We’re all going to be murdered, I thought. But I knew my laird would fight to the bitter end, and so would I. I grabbed up the candlestick and wielded it, bashing it into the leg of the man my laird grappled with.
Another bloodcurdling scream split the night as Ian’s sword punched through a man’s guts. I saw the attacker’s figure slump against the wardrobe and fall to the floor just before my laird came down hard upon his own attacker, wrestling for a dirk.
Pounding footsteps could be heard on the stairs—our men, or the enemy, I couldn’t know. I somehow scrambled to my feet just as the door was flung open and the room flooded with torchlight. I screamed again, for this light revealed the exact moment that the laird shoved a blade into the skull of the man atop him.
Then the dark, grim, unsmiling Malcolm appeared in the doorway, sword drawn, and I’d never been so glad to see him before. Our men. Thank God.
“Laird!” Malcolm cried, as he pushed into the room.
“Are there more?” the laird snapped, shoving the corpse off him.
“No,” Malcolm replied, after a quick search of the room.
The laird wasn’t taking any chances though. He found his plaid and was arming himself in an instant. Meanwhile, I backed up against the wall, naked and horrified by the bloody carnage of the scene.
Ian was a vision from hell, naked and covered in red blood from neck to toe. The bed itself was a destroyed mass of feathers and straw, an axe stuck in the mattress just where I’d been before the laird threw me to the floor.
And my laird—oh, he was a rampaging figure of rage, slamming the door shut to let no one else in, then shouting every curse word I’d ever heard in English or Gaelic.
I realized how lucky we were. These men had come to kill the laird. They had decided to kill him in his sleep, when he would be defenseless and alone but for his harlot. They’d obviously feared him enough to send two assassins instead of one. But they hadn’t counted on finding another swordsmen in the laird’s bed.
And if Ian hadn’t been there…
I shuddered to think. The laird would be dead.
We both would be.
~~~
THE LAIRD
That he’d been attacked in his own castle—in his own bed—was a matter of such profound disgrace that John couldn’t bear for the rest of the castle to look on. Turning to wrap Heather in a blanket, John snapped, “Let no one else in the door.”
Meanwhile, Heather dropped something at his feet. A bloodied candlestick, he saw. Had she used it? “Are you hurt, lass?”
She shivered, but bravely said, “Not at all.”
That wasn’t true, though. The blood on the candlestick, he realized, was from her hands, which appeared to have been burned a bit. Or maybe, along with her knees, they’d been scraped when he’d thrown her to the floor.
And he’d done it because of these wicked fiends.
“Do you know these invaders?” the laird asked his men.
Ian and Malcolm were already inspecting the bodies. “This one’s a Donald,” Malcolm grimly concluded.
“How do you know?” Ian asked, holding his forearm, which seemed to have been cut in the fighting.
Malcolm’s eyes never left the dead man’s face when he answered. “I killed a man who looked just like him in a clearing not long ago. I don’t forget the faces of men I kill. Especially not those fixing to rape a lass. This one is maybe a twin or a kinsman of the one I killed.”
Donalds, in his castle. The laird seethed with fury. And yet, according to Malcolm, none of the entrances had been breached. Which lead the laird to conclude, “So they came over the wall…”
Malcolm shook his head. “I don’t think so. Not tonight. The men were alert—even young Rodric. There’s a full moon and a snapping vicious wind. Men crossing the loch in little boats would have been spotted if not sent down into the deep. T’would be suicidal for them to have made the attempt.”
Ian continued to hold his bloodied arm. “So they were more likely here all along disguised amongst the villagers, or someone let them inside.”
Once, I might’ve suspected that someone was you, the laird thought. But no more. Whether the cause was love, loyalty, or instinct, the plain fact remained that Ian Macrae had saved the laird’s life. Not just his, but Heather’s too.
And not for the first time.