Geordie was Clan Donald’s secret weapon.
Catriona and the dog sealed James’ fate. So he aimed one last gaze their way, willing Catriona to grasp that he’d never bring her anguish. The haughty look on her face said he already had.
To her, he was the devil.
A cloven-footed, horn-headed jackal who’d sinned grievously against her.
That isn’t the way of it. A soft feminine voice came from somewhere above his left ear. She doesn’t want you to see her fear.
Startled, he looked up, half expecting to see an angel. But there was nothing but mist and cloud, racing before the cold wind coming down from the hills. Even so, gooseflesh rippled his skin. Ignoring the chill, he crushed the urge to break rank and pound across the field, demanding a favor of Catriona. Something to bring him luck – and perhaps – give him the courage to yank her into his arms again, this time asking her forgiveness and telling her he wasn’t the devil.
He was a man entranced by her and he’d had good reason to push her from him that night in the stair tower. Just as he’d only wanted to guard her good name later, in his bedchamber. He’d thought to protect her.
Instead, he’d sullied her. A dark deed he’d committed because he was falling in love with her.
Nae, he already had.
God help him.
“God’s mercy on us.” Colin halted abruptly, his words echoing James’ thoughts. But his cousin’s oath had nothing to do with a woman.
James froze, seeing at once why Colin swore.
The shield beating had stopped.
Only James had kept on pounding his targe, though he ceased now, his ears filling with the roar of the crowd and the scream of the pipes, more shrill now than ever. The drones and wails competed against the sudden blaring of trumpets from the King’s royal loge as a great commotion rose from the spectators gathered there.
Eager for blood, they clapped hands and stomped feet, shouting for the slaughter to begin.
Earl David and the Lyon herald stood at the edge of the King’s viewing platform, their faces impervious. But their stares were trained on the three groups of warriors, more directly on James.
Or so it felt to him.
Certain they’d seen him striking his shield after all other champions had stopped, he straightened to his full height, shoulders back and standing proud. He also set his face as sternly as possible lest anyone in the crowd dare to smirk at him.
Then he flashed a glance at Alasdair, not surprised when that one merely nodded, grimly.
When he turned to the Mackintosh warriors, Kendrew patted his sword hilt and gave him a grin that would’ve shriveled the liver of a lesser man.
“Mackintosh is mad.” Colin spit on the ground.
“His men are just as crazed.” James dropped a hand to his sword, frowning at Kendrew and his men. Unlike their chief, naked to his waist, many of the Mackintosh warriors had thrown wolf pelts over their shoulders. “Long as they remember they’re Highlanders and no’ Odin’s fools, they can fight naked for all I care.”
Looking away from the demented cravens, James drew his sword and raised it high. The other two chieftains did the same, though Kendrew roared like an enraged bear as he did so, earning glares from James and Alasdair. He grinned back at them, his face almost feral.
Then, on a swift nod from James, they each brought their blades winging down to point at the ground.
But in the moment they all yelled, “Archers!” something drew James’ eye to the royal loge where a party of MacNaughton spectators stood nearby, sneering.
James blinked, suspicion chilling him, turning his heart to ice.
MacNaughtons weren’t welcome in the glen. They dwelt in the next glen and were ever at odds with the Camerons, MacDonalds, and Mackintoshes.
But now wasn’t the time to puzzle their gloating presence.
Or that when James looked again, they’d vanished.
Already, the best bowmen of the three groups were loosing their shafts, the first two volleys of arrows whizzing over the warriors’ raised shields. None found a mark and James said a silent prayer.
He also risked a glance at Alasdair, catching him jerk a nod at the MacDonald archers.
Kendrew, damn the fool, was still grinning like a madman.
James scowled at him, but the jackal only threw back his head, laughing.
“Again!” James roared, glaring at his own archers, hoping his shout would overtone the fool’s braying. That his dark scowl would hide his own swelling relief that no arrow had yet pierced flesh.
“Launch!” Alasdair’s cry also went up.
Kendrew’s Berserkers answered to the crazed look on their leader’s face, howling like demons as they sent their arrows hissing into the air. Wild-eyed as they were, they could have been the legended Berserkers of Norse myth. Odin’s own bodyguards, ferocious fighters who craved battle lust more than they desired women.
All men fired now, the arrows darkening the sky and – as if the gods indeed loved Highlandmen – some shafts sailed high over their targets while others glanced off the upraised shield wall of targes. Most of the arrows clattered together to fall harmlessly to the peaty ground.
“Damnation!” Colin jerked when one of them dinged his shield and another slammed into the ground near his ankle. He shot a furious look at James, the near misses sending a rush of cold down James’ spine.
The two arrows had come after the others.
And the icy prickles creeping all over James’ nape told him the shafts hadn’t been loosed by one of Alasdair’s men. Or even that wild-eyed fiend, Kendrew’s.
But the arrows had been aimed.
He was sure of it. And he doubted they were meant for Colin.
He’d been standing right next to his cousin and his every warrior’s instinct warned him that the arrows had been launched at him.
And they’d come from the direction of the royal loge.
Fury slamming through him, James ripped one of the spent arrows from the ground. Not surprising, the shaft bore no ownership markings. James glared at the arrow, the rank stench of treachery almost choking him. He tightened his jaw, his blood heating as he broke the shaft in two and flung the pieces away from him.
He’d have thrust the two halves beneath his belt, keeping them to fret over later, but he wouldn’t give the King – or the likes of Sir Walter and his ilk – the chance to accuse him of holding on to an arrow after the allowed quota of three shafts per man had been loosed.
They wouldn’t care that the arrow was snapped and useless.
That he knew.
“They’re no’ ours, eh?” Colin kicked the arrow that had nicked his targe.
“They’re no’ any man’s.” James’ head was beginning to pound. “The shaft was bare as a bairn’s arse.”
Colin’s eyes glittered. “I say that’s as telling as any mark etched on wood.”
“I say it, too.” James turned to scowl at the Mackintosh Berserkers who were casting off their hunting crossbows, tossing aside the light weapons as they howled and leapt about like banshees.
“Heathens.” James pretended not to see when Kendrew yanked his huge war ax from his belt and swung it in vicious arc, saluting him. Kendrew’s men roared approval, slapping their thighs or grabbing their own axes and waving them high above their heads, challenging.
“The bastards are starting with axes.” Colin stared at them, gog-eyed.
“Thon Viking axes will do them no good.” James rolled his shoulders, flexing his muscles. “No’ when we slice through the hafts with our swords.”
As if they heard, a round of hoots and rude taunts rose from the Mackintoshes.
Wishing the earth would open and invite them into hell, James threw down his crossbow, the signal for his men to do the same.
Down the field, Alasdair’s warriors were also ridding themselves of their bows. Crossbows were useless now. Dead weight none of them needed when fighting face-to-face with the naked steel of great swords,
dirks, and axes.
Alasdair caught James’ eye then – as did Catriona, for the MacDonald warriors stood close to where their kinsmen clustered along the barricade – and James felt his frustration clamp hard and tight around his chest. For an agonizing moment, he couldn’t breathe. Not with a fury of kick-to-the-gut guilt slamming into him the longer he stood there, Catriona’s hot blue gaze locked with his.
Colin was right.
She did look like she hated him. Then, for the space of an eye blink, her face cleared and she mouthed the words, God save you.
At least, James thought she did.
Until it hit him that she must’ve been sending the well wishes to Alasdair, who’d used the moment to make a quick sword flourish to his kinsmen.
Ignoring Alasdair, James threw one more look at Catriona and saw at once that he’d guessed rightly.
This time there was no mistaking that she was staring at him. And the fury on her face scorched him.
If he’d thought she was angry before, her eyes blazed like hellfire now. She’d flung a section of her cloak over Geordie’s head – James could see the dog’s shaking beneath the mantle’s woolen folds – and she’d fisted her hands on top of the barricade railing. Her back was so straight it was a wonder the wind didn’t snap her in two.
James couldn’t look away from her.
Her rage was that terrible.
Alasdair was also staring at her, scowling fiercely. Then he whirled to face his men, thrusting his sword to the heavens as he turned.
“Arms!” Alasdair shouted the word, breaking the spell. His command unleashed chaos in the tiered viewing platforms as the crowd went wild. Closer by, the air filled with the shriek of steel as men on the field reached over their shoulders for the swords slung across their backs.
“Shields!” James yelled as hotly, bringing up his left arm to thrust his targe over the right edge of Colin’s. “Shield wall, now!”
“Odin!” The Mackintosh Berserkers roared as one, surging forward like a tide, every man wild-eyed and howling. Some of them sent throwing axes winging through the air as they ran, their shouts and snarls blending with the unholy knocking of wood and iron as men from the other two clans locked their shields together.
Quickly grouping into a tight wedge, James and his men held their swords straight out before them, using the long blades as spears so that their shield wall bristled like a hedge of deadly steel. From the corner of his eye, James saw Alasdair urging his men into the same age-old battle formation. Then both groups of warriors began pacing forward, swiftly closing the distance between them.
Somewhere trumpets blared. And the pipes screamed louder than ever, the skirls earsplitting as the pipers dared to march closer, blowing gustily as they strutted back and forth along the outer edges of the shield wedges, each wail and drone meant to stir the blood.
“Hold tight!” James ordered when the man to his right let his targe slip.
“Valhalla!” Kendrew and his Berserkers gave another great shout and split in two, each group veering away from the center of the field. They whooped as they ran, clearly intending to circle round and attack from behind when the two shield wedges smashed into each other.
“Hah - look at them!” One of James’ men yelled as the Mackintoshes raced across the grass. “They’re turning tail. No stomach for a fight!”
“Shame, you!” Another man called after them. “Running off like the women you are!”
James adjusted his grip on the iron handle of his targe, knowing better.
Kendrew and his wild men weren’t fleeing the field.
And they’d fight like demons.
But it was good for his men to shout taunts. The more they jeered, the less they’d think about dying.
Then Alasdair and his warriors slammed into them and the gates of hell opened as steel, iron, and men clashed fiercely together. The crash was terrible, loud as thunder and rocking the earth. Every man reeled, some men staggering backwards, several falling to their knees.
Shockwaves of pain shot through James’ arms, flushing him with heat and jarring his bones. He set his jaw, blocking the teeth-rattling agony, the loud ringing in his ears as the horrible noise of splintering wood and steel scraping on steel echoed across the field.
“Push back!” James snarled the order, surging forward, into the press of the MacDonald shield wall. “Push hard, now! Don’t give!”
“Ottar, Ottar!” Several of James’ men began chanting the name of the clan’s most revered ancestor, Ottar the Fire-worshipper, whose famed standard sited Castle Haven and became known as the clan’s Banner of the Wind.
Others took up the cry as men strained, shoving with all their might against the unmoving wall of shield-to-shield MacDonalds. “Ottar, Ottar!”
They lunged, panted, and pushed, gaining several feet only to have Alasdair and his men heave them back again, retaking the ground but gaining no more than the few feet they’d lost so briefly.
“Again!” James blinked the sweat from his eyes as they pressed heavily against the MacDonald line. Baring his teeth, he stabbed and thrashed with his sword, trying to plunge the blade into the hair-thin space between the MacDonald shields, or knock aside one of them, freeing a gap in the wall.
But the round, leather-covered targes overlapped so snugly that not a breath could squeeze past them. And his blows, however huge, glanced off the sturdy Highland shields without so much as denting them.
His men fared no better, though Colin did cause one of the MacDonald shields to crack.
But the targe didn’t spring apart, however fiercely Colin swung at it.
Cameron shields were proving equally invincible and that was something, considering the force Alasdair and his men were putting into their blows.
Then the cracked MacDonald shield did split, though its wielder didn’t cast it aside, even though one half sagged dangerously, exposing the man’s hip.
“Forward!” James urged his men to push again, not liking how close Alasdair stood to the man with the broken half-shield. Colin had succumbed to battle fever and was slashing at the MacDonald shield wall as viciously as if he were one of Kendrew’s Berserkers.
“Push, I say!” James put all his lung power in the command. “Break their wall.”
As long as they were straining to burst through the MacDonald resistance by brute force, his hot-headed, sword-swinging cousin would be too occupied to make a wild swipe at the man with the half-shield and lop off Alasdair’s head in the by-doing.
Colin’s aim suffered when he lost his wits.
James glared at Alasdair now, trying to send him a silent warning.
If the fool had any sense, he’d grab a shield from a man in the ranks behind him and thrust it into the hands of the broken-shield warrior before Colin or one of James’ other men could thrust a blade past the damaged targe, piercing the gut of the shield-wielder. And – very likely – also land a killing strike to Alasdair.
“Shove harder!” James cursed the lackwit as his men lunged mightily, gaining a yard.
“MacDonalds - hold fast!” Alasdair’s voice rose above the din, greater than the clanging of swords and the men’s grunts and curses.
Then, just as the two shield walls pressed so fiercely against each other that a shudder ripped through both sides, a sharp scream went up from the back of James’ group. An ominous thud cut off the man’s agonized wail. Another yell – and more - followed quickly, all accompanied by the sickening glide of steel grating on bone.
“Odin!” Thirty deep voices bellowed the war cry.
The Berserkers were back.
And the bloodlust was on them. Shrieking like hellhounds, they hurtled their light throwing axes at the men in the front of shield walls. They were even quicker to fall upon the men at the rear, slashing and hacking with larger Norse battle axes until the blades ran red.
In a blink, the shield hedges broke.
Men everywhere whirled to face the new threat, challenging the Mackintoshes
with swords, dirks, and axes, the deadly thrusting edge of their targes. Some men even used their bare hands.
Chaos spread, the stench of death imminent.
And through the red haze of fury, James searched for Alasdair’s flame-bright head. But the MacDonald chieftain was nowhere to be seen.
Unless - James leapt over the body of a fallen MacDonald, a sick feeling churning in his gut – Alasdair had been cut down before James could reach him.
He had seen the fool running straight for the Berserkers, sword drawn and fire in his eye.
“Aggggh….” A kinsman lurched at James, bloodied arms outstretched, his chest streaming red from an ax gash in his neck. The warrior – a bonny lad only a year younger than James and recently wed – crumpled to the ground before James could grab him.
Not that it mattered, as the man’s sightless eyes stared up at James.
“Ottar!” James threw back his head, bellowing the cry.
Everything around him went black, the horror of battle-frenzied men hacking, slashing, and stabbing each other blotted all but the hammering thunder of his own pulse roaring in his ears.
A rush of hot, blood-drenched air hit him and he whirled, just blocking a vicious sword swipe that would have sliced him in two. The MacDonald warrior’s blade stuck in James’ shield, the vibrations of the blow storming up his arm. He jerked fast, yanking the sword from his assailant’s hand. Tossing aside his impaled targe, he swung his own blade upwards, slicing into the soft flesh beneath his foe’s chin before the man could reach for his dirk or ax.
The man fell, spouting blood and surely dying, but James didn’t wait to be sure.
Instead, he leaned down and helped himself to the warrior’s targe, yanking the shield down and off the man’s blood-slicked arm. Stinging sweat dripped into his eyes, almost blinding him, but instinct let him thrust his own left arm into the two leather straps on the shield’s back. Then he straightened and glanced round, secretly grateful that the MacDonald wasn’t anyone he recognized.
“Valhalla!” A Berserker ran at him, the wicked edge of the man’s war ax arcing for James’ head.
Sins of a Highland Devil: Highland Warriors Book 1 Page 24
