He turned back in time to see it was Leith drawing his mount to a walk as he neared. Knowing who had come failed to make Adair feel at ease without his weapons. Until he discovered why Leith was here, he braced himself, needing to be prepared for any outcome.
Leith halted his dark horse at one corner of the cottage remains, and crossing his wrists, he leaned on his saddle’s pommel and studied the ashes. His posture made him appear relaxed, but Adair could see the tension along his jaw and the strain on the leathers where the stirrups supported his feet.
‘Fire can be a gift or a curse.’ Leith’s voice sounded flat, void of emotion. ‘The flames can be used to preserve life.’ His gaze travelled from the ashes to Adair. ‘Or they can be used as a weapon and take it away.’
Adair’s suspicions had been correct. Leith was the one who’d commanded the fires in Mortlach. ‘The only thing Graham, the MacTiers and Euan were guilty of was showing kindness to Keila.’ He clenched his hands to stem the shaking. ‘And Rory? What did he do to earn your wrath?’
‘Rory? The old fool did nothing.’ Leith straightened in his saddle. ‘But you …’ His impassive expression altered as his lips pulled back, baring his teeth. ‘I have spent my whole life trying to gain my father’s name, doing anything, following in his footsteps, using fire to have him notice me, and you,’ he said, stabbing the air in Adair’s direction with his finger, ‘come to the Highlands and destroy everything I have worked for. You with your charm and strength and looking so much like him, everything my father wanted in a son.’ Leith drew his sword and Adair balanced his weight evenly over both feet. ‘I am the one who is owed,’ he roared. ‘I did all the work. I am the one who delivered you to her doorstep. You owe me, brother.’
Adair pushed aside his confusion and his loathing as Leith dug his heels into his horse’s sides and raised his sword in his right hand. His mount reared and lunged forward. Adair waited until the last possible moment before diving and rolling to his right, through the smoking ashes. He gained his feet and turned as Leith sent his mount charging toward him for a second time. Adair grabbed a long and still warm thick metal rod from beside the fire pit, and stepping to one side, aligned it with Leith’s torso in a desperate bid to even the odds.
Iron collided with muscled flesh, jarring the pole from Adair’s hands and toppling Leith from his saddle. Adair whistled for Demon. His mount was by his side in an instant and Adair pulled his sword free from the saddle sheath and turned about in time to find Leith rolling to his feet.
‘What was it you were saying about delivering me to her doorstep?’ Adair buried his anger deep and focused on his opponent’s every move.
‘After all the time I wasted courting Keila, the foolish bitch wouldn’t marry me.’ Adair’s nostrils flared. ‘I cared not who she wed. I just needed her to marry so Drummin House returned to my father. The price I had to pay for him to finally claim me as his son.’ Swords in hand, they circled one another. ‘I saw you at the inn and even a blind man could see you were another of the earl’s bastards. And then you had old Morag smiling when I’ve never seen the hag smile once.’
Adair used his confusion at Leith’s words to discover more. ‘Is making a kitchen maid smile an offence in the Highlands?’
‘Are you daft?’ Leith stopped and palm up, raised his free hand. ‘If you could make Morag smile then you’d likely charm Keila into marrying you.’
Adair slowly shook his head. ‘But you had me beaten so nae one recognised who I was?’
‘Aye, nae one, including Keila would know who you were. Not until you won her over and wed her. You finally understand.’
‘Nae.’ Adair stopped and stood his ground. ‘I don’t understand and I never will.’
One side of Leith’s mouth curled up in a sneer. ‘Just as I will never understand why you sold me out to our father when you should have been thanking me for giving you such a chance.’ Leith’s face reddened with every word. ‘Now you’ll pay for ruining my life and for making me do this.’ One hand sliced the air toward the smouldering ashes.
A guttural roar erupted from the depths of Adair’s soul at Leith’s callous and open admission of setting Rory’s cottage on fire. He swung his sword in a slashing sideways arc and imagined cutting Leith in two. The momentum spun him around and he lost sight of his opponent for an instant, long enough for Leith to deflect the powerful blow and follow through with his own.
As the tip of Leith’s blade sliced open the flesh below Adair’s ribs on his left side, he’d already determined his error. Emotion held no place in a sword fight. Especially one that instinct told him would eventually lead to someone’s death.
Adair ignored the stinging pain at his side and put all his concentration on the man standing before him, now wearing a confident grin. He too could play the game of distraction.
‘Considering your caterans carry out beatings for you, I’m surprised you fight your own sword fights.’ They once again circled about.
‘I am better with a sword than the four of them together.’
The same four men that had attempted to run Keila and Moira down. Rising heat swept through Adair, as if his very blood were boiling and threatening to bubble to surface through his flesh. But his need to survive and safeguard Keila and Moira and his mother aided his fight to calm his inner fire and helped him take back control. There was a darkness, a coldness about Leith that he’d inherited from their father. He needed to be stopped.
‘Overconfidence can get a man killed,’ Adair said in a taunting tone.
‘Yet I am the one who has drawn first blood.’
‘Aye, but I will be the last.’
Swords clashed as they each lunged toward the other, blades crisscrossing and blocking the next fatal blow. Adair’s arms shook as they each pushed back against one another, so close Adair could feel every breath Leith exhaled, only to spring apart to test each other’s blades again, until they locked swords once more and began the cycle again.
Too much time had passed since Adair had last drawn his sword to fight or practice and the lack was telling. His arms were tiring quicker than usual and one side of his linen shirt was now stained red. He needed to end this fight and he needed to end it now.
They went through another round of clash and resist, standing so close Adair saw the sweat beading on Leith’s brow and upper lip.
‘Tiring, brother?’ Leith said through clenched teeth.
Adair ignored Leith’s words, and sensing the moment before they’d spring apart, he shifted his right foot back further behind him to gain him more leverage. They pushed apart, but instead of stumbling back to find his feet and returning again, Adair put every ounce of strength and power into his right leg. He rocked forward and plucked Leith’s dirk from his waistband and drove it deep and low into Leith’s stomach. ‘You’re nae brother of mine.’
Leith grunted in pain and his dark eyes widened in surprise.
‘And this … this is for Rory.’ Adair turned the blade into a vertical position and sliced upward until he reached bone.
Chapter 22
The sun sat at its highest point when Keila left Moira and Janet in the shade beneath the trees by Rory’s graveside. They’d arranged pillows and blankets in the rear of the cart for Janet to sit in secure comfort and after hitching the horses, they’d set out midmorning for the short journey to bend in the river. While she’d spent the past night weeping into Adair’s shirt over Rory’s death and then sleeping in his arms, the two older women had shared their stories about Rory and had laughed and cried together until close to dawn.
Such a shame to discover how well they got along after living so close by to one another, yet never having spoken. And Janet would be leaving to travel to Braemar the next day and then on to the Borders.
So far away.
Keila raised her hand to shield her eyes from the sun as she gazed in the direction of Rory’s cottage, but still saw no sign of Adair. How much longer was he going to be? Had he found anything of wor
th to give to his mother, or had the flames claimed everything?
She’d thought of little else but his leaving since he’d left early this morning. She’d give anything to have him stay. But she couldn’t put the question to him when he wasn’t here. She lowered her hand as she approached the stable. She understood that he had many people in the Borders he cared for, but couldn’t he return to them to let them know his plans and then return to her? They could prepare the goods for market together and travel to and from Mortlach, as well as further towns if they chose to. Keila knew Moira had softened toward Adair and she and Janet had become fast friends. And Adair had said he loved her, half a breath before she’d seen the smoke from the fire.
They’d left the stable’s double doors open when they’d driven the cart out and Keila halted at the entrance to look again for Adair’s return. The sight of him riding toward her set her heart to thudding. The riderless horse Adair led alongside his mount, Leith’s horse, made her catch her breath and she clutched the stable door.
He drew closer and she could see his fair hair was wet, the shoulder-length strands pulled back into a half knot and tied. The linen shirt he wore was open at the neck where he hadn’t tightened the strings. Her gaze lit on the dark stain on his left side. Her heart clenched and her feet hurried her toward him.
They met at the corner of Drummin House and before he’d dismounted she confirmed to herself the stain was blood. Adair’s blood. A fist closed about her heart.
‘You’re hurt.’ The words slipped out sounding like a rushed breath, instead of the firm statement she’d meant them to be.
‘’Tis only a scratch,’ Adair said, slowly stepping to the ground. He released Demon’s reins and his breath. ‘Is all well here?’ He led the other horse to the stable door and tied the leathers about the wooden handle.
‘Aye.’ She wasn’t surprised he was more concerned for them than for himself. ‘Come inside. I’ll see to your wound and you can tell me what happened.’
The smell of the fresh bread she’d baked this morning greeted them as they entered the warmth of the kitchen, giving her a false feeling of normality.
‘Here, sit, while I fetch my healing satchel.’ She pushed a stool toward him and guided him down as if he couldn’t manage to do so on his own. Keila marched through to the healing room to get her satchel and quickly returned. ‘Help me remove your shirt.’
‘Ah, Keila, ’tis only noon.’ She heard the teasing note in his voice, but his smile was forced and was gone by the time he’d pulled his shirt over his head. ‘Where are my mother and Moira and where is your cart?’
Despite being injured, he noticed so many things. ‘Your mother and Moira are fine,’ she said fetching cloths and a bowl of water and setting them on the trestle. ‘They’ve gone to sit by the river to get some air.’ She recalled Janet’s pale, lucent skin as she leaned in to appraise his wound. ‘I believe it has been quite some time since Janet has gone outside. She needed the cart to get there.’
‘But how did she get to the cart?’
‘Moira and I carried her,’ she said. ‘I do remember you saying I was stronger than I looked.’ The teasing note in her voice failed to erase his frown. She gently pushed and prodded his skin. ‘The wound is deep.’ She stemmed the new flow of blood with a cloth.
‘It likely looks worse than it is.’
‘It needs cleaning and stitching.’ She swallowed and looked him in the eye. ‘You’ve been cut with a sharp blade.’
His large warm fingers grasped her hand. ‘Leith is dead.’
She stared into blue eyes that shone with neither pleasure nor regret, just truth. Despite hearing the words, it was difficult to believe she’d never see Leith again. Keila had never been fond of Leith, but she also never wished harm on anyone. She gave a single nod and leaned in to give her attention to his injury. ‘What happened?’
‘Leith arrived at the cottage soon after I did.’ His voice rang deep and washed over her as she cleansed his wound. ‘He confessed to being the cause of all your troubles of late.’ She paused at the first stitch to think of the hurt he’d caused her friends by burning their homes, and the danger he’d put herself and Moira in. ‘And of mine.’
She glanced up. ‘Yours. How so?’ She commenced stitching his wound closed.
‘Leith saw me at Mortlach’s inn and noted my resemblance to the earl, Alexander Stewart. He had me beaten and delivered to your door, believing I’d charm you into marrying me, thereby gaining his father Drummin House and his own greatest desire to be claimed as the earl’s son.’
Keila slowly straightened and stared at Adair. She’d told him she’d never wed, and respecting her vow, he’d never asked. Despite his feelings for her. Her lashes fell, hiding her eyes as she resumed her stitching.
‘The day I visited my father at Lochindorb, Leith was there before me. I suspected he was involved with your recent ill fortune, but didn’t know precisely how.’ He drew a long breath and she waited to complete the next stitch until he continued his tale. ‘The earl is old and unwell and though my visit with him was short, he wasn’t someone I’d be proud to call my father, more so after hearing my mother speak of him.’
Keila tied off the final stitch and carefully smeared her salve over the wound before straightening. She took his hand in hers and squeezed and settled on the edge of the stool behind her.
‘The earl lost much of his lands and property when Lady Ross’s divorce was granted years before and he’d long fixed his sights on having Drummin House returned to him. Not that he needed it or planned to stay here. Sheer greed and wounded pride drove him. He believes having it back will return to him a sense of power he’d lost when his wife obtained it for you in the beginning. He was leaving to head south the day after I spoke with him and I told him I would marry you on one condition. Leith was to keep his distance and have nae more to do with you and yours.’
Keila’s heart thudded within her chest. She stared at Adair, torn between gratitude for him protecting her and frustration that he hadn’t taken her vow not to wed seriously.
‘It seems the earl did warn Leith away, but he also must have refused to claim him as his son. And it was Rory who suffered his wrath.’
Dear God, Rory. ‘So many have suffered because of me.’
Adair took her fisted hand in his. ‘None of this is your doing, Keila. Leith would stop at nothing to gain his father’s name, but he failed in the end. I buried his body beneath the ruins of Rory’s cottage.’
Keila nodded, and stared at the scar beside Adair’s eye and the newly sewn stitches in his side. This man had done so much for her, but she couldn’t marry him and give up her home. But she didn’t want him to leave.
‘I am grateful for everything you have done for me, Adair, and am sorry for all that has happened to you.’ She reversed their hands and held his. ‘But I cannot marry you. I thought you under—’
‘I do understand and only told the earl I would wed you so he would carry through with his plans to journey south and warn Leith away.’ Adair stood, reached for his shirt and she lost sight of his expression. ‘My thanks for your care,’ he said indicating his side. ‘I will be taking my mother with me when I leave tomorrow, but I would ask you another favour this day.’
‘Anything,’ Keila said and stood, wondering why his swift agreement to honour her vow should be upsetting.
‘There is one last thing I must do before leaving and I would ask you to watch over my mother until I return the morn?’
‘Of course.’ She wanted to ask where he was going but said instead, ‘Here, you’ve not eaten. Take these with you.’ She wrapped a loaf and a quarter round of cheese in a cloth and offered it to him.
‘I will return as soon as I can.’
‘You’re going right now?’
‘The sooner I go, the sooner I will return and set out for Braemar.’
‘Must you go?’
A line of confusion showed between his brows.
‘Though I
cannot marry, you and Janet are welcome to stay and live with Moira and I.’ His frown disappeared. ‘Can you not return to the Borders and tell them about us and then come back?’
Adair stepped closer and cupping her head in his hands, tilted her face up to his. ‘I love you, Keila. I want all of you.’ His thumbs caressed her cheeks. ‘I do not want you as my mistress, I want you for my wife.’ He lowered his head and gently pressed his mouth against hers, sending tingling shivers all through her body. ‘I want you to bear me many sons and many daughters, but knowing the uncertainty and hurt at being a bastard, I refuse to sire any of my own.’ He kissed her again and when he lifted his head, he looked into her eyes. ‘I do understand and admire your vow to never marry to keep your home. But I cannot remain here so close to you and not have all of you.’
Keila’s heart raced and burned within her chest. This man loved her but couldn’t stay.
Adair stepped back and dropped his hands. ‘I must go.’ He donned the bloodstained garment and headed for the door. ‘My thanks again for your care and for watching over my mother.’ His gaze lingered on her face as he spoke. ‘I will return tomorrow.’
Keila stood mute and watched him retrieve the reins of the second horse. He mounted Demon and turned to look back at her. Keila lifted her hand in farewell as he rode away into the afternoon’s sunlight and her fingers folded into her palm.
When he’d disappeared from sight, she sank against the doorway knowing he’d taken her heart with him, yet her chest still hurt at the thought of losing him. But she needed to be strong and go on. People left, people died, people moved on. People like her mother and father and Lady Ross. People like her father’s kin. People like Rory. She looked to where Moira and Janet remained beneath the trees. People like Adair.
The Rogue Page 25
