Teresa Medeiros (7 page)

As they marched him from the hall, Morgan allowed himself one last sweet taste of rebellion. He twisted around and leveled a long, inscrutable look at Sabrina.

His eyes marked her more plainly than his blood ever could, promising plainly what his lips could not.

Later …

A dark shiver raked her. Brian gave Morgan a shove. Then they were gone and her father and mother were kneeling beside her, her father wrapping his frock coat around her shoulders, her mother enfolding her in a perfumed embrace.

“Did that wicked beast hurt you?” Elizabeth smoothed the hair from Sabrina’s face.

“Not yet,” she answered absently, still staring at the empty doorway.

Dougal lifted her wrists to the light as if searching for far more than just the circlet of bruises that should have branded them. They were unmarked, as smooth and creamy as they had been when she crept out of her bedchamber. A strange mixture of triumph and sorrow knitted his brow.

“So, my wee princess, have you had enough excitement for one night?” he asked.

She laughed shakily. “Enough for a lifetime, I do believe. Wherever did you get the pistol, Mama?”

Elizabeth frowned at the weapon as if seeing it for the first time. “A German clockmaker made it for my father in thanks for a generous donation to his Lutheran church.” She pointed it at the ceiling and pulled the trigger. A colorful shock of feathers burst from the muzzle.

An odd sound gurgled up in Sabrina’s throat, half sob, half giggle. “Bested by roses and feathers all in one night. Poor devil.”

Her parents exchanged a troubled look over her head. Dougal reached to stroke her cheek, but was stopped by the sight of the ugly bloodstains on his hands.

“Who would dare to work such wickedness?” Elizabeth asked.

Dougal’s hands closed into determined fists. “I don’t know. But I’ve every intention of finding out.”

“Perhaps some enemy of Angus’s, neither Cameron nor MacDonnell, slipped into the manor undetected,” Sabrina suggested.

Her parents both stared at her as if they’d forgotten her presence.

“Don’t you worry your comely wee head about it, princess,” Dougal commanded.

“Your papa’s right. We were thoughtless to discuss it in front of you. Come along, lamb,” her mother coaxed, helping her to her feet. “I’ll tuck you into your bed and brew you a nice hot cup of tea.”

Sabrina surprised both her parents and herself by pulling away and forcing her weak knees to support her. “Thank you, Mama, but I believe I shall take myself off to bed. If I’d have stayed there to begin with, I might have spared everyone a great deal of bother.”

Sabrina didn’t want to be coddled. She didn’t want to climb between her crisp linen sheets, sink into her warm down mattress, and think of Morgan, chained below the layers of stone and wood in the chill, damp dungeon.

Her parents watched her climb the stairs, her diminutive frame swallowed by her father’s knee-length coat. Dougal’s natural optimism prevailed. A thread of excitement twined through his dismay over Angus’s death. Perhaps the crusty old chieftain hadn’t died for naught. Perhaps the opportunity for Dougal to realize both his hopes for Clan Cameron and his dreams for his beloved daughter had just fallen into his lap along with Angus’s body.

He shook his head, marveling at the sweet irony of fate. “Not a mark on her. Extraordinary.”

Elizabeth’s eyes narrowed. She had seen that angelic expression on her husband’s face before and had every reason to distrust it. “Not a mark you can see,” she muttered.

Sabrina’s steps had already begun to drag before she reached the top of the stairs. She rounded the corner
of the gallery only to stumble over Enid’s prostrate form.

Her cousin rolled to a sitting position, knuckling her reddened eyes. “Dear heavens, I must have dozed off. I didn’t miss anything, did I?”

It took Sabrina three days to muster up her courage. Three days of being ruthlessly cosseted by her mother. Three days of watching her father, brothers, and the elders of their clan stomp and swear about the manor in search of a solution to their dilemma. Three days of listening to the MacDonnell bagpipes keen in protest outside the manor walls. At least, she thought, the sunken earth of the dungeon would muffle their endless drone.

The tapered heel of her slipper caught in a crevice in the stone. She braced her palm against the damp wall to keep from pitching down the winding stairs into blackness. She could well imagine her parents’ horror to find her broken body crumpled at the foot of the stairs. Her breath rasped from her throat, echoing eerily in a silence broken only by the torturous drip of water on stone. A stale draft licked at the flame of her candle. She loosed her grasp on the wall to cup her hand around it. She would rather go tumbling headfirst than to be left alone in this stygian darkness.

Her teeth chattered as she inched her foot from one step to the next, thinking it a fine time to discover she was more cowardly than Enid.

She stepped off the last stair into the belly of a serpentine corridor. The air hung dank and chill. She slipped her hand into the pocket of her gown just long enough to squeeze a measure of valor from the warm, linen-wrapped package within.

The maze of passages twisted, digging Sabrina deeper into the earth with each bend. She passed empty cells layered in limp straw and refuse, iron doors hanging off rusted hinges, manacles dangling from domed ceilings, their tangled chains marred by a coppery stain she feared was not rust. The walls wept oily tears that trickled into dank pools at her feet, soaking
the ruched silk of her slippers. Squeaks and rustles greeted each of her shy footfalls, and once a sinuous slither caused her to jerk up the hem of her skirt and stand paralyzed for a faltering heartbeat.

For decades the dungeon had slumbered vacant beneath the ancient tower of Cameron Keep. Remembering Morgan’s taunts, Sabrina wondered if another MacDonnell might have been its last occupant—perhaps his grandfather or his contentious great-great-great-uncle christened Horrid Halbert by both enemies and clansmen for his unfortunate habit of skinning his foes alive. A draft raked icy claws down her exposed nape, making her shiver.

She hurried around a curve she would have sworn she’d passed only moments before. She didn’t know how much time she had. She’d been able to steal away only because the men had rushed from the manor to keep a drunken MacDonnell from setting fire to the village kirk.

This gloomy cavern seemed a world away from the graceful wings of the manor house. The corridors narrowed. The skirts draped over her wide paniers brushed the walls. The weight of the stones pressed in on her until she could almost hear the ghosts of booted footsteps and hellish screams of torment. She fought panic, afraid to admit she was lost. Remembering the look of warning Morgan had given her in the hall, she realized she must be lost indeed to willingly seek him out.

Just as she was ready to succumb to the temptation of plopping down on the filthy stone and bawling like a baby, a tunnel sprang into her path. A blast of chill wind moaned through the yawning passageway. Her candle guttered, then winked out.

Sabrina slammed her eyes shut. Better a dark of her own making than the cloying murk of panic. But she quickly realized she couldn’t just stand there forever with her eyes closed. Not only was it futile, it was boring. She pried one eye open, then the other. The useless candlestick slid from her hands to clatter on the stones.

The faintest spark of light would have blinded her to the glow at the far end of the tunnel. Only utter darkness revealed it. The floor slanted beneath her feet. She crept forward, hugging the wall for comfort, afraid she might not ever find Morgan and more afraid she would.

The light revealed iron bars rooted between floor and ceiling and a man so still he might have been sculpted of the massive slabs of rock that entombed him. A fat candle sputtered in a wooden sconce, its spare light flirting with the shadows. Sabrina’s relief that her father had not been so cruel as to leave him in darkness was buried beneath a fierce surge of anger as she saw the thick chains that manacled his arms and legs to an iron stake embedded in the floor. No wonder her father hadn’t seen fit to post a guard.

Primitive outrage tore at her. Morgan shouldn’t be imprisoned in this miserable hole. He should be galloping across the glen, a breeze winnowing his wheaten hair. He should be sleeping beneath a crisp net of stars, his only shelter the rustling boughs of the pines.

He sat on a narrow shelf that jutted from the wall. Not even the greedy shadows could dull the sheen of the hair that veiled his face. He slowly tipped back his head, dispelling the image of beaten prisoner with one motion.

A bruise smudged the skin beneath his left eye. The decadent fullness of his lower lip was marred by a cut as if he’d been caught there by a blow from a heavy ring. Recalling the fiercely protective looks on her brothers’ faces as they’d led him away, Sabrina suspected they had sought their own private retribution after Morgan had been safely chained.

But instead of eliciting sympathy, his injuries only made him look more dangerous. Sabrina’s lips tightened. She’d do well to remember that this man neither warranted nor needed her pity.

He unfolded his heavy frame, transforming the confining space from cell to cage. His plaid was knotted around his waist. His bare chest gleamed like buttered steel. He padded toward her, leashed animal power in
every movement. Had he charged her roaring and rattling his chains, he would have no more resembled a warrior spawned from some barbaric hell. As he approached the bars, Sabrina backed instinctively against the opposite wall.

At first Morgan thought captivity had driven him mad. He had paced every inch of the cell before sinking down on the bench to fight despair. Then into this dank, foul-smelling prison had come a whisper of roses and an even more incongruous aroma of ginger and spice. His groin and his stomach tightened with hunger, each vying for his attention.

He couldn’t believe Sabrina was really there, so prim and clean-smelling, her skin glowing like alabaster in the thin light. A coronet of braids graced her fair brow. Still playing the princess, he thought, and he might have grinned if his torn lip hadn’t hurt so damned much.

He closed his fingers around the bars, ignoring the abrading tug of the chains. “Come to gloat, have you? To gawk at the pretty beast and enjoy your revenge for all those nasty tricks he played upon you?”

The chains would never allow him to reach her, yet his very proximity robbed Sabrina of all her wit. Against her own best intentions she blurted out the truth. “I was afraid you might be hurting.”

“I am. My nose hurts like hell. You broke it, you know.”

She tilted her head to study him. Not even a broken nose could damage the ruggedly asymmetric magnetism of his features.

He shrugged off her scrutiny. “It’s been broke before. Probably will be again if I live long enough. Of course, your lovin’ da will see to it that I don’t.”

“I wasn’t talking about your nose. I was talking about your father.”

He shrugged again, although the lazy glitter of his eyes sharpened. “Nothin’ to talk about. The old rogue is dead.”

Sabrina had expected to find him wild with grief, roaring with rage. His icy calm was even more unsettling.
She wondered if he kept all his emotions in such merciless check.

Breaking away from his gaze, she began to pace before the cell, still maintaining a wary arm’s length between them. “I don’t see how you can believe my father killed yours. If he had, don’t you think he would have armed his own clansmen? Why would he risk the lives of his family for such a petty, malicious trick?”

“You tell me.”

She stole a glance at him to gauge his reaction. He yawned, shaking his mane out of his eyes like a big, sleepy lion.

She paced faster, refusing to let him goad her. “Before Angus was murdered, I saw the tapestries ripple as if someone were hiding behind them. What was to stop the assassin from sneaking in by the side corridor, then fleeing the same way? You can’t deny your father had enemies enough. Why, it could have been anyone! Someone from the village. A passing Grant or Chisholm who would relish the idea of starting a fresh war between our clans.”

Or even one of your very own clansmen
. Sabrina bit back the words, knowing he would see them only as a ruse to clear her father’s name.

He braced the back of his forearm against the bars above his head. “Anyone but you, my sweet. We all know where you were, don’t we?”

His mocking tone shamed her. She could almost feel the gentle stroke of his lips against hers and felt as if she’d been caught strolling naked through a regiment of MacDonnells. Tendrils of heat twined up her throat to her cheeks.

Morgan glared at the fragile incline of Sabrina’s neck, choking back a growl. The girl ought to be made to wear her hair loose, he thought, if only for his own self-preservation. The sight of her bare nape twisted something deep inside him, something best left untouched. He’d rather see her angry than vulnerable. Perhaps that was why he’d spent so many years teaching her to hate him.

“Where are my men?” he barked. “No one in this godforsaken hole will tell me.”

Sabrina wasn’t supposed to tell him either. She shot him a look from beneath her lashes, trying to decide how far she would go to earn even a crumb of his trust in the hope of averting further tragedy for both their clans.

“They’re camped on the hill across from the manor,” she finally said, sighing in defeat. “But no one can tell if they’re planning a siege or celebrating. They dance and swill whisky all day, then terrorize the village by night. Oh, and they play the bagpipes. Incessantly. If this were Jericho, the walls would have crumbled the first day.”

“That would be Ranald. He’s a bloody wretched pipe player.”

“At least we agree on something.”

Morgan paced away from the bars, dragging his chains behind him. He couldn’t afford to let Sabrina see the excitement flaring behind his eyes. If his men were still nearby, there might be a chance of escape. Perhaps even now they awaited some signal from him.