A Protector in the Highlands

by Heather McCollum

  Scarlet’s gaze moved between his eyes as if trying to ferret out if he was being serious. She opened her lips and closed them, wetting the bottom one. “I…I love you, Aiden Campbell,” she said. “Think about that while I’m gone.” She turned, hurrying into the tower of stairs.

  Aiden’s chest hurt, and he inhaled past the ache. “I love ye, too,” he whispered, the admission making him more afraid than he’d ever been in his life.

  …

  “We should wear our training trousers,” Alana said, rushing to a wooden chest. Izzy hopped from foot to foot, her silence not hampering her excitement. Cici stood still, her eyes slightly swollen from tears. Cat sat on the edge of Alana’s large bed, propping herself up on her hands.

  “You do not need to come with me,” Scarlet said to the small group gathered in Alana’s room. “It is dangerous.”

  Cat pushed off the bed and crossed her arms. “We are dangerous.”

  “Roses with thorns,” Alana said, grabbing her hair stick out of her bun, making her waves fall down.

  “These men could have muskets,” Scarlet said. “They could…do more than shoot us.”

  “Not if ye kick them in the ballocks like ye did to Finlay,” Cici said and wiped her nose on her handkerchief. She shook her head. “He’s never been a good brother—cruel, actually. Sending me away so he could have his late-night romps through the castle. But he’s still my brother.”

  Scarlet hugged her. “You should stay here, Cici, in case he is involved. I wouldn’t do that to you.”

  She sniffed. “But if he is threatening to kill the queen and another lady…” She backed up. “He’ll be damned for it. Maybe I can reason with him.”

  Scarlet squeezed her hand and looked at the waiting faces. “There are five of us, then.”

  “Kirstin, Martha, Rebecca, and Fiona will want to come,” Alana said. “I know they will.”

  Cat nodded. “And we’ll all be armed with blades.”

  “How will we get out of the gate?” Alana asked. “You’ve said that the king ordered the door and gate to be barred. No one is to leave through them.”

  “Aiden knows that we are leaving,” Cici said. “He will sneak us out.”

  Scarlet shook her head. Aiden. Her heart squeezed just thinking of him worrying over her. “He can’t help us in any way, or the king may say he’s going against his orders. If he were seen, it could make the king think he’s against him. It could hurt all the Campbells of Breadalbane.” She looked to Alana. “There must be another way out of the castle and the wall. A tunnel, perhaps, that you’ve seen.”

  She shook her head. “There is the back door into the gardens by the kitchen, but nothing that leads through the wall. Grey had it reinforced after Lieutenant Burdock’s setting us on fire. We must go through the door by the gate tower.”

  Good lord. “That won’t do,” Scarlet whispered, her mind racing. “There are armed English soldiers out there with smoking muskets.” Blast. Would her plans dissolve like that?

  “Maybe…” Cat said, her word trailing off as she moved her jaw to the side, her lips puckering in thought. She looked to Scarlet. “Have ye noticed all the animals in the bailey lately?”

  Of course. Scarlet had been tripping over chickens, a pair of peahens, and a peacock. Also, a donkey had appeared in the sheep barn with Snowball and his mother. “Yes.”

  “The donkey belongs to Alana’s grandmother,” Cat said. “And I saw peahens and that cock near her cottage.”

  “Elizabeth Campbell?”

  “Gram?” Alana said at the same time as Scarlet.

  Cat nodded. “I think she’s returned to Finlarig and is hidden somewhere inside. I would look in on her when I was at my cottage in the woods. These are her animals, and I know she wouldn’t leave them behind alone. Somehow, she’s been sneaking them inside.”

  Scarlet thought about the strange noises she’d heard, like the braying and the art book dropping, and the candle glow she thought she’d seen once in the library. Could the elderly woman be living in the castle? “And no one has seen her enter or leave?” Scarlet asked slowly.

  Cat shook her head. “I think she’s come through some secret way.”

  Scarlet nodded, hope flaring inside her chest. “Everyone dress in their dark training trousers and black shirts. Find your blades, too. Then return here, and we will search for that secret passage.”

  …

  Molly hurried with Scarlet down the third-floor hall to Alana’s room. “You think she’s coming and going somehow through the library?” Molly asked.

  “I’ve seen candlelight and heard unexplained noises,” Scarlet answered as they passed a paned window. Beyond it, the sun was starting to go down. She was already dressed in her dark trousers and shirt, her hair tied back with two sharp iron spikes, sgian dubhs and a mattucashlass strapped under her shirt and inside her tall boots.

  “’Twould explain the shite I had to clean up there,” Molly said. “Lady Alana swore it wasn’t one of her dogs, and your lamb was out with its mother.” The woman raised her skirts to keep up with Scarlet. “In the mornings, I go by to set up for your class. Chairs are moved. Books are misshelved. Crumbs are about, and I found an empty bladder of wine one morning.”

  “She must be living behind the walls,” Scarlet said. “We will have to get the king out to search it.”

  Molly grabbed Scarlet’s hand as they reached Alana’s door. “Be careful, milady.”

  The thin woman had a tremendously tight grip, threatening the flow of blood to Scarlet’s arm. Scarlet patted her hand. “Cat, Izzy, and Alana know the forests around Finlarig. They will follow me to the queen and her lady once the villains find me with my pretend bag of coin that Cat’s putting together.”

  Molly nodded and glanced side to side, leaning in as if there were ears listening. “I mean around the old woman. She’s wily, and I’ve heard she carries blades and poison.”

  “Alana’s grandmother?” Scarlet asked, finally wiggling her hand out of the maid’s grip.

  “Fiona says her mother said the grand lady was on the edge of lunacy and thirsts for English blood,” Molly said.

  Scarlet’s brows pinched together, and Molly nodded again. “’Tis the harmless looking ones that can bite the hardest,” she said, as if she had firsthand experience with things biting her.

  “I will be on guard, Molly,” Scarlet assured her, adding it to her list of details that could disrupt her plan.

  With a quick knock, she and Molly pushed into Alana’s room, where the four Roses waited, their bodies in black clothing, buns up with steel spikes sticking out of them. Alana’s dog, Robert, trotted over to sniff them.

  Alana paced, tapping her lip. “Before it was a library, it was the chief’s room—always had been, ever since it was built two hundred years ago by Black Duncan. Likely my grandmother learned about a passageway while it was her room.”

  She turned toward Scarlet, and all of them stood, waiting. Scarlet nodded to them, her heart pumping fast. “Step one. We need to get the king out of the library.”

  Molly raised her hand, fingers wiggling. “I can help with that, milady.”

  “Very good,” Scarlet said, glancing at the window where night was falling. “Because time is running out.”

  …

  “I wish to be served here in the library,” the king said. Aiden watched Molly tremble as she curtsied so low that it looked like she might fall onto her face. He’d been forced to stand guard with Covington and Louise as the king hid away.

  Still in her pose, Molly spoke, her words aimed toward the floor. “The cauldron is too heavy for me to carry, and I wouldn’t burden anyone trying to protect the king and castle. If you take a turn with the lady down to eat, you can check on the securities set up by Chief Campbell’s men.”

  The woman was trying to get the king out of the library. She stood up but kept her eyes cast downward. “And the spirits, they haunt this room,” she said with a little nod. “They taint the stew a
nd toughen the meat when I serve it in here.”

  “Spirits?” Louise clasped her hands and looked upward like ghosts might be floating amongst the ceiling beams.

  The king’s brows drew together. “Nonsense,” he said from his seat by the fire.

  “Yes, your majesty,” Molly said, but then made the sign of the cross over her chest in slow, exaggerated movements. Louise moved forward to perch on the edge of her chair.

  Wooooo. The sound came from down the hallway, echoing. Louise jumped. Aiden looked out into the corridor. “It is empty,” he said.

  Louise touched the king’s arm. “Let us take a walk about. My legs are turning to stone sitting in here all day. And I prefer my stew meat tender.”

  Covington walked past Aiden without acknowledging him. “I will tour the defenses outside,” he said.

  “The stew, your majesty?” Molly whispered. She raised onto her toes and then back down. “I’m afraid the rough soldiers will eat it all.”

  “Into the wilds of Scotland for Christmastide,” Charles said, his voice filled with annoyance. “It will be a pleasant diversion,” he said with a scowl toward the door where Covington had just exited. “On how many counts could Lord Covington be utterly wrong?”

  Aiden walked out behind the king and his mistress toward the stairs. Glancing back, he watched a shadow move silently along the corridor toward the library. Gentle curves that could make a man weep with want, clothed in soft black wool—he’d know Scarlet’s grace anywhere. What was she doing creeping around the corridors?

  “Campbell?” the king called from below.

  Bloody hell, he’d been rendered into a blasted nursemaid. Turning back to the stairwell, he descended, the thud of his heavy boots echoing. Good God, keep the lass safe. His head filled with his silent prayer.

  …

  “I don’t see any odd cracks in the walls,” Alana said, tapping her leg to make her wolfhound sit next to her.

  “Perhaps behind the hearth,” Scarlet whispered as she ran her hands across the stone, her fingertips diving into any little crevice she could feel.

  “If he barks, he’s likely to give us away,” Cat said behind Scarlet as she continued to search. “And he’s huge, up to your waist now. He likely won’t fit into any passage we find.”

  “He won’t make a sound,” Alana said with confidence. “He was a rascal as a wee pup, but he’s following my rules now,” she said. “And he is powerful enough to drag a man to the ground.”

  “To lick him to death,” Cat said.

  “Whether biting or licking, the villain won’t be getting up with Robert on him,” Alana defended.

  Scarlet dropped her hand, wiping the stone dust on her trousers as she surveyed the room. Cici exhaled. “We’ve checked every part of this room.” There was a definite whine in her voice. “My hands are becoming chafed from petting the stone walls.”

  Scarlet turned in a tight circle, hands planted on her hips. What had been unchanged in the room since the castle was built? The hearth. The bookcases. Not the ones that Evelyn had ordered from England, but the two deep bookcases that flanked the stone hearth. She stood to one side and studied the oak, its large knots swirling down the side. She moved around to see the books. Something looked slightly strange, as if the one side of the bookcase was thicker than needed. She ran a hand over the oak knots, feeling the holes in the middle. Down low was another hole that seemed deeper in shadow. She pressed her fingertip into it and felt…cold.

  “I’ve found something,” she said, pushing farther into the knot. She curled her finger, catching the wood, and pulled back. The panel moved outward with her hand, exposing a closet no bigger than a man.

  “I had no idea that was in here,” Alana whispered next to her, peering over her shoulder. Robert’s large head pushed against Scarlet’s knee as if he wanted to look, too.

  “It must lead out of here,” Cat said. “If Gram Campbell was bringing her animals in this way.”

  Scarlet looked down the dark, narrow stairs beyond the closet built into the side of the bookshelf. “Where is she now?”

  Alana stepped past her, holding a candle high to light the steep descent. She cursed in Gaelic and looked at Scarlet over her shoulder. “Up and down these steps? She could be broken at the bottom.” She leaned her hand against the stone wall and started to descend. “Gram,” she called down the tunnel. “Come, Robert.” The dog plunged down the steps to follow Alana.

  Scarlet motioned to the others. “Cat, close the door behind us.” Izzy passed Scarlet a candle, one for each of them, and they slowly descended the uneven slabs of stone through the narrow passage. Thank God, they were all wearing the slim trousers, as boned hoops would have made the descent nearly impossible. The candlelight only reached a couple of steps ahead, and there were no handholds except for the uneven stones in the walls. “Careful,” Scarlet warned. If one of them fell above, she could knock all of them to their deaths. Her heart pounded, and she concentrated on breathing the damp, musty air.

  “Gram?” Alana called from ahead.

  “Alana?” came a distant voice.

  “Thank God, you’re alive,” she called back.

  “Don’t fall,” Scarlet called after her, but found herself hurrying along, as well. How the hell did the old woman get a mule up these steps? And chickens. And a peacock?

  “Bloody hell, what a beast,” came the elderly woman’s voice from below. “Goodness, child, what are ye wearing?” Elizabeth Campbell’s tone was filled with both surprise and disapproval.

  Stepping down toward the glow of lamps, Scarlet entered a stone cell at the bottom. Cat, Cici, and Izzy followed closely on her heels. The room was half the size of one of the bedrooms above. A small bed took up one wall. “Have you been living here?” Scarlet asked.

  The woman looked more ragged than the last time Scarlet had seen her at Evelyn and Grey’s wedding, though she wore the same frown. Even though no one spoke of it, it was obvious that she resented the Worthingtons for taking over the castle, which had been her home.

  “They are trousers for easier movement when battling,” Alana said and took her grandmother’s hands. “Gram, the queen and a Campbell woman have been abducted. We need to sneak out of the castle to rescue them.”

  “The queen? Of what?” she asked, her brows furrowing.

  “Of England, Scotland, and Ireland,” Scarlet said. “King Charles is right now residing in Finlarig, and his queen was stolen, along with Aiden Campbell’s sister.”

  “Rebecca?” Elizabeth said, her hand going to her throat.

  “No,” Scarlet said. “Her name is Jacqueline, and she was born down in England, raised there.”

  The elderly woman glanced off for a moment, shaking her head. “I knew that woman was with child when she left. Terrible, sad woman, their mother.”

  “Gram,” Alana said. “What are ye doing in here?”

  Elizabeth glanced at Cat. “When my neighbor in the forest left, and that man who used to bother her kept coming around, I figured that I needed to find a safer place to live, since my family abandoned me there.”

  “Gram, we didn’t abandon ye. Grey asked ye, and so did Evelyn, to come back to Finlarig.”

  Elizabeth looked around, seeming to ignore her. “This was the safest place I could think of, but the animals stunk up the room. Figured they could be cared for above.” She patted her leg to get Robert to come over. He sniffed her hands, his long tongue unrolling to lick them.

  “Lady Elizabeth,” Scarlet said. “You are always welcome at Finlarig. It is still your home. We can move you above soon, but right now we need your help to escape the walls, so we can meet the villains to save the queen and Aiden’s new sister. Does that door lead beyond the walls?” she asked, indicating a latched door.

  The woman studied her, her frown still in place, but she gave a brief nod. “Aye. It comes out in the family gravesite, the crypt room.” Scarlet had seen the family graves when she’d toured the grounds with Grey and Evely
n. It sat off to the west, surrounded by trees, a squat stone mausoleum in the middle.

  Elizabeth squinted her eyes and glanced up the stairs. “So, the bloody King of England is sitting up in my castle? Someone should slit his throat.”

  “Gram,” Alana said as Cat snorted. “Don’t ye go near him.”

  “Lady Campbell,” Scarlet said, catching Elizabeth’s gaze. “Think of the favors your clan will receive if we bring the queen safely back and ensure the king’s safety. Even if you despise him, he is the most powerful man in the land. If he thinks highly of the Campbells of Breadalbane, he could protect your entire family.” She nodded to emphasize the truth in her words.

  “Bloody hell,” the woman murmured and huffed. She lifted the wooden bar from across the door and pushed it open. “Come along then. Let the Merry Monarch and his woman be beholden to us.” She waved for them to follow her out of the tiny room into another cold room of smooth stone. Robert wagged his thick tail, making them all dodge it as he led the way.

  Cici shuddered dramatically. “We’re inside a bloody tomb.”

  Elizabeth laughed softly. “Black Duncan’s bones are off to the side. Leave them be or he’ll haunt ye.”

  “Robert,” Alana called, pulling him around the neck to keep him close.

  Cici squeaked softly and pressed into the back of Scarlet as they filed through the small door, bending low to step out into the darkness of the forest. Scarlet breathed in fully of the chilled night air. Through the trees, she could see the lit torches along the roofline of the castle. The moon was only a sliver, and with the snows melted, their black shirts and trousers blended into the night. All of them, except for Alana’s grandmother, wore their hair in tight buns, stuck with one or two sharp hair spikes.

  She motioned for them to blow out their candles and follow her behind a dense copse of trees. Only the one lamp that Elizabeth had brought with her remained lit. They stepped close together into a ring.

  “First,” Scarlet said. “Someone needs to run to Kirstin and then to Rebecca, Fiona, and Martha to see if they will join us.”

  Izzy raised her hand. “Good,” Scarlet said, nodding. “You are swift. Bring whoever will come back with you here as fast as you can.” The girl sprinted off through the woods while Alana held Robert so he wouldn’t follow.