Unspoken (2 page)

Chapter Three

“See, I told ye he was an eerie bastard.” Abby
nodded to Nellie, another serving maid with copper hair and a mass of freckles.
“Nearly scared the slippers off Evy, here.”

Evelyn grimaced at the nickname that Abby had
coined for her.  They didn’t call her ‘Evie’ or ‘Eve’ but ‘Evy’ as it rhymed
with ‘heavy’.  Painfully aware of her rounded figure, she couldn’t stop herself
from smoothing her apron self-consciously. 

“He would like some ale, sir,” she mumbled to Moorland,
ignoring the women.

“While you’re at it, take this pitcher to the
Mackay table.  Those lads be needin’ a drink after their nasty battle wi’ the
Donald a se’nnight ago.”  He clucked in sympathy

She hoisted the tray onto her shoulder and left,
dreading the Mackay table.  They’d had much to drink already and were becoming
over-loud and bawdy. 

 “Here you are, Milord,” she carefully placed the
fullest tankard on the table at the Berserker’s elbow, “and I brought you linen
to protect your thighs—trews!”

Christ’s Bones!
  To mention a body part was
impropriety of the highest nature.  But she’d been staring at his sinuous legs
while she’d been talking and noticing the cords and ropes of muscles visible
beneath the shamefully tight leggings. 

Cheeks burning, she risked an upward glance. 

He reached his big hand out and removed the linen
from her fingertips, draping it carefully across his lap and looked back to
her, a twinkle of amusement glinted in his devilish eyes. 

The brackets around his hard mouth seemed carved into
a frown.  Had he not much reason to smile?  She stomped on her curiosity.  It
was of no consequence, besides, tomorrow he would be—

“Well, if you’ll excuse me, enjoy your supper.” 
She turned around and grimaced once more, closing her eyes and shaking her head
at her stupidity. 

Making her way to the Mackay table, she swore she
could feel his dark and potent regard caress her spine. 

Alarming, that.

Don’t look at him.  Do not look back. 
As
she made her way through the throng, speculation regarding the mysterious
stranger drifted to her on the heavy air. 

“I heard that when they berserk, they flash
lightning from their eyes.”

“It’s true he’s mute, the gods took a price before
blessing him with the Berserker rage!”

“He has the strength of ten men, he does, just
look at that sword!”

“Makes one wonder about his
other
sword.” 
Evelyn narrowed her eyes at Abby’s annoyingly feminine purr as she swished
passed with a full tray.

Unable to stop herself, her gaze strayed back to
the quiet man consuming his dinner in thoughtful bites.  Sighing, she couldn’t
help but notice the occasional play of torchlight over the strong lines of his
face, the flex of his temple as he savored each slow bite of stew.  For a man
reputed with such violence and brutality, whose very presence emanated lethal
menace, he commanded himself with almost gentle self-constraint.  His manners
compared with that of any noble present.  Better, in most cases. 

‘Do their careless words sting you?’ 
She
wondered, distracted and enthralled by the silent and lonely figure as she
noted the manner in which every person in the room gave him a wide and fearful
berth.  How like people.  To enlist his help in a time of crisis, but shun and
exclude him from their ranks.  They ought to be ashamed.       

“About time ye fill our tankards lass, I can
nearly see the bottom.” 

She needed to concentrate on the task at hand.

“Well, that won’t do,” she responded quickly.  Awareness
of a dark and vital energy shimmered through her very blood. 

“Speaking of
bottoms
, isna’ that the finest
English arse ye’ve seen, Angus?”  Even through her skirts the sharp swat stung
her backside.

She whirled on them.  “How dare you!” Both men
laughed uproariously at her outraged expression.

“Come now, lass, we’re just enjoyin’ yer charms a
little.”  His hand snaked out and tweaked her nipple.

“You keep your hands off me!”  She brandished her
tray like a shield. “This is a reputable establishment and I am a respectable
maid.”  Blushing as she noted the curious glances from patrons about the nearby
tables, she prayed she wouldn’t be dismissed for creating a disturbance.  She
squared her shoulders.  No matter, her dignity was her only possession and she
refused to relinquish it to the likes of him.

Angus’ dirty brown eyes narrowed as a perverse
smile touched his lips, “Ye can be
just
as respectable perched upon
here, my lady!” he crowed, while snaring her in a painful grip and yanking her
down upon his lap.  Evelyn gasped as his erection ground into her backside. 
Gagging as his foul breath hit her face, she froze like a rabbit caught in a
snare. “Show a downhearted warrior some warmth before he goes inta battle on
the morn.” 

“No.”  The whispered plea sounded feeble to her
own ears.  The jeers of his clansmen dashed her hopes for assistance.

“You doona mean ‘
no
’.  Give us a kiss.” 

“Take your hands off me
traitor
.” She
hissed, then reared back and slapped him, putting all of her anger and
humiliation into the blow.  Pain shot up her arm.  Disgusted, she realized
she’d hurt herself more than she’d hurt him.  “We wouldn’t even be going into
battle on the morrow if the MacKay had held their ground as they’d sworn to
do!”  She surged against his painful grip. 

Pushed to the ground by vicious hands, her eyes
flared as Angus loomed over her. 

“I
know
of your treachery Angus Mackay.” 
Her tone lowered to just above a whisper, the voice of prophecy spilling from
her lips before she could stop it.  “The shadow of death resists
every
man
at this table, even though they go to battle in the morning.  Why do you
bargain with the enemy?” 

Angus’ eyes widened in
stunned disbelief, as did those of his clan who were within earshot. “I’ll cut out
your tongue, you English witch!”  His fist rose above his head, closed and
ready to strike.

Protect your face, cover your eyes.
   Evelyn
braced herself for the blow.  She knew what came next: blood, swelling,
explosive pain. 

The smell of leather, horses, and fields of
heather wafted by on a sultry breeze followed by a sickening crunch and a
bellow… yet she felt nothing.

The room fell utterly silent.

Chapter Four

Cracking an eyelid open, Evelyn drew in a shocked
breath as she looked up, and up.

Roderick stood between her and the Mackay with Angus’
wrist caught in a crippling hold. 

“Ye’ve broken me arm!” the man cried.  Shock and
pain etched in his dirty features as he squirmed in the unyielding grip. 

Roderick’s lips pulled back into a silent snarl,
murderous rage etched into his savage features as he held the other man
effortlessly immobile.  Angus’ arm bent at an unnatural angle. 

A Mackay kinsman bravely stepped forward. “All
right!  All right, man, we’ll leave the wench alone!  Doona be crippling
another sword arm when they’re sorely needed.”

The berserker remained motionless.

The room seemed to hold its collective breath.  Expectant
fascination and unease permeated the moment.  Would he berserk in the middle of
Moorland’s common room?

Tentatively, Evelyn reached out and touched his
leg.  “Really, milord,” she murmured. “Tis finished now.  No harm done.”  A
dark part of her wanted to see him break each Mackay finger that touched her. 
She squelched the vindictive feeling, somehow knowing if she voiced the hideous
request, it would be immediately carried out.

Through the buttery leather trews, she felt a
quiver of solid muscle beneath her fingertips.  She could sense his reluctance
to liberate his quarry, and the self-control it took to do her bidding.

With infinite slowness, he released the squirming
Mackay.

The fluid grace of his movements was astonishing for
someone his size.  He turned and lifted her to her feet as though she weighed
nothing. 

After performing a
cursory inspection which, despite its brevity, left her feeling naked and
vulnerable, he met her gaze.

She whispered, “Your eyes, milord.”  The pupils
swallowed the irises completely and the ebony bled into the whites of his eyes,
creating a cold and eerie contrast.  Disbelief snaked through her.

Impossible!

She watched dumbly, her blood roaring in her ears,
as he stooped to retrieve her tray.  He straightened and held it out to her. 
Irises the color of Irish moss glimmered at her.

Had she imagined the change?  Evelyn always prided
herself on being of a practical nature, not prone to fanciful imaginings even
through the acceptance of her own anomaly. 

He took her limp hand in his enormous one and with
gentle care, wrapped her fingers around the tray. Once she had steady hold of
it, he released her and cut a pathway back to his seat, leaving Evelyn feeling
oddly bereft. 

“Thank you,” she whispered, unable to speak until
he was out of earshot. 

A pause in his step caused her to wonder if he had,
in fact, heard her.

Hastily she mumbled “Pardon me,” to the assembly
at large before cutting a retreat to the kitchens. 

“Well if that don’t tickle me stones.”  Moorland
roared with laughter, “Ye’ve a Berserker champion, and ye doona even know what
that means!” 

She refused to ask and give Moorland the
satisfaction of berating her ignorance.  Instead, she lifted her chin, grabbed
a fresh rag to clean the tables, and headed about her duties, her heart lighter
than it had been in months.

*  *  *

Lud, the day had been long.  Evelyn tried to
squeeze the tautness from her lower back for a stolen moment and warm the icy
fingers of stiff pain that spread through fatigued muscles.  The witching hour hastily
drew to a close when she bent to pick up the final basket of clean bed and pallet
linens for the morrow.  She grunted.  This particular load must weigh ten stone
and the distance to the back door was a mile if it was one more step.

Evelyn felt the tiniest bit rejuvenated by the
quick and cold scrubbing she’d just given herself from frigid water she’d
pulled from the washhouse.  She thanked the heavens to be clean and also for
her small mattress of straw that awaited her on the attic floor.  A shiver of
yearning ran through her as she pulled her grey cloak tighter against the sudden
chill.

The extremes of the Scottish climes never ceased
to amaze her.  Just this afternoon, excessive warmth had streamed through the
meandering summer clouds.  Tonight, however, a moist chill blew in from an
approaching ocean storm.

Small price to pay, she supposed, for the safety
of anonymity.  Escaping as she had from the convent after the final disastrous “calling”
she’d been set to by Bishop Grimstead, no corner of her home country felt
safe.     

She huddled beneath her cloak.  Had the
temperature dropped another ten degrees?  Looking up from her basket, she
squinted at the back door of the inn.

Black spots immediately danced before her eyes as
the building began to blur in her vision.  Frigid and foreign fingers grasped
at her legs beneath her skirts, pinning her in place.  After a moment of
extreme disorientation, her vision cleared.  She found herself staring through
the trees at the
front
of the building; a completely different position
than before.

What is happening?
Her mind was suddenly
interrupted by the thoughts of another in a frenzy of quick and foreign
calculations.

  The inn doors are thick and the ceilings
high.  Too high to jump.  Clever innkeeper doesn’t want unwelcome visitors in
the night. 

The voice permeating Evelyn’s thoughts was arctic,
sinister.  And
Male
.

A dark chuckle choked her, filling her throat with
malevolence and bitter envy.  
No matter, the soldiers camping in the fields
tonight will be crushed on the morrow.

Cold hatred reached out toward the structure,
emanating from this body she inhabited.  If she’d been capable, Evelyn would
have cried out with the chilling force of it. 

Yes
…
He’s here,
the triumphant voice
hissed.

Whose thoughts were these? 

As if lured by the evil stirring the air, the traitorous
McKay and his clan ambled on unsteady legs in the direction of the front guest
entrance.  Evelyn was startled to feel amusement and recognition in this
foreign conscious she somehow inhabited. 

Angus, favored a splinted arm.  “Once we find her,
I’m going to enjoy plundering an English cunny as her countrymen have plundered
our lands for centuries.”  A drunken, riotous chorus of agreement sounded from
his five or so kin.  “Then, I’ll let ye all have a turn wi’ her.” 

“We’ll ugly her up, after, so no one will stand to
look at her face, the haughty witch!”  Evelyn recognized him as the man who’d
reasoned with Roderick in the tavern. 

They’re after me!
  She panicked.  Desperate
to return to her body from… whatever was happening, she struggled with all her
will. 

Unfortunate little witch.
  The whispered
laughter followed her as she somehow ripped from his presence and slammed back
into her own being.   Her eyes flew open to behold the rear of the inn again and
the small kitchen door.  Plucking up the basket from where she’d unwittingly
dropped it, Evelyn scrambled for refuge as though demon hounds bit at her
heels.

Chapter
Five

She sped across the empty dining room and plucked
a candle from its perch, intent upon using its wan light to wind her way to the
hidden linen closet beneath the stairs.  There she might make her bed. 
Grimacing, she turned down the back guest hallway, which was only a short few
doors on the way to the stairs.  Evelyn had never been fond of small spaces. 
They terrified her, in fact.  Her stomach twisted uneasily at the idea of
spiders that surely made their nocturnal homes in the dank recesses of the
cupboard.  

Better to spend her night with them than the MacKay. 
Spurred on by the terrifying thought, she hastened her steps toward the foot of
the stairs.  She intended to ponder on the strange and frightening phenomenon
she’d just experienced once safely locked away.

She jumped at the unexpected sound of heavy boots making
their way towards the hall. Within seconds, the man would cut her off from her
intended hiding place.

Panicking, she snuffed her candle and shoved it in
the linen basket, hoping to dispel the fresh smoke.  Then, she ducked into the
closest guest room doorway alcove and balefully eyed the closet and its
comparative safety, now steps out of reach.

Holding her breath, she flattened herself against
the doorjamb, certain the darkness veiled her completely. 

The weighty footsteps paused before rounding the
corner where Evelyn hid.  Tremors weakened her legs, and a throbbing pain
pulsed in her jaw where she clenched it tightly.  After a moment’s hesitation,
the footsteps resumed and a large, dark shadow passed her hiding spot trailing
the clean smell of leather, earth, and heather.

Roderick MacLauchlan.  

What was
he
doing out so late?  And how was
it possible for him to make his way in the darkness without the aid of a
candle?  Even with eyes adjusted to the dimness, Evelyn had difficulty distinguishing
his hulking form. 

He stopped ten paces beyond her and turned the key
in its lock. The lamplight of his room spilled from the open doorway and onto
the burnished skin of his bare torso.  Fortunately, the illumination didn’t
reach her alcove.

Her breath caught again as she drank in the sight
of his unclothed back.  He momentarily filled the expanse of the entry, and
then disappeared into the room. 

As his door latched, cloaking her in darkness once
more, Evelyn sagged against the wall. A whispered prayer of relief escaped her
lips.  But before she was able to form a coherent thought, the door burst open
and Roderick stepped out into the hallway pinning her where she stood with his
unrelenting glare.

Alarm spiked her heartbeat, and his nostrils
flared; as did a banked fire in his fathomless glittering eyes.  

At that moment, Evelyn began to understand the
nature of a Berserker. A man possessing the speed to leap across an entire
dining room faster than the eyes could track.  That could easily break a brawny
man’s thick bone with one hand.  Someone who had acute hearing and night vision
akin to that of a bird of prey and who could easily identify the scent of fear.

Evelyn couldn’t slow her breathing as they stared
at each other.  The way his eyes insolently traveled the length of her body,
even with half of it covered by a heavy linen basket, caused peculiar warmth to
spawn low in her belly, and tendrils of it to curl upwards toward her heart and
spread out through her fingertips.

Embarrassed and confused, she lowered her gaze to
the expanse of his smooth, hairless chest.  The rounded muscles flared into immense
shoulders, which ebbed and crested into the thickest biceps she’d ever seen. 
Long, thick and veined, his arms remained hairless until below his elbows where
a light dusting of black hair gleamed in the lamplight and crawled toward his
wrists.  As he stepped out of the doorway, more hair caught her eye, this trailed
between the obdurate ripples of muscle that made up his torso and disappeared
into his dark trews.  The glossy strings of his damp ebony hair confirmed a
recent bath.

The niggling warmth became a pervading flood and
hot bewildering moisture pooled between her thighs, which she was suddenly
aware she’d been clenching together. 

Roderick’s nostrils flared wider and he tightened
his jaw, an unholy knowledge lurking in his otherworldly eyes. 

After a tense moment, he broke their mesmerizing
connection to slowly gesture with his eyes toward the light of his room and
then looked back at her.  He jerked his head toward the doorway a few times. 
An unmistakable invitation.

He was asking her into his bed.

Roderick remained patiently immobile as she
battled her uncertainty.  What if bedding a berserker was dangerous?  Could he
control his formidable strength?  What if, in her ignorance, she did something
to make him angry?  Evelyn knew a little of what happened when a man took a
woman.  She’d come frighteningly close to understanding it in the convent where
she’d spent her childhood.  In any case, her entire limited experience lent her
to believe that she was better off a virgin for the rest of her life. 

Yet, a knowledge that lay dormant all of her
twenty years whispered that she unequivocally desired to see the rest of this
magnificent man.

Shifting her eyes to the cupboard, images of being
stashed in other closets and nooks danced before her.  Listening to
conversations no innocent child should be privy too and saving or damning
people with her
sight
at the point of a bishop’s dirk.  Crying in the
night as the blood of the innocent dead called out against her in her
dreams.   

The sound of irate masculine conversation carried
down from the stairwell.  Moorland’s Inn stood only three stories high and she
knew without a doubt who descended from the attic in search of her.

Hastily making her reckless decision, she ducked
past the half-naked warrior into his room, laundry basket and all.