Highland Chieftain

by Hannah Howell

  Callum suddenly strode into the room and the look on his face told Bethoc something had gone wrong. She was a little jealous when Brenda hurried over to him. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed and was about to stand up when Callum strode over to her and sat down beside her. He bent his head and rubbed his hands over his face. Bethoc looked at Brenda, who was looking very sad, and the woman just shook her head and left.

  “What is wrong, Callum?” she asked, and gently rubbed his arm.

  “Cathan’s mother is dead.”

  She gasped. Although she had only met with the woman a few times, and thought her a bit silly, she had seen no taint of illness. Smelled no taint at all. Now she felt bad for thinking the woman a bit dim-witted but sweet. And then there was Cathan. He had just been in with the other boys to visit her and had been so happy. She felt so very bad for the boy.

  Callum looked at her, his eyes dark with sadness. “None of us kenned it but she was in touch with this mon she kenned for a verra brief while after her husband was killed. He sent a message and arranged to meet with her. She slipped into the village to see him, they argued, and he beat her to death. I am nay sure we can clean her up enough to allow Cathan to see her. She was so broken up.”

  Bethoc rubbed his back. “Why? Why would she go to him secretly? She said once she left him because of what he was, was afraid of him.”

  “She said that to ye?”

  “Aye. She was missing him and wondered out loud why she should be and then it came out.” She sighed. “I should have told ye. Ye would have been able to keep a closer watch.”

  “Nay. Ye are nay at fault in even the smallest of ways. That was a confidence between lassies and ye just kept it to yourself as ye have always done, I suspicion. But it wouldnae have helped. If she was that eager to see the fool she would have slipped away somehow. We could ne’er get her to cease thinking she needed a husband, needed a father for her boy.”

  “She was saving him. Nay only from the ones who killed his da, either.”

  “Aye, and we thought we had gotten her to believe it, but I think now that she simply stopped saying it. She was surprisingly stealthy about the notes and going to see him.”

  “Did ye get him?”

  “Oh, aye. Aye, and I was enraged. I doubt she gave him any fight at all so he was doing naught but beating on a helpless weeping woman. It angered me so much. Simon finally yanked me off the mon and I realized he was dead, didnae look much better than poor, wee Sarah.” He turned and pulled her into his arms. “I warned ye. It was the rage.”

  “Did ye hit Simon when he pulled ye off?”

  “Nay!” He pulled back enough to frown. “Why would I hurt him?”

  “And there is the answer to your worry. Aye, ye go into a rage when ye see a child or a woman abused, and ye may need to get a rein on that, but ye are nay senseless with it for all it might seem so. Nay a danger to everyone around ye. Ye visit that rage on the one who earned it.”

  Callum frowned and thought about what he said. He had known it was Simon who grabbed him, knew without looking that it was his friend. As he had stood there panting, his bloodied fists still held in front of him, he had never once thought of striking Simon. Then regret swamped him. He had looked down at the mess he had made of the man and had been sickened by it.

  “How can I tell Cathan I killed the mon? He seemed to like Donal. Talked of him now and then.”

  “Why do ye need to? Has he asked?”

  “Aye. He worried the mon would come for him and I said he cannae because he is dead.”

  “And he didnae ask why, did he.”

  “Nay, but he might yet. He is still too upset o’er his mother.”

  “Then dinnae say it at all. Just say the mon was killed the same way he killed Sarah.”

  “Ah, that might work although it feels like a lie.” He breathed a little easier for he had not wished the boy to learn of how, mad with rage, he had broken the man into pieces.

  “Weel, mayhap a wee bit, but we both ken that, if the boy asks ye directly, ye will tell him the truth.”

  “Aye, ’tis true. I will.”

  Callum gently hugged her and rested his chin on top of her head. Her words were not just sympathy; they made sense. He worried for a moment that he believed that only because he needed to, then decided that was not it. She made sense and he simply could not ignore that. His rage was not a blind one, but it did need to be controlled. He could not just beat to death every man who raised his hand against a woman or a child, and not just because some of them were very high born and it would only get him hanged. It made him judge, jury, and executioner.

  He needed to speak with Payton, he decided. It was time that Bethoc had a good talk with a Murray. She had met Brett but they had not realized she had one of those strange gifts that ran rampant in the family. Now that he was aware of it, he believed she needed to talk to someone who had knowledge of such things. Bethoc handled it well but he thought it might be because she had thought everyone could do as she did. She had certainly blurted it out to him and Uven as if they would know exactly what she was talking about. If nothing else, she needed to understand the need to be secretive.

  “We are going to visit Payton and Kirstie” he announced, and kissed her.

  His kiss clouded her mind as it did too often and it took Bethoc a minute to grasp the import of what he had just said. “Why?”

  “I need to talk with him and I think ye should as weel.”

  “Because I can smell a taint in people?”

  “Aye. ’Tis a gift, lass.”

  “Kerr said it was witchery.”

  “Weel, many think so, but ’tis just like sight and hearing. Ye just have an added sense.”

  “That doesnae sound quite so bad.”

  “It isnae bad, love. ’Tis rather wondrous. Ye can tell who should nay be trusted, who should be avoided. Ye have an added weapon, an added defense against any threat.”

  Bethoc thought that sounded nice but was not sure. She had never thought what she could do was special but had never spoken of it because of Kerr’s horrified reaction. At times she had thought it was a reaction born of jealousy because he was lacking in the ability many others must surely have. The way she had spoken of it to Callum and Uven, however, told her she might be in need of some advice on how to hide it. It would also be nice to know there were others out there who understood, who struggled with their own “gift.”

  “So when do we go?” she asked, resting against Callum’s chest.

  “I am nay sure. I must write him first to be sure he isnae traveling and that ’tis a good time to visit. Ye can bring Margaret.”

  “Oh, good. I was just trying to think of how to explain it all to her and nay looking forward to it.”

  He kissed her again, hungry for her but knowing it was too soon. “We will be gone at least a week, mayhap more for we will stop at your home since we ride right past it. Then, the time we spend at Payton’s depends on a great many things.” He stood up. “But now I must tend to the burial of poor Cathan’s mother.”

  “Help me dress, please. I need to be with him when ye do.”

  Callum only hesitated a moment before helping her out of bed. He watched as she collected her clothes. It was going to be a true test of his willpower to help her dress. He wanted her but Brenda had warned him that her wound needed time to do more than just close.

  To his relief, she did much of her dressing by herself and did it in a way that tempted him with few sights of bare skin. He realized living with Kerr and so many boys had probably taught her such skills. He helped with laces and then helped her don her shoes so that she did not need to bend down. Then, despite her protests, he brushed her hair out and neatly braided it.

  “How did ye learn to do that?” Bethoc asked with a hint of suspicion as she patted the braid and looked at him over her shoulder.

  “Horses’ tails,” he replied, and grinned.

  “Wretch.” She stood up and brushed down her ski
rts. “Let us go get the sad deed done. I pray poor Cathan’s heart is nay too broken.”

  Taking her by the arm, he led her out of the room. “I cannae say whether the lad is heartbroken though I suspicion he is, but I cannae believe it will last all that long. She was a sweet woman but nay so good as a mother. She was too caught up in her own sadness and wee Cathan looks a lot like his da.”

  “Yet she ran off to meet another mon?”

  “I do wonder if she was one of those women who doesnae feel, weel, whole, unless she has a mon.”

  “Ye say it is his relatives trying to get his inheritance, so do ye think this mon was all part of that?”

  “’Tis a possibility. Without her about they may think it will be easier to get the boy. I dinnae ken exactly who the mon was to her but she was ripe for seduction. Verra easily swayed. And the mon had the look of her husband. Good bait, I am thinking.”

  She shook her head. “I hate to speak ill of the dead, but she was, mayhap, a bit foolish.”

  “Oh, aye, and filled with romantic fancies. I now think she was sneaking out to see him for a while. So excitingly dangerous but, she assumed, the penalty would only be embarrassment. If she thought at all. ’Tis nay as if she was unaware of the danger. ’Tis why she came here, brought Cathan here.”

  “I am nay sure we can e’er ken what she was thinking.”

  “Nay,” he agreed. “Ye and I would ne’er have done it. Now the poor lad is an orphan.”

  “Does that put him in more danger?” Bethoc asked, worried about the child.

  “Aye, I think it might, but then I wonder if this trick means it willnae be a direct threat. He may have been trying to get her to bring Cathan out when she came to him and that was what the argument was about. This implies they willnae act openly against me. Cathan willnae leave here either. So he should be safe.”

  “He willnae be able to be given to any family, will he?” She felt sad that Cathan would not be able to have a family of his own.

  “Nay. It would be too dangerous. I have someone watching that cursed family of her husband’s but he clearly missed this plot.”

  They arrived at the small graveyard just beyond the walls of the manor. Two guards stood near Cathan but so did all her boys. Liam stood the closest, his arm around young Cathan’s shoulders. Cathan had only been with them a short time but it was clear they considered him one of them.

  “I do think I may be right and he willnae stay heartbroken for long,” whispered Callum as they moved closer. “He is not alone.”

  “Nay, he isnae.” Bethoc stepped next to the boy and Cathan clutched her around the legs and buried his face in her skirts. She stroked his head as Callum began the service for the poor woman. “She is with the angels now, Cathan,” said Bethoc.

  “Will the angels make her happy?” he asked.

  “Oh, aye. Angels are verra good with that.”

  “Good. She hasnae been happy since my da died.”

  Bethoc thought about that and then smothered a sigh. The woman had had a bright, handsome little boy, a son to be proud of. Clearly that had not been enough. The woman had been ripe for a sly seduction. Her enemies had probably searched for some fool who had looked a lot like her husband. A few meetings, a few love notes, and she was his. She did wonder if he had been ordered to kill her or if there had been some argument. Perhaps Callum was right and her lover had asked Sarah to bring the boy but she had retained enough sense not to do that and it had cost Sarah her life.

  Then she decided the way did not matter as much as the result. Sarah had been killed and it made it easier, or so their enemy thought, to get to the boy. She put her arm around him and held him close as the priest spoke over the woman’s coffin. The enemy was wrong. Cathan was not alone.

  She led him over to the grave when the priest signaled and gently led him through the ritual of tossing dirt and a flower in the grave. He looked so small and lost Bethoc had to swallow hard to keep back the tears. Then, as the service trailed to an end, she saw Margaret march up to stand next to Cathan and take his hand in hers. She went up on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. Then she stood close to him and pressed her cheek against his arm. Bethoc silently cursed when she felt the sting of tears again and then realized Liam was now standing on her other side. She turned to look at him.

  “Lass has a way of kenning what is needed,” Liam said.

  “Aye. Aye, she does,” Bethoc said as she fought down her urge to cry.

  Callum stepped up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. “She is a clever, fierce, demanding wee angel with a verra big heart,” he whispered in her ear. “Now we need to get ye back to bed.”

  Bethoc turned to Cathan and carefully crouched down in front of him. There were tears but he was not sobbing. As she looked at his face, something there told her he was fully aware that his mother was gone and would never return. She brushed his curls back from his face and kissed his forehead.

  “Ye ken ye will always have a place with me, Margaret, and the lads, aye?”

  “Aye.”

  Nodding, she let Callum help her up and they started back to the house. As they drew near the gates she heard the sound of horses approaching and felt Callum tense. She turned with him but he nudged her until she stood behind him. Facing him were four rough men. They did not have their swords drawn but they did not look as if they were friendly, either.

  “We have come for the laddie,” said one of the men.

  “What laddie? I have quite a few running about.”

  “Oh, I think ye ken weel which laddie. Cathan. His kin want him back.”

  “They have made that clear. E’en killed the poor lad’s mother but she had already given me the rights o’er the care of her child.”

  “Sarah is dead?”

  “Aye, we just had the burial.”

  “Weel, she had no right to give over the right to the boy.”

  “Nay? She was the lad’s mother. The mon who has paid ye killed the lad’s father. Now he has hired some fool who beat her to death. So what do ye plan to do?”

  “We have been paid naught,” the man snapped. “We are just here to collect the boy and take him home.”

  “Ye do ken the one after the boy has already let five of his hirelings die. Then sent the last on a hunt he kenned he would lose, and he did. So, six dead and the one who actually benefits from all this deadly nonsense has yet to reveal himself. Ye, I think, are working for a coward.”

  “We are nay working for anyone.”

  The man just stared at Callum for a moment then exchanged long looks with each of the other men riding with him. Callum waited patiently, knowing they were considering all he had said. He just had to hope these men were smarter than the last ones. He needed this hunt ended.

  Something made him suspect the man was telling the truth, that these were not hirelings, might even be men from Cathan’s own clan. “If one pauses to think, killing isnae needed,” he said. “There is a good fourteen years ere the boy would be ready to lay claim to anything.”

  “Ye keep talking of killing,” the man began.

  “And why shouldnae I? I just buried the child’s mother. Since I got the boy there have been several attempts to kill me. His father was murdered.”

  “Nay, he wasnae.” The man shook his head and Callum began to be certain he was actually speaking to relations of Cathan’s father. “Weel, aye, he was, but t’was by her. And I figure she must have had help. Mayhap the mon who just killed her.”

  “Weel met, Cousin Duncan.”

  Callum quickly grasped hold of Cathan’s hand as the boy stepped close to his kinsmen. He was beginning to question what he had been told and his own assumptions concerning Cathan’s kinsmen but he was not ready to trust any one of them near the boy. It was interesting to see that Cathan had no fear at all of the man he called Cousin Duncan.

  “Weel met, Cathan, me lad. I have come to take ye back to your uncle Wallace.”

  Cathan shuddered then vigorously shook
his head and kept shaking it as he climbed up Callum’s body. “Nay! Callum said he would keep me here. Aye, ye did. I cannae go back there. I dinnae want to die like my da!”

  “What do ye mean, Cathan?” Callum asked as the boy buried his face in his neck.

  “Uncle Wallace came to see Da and they were fighting then he hit him and hit him and hit him.” Cathan started crying. “He kicked him too. A lot. So did the other men.”

  “Where were ye, love?” asked Bethoc as she stepped closer to rub the boy on the back.

  “Hiding in a wee hidey-hole, Maman called it, over near the fireplace. I left Tippy there.”

  “Tippy?”

  “My toy. It was supposed to be a dog. It was my favorite toy too, because Maman made it for me. But the men looked for us so we had to stay hiding then we ran and ran until we came here. Maman said we would be safe here but she died because she left. Aye?”

  “I fear so, love. But ye willnae do that, will ye?” Cathan vigorously shook his head.

  “What did those other men look like, Cathan?” asked Duncan.

  Callum looked at the man and almost smiled. He, as well as his companions, looked coldly furious. These were definitely kinsmen and ones who kenned nothing about what the current laird had done or had planned to do. He was certain they intended to deal with it and he wished them luck.

  “If ye would be so kind as to tell your men to nay skewer me the moment I step down, I would like to have a word or two with the lad,” said Duncan, but his attempt to keep his voice pleasant was not good, the hard tone of his anger leaching into it.

  “Nay too far from us,” Callum said as he signaled his men, who then let the man dismount but disarmed him.

  “Agreed.”

  “Are ye certain?” asked Bethoc quietly as she watched the man walk Cathan a few feet away before crouching in front of him to talk.

  “Aye. These men are his kin and they didnae ken the truth. They didnae like it either. I suspicion he is trying to get more information, such as what the other men looked like. I will ken what was said soon enough.”