The Highland Outlaw

by Heather McCollum

  Shaw let his gaze roam the generous curves of her body, which were quite evident in the tight-fitting clothing. The ring on her finger indicated that she was likely wed or promised, but the only evidence of a birth was the fullness of her breasts. He nodded toward them. “Yer…yer bosom is full.”

  The twilight was making it harder to see, hiding the green he’d studied earlier in her large, dark-lashed eyes. But he’d have been blind to miss the surprise in her face. She didn’t say anything. “So ye have no bairn and are not currently producing milk?” he asked just to make sure.

  “Is this something you ask every woman you encounter?” Wide eyes with pinched brows gave her a shocked look.

  “Presently? Aye.”

  “Good God,” she cursed. “You do not go around asking a woman if she has just had a babe unless you see her nursing one. That is like asking a lady if she is with child, which you do not do unless she is writhing on the ground screaming ‘I am having a babe’,” she yelled, her hands gesturing wildly. “You will get yourself punched or stabbed.” She ended her lecture by crossing arms over her lovely, full bosom.

  He frowned and glanced away, but there was no one else to see. “Do ye know of any wet nurses at the festival?” he asked, looking back at her. “Or nursing mothers?” She looked astonished and shook her head again. Speechless.

  He exhaled in a huff. “Happy Samhain,” he said and turned.

  …

  Alana stared after the retreating form of Shaw Sinclair and untangled her arms, letting her hands slide down to her stomach. Was it more rounded than usual? Had he seen it sticking out in the trousers but didn’t want to offend, so he said it was her breasts that looked full? It was true that she had an ample bosom, but no one had ever mentioned it to her before. She’d been eating a lot of Evelyn’s tarts back at school. The honey apple ones should be a constant offering up in Heaven. She had no resistance against their sweet aroma.

  “Blast it,” she grumbled and ducked back into the tent to step into her regular skirts and stays. She cinched her stays a bit tighter, glad to have the laces in the front, so she could tie them herself. She left the wool trousers on underneath to keep warm in the lowering temperatures and made sure she could still access the sgian dubh sheathed in a leather pocket sewn into her boot.

  Robert trotted back to her when she emerged, his leash wet and frayed from where he’d chewed through it. She frowned, shaking her head. “Are you trying to be in charge?” If she exiled him now, he’d have no idea why since he’d misbehaved earlier before Shaw had shown up. Instead she hugged him, inhaling the smell of fresh grass on his fur.

  “Let us find the others,” she said. The dog kept pace easily as Alana hurried between the forest of tents to meet the Highland Roses and Kerrick at the bonfire in the center of the meadow. Darkness was descending rapidly, and the music had begun. Each Highland Rose wore a rose hair spike in her hair, and some of the ladies wore their training trousers, so Alana easily picked them out despite the masks that they’d made to cover all but their eyes and mouths.

  “What happened to your trousers?” Kirstin said as Alana stepped up, her words snapping like an accusation.

  “I was…cold,” Alana said, and lifted the edge of her petticoat to show that she still wore them. “The petticoat is another layer to keep me warm.” Izzy ran over, wearing a mask painted with the white face of a skull. She held her arms out, palms up as if asking why.

  “When out with people, ye should all be in skirts,” Kerrick said, making Alana regret her change. The blasted man never wanted them to wear their training trousers where others could see. He didn’t seem to mind when they were practicing their self-defense moves inside the classroom at the school.

  “With the bonfire, ye will be plenty warm,” Kirstin said, frowning.

  “I am putting on my petticoat, too,” Martha said, grabbing Cici’s arm. “Come with me.”

  “I have been feeling a bit…exposed here,” Cici whispered. “People keep looking at me.”

  “Since when do ye worry about people looking at ye?” Kirstin asked but turned to follow them back toward the tents, Izzy running with them. Only Kerrick and Lucy, who hadn’t worn the training trousers, remained.

  Kerrick held Lucy’s arm. “Makes my job easier to protect ye all when ye are wearing more clothes,” he said.

  “Your job of protecting us?” Alana asked, her brows high as she blinked in wry amusement. “Because you know that we are all armed. Even Lucy here.” She nodded to Lucy’s head where she could see the steel hair spike, its point as deadly as an awl.

  “That is correct,” Lucy said, her accent light and reprimanding. “We Roses are quite lethal on our own, and the skirts often get in the way.” Lucy slid her hand from Kerrick’s arm and frowned as she lifted the edge of her petticoat to show that she wore them, too.

  Kerrick looked like he was going to apologize, anything to get in Lucy’s good thoughts again, but an elderly man hobbled over, using a gnarled tree branch for a cane.

  “Ye be Campbells here?” he asked, flipping his rough-cut mask up onto his balding head. He squinted in the splashes of firelight, studying their faces.

  The wind shifted, and the smoke billowed toward them. “Aye,” Kerrick said and coughed into his fist.

  “From Finlarig in Killin?” the man asked.

  “Aye,” Kerrick answered, trying to edge them out of the path of the woodsmoke.

  The man bobbed his head. “I was in Edinburgh just a fortnight ago. There are still some covenanter prisoners there, kept and forgotten. Met a lady. She said she was a Campbell from Finlarig Castle in Killin, said her husband was killed and she was taken.”

  Alana yanked her mask from her face, the sting from the smoke in her eyes forgotten. “What was her name?” Alana’s stomach clenched, her heartbeat taking flight as her mouth hung open, waiting for his next words.

  His gaze moved to Alana, and his eyes widened. “Ye look like her,” he mumbled. He rubbed his chin. “Said it was the name of a flower.” He glanced upward as if recalling which flower. “Rose? Nay. Viola…?”

  “Violet,” Alana said, the word breathless.

  “Aye,” he said, nodding. “Violet Campbell from Finlarig.”

  Alana grabbed onto Kerrick’s arm as she felt dizzy, her nails digging in. “My mother.” She held her hand up so that the firelight reflected off the thin silver circlet that ringed her finger, her mother’s wedding ring. “My mother is still alive.” She turned to look into Kerrick’s grim face. “I am going to get her.”

  Kerrick shook his head. “Not alone, ye aren’t. We need to tell your brother, send for troops if she is in prison there.”

  Alana released his arm, turning back to the elderly man. “Exactly where in Edinburgh did ye see her? Was she sick, hurt?”

  He scrubbed his chin. “I was working up at the castle when I saw her working in a garden on the premises, said she had been a prisoner for nearly two years and her family did not know. Told her that if I heard of Campbells from her area, I would let them know she was there.”

  Alana reached forward and squeezed the man’s bony hand. “Was she well?”

  “She was working in the garden, so, aye, she seemed well enough, though…she…”

  “Go on,” Alana said, the dread in her gut hardening into a heavy boulder.

  “Well, the lady I met, she was blind. Was your mother blind before?”

  Alana shook her head, feeling the worry press at the backs of her eyes, making her want to cry. “No, she was not,” she murmured. She met the old man’s gaze. “Thank ye for bringing us news.”

  “The lady is a strong one,” he said, nodding, his mask falling over his eyes so that he had to push it back up. “Working out there with the others without complaint. I don’t think they guard her as much, seeing as she lost her sight. She gave me a few potatoes meant for the commanders’ suppers. A true lady, your mother.”

  “She is,” Alana said, remembering the strong convictions her
mother always held, one of them being that no one should go hungry. She reached into her pocket where she kept a few coins and pressed a shiny shilling into the old man’s palm. “Thank you, kind sir. The Campbells of Finlarig Castle are indebted to you.” He nodded and used his staff to hobble off.

  Alana turned back to Kerrick. “We must go get her now. Leave tonight.”

  He was already shaking his head. Blast the man. I should kick him.

  “I will send word to Grey,” he said. “He will gather Campbell troops to ride to Edinburgh.”

  “Grey is in England. It will take weeks to reach him, and more weeks to wait for his return with troops. Send all the words you want, but we should go now.”

  “Lady Campbell is locked up in Edinburgh Castle, Alana,” Kerrick said. Lucy stood beside him, her fingers flat against her mouth over wide eyes as she listened. “We need troops or at least the chief to petition for her release,” he said.

  “I will petition in his absence as the chief’s sister and daughter of the captive,” Alana replied. “And if the petition is refused, we go in quietly and sneak her out, a group of women perhaps, an unexpected army of warriors.”

  Alana glanced at Lucy, but the woman just stood without comment, although she looked frightened. She’d only been a Rose for six months. No doubt this mission sounded dangerous to her.

  Kerrick scratched at his scalp as if Alana’s words were bringing on hives. “Let us think on it tonight, Alana, and form a plan tomorrow. But I will send word to Finlarig and then on to Hollings Estate where Grey is right now.”

  Alana grabbed Kerrick’s arm. “She is family, Kerrick. Grey would agree that we must risk all for family.”

  Kerrick met her gaze with serious eyes. “We have a new family that we need to also protect.” He glanced toward Lucy and then nodded to the other Roses who were hurrying back toward the fires, now clothed in heavy, burdensome skirts.

  “Violet Campbell is family by blood, Kerrick,” Alana said, her words spoken through stacked teeth.

  “Aye,” he answered. “But does that make her more important than the lives of your students?”

  “Violet Campbell is family,” Alana emphasized.

  “The Roses are family, too.”

  Damn him. He was asking her to choose between her family by blood and her family of Roses. She gave the man a fierce frown.

  “What has happened?” Kirstin asked, sounding breathless as they came up, her gaze volleying back and forth between her and Kerrick.

  “A man came up who has seen Alana’s mother still alive,” Lucy said. “She is a prisoner in Edinburgh.”

  Alana let Lucy describe everything as her mind raced forward. I will go now. She would not even wait for the Samhain dancing to start. If Kerrick was worried about the Roses, she would just go alone—well, with Robert and her Highland pony, Rainy.

  She watched the old man lean on the thick stick. He worked his way slowly over the tufts of grass to the other side of the fire where someone handed him an ale. Off to the right, a movement far from the circle of firelight caught her gaze. Narrowing her eyes, she studied the large form in the shadows. It was Shaw Sinclair. He stood by himself, and he was…swaying. She could see him dipping low, bending his knees. It wasn’t even to the drumbeats being pounded out to call people to dance.

  “Alana,” Kerrick said, drawing her attention. “We will get your mother back. She has survived this long, and she is a strong woman.”

  “She was a strong woman,” Alana said without looking at him. “We do not know that now. The man said she is blind.”

  “My chief commanded me to protect the Roses while at this festival. Letting ye all go to Edinburgh to storm the castle is definitely not protecting ye.”

  Alana turned to stare at him, breathing in even exchanges while her mind churned with possible plans. But she wasn’t a fool. If she left on her own, how many nights sleeping outside would it take to reach her mother? Three nights? Four perhaps? She glanced upward at the night sky where only a few stars peeked through the growing cloud cover. She’d learned the basics of navigating by the night sky, but not enough to bring them to Edinburgh.

  “Robert is wandering again,” Lucy said, coming next to her. She leaned closer. “And I am sorry about your mother. Well…I mean…I am happy that she is not dead like you thought, but I am sorry she is imprisoned and blind.”

  “Thank you,” Alana said, her gaze scanning the crowd opposite them where her large dog was licking a giggling child who was likely coated in something sweet. Robert would eat whatever he could find. If she was going to ride to Edinburgh, she didn’t need a vomiting dog as a companion. “Excuse me,” she said, heading after him. “Robert,” she called.

  Dodging masked revelers, Alana weaved through to the outside of the circle. Up by the dark tree line she spotted the large Highland warrior again, who was still oddly swaying. “Robert.” She glanced over to see him eating something that a child was feeding him while two young girls helped each other climb onto his broad back. The boy held up his hands to show him it was all gone. Good Lord, don’t let him get a bellyache. “Robert,” she yelled, but he trotted off in the opposite direction after several other children holding soul cakes, the two little girls laughing while clinging to his back.

  Alana rubbed a hand down her face. Could she convince the Highland Roses to travel to Edinburgh with her in the morning? Should she even ask them or just go alone? Lord help her. What should she do?

  She dropped her hand and looked back to the woods. Shaw Sinclair still lowered and straightened in the shadows. Was he…dancing? With one last glance at Robert who was headed back toward the Roses, she gathered her full skirt and trudged toward the Sinclair chief.

  The crisp leaves that had already fallen crunched under her boots. He glanced over his shoulder at her as she neared but did not halt his deep knee-bending. She stopped some ways back, definitely out of snatching range. She had one sgian dubh strapped under her skirt and her rose hair spike holding a small bun on top of her head in case he tried anything villainous. “Are you drunk, or do you just fancy odd dancing?” she called to him.

  Waaa. Hiccup. The sound of a distraught newborn answered for him. Alana rushed forward. “You have a babe?” She dodged around to his front to get a better look. He cradled a wrapped infant on one of his forearms, pressing what looked like a rag to its mouth as it fretted, twisting its face away. “What are you doing to it?” She tried to take the baby from his arms, but he turned away, so she couldn’t reach it.

  “Feeding it,” he said, dipping low again and straightening, although his jostling of the tiny thing wasn’t helping in any way. “Rather, I am trying to feed it. She will not take the milk.”

  She? It was a girl. “This is why you need a wet nurse,” she whispered. She grabbed his arm to stop him, so she could peer down at the pinched features of the hungry child. “Where is her mother?” Alana’s fingers curled into the sleeve of Shaw’s shirt as the poor thing cried against the dripping cloth that Shaw dipped to her lips.

  “Far away.”

  “Far away? Did you steal her?”

  Shaw cut a glare at her. “Do I look like a man who would willingly spend the night trying to woo a wee bairn into staying alive by drinking this damn milk?”

  “Not without good reason,” she said, touching the rag. “It is cold.”

  “Aye, now it is. It was deliciously warm when it came from the cow.”

  “And she does not have a wet nurse?” Alana stared up into Shaw’s pinched face. There was a story here, but she doubted he would tell her since he wouldn’t even let her touch the child.

  “The wet nurse died on her way to Scotland. The bairn arrived just this morning, hungry and filthy.”

  Alana gasped softly. “She will die if she is not properly cared for.”

  Shaw’s gaze snapped to Alana, and she took a slight step backward from such intensity. “Ye know how to care for bairns.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Well,
I know not to force a dirty, cold rag into one’s mouth.”

  He huffed, his one hand shooting out in frustration to throw the rag away into the dark woods. “How do I feed it then?”

  “Come,” Alana said, tugging his sleeve. “Bring her to my tent. I can make a warm pap of milk and bread. It will stop her belly from pinching, so she can drink more.”

  “Is Robert there?” he asked.

  She glanced over her shoulder at the giant man who frowned on the fringe of woods. “Robert is out being ridden by some generous lasses.”

  Shaw choked, coughing, which made the baby cry more at being jiggled. “Your husband is being ridden by generous lasses?”

  “Husband? No. My hound, the one you said I should exile for misbehaving.” She shook her head and tugged him down the slope into the meadow, though they stuck to the edge away from people. Her helping a baby in the arms of a Sinclair was sure to cause Kirstin and Kerrick to spout lectures all night long.

  “Your dog’s name is Robert?” Shaw asked.

  “Yes, for the French explorer, Robert de La Salle.”

  His long strides brought him up even with her in the deepening darkness. On the edge of the woods, the firelight didn’t reach them. “I am Shaw Sinclair. What is your name?”

  “Alana,” she said. “Alana Campbell.” Would her family name make him slice her through? Surely not with an infant against his chest.

  “Alana,” he repeated, and a slight shiver ran through her at the sound of her name sliding upon his tongue. His accent was northern, and his dialect tumbled around the syllables in her name like the burbling of water over rocks. The ridiculous heat she’d felt before threatened to rise again within her. She wrapped her shawl tighter around her shoulders as if warding it off. “Ye are not wed then?” He repositioned the baby against his shoulder and threw a short blanket over her. To hide the baby or keep her warm? Probably both.

  “Not wed,” Alana said and felt him grasp her cool fingers, raising her hand so that the distant firelight caught on the silver of her mother’s wedding ring.