Highland Steel (Guardians of the Stone Book 2)

by Crosby, Tanya Anne

  Aidan would never have allowed Keane to put himself at risk that way, especially were he so ignorant or unequipped. Look how hard he’d fought to keep Lael from the battle, and she was far more adept with her blades than Aidan had ever been. But then again, neither did he spend every minute of every day practicing as she had. As leader of their clan he could not afford to harbor vengeance, so Lael had always understood that retribution must be hers.

  She didn’t know what else to say to Broc, so she said naught more.

  She’d dug a small pit before she realized how deep in thought she’d lost herself, and she hoped her silence didn’t condemn her friend. If she could find a way to make him feel better, she must—despite that she had trouble believing her own words. “I am certain the rest of the men fared better than we did, Broc.”

  Broc nodded, and she persisted. “I must believe they survived the night.”

  She eyed the guards—one half asleep and the other staring stupidly at a drip in the ceiling above his head. She wondered idly why he didn’t move, and then dismissed him and continued digging, every so oft peering over at the pine marten, wondering how best to move the animal into the hole once her little grave was done. She certainly didn’t intend to touch the gruesome creature, no matter how badly she wanted not to see it—or smell it—any longer.

  Eyeing the guards once more, she began to hurry, because it also occurred to her that as soon as the guards spied her they would put a stop to her digging in order to prevent her from tunneling beneath the cell. In truth if she could manage it, and if they didn’t spy her before then, if the other fell asleep as well… perhaps she might find a way to dig beneath the bars and slip back whence they came through the long tunnels. Certainly it was possible.

  With a furrowed brow, Broc watched her dig her hole, possibly thinking the same thing she was thinking. His gaze shifted warily to the guards, and he spoke in a whisper, lest they overhear him. “Do ye believe it?”

  Lael peered over her shoulder at him, her nerves taut. ““That they survived? Aye, Broc, I do.” And then she grinned—for his sake. “Anyway, your cousin is far too scrawny to be a worthy target. Tis like as not the arrows whizzed past his ears.”

  Broc chuckled quietly. “Aye, though he wadna like to know ye said such a thing. I believe he fancies ye.”

  “Nay, he fancies Cailin. He told me so himself.”

  “Your sister?”

  Lael nodded and dug a little faster, wondering if it might be remotely possible that she could actually dig herself out of her cell. But then her fingers suddenly encountered something solid, buried beneath the muck. Her heart sank, thinking it must be a subfloor, built with the sole purpose of preventing prisoners from escaping—as she would like to have done. She scraped more mud away and brushed her fingers over the edge of what appeared to be a wooden box.

  “What is it?”

  Lael shrugged. She made a fist to rap her knuckles upon the wood. It returned a hollow sound. “I dunno,” she whispered, and her fingers worked deftly to find another corner of the box. In silence she kept moving aside dirt, sliding her fingers around the edges of the wood, exposing a larger and larger section before the guards chanced to spy her.

  Broc remained silent, watching with obvious anticipation. He moved now, repositioning his hulking form to conceal her from the guards’ view, and Lael held her breath as she continued to work, a sense of horror overcoming her… because she was beginning to realize what it was she’d discovered, despite the fact that her kinsmen had only ever buried one woman this way… Her mother. When she was eleven. The memory assailed her, making her lightheaded, though she kept working, clearing away mud.

  A hush permeated the dank tunnel, a hush filled with expectation and dread…

  In Lael’s mind’s eye, she saw her sweet mother’s face behind the lid of the box and she sucked in a breath.

  She began to dig now in earnest, not caring about the clatter she must be making with her effort. A small knothole appeared in the box and she poked her finger through, pushing dirt into the box then she peered down into the hole. Her breath caught over the horrid stench that wafted out—a smell more putrid than even the pine marten’s. She rose to her knees, working feverishly.

  “Lael,” Broc hissed, and the single word was meant to be a warning.

  “Someone’s in there,” she hissed back.

  “Hey!” one of the guards shouted at once. At last noticing the flurry of movement in her cell, the man leapt up from his rickety chair and raced to the cell door, calling out to wake the other guard. “Hey! What the devil are ye doing?”

  It is a coffin.

  Lael was certain of that fact.

  She was too frantic now to stop.

  Her fingers pried at the sodden edges of the wooden box, trying to make room to slip her fingers between the lid and the bottom edge. She repositioned herself atop the box, scooting backward, realizing that it extended far beneath her. Wet and rotting, she could feel it sag beneath her weight now that she realized what it was.

  The other guard rushed over with the keys in his hand, nearly fumbling them upon the floor. They jingled noisily. “What the hell?” he asked.

  In that very instant, Lael shoved her fingers beneath the lid and pulled back with all her might, grunting over the force of her effort, realizing she hadn’t much time. The key was turning in the lock. Click. Click. One of her knees suddenly broke through the wood as the lid, wet and full of wormholes snapped unexpectedly. The effort propelled her backward and she smacked her head against the metal bars. The tinny sound rang through her ears and she lay there an instant, dazed.

  “Devil hang me!” exclaimed the guard.

  “Mother of Christ,” said the other.

  Broc groaned, and then suddenly, quite unexpectedly, he spewed the contents of his guts.

  Momentarily confused by the smack upon her head, Lael sat up and peered down into the wooden coffin. And then she did a thing she had never done in all her years: She screamed like a wee girl.

  When all was said and done, nineteen bodies lay upon the pyre, including those they’d retrieved from outside the gates. Every man deserved a proper end and Jaime understood that even those who’d fought for Broc Ceannfhionn were simply doing what they were told.

  All the men who now remained were gathered in the bailey—his own and those of MacLaren’s. Friend and foe alike prepared to pay respects to their dead, but ambivalence wove uncertain thoughts through Jaime’s head.

  At his command, Luc lit a torch and put it to the pile of wood in the center of the bailey. It took an instant before the flames caught, but once they did, they swept over the wooden heap like a brush fire. The cold, wet wood hissed in protest, crackling and spitting glowing cinders into a fitful wind.

  Whilst David slept, preparing for an early departure in the morning—untroubled by the unsettling news he’d simply dropped in Jaime’s lap—Jaime stood watching the flames lick higher over the woodpile toward the bodies in a heap. Somewhere up on the ramparts someone blew a melancholy tune into a reed. The haunting refrain lifted and fell upon the breeze. He did not relish the stench to come. It made his gut turn and his chest ache.

  But this was the first time in his military history that he was not already forming some sort of strategy for an imminent withdrawal. Usually, it was his task to recover David’s strongholds, secure the premises, then make certain the recipients of David’s benefaction, whomever it may be, would come into an unchallenged seat—some fat, greasy lord, whose days on the battlefield were few and far between but whose pockets were deep enough to rally men to David’s cause. Not this time. This time it was Jaime who was commanded to remain. This time, he had cause to want to earn these men’s trust, not merely their surrender, and foremost on mind was how to find a way to unite all the men under his charge. To begin with, he was determined to remove all remnants of the battle waged here before the sun rose again over Keppenach.

  Some of his men were tasked with dismantli
ng the gallows—a permanent structure apparently, elaborately constructed that clearly sent a message Jaime no longer wished to impart. He tasked others with the removal of charred debris. It was too late in the year to gather new thatch for the roofs so he instructed the men to use what wood they could from the gallows in order to repair the decimated roofs. The remainder of the damaged buildings were to be emptied and whatever stores had not been ruined would be taken elsewhere. The blacksmith’s shop would be the first to be rebuilt. No good army was sustainable without a decent blacksmith and he’d seen firsthand the excellent work the man could do. Jaime wanted to keep him in residence and keep him contented. The first task he had set for him was to manufacture the bolts for the gates.

  Across the bailey Maddog stood with arms crossed. Jaime felt the heat of the man’s gaze, but endeavored to ignore him. However, Jaime decided his mother had named him appropriately, for he looked a bit like a mastiff with thick jowls and black, beady eyes. If he forced Jaime to acknowledge him it wouldn’t bode well for the man, because Jaime’s mood was churlish at best.

  As for the work left to be done it was Jaime’s inclination to roll up his sleeves and help, but he was far too aware of the importance of establishing himself as laird here. Unaccustomed to setting himself apart, he nevertheless realized that only once these men understood his place among them could he let down his guard.

  Fortunately, during the course of the day, most of MacLaren’s men had already joined him without protest. Only Maddog with a few of his cohorts remained recalcitrant, lifting their hands to tasks only when commanded to. If necessary, Jaime knew how to bend their knees as well, but for the time being he would exercise restraint, knowing full well that he would gain far more with clemency. If there was one thing he understood well about defeated men it was that pride was not as easily broken as their backs and these Highlanders were born with far more pride than most.

  “I chose ye for this task… because you’re a bloody Scot. ’Tis time ye recalled how to be one.”

  Even Jaime’s language was English now. His Scots brogue was nearly forgotten… like the Pechts who’d once traversed this rugged land. At times he heard a betraying lilt in his words—mostly whilst in his cups—but it was rare. For all intents and purposes, he was English, born and English raised, fostered by men who were more English than Scot, David included. And though the king had reason to return to his roots, Jaime had equal reason to forget his own.

  At long last, the scent of burning flesh assaulted his nostrils. It brought back flashes of a past he loathed to recall. The simple fact that this time there were no screams to fill the lowering night did little to lighten his mood, nor did the realization that he was holding his future bride down in his dirty gaol—a turn of events he could never have foreseen.

  God’s teeth. There were times when he questioned David’s wisdom. Betimes he could not see the king’s reason, though in the end, whether or not Jaime agreed, he understood what drove David to every decision he made and that was something Jaime could not argue against: the greater good. All in all, David mac Maíl Chaluim was a good man, trying nearly in vain to unite a people who couldn’t seem to coordinate two hands to put on trews. More than like ’twas why they wore skirts.

  What the devil was she doing amidst men doing battle?

  The question plagued him more than it ought to—especially now that he realized she was to become his wife. What man worthy of the name would allow a woman to take up arms? Though the instant he asked himself the question, he berated himself, for whilst she was every bit as lovely as a flower, there was hardly anything gentle about the lass.

  Lael.

  Her name is Lael.

  Simply Lael.

  By the king’s decree, she was no longer a prisoner meant to be forgotten. Nor was her name to remain simply Lael. Nay, but regardless, he could never have forgotten her, with those unsettling green eyes, so bright in color that it brought to mind spring’s first pale blades of grass.

  He stared hard into the rising flames, and had a vision of Lael at the head of an army, riding proudly on the back of a dancing white steed—a warrior princess with flowing ebony hair and eyes so compelling a man would die to fight at her side.

  He had to remind himself she’d fought to seat Broc Ceannfhionn, not the other way around, but either case was treason. For all his loyal service David had aligned him with a treasonous shrew. Devil hang him! If David wished him dead, he should have ordered a quick beheading rather than consign him to sleep night after night worrying about waking—or not waking—with a blade to his neck.

  “Is there room for one more?” Luc asked, appearing at his side.

  Jaime was uncharacteristically distracted. “One more?”

  The lad grinned up at him. “On the pyre,” he said and nodded toward the blaze.

  Jaime shot the lad a beleaguered glance for his endless well of good humor, and he had the good sense to appear chastened. There was a time and place for jests and this was not it. He arched a brow. “Are you perchance looking to join them?”

  “Nay, my lord,” Luc replied, and fidgeted uncomfortably. Jaime allowed him a brief moment to squirm, intent upon helping him learn his place. After all, this was now their home—amidst men who would as soon see them both dead. Simply because their fathers were fellows and Jaime liked the lad was not enough reason to allow him to endanger himself or others with a lack of sobriety. “’Tis but… well, they discovered… a body… in the gaols,” the lad stammered.

  Jaime assumed that perhaps one of the attackers had fallen after last night’s battle and only now had been found. “Bring him up. Put him on the pyre,” he commanded, then turned back to assess the fire. It was slowly licking its way over the mound of dead. “There’s still time,” he said.

  “Uh… ’tis no man,” Luc replied.

  Jaime’s gaze skidded back to his squire. A sense of terror shot through his veins. He feared at once for Lael, and had a sudden vision of her skewered through by the guards—no doubt prompted by her acid tongue.

  He didn’t wait to hear more. He left the squire standing open-mouthed beside the pyre and sprinted toward the chapel.

  Chapter Ten

  The body belonged to Aveline of Teviotdale.

  It was the most gruesome discovery Lael had ever beheld. Only moments prior she’d been thinking of the girl, and it was almost as though she’d sensed her presence even before they’d discovered her body.

  Bloodstained though it was, the Teviotdale coat of arms was emblazoned upon the cloak the girl lay wrapped in. Too badly decomposed to determine precisely how or when she’d died, her mouth was frozen in a ghastly scream, stuffed with a wad of cloth. Her hands were gnarled, her fingers bent to claws, as though she’d died attempting to scratch her way out of the wretched box. In fact, there were desperate claw marks along the ceiling of her tomb, bloodstains marking the wood.

  Had Rogan buried the girl alive?

  The possibility horrified Lael.

  Before they began to dig in earnest, they removed Lael from her cell and shoved her into Broc’s, but no matter how much she didn’t wish to watch the grisly disinterment she didn’t have much choice. No one but the diggers themselves had a better view and she clung to Broc in the farthest reaches of his cell. Yet despite her sense of horror, she could not bring herself to look away. Even when Broc attempted to make her turn her head, she refused.

  “Now we ken why the chapel doors were locked,” remarked one of the two diggers. Another half-dozen onlookers were crammed into the tunnel, watching the excavation unfold.

  Only months ago—how long?—Aveline had been a guest of theirs at Dubhtolargg. And although Lael had not much liked the whiney lass, and in truth had wished her gone, she would never, never have wished such a terrible end for the poor girl. Aveline had begged Aidan to send her back to Rogan. She’d come to her brother, weeping—nay, begging—to be released from her duties as Lìli’s maid, because she’d wanted so desperately to bear her
babe here at Keppenach… near the child’s father. Lael could scarce bear the notion that she might have played a part in seeing the girl to her gruesome demise, because Lael herself had nearly begged Aidan to let the girl go home.

  Only now did she realize that Rogan was more a monster than anyone knew. Oh, they had known he wasn’t a particularly good man, but this—this—was a sin greater than any sin Lael would have placed upon his shoulders.

  She remembered the night he’d died at her brother’s hands and was heartily glad Aidan left his bones to be picked clean by the wolves. The arrogant bastard had nearly killed Lìli and her boy, and it was in that instant when Lael spied the fear in young Kellen’s eyes as he ran away from Rogan that she had fully embraced her brother’s new family.

  But she hadn’t known about Aveline then.

  Apparently Rogan murdered her sometime before that night, and then buried her alive where no one could hear her anguished screams. And just to be certain no one stumbled upon his crime, he’d padlocked the chapel doors to keep anyone from wandering into the church and into the hidden tunnels.

  Indeed, no wonder the doors were locked.

  “Christ… she’s got a babe,” announced one of the diggers, and Lael gagged—even knowing the girl had said she was quickening with child. At last, unable to bear it, she buried her head against Broc’s shoulder and tried to block out the sounds. But it was in precisely that instant the Butcher made his appearance. She felt him before she saw him. His presence was unmistakable from the instant he walked in through the door. As tall as he was—nearly as tall as Broc—the top of his head grazed the tunnel’s ceiling. His men parted before him like trees bending before a wind, but he said not a word. He spared her but a single glance, glowering at her before dismissing her.

  Lael sucked in a breath and held onto Broc for support, dizzy, and sick to her belly. The Butcher walked past and stood, peering into the adjoining cell, and for a moment, Lael watched him unheeded, unable to keep herself from it. His throat bobbed at what he spied through the open door and he moved closer to examine the grave. Only then did his gaze return to Lael.