Torn Between Two Highlanders (Sword and Thistle 2)

Even before the big bleeding warrior began to fall, Arabella tried to brace him with her own shoulder. But he was too heavy. He crashed down. It was only because Davy’s hand darted out to catch his friend’s head that Malcolm’s skull didn’t crash to the ground with a thunk like the rest of him.

Davy cursed, a catch in his voice. “Is he dead?”

Arabella felt the pulse of Malcolm’s life’s blood and put her ear to his mouth, to hear deep, reassuring breaths. “Not yet.”

“Can you ride?” Davy asked, grasping his friend under the arms and hauling him upright. And when Arabella didn’t answer swiftly enough, he repeated the question. “I asked if you can ride, lass.”

“Aye. What self-respecting Highland girl cannot?”

Davy didn’t seem to concern himself with Scots pride. Instead of trying to hide how exhausted he was—instead of pretending that he could manage his friend on his own, he said, “Help me get Malcolm onto my horse then ride his.”

She found it strangely reassuring to be asked for help again. Strangely thrilling that he treated more like a comrade-at-arms than a damsel in distress. So she grasped the slumped warrior around the waist just as Davy whistled for his bay stallion. “A well trained horse,” Arabella said with delight, when the horse trotted over.

“Animals like me,” Davy explained. “Women, too. So be on your guard, lass. These dimples of mine, you might find hard to resist.”

Arabella sputtered, having no reply to that. Was he actually flirting with her in the midst of this bloody carnage and danger, while she nearly bowed under the weight of his dying friend?

As he hoisted the unconscious man over the saddle, Arabella helped him, shoving with all her strength. Not being overly careful where she might touch the big warrior’s body, either. And when they finally got him onto the horse, Arabella was shaking from the effort.

Davy leapt up onto his horse behind his friend’s body, steadying him with one hand. “What are you waiting on lass? Malcolm’s horse is the black one.”

“A moment,” Arabella panted, having fetched the claymore to take along with them. “I’m a little breathless.”

“Och, aye. I have that affect on the ladies, but there’s no time for panting after me,” he said, exasperating her utterly. “If these louts were meaning to meet up with their clansmen, we need to be well away by the time they’re discovered.”

Arabella climbed atop the black mare, gripping tightly to its mane. “Let’s go then.”

Davy nodded. “Follow me. We need to get Malcolm back to the castle.”

He meant the castle at Eilean Donan, where Laird John Macrae served as constable. Feeling the horse’s strong muscles ripple beneath her, she wished never so much as anything to gallop off to the safety of that castle, a place of protection and defense for the clan. But one look at the man slung over the saddle like a sack of wheat, and she said, “He won’t make it all the way back to the castle. We’re too far away. We need to get him somewhere he can be tended to.”

Davy’s horse pawed impatiently at the ground. “Your father’s cottage then?”

Arabella bit her lip thoughtfully. “Still too far. I think I know where to go.” She didn’t expect him to simply nod, encouraging her to go on. Arabella’s father preferred that she not speak unless spoken to, so she wasn’t used to men deferring to her as if she had something useful to say. “To my betrothed. He has a secluded farmstead not far from here—on the other side of the wood.”

“You’re betrothed?” Davy asked, his blue eyes narrowing.

“Aye,” Arabella said, wondering if it seemed so very unlikely that a man should have agreed to marry her. She wasn’t as pretty or delicate as her older sister Heather; her eyes weren’t an enchanting violet, but a soft brown. It’s true she tended to smile with mischief rather than sweetness, and that she walked sometimes with a gait that her Papa said was too boyish. Still, Conall seemed to like her well enough. “We’re to wed after the next market day.”

“I see.” No doubt, Davy really did believe she was a witch, because he didn’t look as if he approved. Then he wiped a smear of blood from his cheek with the back of his beefy arm. “Lead the way then.”

Nodding, Arabella dug her heels into the horse’s side and galloped off, her two clan warriors following behind. She felt strangely exhilarated. She’d lived through this horror. And she’d escaped with her virtue…a thing her betrothed might well appreciate.

Before Conall’s farmstead came into view, Davy warned her to be wary. “If the Donald scouts were at your father’s cottage, they might be holed up here too.”

“I’ll go first then,” Arabella said, her hands tight on the reins.

“And risk putting yourself back in their clutches?”

“I risk that either way,” she said, realizing that if the countryside truly was crawling with men of the Donald clan, she was likely to be retaken.

“True enough, lass,” Davy said, while his comrade groaned from his place slung across the horse. And the sound of his pain made clear to Arabella that she must find help for him. She must.

“I’ll whistle for you if it’s safe,” Arabella said, dismounting from the war horse that she’d have no way of explaining. She might be able to think up a lie to explain her disheveled appearance and the blood on her hands, though, so she tucked loose hair behind her ears, wrapping the plaid cloak tighter around her. “If it’s not safe, then…”

Davy waved a hand. He understood. If this farmstead, too, was overtaken by rival clansmen, then they were likely all to die. But Davy didn’t look grim. In truth, he gave her a warm encouraging smile, and his blue eyes were filled with excitement—almost as if he welcomed the danger.

Both these blood-spattered men were in danger for having come to her rescue, and Arabella knew she must rescue them in return. She hurried across the field, striding purposefully, then bashing upon the door of the humble abode where she was intended to be mistress of the household one day. “Conall!”