by Paula Quinn
The attacker came at them again but was halted this time by Edmund’s sword across his neck.
Sarah pressed her face into Amelia’s shoulder and wept when the man’s body fell from his saddle. Amelia wanted to do the same but she couldn’t take her eyes off Edmund. Sitting high in his saddle, his golden hair and his face spattered with his victims’ blood, he looked like a lion wild to protect what was his. A moment passed and his expression changed, going soft on her and then on Sarah. He offered her a subtle nod, making certain she was not injured. When she shook her head, he called out to Lucan.
“Yer leg.”
“’Tis fine.”
Edmund nodded and turned his stallion back to the fight.
All around her the Highlanders’ enemies fell. Some run through to the hilt by Malcolm’s blade while others fell from their horses, broken and crushed beneath Lucan’s mighty arm. Darach preferred to use a dagger and twice he leaped from his horse to his opponents’ to kill them at a closer proximity.
Soon the fighting slowed, and with its end, the drawbridge finally descended. Edmund, Lucan, Malcolm, and Darach sat perched in their saddles, drenched with rain and blood, and watched the three riders approaching from the inner bailey. Malcolm waited until they reached him before he struck the first in the face with his fist and then ordered the other two to go back, get their comrades, and get the hell out of his castle.
“Mercenaries.” He turned to Lucan with disgust. “Canna’ trust a one even when it comes to keepin’ Buchanans away.”
Lucan nodded, then leaned forward on his mount and looked across the glen to where Amelia and Sarah were hidden. His eyes, like topaz flames, sparked and then faded as his eyelids closed and he fell unconscious from his saddle.
His three cousins leaped from their horses and ran to him, but Grendel reached him first, whining and sniffing Lucan’s thigh. His plaid was cut. Blood saturated the wool and the ground where he lay.
“He’s bleeding out!” Edmund tore a long strip from Lucan’s bloody plaid and tied it tightly around his cousin’s thigh. “We need to stop the bleeding. Help me get him inside.”
“We shouldn’t move him,” Darach countered, swiping rain or tears from his eyes.
“We cannot leave him out here. Take the horses,” Edmund commanded. “Malcolm, help me.”
They picked Lucan up with exquisite care and carried him by foot over the drawbridge. Amelia clasped Sarah’s hand and hurried to keep up with them. She heard a strangled cry from somewhere behind her and turned to see Grendel close his massive jaws around the throat of one of the Highlanders’ dying victims. She looked away and swallowed back the swell of raw emotions that threatened to consume her. Lucan was hurt, possibly dying. Edmund didn’t need to watch her fall apart. They needed her help.
“My nursemaid Alice taught me how to mix some poultices fer wounds.”
Edmund turned to look at her over his shoulder. “Good. I would be in yer debt if ye help him.”
“As would I,” Malcolm agreed.
“And I,” Darach echoed. “Tell me what ye need and I’ll fetch it. There’s an alchemist in the village.”
Darach listened to every word she told him. She needed yarrow or agrimony to stop the bleeding. She also needed cinnamon or clove to reduce pain and disinfect the wound to avoid infection. She gave him a list and added a few things that Sarah requested in case of fever or infection and then sent him on his way.
She followed Edmund and Malcolm into an enormous room in the west wing and watched them as they set Lucan down in a bed that was so big it made the huge Highlander look small. They laid him on his side and set about examining his wound.
“His mother will kill us all if he should…” Malcolm’s words faded and he looked away.
“He won’t,” Edmund finished after they all paused in silence.
The gash in his thigh, received from the ax he’d stopped from hitting Amelia, was about ten inches long and quite deep. He’d protected her and Sarah because she’d given away their position. She shook her head. She couldn’t let herself think about any of that now. She had never seen a wounded man before. She prayed she didn’t retch from the sight of his gaping flesh. She knew the wound had to be cleaned and likely sewn. The thought of it twisted her belly into a knot and produced beads of sweat along her brow. “We’ll need fresh water.”
“And clean rags,” Sarah added beside her.
“I’ll fetch them.”
When Malcolm left the room to his task, Sarah turned to Amelia and offered her a comforting smile. “Ye clean him and I’ll sew him, aye?”
Amelia nodded, loving her dearest friend for being able to read her thoughts and for helping her with this grim task.
“First though,” Sarah continued, rolling up her sleeves and bending over Lucan’s body, “we must discover if he still lives.”
Amelia and Edmund watched and waited in silence while Sarah pressed her head to Lucan’s chest. Moments passed, slowly, torturously, with Edmund running his fingers through his hair and finally turning away when Sarah said nothing.
“He lives,” she finally announced, bringing such relief to Edmund that he fell back into a chair close by the bed. She touched the back of her hand to his forehead. “He’s cool to the touch. We need to begin soon.”
When Malcolm returned, she requested a pan and his and Edmund’s removal from the room.
Amelia was glad to see them go. She didn’t want Lucan to die, and she barely knew him. It was Edmund and Malcolm, and even Darach, when he returned sometime later with her herbs, who coiled her nerves into a knotted mess. They clearly loved him. She imagined the devastation of losing Sarah and had to push back her tears. She had to stay in complete control of her emotions and do everything she could to help Lucan. They couldn’t let him die.
With that thought pushing her forward, she cleaned Lucan’s wound and applied her ointments, then aided Sarah in repairing his sliced artery and stitching him up. After three hours they were finally done. Amelia stood back and cleaned the blood from her hands while the Highlanders returned and took turns at Lucan’s beside. He still hadn’t regained consciousness but they had done everything they could. Now all they could do was wait. The men all looked terribly worried and frightened for their cousin, but Edmund broke her heart just a little more. He stood by the bed, looking down at Lucan’s unconscious body. Amelia couldn’t read his thoughts, but they were clearly fraught with despair. When he ran his fingers through his hair and looked away, she wanted to go to him. He appeared to be the one in charge of the group, making the quickest decisions, ready for action an instant sooner than everyone else. Did he feel responsible the same way she did when people she loved were hurt? Surely he knew this wasn’t his fault. They were warriors. Sometimes they died.
She caught Edmund’s eye and held it for a moment, unsure of what her reaction should be, but wanting to somehow comfort him. A glance seemed to be enough.
“Thank ye,” he said, moving around the bed to stand before her.
Amelia felt her face go hot and looked away from him. “Sarah did the more serious mending. Besides, ye’ve no need to thank me. I’m fond of Lucan. I would not see him perish.”
She didn’t realize her hands were shaking until he took them and finished wiping them tenderly with a rag. Suddenly her knees felt shaky, too.
“I’m in yer debt.”
“Nae.” She shook her head and the room spun a little. “I—” She closed her eyes to clear her head but the room only reeled more.
“Are ye ill?” he asked her when she swayed on her feet.
Damnation, she wasn’t prone to fainting spells like her mother and she certainly didn’t want to faint in front of Edmund and his friends. She was made of stronger mettle than that, but the day had been so taxing what with all that killing, all the blood…so much blood…
“I’m fine,” she assured Edmund, stepping away from him. “I simply need a bit of air. Would ye…”
She didn’t realiz
e she was falling or where she landed, or why she felt safe for the first time in two days.
Chapter Twelve
Edmund watched Amelia’s eyes flutter open as he set her down on a stone bench in Ravenglade’s walled garden. He realized, standing over her while her lush black lashes rose slowly over the glory of her dark eyes, that she could be trouble. He liked her. He liked her more every moment he spent with her, especially after she saved his cousin. He would be forever in her and Sarah’s debt for that. But he couldn’t allow his feelings for Amelia Bell to go any further than this. He didn’t have time for a lass in his life, especially not the Duke of Queensberry’s niece, the Lord Chancellor of Scotland’s future wife. He’d vowed to protect her and that’s what he would do. And himself along with her. He hadn’t expected to have to guard his heart from her. He’d never had to do it with any lass before her. But guard his heart, he would.
Though the idea of waking up to her slumberous face every morning was tempting, she was a dangerous distraction, and he’d been taught by men of honor to stay true to his course, wherever it led him.
Scotland would always come first. He didn’t fight alone. He had his cousins, more at home. His father and his uncles, all willing to die for their country or their name. He was one of them, their beliefs and ideals etched into his heart from the age of four.
But hell, he thought, looking down at Grendel’s big head resting on her knee, even his dog liked her.
Her breathing quickened and she opened her eyes. He wanted to smile at her, but he didn’t. “What happened?” She sat up, holding one hand on her head, and placing the other on Grendel’s. She looked around. “Where are we?”
“Ye fainted. It stopped raining and I thought ye needed some air so I carried ye out here to the garden.”
She spread her gaze over the tangled shrubbery and long weeds covering most of the ground. Though it was spring, most of the trees were bare and gray to match the sky. Still, when she scratched her head, leaving her hair bunched in that one spot, her eyes still a bit glazed and her cheeks flushed, he thought she looked like some delicate fairy queen who’d been snatched from her glade and dropped into a harder, uglier world where she didn’t belong. A world inhabited by pitiful knights on quests to prove who they are and where they belong.
“’Tis sorely neglected, I know,” he said, trying to lighten the mood that made him feel wretched because he couldn’t have her. He shouldn’t want her. “Ravenglade belongs to Malcolm now, but he spends much of his time in Skye.”
She tilted her head and set those glorious eyes on him, rattling his head a bit. He sat down on the bench beside her. Her gaze followed him.
“I feel foolish fer fainting,” she said, keeping her attention on his dog. “It doesn’t happen often.”
She was still angry with him. He understood but he wanted her atonement.
“Good, because I was beginning to think ye had some sort of sleeping disorder that plagued ye whenever I was near.”
Her scant smile pricked his heart. She’d been through much since meeting him. The absence of her mirth was his fault and he felt the weight of it. “I wish I could take ye back, lass,” he told her sincerely. “But I cannot. There is too much at stake fer too many.”
“And I am the sacrifice.”
For the first time he hated his task. He hated men who wanted power simply to take what others had, and that innocent people had to suffer for it. “I’ll let nae harm come to ye, Amelia. Not from any quarter. But this must be done. And as soon as it is, I’ll return ye into the hands of yer father.”
She nodded, then angled her head away from him so he couldn’t see her face. “I understand.”
He didn’t think she did. He waited a moment and when she remained quiet, he sensed something darker, deeper troubling her.
“Luke will recover, lass. He’s strong and determined.”
“I…I don’t know.” Her voice was a stark, strangled mess that drew him, along with Grendel, up.
“Amelia?” He sat forward. “I know ye did all—”
“This is my fault.” Her eyes filled to the rims with tears that sparked in him a deeper purpose. “I called to ye and the man saw me, Edmund. Lucan saved us and he may die fer it.” She covered her face in her hands and wept into them. Grendel whined. “Misfortune follows me. It always has! Ye should send me back before one of ye dies!”
Had he heard her right? Aye, he quickly realized he had. He remembered her father telling him how her “ill fortune” had driven off many suitors. Hell, even traveling bards sang of it. Edmund would have laughed at the idea of such a foolish belief, but Amelia believed it and he wouldn’t mock her, so he merely smiled and moved closer to her.
“Listen to me, lass,” he told her gently. “Ye called out trying to help me, and my cousin, who believes he lives in the time of Arthur, did what is in his blood to do. There’s no shame in this day. No shame fer ye. Only gratitude.”
“Ye speak of it lightly because ye don’t know everything that’s happened. I almost killed my father last winter when he nearly choked to death on one of my hair pearls that broke free and fell into his soup.” She wiped her eyes and sniffed but her tears kept coming. “He sat there at our family table holding his throat, turning a horrible shade of gray, choking to death before my eyes. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t move, too afraid that if I touched him he would die quicker. Sarah saved him with a hard pound on the back.”
“That sounds like an accident and nothing more,” he said softly and smiled at her.
“It didn’t matter what anyone called it when I dropped my baby cousin three days after he was born and brought on his madness.” Her tears fell heavier as the true weight of her life came upon her.
Whatever Edmund convinced himself of earlier faded with the need to hold her. He wanted to comfort her and he wouldn’t be denied.
Reaching for her, he pulled her in closer and closed his arms around her.
She sobbed against his chest. “My sister has already vowed that I may never hold my future niece or nephew.”
He closed his eyes, angry. “Yer sister deserves her husband.”
She laughed and he pulled back to see her and discover if his ears deceived him.
“There now, that’s what I wish to see, yer happiness.” When her smile remained, he considered it a great accomplishment, one that he wanted to continue striving to achieve. He ran the backs of his knuckles lightly over her cheek, vanquishing her last tear. “I’m certain ye are worth more to yer father than anything he possesses.”
“I would do anything fer him.”
Like marry the chancellor? He didn’t ask her. He understood loyalty. He admired it. He would do anything for his own father.
“Yer fortune isn’t really that bad,” he told her instead.
She leaned in again and blinked her gloriously huge eyes at him. Edmund wondered how long it took a man to go mad with desire.
“I wouldn’t get close to me, were I ye.”
“I don’t fear misfortune.”
“How about ceilings falling down in yer bedchamber?”
He scowled, remembering that there was another man’s bedchamber waiting for her. “’Tis good fortune, Amelia. ’Tis a sign from God not to marry the chancellor.”
She tilted her face up to him and stared into his eyes for a moment that made him forget what they were talking about and filled his head with thoughts of kissing her. “I thought that at first but—”
“Ssh.” He touched his index finger to her lips to quiet her. “Misfortune does not follow ye, lass. If it did”—he struggled to restrain himself from tracing the tip of his finger over the soft contours of her lips, leaning in—“my heart would not feel so light when I’m with ye. But if I’m wrong and misfortune ever dares come near ye again, I’ll slay it like David slew Goliath.”
Her smile widened into laughter. “Ye’re quite audacious to make such a claim, Edmund MacGregor. But no one has ever promised me such a thing. I
will hold ye to yer word.”
He looked into her eyes and wondered if he’d gone mad. He shouldn’t take interest in her life. A thousand times he heard his father’s voice telling him not to allow distraction to veer him off course.
“I won’t let ye down.”
She thanked him softly and rose from the bench to leave him. Grendel stood with her. He had to have gone mad when he took her hand and stopped her, not giving a damn about distractions for the moment. “Remain with me a wee bit longer. At least until I can prove to ye that I’m more than just a thief.”
“And a liar?”
He tossed her a smirk. “Ye ferget that ye already admitted that I did not lie to ye?”
She shook her head at him and didn’t move forward or back to her seat. “I said ye hadn’t been completely dishonest. But ye have nothing to prove to me. After ye saved my life today, I forgave ye fer all yer crimes against me, but I may make ye pay fer them yet.”
His smile widened and then faded against the glorious vision of her swathed in warm, golden light as the sun broke through the clouds. For an instant or two he fell captivated by the sight of her with her damp hair curling softly around her shoulders. “Thank ye fer yer favor. ’Tis undeserved.”
“Nae.” She moved closer to him and patted his hand. He looked at her and then her hand. Hell, it was difficult to keep from kissing her senseless. “Truly, what ye did fer us today merits my favor. That man would have killed us. He almost killed Lucan with his ax. Ye may be an untrustworthy outlaw, but I don’t feel unsafe with ye.”
Should he thank her? He sure as hell couldn’t seduce her now. “I’m pleased to hear it,” he said, not sure if he was or not. And what did she mean calling him untrustworthy. It stung, but he had lied to her. Still, he didn’t like that she considered him so despicable.
“I can seek yer fergiveness fer deceiving ye, Amelia, but not fer kidnapping ye. That I had to do and would do again.”
She nodded and slipped her hand free of his. “I understand.”
He saw her hand coming at him and braced himself for it. Her palm against his cheek didn’t sting as much as he expected. He glanced at Grendel, relieved and a bit insulted that his dog was ignoring him.
