Kenna floundered her way to the back of the wagon. “Liam. Help me get out of here. If I don’t get to where they can see me, they won’t know what’s going on.” I don’t want anyone else hurt. There’s been enough pain. Kenna bit her tongue against saying her thoughts aloud, but it was what it was. Ronan’s men were sorely outnumbered and didn’t stand a chance.
Liam hopped to the ground and ran to the back of the wagon, all the while keeping his concerned gaze trained on the mounted Highlanders racing toward them. He swung Kenna to the ground and steadied her on her feet. “Yer clan rides well.”
“Yes.” She didn’t have time for niceties right now—she had a clan war to defuse. Kenna pushed her way between the horses until she stood in the road beside Ronan’s mount.
“Get back to the wagon. ’Tis no’ place for a woman.” Ronan stared straight ahead as he spoke. His gloved hand rested on the haft of the sword he had already pulled from its sheath.
“Put your sword away.” Kenna limped to the middle of the road a few feet in front of Ronan’s horse. “There will be no fighting,” she called back over one shoulder. They didn’t have time for that crap. They had to get Colum home.
“Lady Kenna!” Ronan’s growl reminded Kenna of Karma’s warning bark when Granny’s cat got too close to his food. “Woman, ye best hear me. I said get back to the wagon.”
Kenna ignored Ronan and raised her arms, waving at the oncoming riders. Karma reached her first. The dog greeted her with a series of happy yips and snuffling woofs as he bounced all around her and butted her with his great broad head. Kenna giggled and hugged the dog. Tears escaped down her face as she rubbed a cheek against his satiny black ears.
Karma stiffened. The warning growl rumbling deep in his throat shook his muscular body as Kenna held him in her arms.
Kenna stood and turned. “You should really stay back there until I have a chance to explain everything.”
Ronan had dismounted. With sword in one hand and a glistening black targe in the other, he slowly walked toward Kenna. “I dinna hide behind any woman—even a fearless stubborn sort who ne’er listens ta reason.”
Karma lowered his head, flattened his ears, and bared his fangs. His growl shifted to an eerie clicking rumble as he eased forward in a tensed crouch, ready to spring at Ronan.
“Karma. No.” Kenna stepped between the snarling dog and the scowling man. “It’s okay, Karma. Everything is okay.”
Karma eased back, flicked an ear, and stared at Kenna as if to ask if she was sure.
Kenna rested her hand atop the dog’s broad head. “I promise. Everything is fine.” Kenna sucked in a deep breath as Karma relaxed back on his haunches. The dog still glared at Ronan as though he wished the man would give him an excuse to rip out his throat.
“Lady Kenna!” Chieftain Gray MacKenna shouted across the remaining expanse of road as he pulled his horse to a stop, dismounted, and ripped his sword from its sheath in one fluid move. He held up a hand to the rest of his men as they flanked their horses on either side of the road and completely surrounded Sutherland’s men.
Kenna rushed toward Gray, hot tears of relief streaming down her face. Finally. They were almost home. For the first time since they had pulled Colum from the debris, she allowed herself to actually believe he would make it.
“Lady Kenna. Are ye well? Ye look…” Gray’s voice trailed off as he motioned from the top of Kenna’s matted hair down to the shredded muddy hem of her dress. “What the hell did the cur do t’ye?”
“I saved her,” Ronan said, as he stormed forward and stood beside Kenna.
Gray pulled Kenna behind him and raised his sword. “Ye best concentrate on savin’ yer own arse. Ye have much to answer for.”
“Stop it!” Kenna grabbed Gray’s wrist as she moved out from behind him. “Both of you just stop it.” They didn’t have time for this. Colum was dying.
Gray kept his sword raised as he glanced back and forth from Ronan to Kenna. “When Rua returned without Colum, we feared the worst. Yer sister and Granny are both nearly sick with worry. What say ye, Kenna? Explain t’me why ye defend this man who has caused such strife in our lives.”
Kenna swallowed hard and glanced toward Ronan. His sword slowly lowered and his stance widened, as his eyes narrowed into a pair of waiting, watchful slits. Kenna took a deep breath, then exhaled. It was time to keep her word. Her Sinclair heritage demanded it. Only one Sinclair had ever broken an oath, and she had paid for that dishonor, first with her life and then with her soul.
Sliding her hands away from Gray’s sword arm, Kenna bowed her head and moved to Ronan’s side. She rested her fingertips against the cold rough surface of his targe as she lifted her chin. “I defend him because he saved my life and because he saved Colum and…” Kenna took a deep breath and stood even straighter. “…and because he is my husband.”
Gray took a step forward, eyes narrowing and head tilting as if he hadn’t heard quite what Kenna had said. “He is yer what?” He stared at Kenna in disbelief.
“My husband,” Kenna repeated, wincing when her voice cracked on the word. There was no going back now. She had made a promise and she would keep it. She cleared her throat and raised her voice. “I am Ronan Sutherland’s wife.”
“I dinna believe it.” Gray pointed at Ronan with his sword. “I will send ye on a slow journey straight t’hell if I find ye harmed her.”
Ronan took a step forward and touched his blade to Gray’s. “I treat m’wife wi’ the respect she deserves. I’ll thank ye no’ to sully her honor or her intelligence by insinuating otherwise.”
Gray’s scowl swiveled back to Kenna. “Kenna? What say ye? Sutherland speaks the truth?”
Kenna wet her lips and straightened her shoulders. “I am Lady Sutherland by my own choice. Ronan hasn’t forced me to do anything against my will.”
Gray lowered his sword and took a step back. He made a sharp motion to his men and barked out something in Gaelic that Kenna didn’t understand. The MacKenna men shifted their horses from around Sutherland’s group and returned to the road behind Gray.
Gray nodded to Sutherland with a short stiff jerk of his chin. “Then it appears congratulations are in order.”
Ronan acknowledged this with a wary nod of his own.
Both men’s expressions and tones transmitted a great deal more menace than their formal words. The standoff was tenuous at best, but Kenna would take it. Time was wasting.
“Colum is in the wagon. He’s badly hurt. We’ve got to get him to Granny and Trulie. We may already be too late to keep him from dying.”
Gray bolted straight to the wagon. When he saw Colum, he banged his fist atop the wagon’s side, mumbling something Kenna couldn’t hear. “What the hell happened here?” Gray forced out the words between clenched teeth, not taking his gaze from Colum as he spoke.
“A landslide. A rock…” Kenna’s voice trailed off. How could she begin to explain all that had happened? She couldn’t, and they didn’t have time for it if she could. “We’ve got to get him to Trulie and Granny. They can heal him.”
“Can they ensure the man will walk again?” Gray turned and stared at her as if she had lost her mind.
“I don’t know.” Kenna took a step back and clenched her fists against her middle, willing the storm of emotions thundering inside her to go the hell away. “But they can make sure he doesn’t die.” If the Fates see fit, she silently added.
Gray pushed off from the wagon, motioned to his men, then plodded toward his horse. He slammed his sword back in the sheath and swung up into the saddle. With a grim expression, he sadly shook his head as he reined in his horse and turned the beast homeward. “For a man such as Colum, there are worse things in this world than dying.”
Whether it was the look on Gray’s face or the way he spit out the words, Kenna got the distinct impression that Colum’s ability to walk wasn’t the only thing Gray was taking about.
Chapter 30
Kenna sent up a silent praye
r of thanks as the wagon rolled beneath the stone archway leading into the bailey. Colum was rapidly getting worse. His body alternately tensed and jerked with wild, violent thrashing and then collapsed. With the high fever now refusing to subside, seizures couldn’t be a good sign.
“Granny!” Kenna waved madly as Trulie, Granny, and Coira burst out the wide double doors and ran down the sprawling front steps of the keep. “Hurry, please. It’s Colum. Please—
you’ve got to save him.” Kenna’s heart thumped so hard she gasped for breath. Colum’s salvation was finally in sight. At least she prayed it was.
Kenna wallowed through the tangle of blankets and jumped down from the back of the wagon before it groaned to a complete stop. She stumbled in the tangled mess of torn skirts and pitched forward. Ronan caught her before she hit the ground and steadied her to her feet. He immediately released her and stepped back as Granny and Trulie rounded the wagon.
“Thank the heavens you are finally safe.” Granny grabbed Kenna to her and held on tight. She patted and smoothed shaking hands across Kenna’s matted hair, all the while sobbing unintelligible endearments against Kenna’s cheek. She pulled back, looked Kenna up and down, then yanked her close again. “My baby…my poor brave baby. I’ll curse that man to the hottest part of hell for what he’s put you through. That son of a bitch will rue the day he ever laid eyes on MacKenna keep.”
“Granny.” Kenna gently extricated herself from Granny’s embrace and eased a step back. “Granny, not now. Colum is dying.” Kenna couldn’t believe she had just said Colum was dying as though she was noting the day’s weather. She felt numb to everything, to all that had happened over the past few days. Kenna stood taller and sucked in a deep breath. Numb was definitely good. She hoped like hell the absence of feeling lasted forever.
“Dying?” Granny hurried to the open end of the wagon, waving an arthritic hand for Trulie to follow. “Quick, gal. Kenna knows the right of it. I see his spirit trying to rise. Make haste before Colum’s soul breaks free and travels beyond the gateway.”
The cart rattled and swayed as another violent seizure shook Colum’s body across the bed of the wagon. Gray lifted Granny into it just as Colum stiffened, then thrashed wildly with a second attack. Trulie took one look at Colum and turned back to Kenna. “Get up here, Kenna. You’ve got to keep his soul anchored here long enough for us to heal his body.”
With Gray on one side and Ronan on the other, the two men lifted Kenna over the side of the wagon. She knelt behind Colum and pulled him back into her lap. His head thrashed side to side as she hugged him against her chest. Colum’s hair was soaked. His flesh was on fire. The heat of his fever seeped through Kenna’s gown as though she cradled a bucket of red-hot coals. Colum jerked wildly with the increasing strength of the convulsions.
“Hurry. I can’t hold him much longer.” Kenna clenched Colum tighter against her chest and clamped her legs down across his shoulders. Colum bucked and roared like an enraged beast, fighting as though he was beating demons back down to a deeper hell. Gray and Ronan clambered up over the sides of wagons. The men crouched on either side of Colum, latched onto his flailing arms, and pinned his body.
Trulie rubbed her thumbs across her fingertips in a rapid sweeping motion. Her hands twitched faster and faster, her fluttering fingers creating an eerie whisper of frenzied flesh against flesh.
Kenna held her breath as both of Trulie’s hands began to glow. Finally. The healing energy was powering up, that rare energy Trulie, Granny, and Mairi controlled and manipulated at will.
Granny appeared at Trulie’s side, her hands already humming with the same glowing power.
Kenna struggled to hold Colum tight against another fit of thrashing. Thank goodness both Trulie and Granny were here. The only thing that would make Kenna breathe a little easier would be if Mairi were here too. Healing was Mairi’s dominant gift. As bad as Colum’s situation had gotten, it was going to take all they had to keep him on this side of death’s door.
“Stay with me,” Kenna whispered as she pressed a cheek against Colum’s soaking-wet head. “I can’t bear it if you cross to the other side.” Kenna blinked hard against burning tears. If Colum did live, she’d never be allowed to get this close to him ever again. She tightened her hold and burned the very feel of him into her senses. Colum tensed and pushed against her, as though somewhere in his delirium, he knew what she was doing.
The air crackled and hissed with building energy. Kenna lifted her head. It wouldn’t be much longer now. She wiped her cheek against her shoulder and braced herself for what was about to come.
In a unified motion, Granny and Trulie dove forward and slammed their hands flat atop Colum’s heaving chest. A golden glow emanated from their arms and hands, pulsating with a low-pitched hum. Trulie and Granny stared at each other as though marking time, tensed for the perfect moment.
With the barest bit of movement, their heads bobbed in unison as though counting out the rhythm to a song only they could hear. Their focus was locked on each other. Their eyes unblinking, they rocked to and fro until the entire wagon swayed with the rhythm of their motions.
The strange luminescence around their hands changed from a golden glow to a sizzling blue-white arc. Kenna closed her eyes against the retina-burning light and turned her head away. It wouldn’t be long now. The arcing energy was about to explode.
The healing power surged free of the women with a deafening boom. A scream ripped from Kenna’s throat as the explosion rattled her very bones. A violent wind ripped past and wailed around the stone walls of the bailey. Flying debris blasted her, threatening to sand away her flesh.
The force of the gust whipped Kenna back, throwing her against the sides of the wagon as though Colum’s soul was trying to shake free of her embrace. Kenna clutched him tighter, curling herself around Colum as her back slammed into the iron framework holding the boards of the cart together. Then all went silent. It was finally over. Either they’d managed to heal Colum, or his soul had broken free and moved on.
Kenna slowly raised her head and opened her eyes to Colum’s bewildered expression.
“Kenna?” Colum’s rasping whisper was sweeter than any music Kenna had ever heard.
A relieved sob shook through Kenna as she gathered Colum to her. She wept as she pressed a cheek against his matted hair and rocked back and forth.
“Yer…” Colum pushed Kenna away, fumbling across the bloodied pillows and blankets. His left leg was still stiff at the knee and dragged beside him like a dead weight. Colum’s jaw rippled with clenched teeth as disbelief and anger filled his face. “It wasna a wicked nightmare. Ye actually did it. Why the hell did ye do it, Kenna? Why the hell would ye think…”
With a shaking hand, he reached toward Kenna’s face. But just before his fingers made contact with her cheek, he slowly closed his hand into a shaking fist and brought it down hard against the bed of the wagon. “Why? Why would ye think I would wish t’live this way?” Colum slammed his hand atop his weak leg, then locked his scowl on Kenna. “And how could ye ever think I would wish t’live without ye at my side?”
Servants and clansmen gathered closer about the wagon. Kenna felt each and every nervous glance in her direction, especially Ronan’s watchful stare. Both Ronan and Gray slowly rose from their posts on either side of Colum and vaulted over the sides of the wagon, leaving Kenna alone with Colum. Kenna inhaled a deep breath and released it in a shuddering sigh. She had to make him understand. She’d had no choice.
“You know why I did it.” She motioned toward the bloodied blankets scattered about the wagon. “You’re lucky to be alive. You came so close to dying that you’ll still be weak for a while, but at least you’re alive.” It sounded so simple when she said the words aloud, like reading items off a list.
Colum shoved himself up through the blankets and struggled to a sitting position. He growled like a caged animal when he lost his balance and fell back against the side of the wagon. “Ye call bein’ a cripp
le and livin’ without the other half of yer soul a matter of good prosperity? What the hell good can come from livin’ a life such as that?” Colum fixed her with a hurt-filled stare, his teeth bared in a sneer. “What the hell good can come from livin’ a life without the one ye love more than life itself?”
“You should be thankful to be alive.” What else could she say? Colum was alive and now she was Ronan Sutherland’s wife. Somehow, life would go on. Kenna swallowed hard and struggled to keep her emotions out of her voice. “You’re healed, but you’re still extremely weak. You’ve still got some serious mending to do for a few days. Just be patient. We won’t know for a while if any of the damage is permanent.” The damage is permanent all right. My heart will never be the same. Kenna wet her lips and sucked in a deep breath. She had to stay strong. She never broke her word. Ever.
Colum snorted at Kenna’s advice and pointed a shaking finger at Granny and Trulie. “Did the two of ye ever stop t’think that I wouldna wish to live out m’life as a lonely cripple—as a useless bit of a man good for absolutely nothing?”
Granny and Trulie stared down at Colum for a long moment, both their faces grim. “You’ll never be alone, Colum. You know that.” Granny touched a bent finger to Colum’s boot as she shook her head. “Kenna will have you up and around in no time. You’ll see.”
Colum jerked back to Kenna. “Tell her. Tell them all.”
Kenna turned away. She couldn’t do this any longer.
“And you!” Colum thumped his fist against the side of the wagon, then pointed a shaking finger at Gray. “You, m’chieftain, should know better than any what m’wishes would be. I canna serve this clan anymore. I canna bear the thought of livin’ such a life…alone.” Colum’s bitter laugh filled the air as he raked a shaking hand through his matted hair. “Am I t’become amusement for the great hall then? The lame warrior, forever alone and pitied by all and unfit t’care for anyone?” Colum’s hoarse voice cracked as he shouted to Kenna. “Tell them, Kenna. Tell them what else about my life has been ripped away. Tell them all what ye have done in the name of just keepin’ me alive.”
My Highland Bride (Highland Hearts #2) Page 21
