We’re several hours into the day’s ride when I ask again where we are going. This time, Angus and Conrad exchange meaningful glances before Conrad responds.
“Angus is a MacLeod,” Conrad says, “so we’re heading to the MacLeod laird’s castle in Skye.”
“How far away is that?” I see the men still shifting in their saddles uneasily. “Why the odd looks?”
“It’s a long hard ride to the north and west,” Angus answers, “and we’ve to pass through Fort William to get there. There is no much choice, given our lack of supplies.”
“What’s the problem with that?”
Conrad rattles the hilt of his borrowed English saber. “It’s a massive garrison for the redcoats. If Markham’s gone anywhere to lick his wounds and rally forces to find us, it’s there. And we’re walking right up to him.”
“Oh,” I say.
“Aye,” Angus says. “Oh.”
“Isn’t there anywhere we could go that wouldn’t take us to Fort William, then?” I glance at Conrad. “Your clan, maybe?”
“It’s not quite that simple,” Conrad says, his expression tight and dark. “Though I wish it were.”
Signalling the discussion is at an end, he kicks his horse into a canter, his long black hair flying behind him.
I glance at Angus, who merely shrugs and says, “Touchy subject for the lad. He doesna really have a clan, you see. My own father raised him and I both from the time Conrad was just a wee little lad. We’re brothers more than friends, but he’s never been really accepted as a MacLeod. Not as such—he’s too ornery, too difficult, too given to trouble for that. But he’s no other family as such either, so it’s Skye or nothing. Edinburgh? Inverness? We’d be alone there as we are now, and Conrad’s got enough of a price on his head that it’d be rank foolishness to do anything else. We’d be sold out in a trice. And were he not my brother, I’d not blame them for it either, since his price is high enough it’d keep a family in food for a year. Hard to pass that up, even when it’s giving one of your own over to the English for hanging.”
“I see,” is all I can say.
But, really, I don’t see at all. I knew little or nothing of Conrad’s past, and what Angus has told me gives me pause—it explains a lot about Conrad.
Angus harrumphs, and rides in silence a few paces. “I’m no so sure you do, lass. We’re riding into Markham’s very hands. There’ll be talk. Which means there’ll be a fight. We’ve few enough friends in Fort William that this could be suicide like as not.”
“But must we go to Fort William?”
“Unless you’ve a wish to starve out on the road, yes. We know no one out here who could or would provide shelter. Conrad’s name is too well known for that. The Campbells, the MacLeods, they’ve influence enough to weather the rumors of harboring him. A farmer with little more than a plow for defense? Even the villages we might pass…no, it’s too dangerous for them. Markham could and would crush them and burn them out without rebuke.” Angus shook his head and sighed. “No, it’s Fort William, and we’d best hope we can keep Conrad’s name from being uttered too loudly.”
“What about you?”
Angus shrugs. “Bah. I’ve no worry. Markham can do no more harm to me than he already has and I welcome him to try. A price on my head? I’d sell myself to Markham if it meant I could put my dirk in his gullet.”
We lapse into silence for a long time after that. Conrad rejoins us after a while and rides beside me, but remains silent, brooding. His hand is never far from his sword hilt. Neither is Angus’s, I notice. They’re wary, watchful. And, with Markham’s tendency to simply appear when least expected, it’s not an idle precaution, either.
We ride past dark, and then find the ruins of an old farmhouse on a hillside with just enough of a roof remaining that we can build a fire and hope for shelter from the elements. We sleep in our cloaks, all three huddled together in the corner near the fire, though I notice Angus’s eyes glinting in the firelight, keeping watch, and then later I feel Conrad stir and rustle the fire to nudge the embers into life.
We spend days in the saddle, thus. Riding from before dawn to after dusk, sleeping beneath trees or in ruins, keeping watch the night through. Aching, cold, hungry. The provisions Campbell provided lasted us quite a long while with careful rationing, but we’re still a day from Fort William when they run out, and hunger gnaws at our guts from then on.
Constant watchfulness, constant hunger, constant cold. The tension is weighty and wearying, expecting Markham at every turn. We speak little, and though Conrad always remains near me, there’s little of the tenderness or affection he showed in the room at Castle Kilchurn. I feel his eyes on me, though, and feel the weight of his attention.
We ride, and we ride, and we ride.
I learn to hate the saddle, and the cold of the Scottish Highlands, and pretty much everything else. By the time we reach Fort William, I’m fairly certain I’d sell my soul for a hot bath and hot meal.
We enter the town of Fort William without issue just past sunset—Conrad keeps his head down and has his hood drawn and his hair pulled back in a tight queue. He’s always scanning, though. I see his head swiveling constantly, scanning the crowds thronging the streets. There are redcoats everywhere, in singles and pairs and groups, in stomping-boot troops, muskets shouldered, eyes hard, bayonets fixed. Conrad keeps his gaze away from them, finds something to fix his attention on until they’ve passed.
We all expect to see Markham at every corner, and in every face above a scarlet coat.
My heart pounds in my chest like a hammer on a barrelhead, and I find myself watching closely, eyeing the redcoats, and shifting my gaze elsewhere as they pass by. Angus sits tall and proud, hood pulled back, red hair a flaming beacon, weapons proclaiming him a Highland Warrior. He accepts the attention, I realize. Claims it, and thus keeps it off Conrad.
It’s a long winding journey through Fort William, turning here and there until I’m hopelessly lost, although Angus seems to know the way well, wherever we’re going.
Our destination soon becomes obvious: an inn—though the word “inn” is a generous appellation. It’s a small, dark, dirty, low-ceilinged place off an alley, which is itself well off any busy thoroughfare. There’s a bar, with a hoary old man behind it rubbing glasses with a cloth that may have once been white. A few tables, only one of them occupied, and that by a person with a cloak hood drawn and his shoulders hunched, hands cupped around a mug of something hot. There is a booth along one wall and stairs on the other leading up to a short hallway with two doors on either side. If the hovel has a name, there was no sign proclaiming it.
Angus takes a seat one side of the booth, which is in a shadowy corner of the already dark common room, and Conrad and I take the other. The men spend a moment readjusting scabbards to sit out of the way, and I notice they each have their smaller swords easy to hand, with me sheltered on the inside of the booth. Angus slides a coin across the tabletop as the bartender approaches, ordering food and whisky and hot tea and requesting two rooms.
“None o’ the rooms are let,” the old man grumbled in a throaty, raspy voice. “Take your pick. They’re all the same.” And then he ambled away, shuffling on a game left leg, flipping the coin Angus gave him across his knuckles.
The food, when it arrives, is…edible, and hot, but of a similar quality as the rest of the inn. But then, the draw of the place isn’t the finery of the accommodations so much as the privacy, and the lack of questions asked. The bartender didn’t even really look at us as he took our order, nor when he brought it out from the kitchen.
We finish the food and the tea, and then Conrad leads me upstairs and we choose a room. It’s the size of a closet, with a straw-filled mattress draped across a rickety makeshift frame taking up most of what space there is. There’s a stand in the corner with a pitcher and basin, and a small window overlooking the dingy alley. Bugs scrabble in corners—or at least, I hope they’re just bugs. Could be worse things, but I d
on’t really want to know.
All I care about is the bed itself. Straw it may be, prickly and lumpy at best, but it’s still a far sight better than the cold hard ground. I collapse gratefully into the bed, still fully clothed, and pull the thick wool blanket up to my neck, and promptly drowse.
Conrad kneels beside me. “I’ve got to go with Angus, take in some more supplies for the journey to Skye. Stay in here. Don’t leave, not for anything.”
I nod sleepily, and hear the door open and close, boots on the wooden floor and then, distantly, the door of the inn opening and closing.
I’m not sure how long I slept or what woke me. A sound? A voice? An instinct? All I know is that I wake suddenly and in full darkness. Many hours have passed, and Conrad should have returned by now.
I rise slowly, carefully, and peer out the window. I can make out the entrance to the alley and a bit of the street beyond. At first, I see only shadows, but then as I stare the shadows resolve into shapes. Bodies, male, moving stealthily on careful feet. Musket barrels gleam dull in the dim moonlight, the bayonets fixed. It is hard to tell for certain, but I know there are several men. While their red coats are hard to see in the darkness, the white stripes in an X across their chests is identifiable enough.
My heart thunders.
Have Angus and Conrad been caught already? Or did they spot the redcoats on their way here? What do I do?
Not sit here waiting to be found, that’s the truth.
I’m still fully clothed, so I carefully, quietly open the door and peer out into the hallway. I can see nothing, and the inn is deathly quiet. I’m halfway out the door when I see that Conrad’s left his claymore by the door, and I don’t dare leave it behind. It’s a marker of our presence, if nothing else. I move out into the hallway, carrying the huge, heavy sword, which is longer than I am tall. I see another door left partially open.I peek in and see Angus’s claymore by the door, as well—they obviously knew it wouldn’t be wise to go traipsing off through Fort William lugging around such mammoth weapons, which is why they left them behind, thinking we’d be safe here one night. I add Angus’s sword to my burden, and then close both doors tightly.
I tiptoe to the top of the stairs and peer down. All is silent and dark so far as I can see, so I angle down the steps on silent feet, two giant, enormously heavy swords in my arms. The fire in the hearth is banked, nothing but dull orange coals casting a dim glow on the common room. I hear snoring—the bartender is stretched out on the booth bench.
I hear voices then, English accents just beyond the door.
My heart is in my mouth and fear thrums in my veins, my pulse racing. They’re out there, right beyond the door. What do I do? I’m hyperventilating, gasping. There’s nowhere to go—no back door, only the stairs whence I came and they are a dead end, and there is a troop of redcoats on the other side of the main door. I’m guessing they have orders to take me.
Or, if they don’t have such orders, I don’t think I’d like what would happen to me, as a woman, if these soldiers get their hands on me. It’s the dead of night and I’m alone, all but defenseless, and they’re both the keepers of order and the source of the danger. I’d be raped a dozen times by dawn, no doubt.
The thought has tears pooling in my eyes, a knot in my throat, and bile at my teeth. No. No. I cast one last desperate glance around the inn, and see the bar. As a hiding place it is better than nothing, although surely the redcoats will search here as a matter of course.
I hustle behind the bar, crouching down with my back to the wall, keeping the two huge claymores angled so they won’t knock or bump inadvertently.
There’s a shelf built into the back of the bar, stocked with old jugs, dusty mugs, a few old rags, sacks of something or other, and a large dagger, the blade bare; unlike everything else under the bar, this blade is clean and dust-free, sharp, well-used and cared for. I won’t let them take me without a fight, I decide, and set the swords down as carefully and quietly as I can, taking the dagger in both hands. It’s heavier than I expected, the polished wood hilt cold in my fists.
The door creaks open, and a gust of wind blows through the common room. Silence, but for that creak of hinges. Then I hear boots on wood plank floor. There are too many footsteps scuffing and thunking to count, and I have to clap my hand over my mouth to keep from crying out as they pass mere feet away from my hiding place on the way to the stairs. The old innkeeper snores away as the soldiers clamber up the stairs.
I hear doors open, thuds against the walls, scuffles, and voices.
There are a few moments of this, as they search the rooms, then I hear a single pair of boots on the stairs.
“Sir,” a young male voice says. “No sign of them. One of the beds is warm from being slept in recently, but no sign of anyone. Just the old innkeeper.”
“My source said they’d be here,” I hear, and this voice is close, so close, just above me—it’s Charlie Markham. “He saw them enter. The girl, at least, should be here.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but the rooms are empty.”
“Damn. Double damn.” Markham is angry, frustrated. “Look again, thoroughly.” Louder, then, to the rest of the men. “They can’t have gone far, spread out and watch the alleys and doorways. Five guineas to the man who finds them.”
Footsteps carry Markham away from the bar, and then I hear snores choke and cease.
“Whass th’meanin’ of this?” I hear the old man say, sleep muzzy and irritated. “Got no call to be here. Bugger off, English.”
There is a ring of steel, and a hiss of pained surprise, then Markham’s voice, “I’m looking for two Highlanders and girl. They were here. Where are they?”
“Dunno, English. Ate, drank, took two rooms. Came and went, coulda been back after I fell asleep. Dunno—dunno.”
“They left? All of them?”
“I guess, I dunno. Didn’t watch ‘em leave. What my custom does is no concern of mine.”
“You’re lying.”
“Why would I lie with a blade to my throat? I don’t know nothin’, I swear’t . Two men were here, with a woman. Ate some stew, drank some whiskey, went up to sleep. Heard feet a while later, but I was—got old bones, right, and the whisky helps the ache, y’know? I like a tipple or two at night’s end. Didn’t see who left or where they were headed. I swear that’s all I know.”
“If I find you’ve harbored them, I’ll have your head off myself, old man.” A pause. “You know who you had under your roof?”
“No sir, swear I don’t know nothin.”
“Conrad Killian. Sworn enemy of the Crown, and wanted outlaw.”
“I didn’t know, sir, I swear I didn’t.”
Markham spits. “No, so you’ve said.”
The footsteps move away, and then another set of feet can be heard trotting down the stairs. I’m holding my breath, hardly daring to believe they’d just waltz right out without checking behind the bar.
I hear Markham’s voice once more, outside. “Smith, pop back in and have one last look. Can’t be too thorough.” I hear his footsteps recede, leaving Smith to do his bidding.
“Sir.”
Feet clomp back up the stairs and can be heard on the ceiling over my head. Finding nothing, he comes back down again. I can hear him kicking the chairs aside, as if someone would be hiding under a table. And then, yes, at last I hear him approaching the bar.
I clutch my dagger in shaking fists, get my feet underneath me, ready to leap.
First I see tips of boots, black, scuffed and worn, and then white leggings. As I look up I see a red coat and a young face, barely old enough to shave. His hands clutch a Brown Bess, the bayonet fixed. His eyes are squinting in the darkness.
As soon as I see him, I leap. It’s automatic, without forethought. The dagger is clutched in both of my fists, tip pointing at the ceiling. It scythes upward as I cross the few feet between us. He sees me as I’m leaping, and there’s just time for him to register surprise, and to begin bringing his musket t
o bear, but it’s too late. I feel myself slam into his thin body, knocking him backward. My arms jolt, and there’s a hard thud and a wet squish, and warmth coats my hands. I stagger backward, and the young soldier is staring at me, blood staining his coat at belly level. He blinks at me, seeming more surprised than anything.
Then…he lifts his musket. The barrel wavers, the tip of his wickedly sharp bayonet circling dizzily, as if he can’t quite make it fix on me. He steps toward me, and I shuffle backward with a squeal of fright.
He’s not dead yet.
I…stabbed him, but he’s not dead. I thought it would happen faster. Bile fills my mouth as I realize I’m not safe yet. I have to…I have to finish it. He’ll shoot me, and even if he doesn’t hit me, the noise will draw Markham.
I move toward him, but leathery hands snatch the blade from me. It’s the old man. He steps in front of me, knocks the musket aside, and drives the dagger neatly into the soldier’s throat with one hand, catching the musket barrel with the other and snatching the weapon away. There’s a wet gurgle, and then I look away. I hear something else wet and then a heavy thud of a body hitting the floor.
I look, then. I have to. He’s on the ground, the young soldier, eyes blinking, feet twitching weakly on the floor. Blood is everywhere. On my hands, on the innkeeper, on the floor.
“Go, girl.” The innkeeper’s voice is low, steady. “Go, before they send someone to look for young Smith, here.”
“What will you do?” I ask, my voice quavering.
“I’ve friends who can deal with the body quick enough. Won’t be the first redcoat to find his end on this floor, and won’t be the last.” He eyes me. “I knew Killian on sight, and I wish him God’s own luck ending that bastard Markham.” He waves at the door. “Now…go.”
I fetch the swords from the floor behind the bar and exit the inn with one last backward glance. The innkeeper is dragging the body somewhere, blood trailing in a thick dark wet smear.
What now?
I have to get as far from this alley as I can, before someone comes back for the missing soldier. But what if Conrad and Angus come looking me? I can’t stay here, I know that much…but where do I go? I’ve got blood on my hands, wet, still warm and sticky. Fear pulses in my gut. I cast a glance around, see nothing but shadows and the alley walls. I creep slowly toward the main street, listening, watching.
The Black Room: Door Six Page 5
