Wishing For A Highlander

by Jessi Gage

“Hamish,” she blurted as her hand flew to her chest.

  Steafan’s enforcer narrowed his eyes. “Good morn’, lass. ’Tis glad I am to see you.” He didn’t look glad. He looked dangerous. “Is Darcy about?”

  Warning alarms went off in her head. She couldn’t imagine what Steafan’s enforcer was doing here, but he’d surely know by the turning of the sails that Darcy would be at the mills doing his work for the day.

  Smiling brightly, she said, “Why, good morning. How lovely to see you. I trust your day is off to a shining start. I was just on my way to find my husband. Would you care to join me?”

  Without waiting for his answer, she breezed around him and down off the porch.

  A meaty hand landed on her shoulder and stopped her. “Where’s the box, lass?”

  Fear coiled in her stomach. How did he know about her box? Had Darcy said something to him or Steafan?

  No. He wouldn’t, not after he’d gone to such lengths to hide it from her so she wouldn’t accidentally mention it to anyone.

  She thought better of admitting she knew anything about the box. She also knew she needed Darcy. “He’s at the mill, I’m sure,” she said, ignoring Hamish’s question. “I think I’ll just say good morning and then I’ll be happy to help you with whatever you need.”

  He didn’t release her shoulder. He moved in close behind her and said in her ear, “What I need is that box.” When she turned to face him, she met a sharp, beetle-black gaze. “You ken the one I mean. Rosewood. With silvery touches. And a date of 1542 on the bottom.”

  Her heart sank. Somehow, Steafan had found out about the box. Maybe Darcy had told him. She had tried to leave him last night, after all. What if he’d gone to Steafan in the night and confessed everything? What if this was how Highland husbands showed their appreciation for wives who tried to desert them?

  No. She had meant it when she’d determined never to question his honor again. It couldn’t have been Darcy. But if Steafan knew about the box, what else might he know about? Did he know she’d tried to run away last night and that Darcy had tried to help her? Should she pretend not to know what Hamish was talking about, or should she own up to her involvement with the box?

  “Where is it?” Hamish demanded.

  “I don’t know.” That was the truth.

  His eyes gleamed with satisfaction.

  She’d inadvertently admitted to knowing about the box. Darn. “I mean, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It came out as more of a question than a statement. Double darn. She needed Darcy’s cool head and careful speech. He’d know what to say to get the enforcer from hell to back off.

  Hamish chuckled and it was not a happy sound. “Come wi’ me, lass. We’ll look for it together.”

  With little choice but to go where he dictated by the unyielding clamp of his hand on her arm, she followed him through the house as he poked around looking for the box. She willed Darcy to come to the house, but from what she knew of the Highland work ethic, she doubted he’d make it back to Fraineach before dinnertime.

  Hamish looked in cupboards and chests and eventually dragged her into what looked to be an office with a small desk scattered with papers and quills. He pulled drawers out haphazardly. One drawer fell to the floor and the bottom splintered.

  “Hey!” she protested. “Take it easy.”

  He did no such thing. Tugging on a large, lower drawer, he frowned when it wouldn’t open. Removing his dirk, he released her and jimmied the lock, damaging the drawer’s frame.

  She ran for the door.

  “Do ye ken what box I’m referring to now, lass?” His voice made her pause.

  Looking back, she saw him lift the damning artifact from the drawer.

  She said nothing, but her face likely proclaimed whatever guilt Hamish assumed was hers. She pushed through the door, shouting for Darcy. When she ran down the steps, a guard leaning on the porch railing out of view from the front door deftly caught her around the waist and swung her around.

  “Watch yourself, Glen,” Hamish said from the doorway. “Bind her mouth so she canna hex you.”

  She kicked and fought the two men, but she had no chance against Hamish’s cruel hands and the burly arms of the guard. They stuffed a rag in her mouth and kept it there with a kerchief knotted at the back of her head.

  “Come,” Hamish ordered the other guard. “Steafan will want to question the witch.” After frowning at the date on the bottom of the box, he tucked it against his shirt in the wrap of his kilt. “And he’ll want to see her wicked box as well.”

  He pulled her from the house and down the footpath, away from the windmills.

  She looked back longingly at the three sturdy structures, willing Darcy or one of the other men whose voices and laughter occasionally caught the breeze just right for audibility to poke a head out and witness her–what was this, anyway, an arrest? Hamish had called her a witch. Did that mean she was on her way to a burning at the stake?

  She had to get someone’s attention. When a cart laden with wheat rattled by, heading for the mills, she gave up trying to keep her footing and let herself go limp. Hamish had to slow and take her weight. Giving the enforcer no help whatsoever, she turned imploring eyes to the driver of the cart. It was no use. The gray haired man looked resolutely ahead, ignoring the spectacle.

  Hamish bruised her arms and tore her dress at the sleeve as he yanked her to her feet. One of her breasts spilled free of the dress’s neckline. Oblivious to or uncaring of this humiliating exposure, he plowed ahead, propelling her toward the castle. Within ten minutes, she was back in Steafan’s office.

  The laird of Ackergill stood before her with an icy expression void of the warmth he’d shown when he’d embraced her last night.

  Fear iced her skin and made her shake.

  Hamish forced her to her knees. They cracked on the floor so hard she had to blink back tears. The guard pressed her shoulders to hold her down as Hamish handed Steafan the box. The laird inspected it for a long minute during which her heart drummed with terror. He gave special attention to the inscription on the bottom.

  “Curious,” he muttered to himself. “How does it open?”

  She shook her head, trying to convey that she didn’t know.

  Steafan put the box on his desk and took two brisk strides to bring himself so close his kilt brushed her nose. Tears filled her eyes as he pulled his sgian dubh from its sheath.

  So this was it. She was about to die at the hands of a paranoid Highland laird. Her parents would never know what happened to her. She would never meet her precious baby. Darcy would hate himself for failing to protect her. She didn’t blame him for this, but she knew him well enough by now to figure he’d blame himself.

  Steafan put the tip of the blade against her cheek. “Are ye a witch or no?” he asked bluntly.

  She tried to say no past the handkerchief. Tears freely flowed down her cheeks. Craning her neck to look up the laird’s imposing body, she searched for a flicker of reason in his eyes, finding only cold calculation.

  Without warning, the dirk moved. She cringed, waiting for the sting of a cut. But no sting came. Instead, the gag fell away. She spat out the soaked wad of fabric in her mouth, licked her lips and said, “I’m not. I swear to you I’m not a witch.”

  “Explain the box, then.”

  She paused, undecided as to whether to tell the truth or try to make something up, aware her life meant little to the man frowning down at her. “A forgery,” she said.

  “Lie,” he said. “Hamish.”

  The enforcer stepped up and slapped her solidly across the cheek. The blow whipped her head around and left the side of her face numb.

  Stunned by the quick violence, she stared into Hamish’s black eyes.

  “Explain the box,” Steafan repeated, but she hardly heard him.

  “Why did you hit me?” she asked, in a daze of shock. She had never been hit by a man before, had never been hit by anyone before. It rocked the foundation of her con
fidence. She felt shattered. She felt alone.

  Some fundamental part of her cried out for Darcy. She desperately wanted to rebuild herself in the comforting circle of his arms. “I want my husband,” she whispered.

  “You’ll nay be married much longer,” Steafan said, nodding to Aodhan as he entered the room.

  Aodhan’s blue eyes found her kneeling on the floor and widened with concern before settling into guarded indifference.

  “Her silence is as good as a confession,” Steafan said. “I willna suffer a Keith to remain married to a witch. Bring the contract that it might burn along with her.

  “A few more questions, lass, and I’ll have Hamish see ye to the dungeon, where ye can pray for your soul ’til nightfall.”

  * * * *

  Darcy pulled the door on the grain chute to send the coarse kernels hissing onto the grinding stage. Sweat dripped from his brow to sting his eyes as he worked with more haste than usual, eager to return to Fraineach and discuss with Malina how they might return her home. But the mill was no place for distracting thoughts. He’d already nearly caught his plaid in the winch when he’d hoisted the day’s second bag of raw bere to the grinding floor. The last thing he needed was to injure himself and thus fail the woman relying on him. So focused was he on his task he hardly heard Edmund’s call above the music of the cogs.

  “Darcy! Tallock’s backing his wagon in! Send down the hooks!”

  He did as his brother asked, then climbed down the ladder to greet Tallock and help the Wick farmer unload his supply. He’d hardly set foot on the dirt floor when Fran came whipping in like a stiff wind, and threw herself into his arms.

  “Melanie,” she managed between panting breaths. As her chest rose and fell, he realized her bairn was pressed between them as well as a meal sack meant for Edmund. “Hamish. Dragging her to the keep.”

  His body went tight with readiness. He tensed to flee after his wife, but Edmund’s hand fell on his arm.

  “What’s this about, lass?” he asked, guiding Fran from Darcy’s arms to his own. “Slow down. Tell us what happened? Why are ye breathing like a mare run twenty leagues?”

  “Coming up the path,” Fran gasped, looking back and forth between them like a weathervane in an indecisive gale. “Saw Hamish and Glen. Pulling Melanie along. I hid behind the cart so Hamish wouldna see me, but I saw them through the tack. They have her gagged! She fell, and Hamish pulled her up none too gently and tore your mother’s fine gown, and poor Melanie popped out of the top. And Hamish has a lump of somat under his plaid. Looks mayhap like a box of some sort.”

  His vision went red with fury. Hamish had mistreated his wife! His heartbeat pumped in his ears, deafening him to whatever Fran said after she took a mighty gulp of air. Leaving Fran to Edmund, he sprinted from the mill.

  “Hail, Big Darcy,” Tallock greeted as he spun the farmer around in his haste to get to the keep.

  “Edmund will see to you, Tallock,” he called, not slowing.

  His gaze fixed on the keep. His stomach lurched with dread as he pushed his legs to run faster. His Malina was being treated like a criminal and not twelve hours after Steafan had married them and granted her the protection of the Keith. His uncle was feared for his swift changes in mood, but this was strange even for him. What had caused the paranoid bugger to turn on Malina in the span of a single night?

  He remembered Fran saying Hamish had somat under his plaid, somat in the shape of a box. The memory collided with another. The faint trace of rosy scent he’d noticed in the tack room last night when he’d found Malina’s box on the floor.

  The box hadn’t merely fallen from his saddlebag, as he’d assumed. Someone had found it and dropped it. Someone who tended to be in the stables at odd hours, who smelled like perfume, and who liked to stir up trouble.

  Anya.

  Snarling, he stormed through the keep’s doors and made straight for Steafan’s office, taking the stairs three at a time. Bursting through the closed door, he was met with a sight that turned the red rage of his vision to a fiery blaze. Glen had Malina on her knees, and Hamish stood ready to strike her. Tears streaked her face and one of her eyes was swollen shut. In her struggles, one of her breasts had spilled from the low neckline of her dress. One sleeve hung by mere threads.

  In Steafan’s hands was Malina’s box.

  “Release her!” he shouted, advancing on Glen.

  “Easy, lad,” said a voice behind him. Aodhan. “’Tis just talking the laird wants with your wife. Isna that so, Steafan?”

  “Aye,” Steafan said. “I have some questions for her. Questions she willna answer to my satisfaction, and Hamish has been good enough to persuade her. Hamish, again.”

  Hamish cuffed her across the cheek, his hand spanning from her reddened jaw to her swollen eye.

  His wee bride cried out as the slap echoed through the room.

  He tensed to lunge, but Aodhan caught his arm. “Calm yourself,” he whispered urgently. “Dinna make this worse. If Steafan makes me bind ye, ye willna be able to help her.”

  He froze as Aodhan’s words sunk in. Growling sounded from somewhere, and he realized it came from him.

  “Easy,” Aodhan rumbled, his fingers digging into his arm. “Answer the question, lass,” he said to Malina. “Answer and Hamish willna strike ye again.”

  “Fail to answer truthfully,” Steafan said, “and ’twill be fists next.”

  “I already answered,” she said, and her voice was steady and strong despite her trembling. His poor Malina. He shouldna have left her at Fraineach alone. He should have hid the box better. Christ, he shouldna have been so absent-minded as to leave the box in the stables for anyone to spy. He’d let his desire to make her comfortable in their home distract him from keeping her safe.

  “I told you the truth,” she insisted. “I’m not a witch, and I don’t do magic. I don’t know how to open the box. It’s not even mine. I’m just taking care of it for someone.”

  Steafan’s eyes darted to Hamish, as if he were about to command more violence.

  “’Tis not hers,” Darcy found himself saying. “The box is mine, and the date is merely a forgery. A simple matter of changing a one to a four.” His heart slammed against his breastbone at the lie, but it was for Malina. It was to spare her from his uncle’s suspicions.

  Steafan’s gaze snapped to him. “You never could lie well, lad. Stop defending the wench. She is nothing to you. Had I kent she was a witch, I wouldna have wed you. Hamish, fists.”

  “No!” he shouted. “I lied, but Malina is telling the truth.” When Steafan held up a finger to stay Hamish’s ready fist, he pressed on. “I found the box where I found her on Berringer’s field. By the marker. She isna a witch. I’ll swear to it. Mayhap ’twas magic brought her here, but ’twas nay by her doing.”

  Steafan flicked a look at Hamish, and the brute relaxed his fist.

  He ventured to press his advantage. “Dinna lay another hand on her. She is my wife. A Keith. You married us yourself last night, and I willna agree to a null. And she is with child, damn you. She doesna deserve this. If you must have Hamish using fists, have him use them on me. Malina is my responsibility. I will bear whatever punishment you feel she deserves.”

  “With child?” Steafan sneered. “A bastard child? What is that to me? And will you bear a burning on a pile of tinder for her? ’Tis what any witch deserves and well you ken it. The longer we abide her presence in our midst, the more her wicked spirits will seek to ruin us.”

  “I’m not a witch,” Malina said faintly. “Oh, God. This can’t be happening.”

  His uncle had that gleam in his eye that meant reason was leaving him. The first time the laird had gotten that look had been after Creag Kirk, just before he’d tortured to death with his own hands the traveler to whom he’d granted hospitality but had turned out to be an English spy. Not a dwelling in Ackergill had escaped the grief of the two-day skirmish that spy had instigated, and the keep was no exception. Steafan lost his brot
her, Darcy’s da, and his son, aged sixteen years, born him by his wife, Darla, who had died of grief soon after. Since then, Steafan had become overly protective of the clan. Any threat, real or merely perceived, was dealt with swiftly and decisively, to the extent where Darcy feared innocent men had suffered unfairly at the laird’s hand. But so far, no woman had been slain. Beaten, aye. Humiliated in the stocks, aye. Imprisoned in the dungeons, aye. But now Steafan was threatening a woman who was neither a stranger nor a threat. A woman who carried a precious, vulnerable bairn.

  A woman who had caused his heart to sprout the first tender shoots of love.

  He could answer that he was willing to burn in Malina’s place, but he kent Steafan wouldn’t be swayed from what he thought must be done. The gleam in his eye meant his mind was fixed and there would be no talking him out of it.

  At his silence, Steafan told Hamish, “Put her in the dungeon. Prepare the pyre and alert the village. We will light the lawn of Ackergill Keep tonight with the spirit purging of a witch.”

  Darcy glanced over his shoulder at Aodhan. An understanding cut between them. Once Malina was under guard in the dungeon, he would be powerless to rescue her. ’Twould have to be now or never.

  Aodhan afforded the smallest of nods.

  He sprang forward and swept his wife up in his arms, tearing her from Glen’s grasp. Cradling her to his chest, he ran.

  Steafan’s shouts and Hamish’s surprised stammering sounded behind him on the stairs. As he threw himself into the daylight, the last things he heard from within the keep were Aodhan’s raised voice and then Steafan yelling, “I’ll burn whomever I wish!”

  Flying down the steps of the keep, he nearly collided with Edmund, who was leading a trotting Rand up the road.

  “Best hurry,” Edmund said as he took Malina from him so he could mount.

  Once in the saddle, he drew Malina up to sit before him.

  “There’s food in the bags and a wee bit of coin,” Edmund said. “I’ll mind the mill for ye, brother.”

  His chest tightened as Edmund slapped Rand’s rump. Steafan’s shouts meant he and the others had emerged from the keep.