll soon be strong enough to leave here,” Allan said.

“Not for a while. I am surprised Rob is not back yet,” Kate said. “Do you think he is close to home by now?”

“Who can say? No doubt he’s coming back over the hills with Connor MacPherson,” Neill answered. “We had some trouble recently. Andrew MacPherson and your cousin, Donald MacCarran, were captured when they went to spy on the newest section of Wade’s road. They were taken to Edinburgh Castle, we heard. Rob and Conn went out to learn what they could from the constable. Rob’s been distracted by your arrest lately, and he’s been out, along with his men, nearly every day to learn news of you. That’s why the lads and I came across you, then the red soldier.”

She nodded. “I’m so glad to be back, but I’m sorry about Andrew and Donald. At least my brother will be relieved that I’m back so he can concentrate on helping them now.”

“And Ian Cameron, too. We all want that lad back as well. Padraig will find Rob and Connor and bring them back quickly,” Roderick said. “And Padraig has Thomas MacPherson with him. If they meet up with red soldiers, both are armed with fine pistols, those Spanish-made flintlocks. We found a few, but the rest—”

Kate shook her head. “Do not speak of that matter. That’s why Andrew and Donald were taken to Edin
burgh Castle—did you not realize?” She spoke in a whisper.

“What do you mean?” Allan demanded.

“I heard they were arrested with Spanish weapons. Wade wants to find the hidden cache. Captain Fraser is looking for them as well. Take care not to speak too openly of that matter.”

Neill frowned. “It is not safe to have this red soldier of yours here.”

She returned his gaze. “We cannot send him away.”

“For all he’s braw and bonny,” Neill said, “and for all he seems to have won your heart, he’s got to leave.”

Kate glanced away. “I have not given anyone my heart.”

“No?” Allan asked. “Well, I agree with Neill. Your captain goes, or we’ll have even more trouble.”

“And you, lass, will want to keep your loyalty where it belongs, home with kin and clan,” Neill added sternly.

Kate said nothing. How could she expect them to understand that she had fallen in love, when she should not have risked it, and now loved an officer of the crown? As a fairy-blessed MacCarran, she must be careful whom she chose to love. Neill and Allan knew it, and she supposed it was part of their concern. Already there was trouble brewing over Alec’s presence at Duncrieff, which did not augur well for the future.

She touched her crystal pendant. “He’ll stay,” she said firmly, looking at the others.

“Stubborn lass.” Neill shook his head.

“Katherine, you know your brother will not be
happy to find a red soldier here,” Allan said. “Let alone the one who arrested you and pursued you out here. They will know where we are, whether he stays or goes, now. He cannot be trusted. I say we send him away now, tonight or tomorrow, before he recovers enough to learn more about us and our glen.”

Roderick nodded agreement. “We can carry him by cart to a spot outside of Glen Carran, when he is well. He can make his way east from there.”

“What sort of hospitality is that?” Kate asked bitterly. “We pride ourselves in the Highlands on helping friend and enemy alike in time of need. You cannot do this.”

“In this case, it’s wise. Rob will agree,” Neill said.

“What of the lists, Katherine, and the weapons?” Allan asked. “With all the nursing you’ve done, we’ve had little chance to discuss these things. You said you saw Cameron. What more?”

“When Rob arrives, I’ll tell you. Not now, not here.” She glanced at Alec, who slept.

“You have other things to explain, too,” Allan said. “You’ve changed somehow, lass, though I cannot quite say how.”

“I have. And this man will not leave here.”

“He should be out of this glen,” Neill said.

“I suspect the lass has other reasons for what she says,” Allan murmured. “If so, she could endanger this clan with the wrong choice if I remember the fairy legend properly.”

“I will make the right choice,” Kate said. “I will.”

Later, when moonlight filtered through the windows and the castle seemed to slumber, Kate sat on the edge of Alec’s bed. The fire in the hearth crackled, its smoke fragrant, making the room warm and cozy. Enclosed by curtains drawn nearly shut, the bed seemed a peaceful space. Kate dipped a cloth in the basin on the table beside the bed and stroked the dampness gently over Alec’s cheek, beard-roughened and firm, over his jaw with its stubborn, handsome contour, over his strong throat, where his pulse thumped steadily though his eyes were closed.

His fever had broken early on the previous morning, though Neill’s wife Mary had given him a potion that kept him slumbering through the day to speed his healing. Kate felt vastly relieved that the crisis of the illness and injury had passed, though she now felt a new anxiousness—he must leave soon, for her kinsmen had determined that for the sake of all of them.

She slid the damp cloth over his shoulders. He was without a shirt, and she skimmed the moisture over the rounded muscles of his shoulders and arms, and across his chest, where power lay banked beneath smooth skin. The cloth passed over his breastbone, his heart, over his ribs. His small, flat nipples tightened, he shifted, his breathing changed. The beating of her heart quickened, and she licked her lips a little, rocked with the motion as she pushed the cloth slowly over his chest, down his abdomen. His lips moved, his eyelids fluttered, and he seemed on the verge of waking, sighing so that his abdomen rose and sank under her hand with the damp cloth.

She did not doubt that Rob would agree with their kinsmen when he arrived. As soon as Alec’s strength returned, he would be escorted elsewhere.

This night was perhaps her last chance to be alone with him.

She moved the cloth up and down, avoiding his bandaged left arm, which rested on a small pillow. Touching the cloth to his chest again, she watched drops of water trickle over his bare skin to enter the soft mat of dark hair that feathered over his chest and arrowed beneath the coverlet to his lower abdomen. With one hand, she pushed the cover down a little and brought the cloth down with it, sweeping, tracing, easing the warm, damp, soft cloth over his skin.

He roused under the covers, bold and already rigid, and as she stroked the cloth downward, she saw his unmistakable response. Her own body answered with a quickening. The yearning grew, heating her from within.

She trailed her hand after the cloth, taking up the moisture with her palm. He was a bonny and beautiful man, she thought, his skin cool and smooth, softened by a mat of hair that was delightful to touch. Chiseled in places, rounded and comforting in others, he carried strength in every fiber of his form. Flawless skin slid over taut muscle as he moved a little, the sheen lovely in the amber glow of the firelight. He stirred her within like no one ever had, ever would.

Even if her kinsmen did not send him away, she would have done so herself, knowing he could not remain here for long without raising suspicion in the
government, and she could not travel east with him to fulfill the obligation in Edinburgh. Yet despite all the tugs and tussles between them, she had come to realize that she loved him.

Shifting on the bed to reach his side, leaning over him, she pressed against him and felt him arouse further, just beneath her, so that she moaned a little on a breath, to herself, and moved closer still, sliding her palm up along the muscled terrain of his abdomen.

“Kate, lass,” he murmured, “either stop that now, or there will be consequences.”

“Oh!” Gasping, she sat upright. “I thought you were asleep!”

“How could I be, with so lovely a creature here with me?”

“You!” She slapped him a little with the damp cloth. Laughing softly, he caught her wrist with his right hand. “And I was bathing you all this time—why did you let me go on with it?”

“That hardly needs an answer,” he said, drawing her close to him. He brought his right, uninjured arm fully around her, and she fell gently against his chest where he reclined against a bank of pillows. “I was up and about after supper, but you were not here then,” he said.

“I was with my kinsmen, and my sister. We thought you were still sleeping.”

“Aye. Well, a servant left a fine meal, a pot of tea and one of lemonade, too—though it was not what I would prefer—”

“Lemonade and tea are all you’ll get,” she said, slid
ing her hand in circles over his bare chest, feeling the heartbeat beneath, “unless you want cocoa.”

“Lord, no. I ate a little, had the tea, then had a bit of a wash myself, and I read among the books in the case over there. Poetry and such. I was dozing when you came in a little while ago. Since you wanted to give me another bath, I wasn’t going to refuse.”

She gasped a little and laughed as he nudged her downward to nestle beside him in the warm, deep bed. “Alec,” Kate said, slipping her arm around his neck. “So you’re feeling well?”