by Carol Arens
Author Note
Prologue
‘Come with me!’ Athdar called out like the commander of his father’s warriors would. With his wooden sword brandished high in the air, he pointed deeper into the forest and nodded. ‘Our enemies have taken to the woods!’
Athdar led his friends, two his cousins and two the sons of a villager, all almost the same age as him, through the thick growth of trees and bushes. Following the rough path along the river, he sought any sign of movement deep in the shadows.
There! Something moved and he called out orders once more. Deer or some other wild animal—it mattered not to him what the target—scampered ahead of them as the sun’s light flickered through the leaves and branches above them. Laughing, they followed the sounds ahead of them as the creature outraced them. After some time and distance, the sound of the river quieted, telling Athdar that their path had changed. Glancing around, he realised that nothing looked familiar to him. Athdar paused for a moment and then raced off, calling for the others to follow him. Without warning, he reached a small clearing bordered by a gully, a remnant of the river’s previous path, that blocked their way.
He was tall enough, strong enough, a good runner and jumper, to make it across so he speeded up and crossed the pit with little effort. Skidding to a stop on the other side, he landed in a pile of leaves and quickly stood up.
‘Come now!’ he called out. ‘It is not wide enough to stop us.’
As the chief’s son, Athdar was used to being in charge and making the decisions for his ragtag collection of friends and followers. He waved them on now, waiting for them to obey.
‘Are you afraid to jump?’ he asked, challenging them to the edge. ‘Get a running start and you will make it.’ He saw the uncertainty on their faces and would not allow that to ruin their adventure.
‘Cowards!’ he shouted at them. ‘Only cowards would disobey their chief.’ The words burned his mouth as he said them, but he knew his friends only needed some encouragement to do as he did and cross the gully.
Athdar watched as they nudged each other, nodding and backing up to get a good running start to their jump. Smiling, he crossed his arms over his chest the way his father often did and waited for them to reach his side. One and then another soared into the air above the deep gash in the ground....
Their cries turned to screams as they plummeted down into the dark crevasse below them. Athdar watched in horror as the screams faded into a deathly silence. Only the sound of his breathing broke that stillness as he crept over to the side and peered down.
The bottom lay about twenty feet below him and his friends lay strewn across the small floor of the gully. Even his seven-year-old mind understood some were dead and the others badly injured. Arms and legs and heads twisted to impossible angles foretold of much sorrow.
He was the cause of this! Searching through his sack, he looked for the rope he always carried and could not find it. More soil loosened as he crept to the edge once more and poured down on his friends. A faint cough told him that someone yet lived. Shaking, he called out names until Robbie groaned back.
‘Robbie! I am coming down!’ he said, easing his legs over the side and planning to slide the rest of the way down to his friends.
This was his fault. His fault. He must help them.
‘Stay,’ Robbie moaned out. ‘Ye’ll be of no help if you get trapped here.’
Athdar paused, grabbing on to the exposed roots of a tree to keep from sliding down into the pit. ’Twas true. Without the means to pull his friends up, he was of no help. The winds rustling through the trees reminded him of the time passing. Soon it would be dark and new dangers would arise.
‘I will go for help,’ he called out in a loud voice. When no sound answered, he called out again, ‘Robbie! I will go for help!’
Gathering up his sack, Athdar glanced around, trying to get his bearings. They’d run through the forest from east to west. Or had they? Now, it all looked the same and he took deep breaths, trying to keep the panic at bay.
He had to find his way back home. He had to get help. He had to...
Athdar ran, ducking through the low branches, seeking the edge of the river.
* * *
It took him hours to find it and then he could not tell which direction was home. Every time he grew too afraid or too tired, he thought about his friends at the bottom of the gully and ran on. Night fell while he searched for home and he collapsed at some point, sleeping a few hours before waking and continuing on.
* * *
Daybreak found him no closer to finding home or help and he gave in to the terror and the guilt and cried for his friends.
And that’s when his father and uncle came charging through the forest on their horses. In a matter of hours, Athdar had managed to lead them back to the place where his friends lay injured and then he watched as the men in his clan rescued Robbie and the others from the ground below.
It was terrible. His heart hurt as each one was carried out. Only one moved and the silence as the boys were examined tore him apart. Soon, the completely desolate group made their way back to the keep.
Though the parents mostly whispered about the terrible accident, Athdar knew the truth—this was his doing. He had killed his friends just as much as if he’d pushed them from a cliff. For he had pushed them—with words, with insults—using their pride to edge them to the end and fling them into the darkness of the earthen pit. And when he could have saved them, he’d stumbled in the forest, losing his way and wasting precious hours that could have meant saving their lives.
And, even if no one pointed an accusing finger at him, he saw the sidelong glances and questioning stares as three of his friends were buried. He heard the whispered doubts about his part in it and wanted to scream out his guilt. But his father and mother tried to convince him it was not his fault and it had not happened the way he said it had. It was a terrible accident to be put behind him. A horrible event which would fade in time.
* * *
And it did. No one ever mentioned it—his father, the laird, forbade it. No one mentioned the children who had died or their parents who had moved away or the injuries to the other one who had survived. No one asked too many questions and Athdar was told relentlessly he must push it all away. In time, all thoughts and memories of it and those friends faded, until, within a few years, it was a muted, empty part of his past.
A part he no longer remembered.
But someone remembered.
Someone mourned their loss and sought solace in the madness brought by the sheer anguish and pain of it.
And that someone decided to seek justice against the one responsible, even if he did not remember.
Someone remembered.
Chapter One
Lairig Dubh, Scotland—AD 1375
‘Look! Look! There he is.’
The excited whisper drew Isobel’s attention. Her friend Cora rarely took notice of the opposite sex, so this was something different, something special. She turned to see who her friend was watching.
Athdar MacCallum, brother of the laird’s wife Jocelyn, strode through the yard, heading for the keep. From the decisive way he walked, looking neither right nor left, he had business with the laird and would not be slowed from his task. Still, he was a fine-looking man to gaze upon.
‘He is leaving to return home,’ she said. At Cora’s questioning frown, she nodded. ‘My father mentioned it this morn.’
‘Will he be here for the evening meal, do you think?’ Cora asked, watching her closely for her reply.
Isobel wanted to show her excitement much as Cora did, but she held back. If she showed her interest in Athdar, word would make it back to her father and then trouble would begin. Just mentioning his name usually caused her father to look extremely bothered. And bothered wa
s not something she, or anyone, wanted her father to be.
The half-Norse, half-Scottish natural son of the Earl of Orkney did not suffer fools easily and at some time in the past, before even her birth, Athdar had done something very foolish and her father would never let it go. It mattered not that Athdar had been young and tended towards brash acts. It mattered not that he had suffered for his misjudgement. And it mattered not that the result had brought Jocelyn MacCallum to Lairig Dubh as the laird’s wife. All that mattered to her father was that Athdar’s character was lacking then and possibly still. Isobel turned away from the path and faced Cora.
‘I know not, Cora. I do not keep watch over his comings and goings.’
Though she would if she could.
As Isobel had watched her various cousins being matched and married these last couple of years and as she’d reached what she considered a marriageable age, the only man who had caught her attention was Athdar. Oh, it had nothing to do with his strong, muscled body or his piercing brown eyes or the way his long, brown hair framed the masculine angles of his face. Dabbing at the perspiration on her forehead with the back of her hand, Isobel realised she’d noticed his physical attributes much too much!
There was also the fact that he intrigued her. Always respectful of her, he spoke to her as though she had a mind and did not shy away from her as all the other men did. Someone who would stand up to her father was not a bad thing. He was a fair and competent man, according to the earl. Compassionate, according to his sister.
And Isobel could sense the pervasive sadness that lived within him and it called to something deep within her soul—she needed to be the one who gave him solace. Rather than drive or scare her away from him, it appealed to her. She shivered now as she glanced at him again.
Cora noticed her reaction, for her friend squinted and stared at her face. Then the girl smiled and nodded.
‘I think you are not so unaffected as you want me to believe, Isobel.’
‘Cora, he is kin through my father,’ she offered, hoping Cora would allow the issue to settle. Wiping her damp hands on her gown, she tossed her hair over her shoulders and took her friend’s hand. ‘Come, we have tasks to see to before dinner, whether Athdar attends or not.’
That had been a near thing. Her friend wisely let the subject drop though the man walked half the yard ahead of them as they also headed for the keep. Her mother was attending Lady Jocelyn in the solar and that gave her the reason to follow him inside. Her heart raced in her chest and she tried to keep the anticipation of speaking to him under control...and she might have if someone had not called out his name from behind her. Athdar paused and turned to see who had called out to him. As he did that, his gaze, those intense, brown eyes, fell on her.
Any attempt to continue to behave as though his attention was usual or customary in her life dissolved away when he winked and then smiled at her. She stopped where she stood and tried to remember to breathe. Cora had not been looking so she continued forwards a step or two before realising she’d left Isobel behind. Isobel forced a breath in and out and then glanced back, returning his smile. She was trying to think of something pithy to say to him when Ranald brushed by and stepped between them.
‘I am working in the practice yard, Dar,’ Ranald called out. ‘Come there when ye finish with the laird.’
Isobel watched as Athdar waved to Ranald, nodded his agreement and then turned to enter the keep. Ranald greeted both of them and then went back to the yard. Cora’s gaze followed his every step until Isobel cleared her throat to gain her attention. The blush that crept up her friend’s cheeks must be similar to the one she could yet feel heating her own. She waved her friend along, not commenting on Ranald’s obvious appeal to Cora.
As they entered and walked the corridor to the lady’s solar, Isobel decided that she would find a way to watch the two men practice in the yard later. Surely Cora would accompany her on her mission.
* * *
Athdar swore under his breath as he walked ahead of the two young women into the dark stone keep to find his brother-by-marriage. He had to meet with Connor and several of his advisors over changes to their plans. As he nodded to those he knew, he cursed himself for his stupidity. Smiling and winking at Isobel? Truly, he was wanting in the head to do such a thing in front of others.
Nay, to do such a thing at all.
Isobel was Rurik’s daughter and if Rurik learned of any attention paid by him to her the man would have his head...or nether parts! He’d already faced death at Rurik’s hands once before and he never intended to do that again, not even for the lovely Isobel.
Damn his eyes, but she was a beauty! He’d watched as she’d grown from gangly girl to this stunning young woman of confidence and intelligence. Her parents had seen her educated as most of those in the MacLeries’ immediate families were. And like many of the other girls and women, they had been encouraged to know and speak their minds. Most unusual, he knew, but here in his brother-by-marriage’s keep and village it all seemed the norm.
He sought the chamber that Connor used as a workroom and found him there with several others he knew. As they began their discussion, Athdar found his thoughts distracted by a heart-shaped face surrounded by pale blond curls and the blue-green eyes that were ever filled with merriment when they met his. And the full, pink lips that tempted him to madness. His body went along with these thoughts and reacted in surprising manner. Athdar shifted in his chair, gaining Connor’s attention.
‘Are you well?’ Connor asked, offering him a cup of wine.
‘I am,’ he replied, taking a mouthful of wine to give him a moment to focus his thoughts on the business at hand and not on the lovely and forbidden Isobel. ‘About the preparations for winter?’
Try as he might, even as Connor went back to explaining their plans, and his clan’s part in them, Athdar thought about Isobel.
And the fruitlessness of any interest he might have in her.
Glancing around the chamber and realising that most of those there were happily married, he felt the heartache pierce through him as it always did.
Happy, he might be, but married he would never be again.
The disasters of his previous marriages and the most recent betrothal had made his decision for him—he would not subject any woman to the dangers of marrying him.
Especially not the lovely Isobel.
The tragedies of his past would haunt his every day and night, but he would not risk someone as precious and vibrant as her to the chance that he was truly cursed.
Some would laugh and call him foolish. People died. Women died, especially in childbirth or such manner. But then they would recall that he’d lost two wives to death, a betrothed to an accident and two possible wives to the fear of all that would befall them if their fathers agreed to matches with him.
So, in spite of any desire he had to find a wife and have a family as these men had, Athdar understood that the fates stood against him. Standing and walking to the window, he listened and replied to Connor from there.
As though his thoughts had conjured her up, Rurik’s daughter passed into his view as she walked through the yard in the direction of the practice yards. She and her friend had their heads close together, conspiring no doubt on some feminine matter, as they laughed and glanced at the men practising their fighting skills. He emptied the cup and placed it on the nearby tray.
‘I will accept your invitation to stay for a few days, Connor.’ He strode towards the door, ignoring any questioning glances. ‘I must check with my man about some of the supplies we need.’
‘Your sister is in her solar, Dar,’ Connor said.
‘I will seek her out later.’ Lifting the latch on the door, he pulled it open. ‘I will return shortly.’
His feet led him outside before he could consider how strange his behaviour was. Something, someon
e drew him as though a rope connected him with...her. When he realised his dangerous actions—dangerous to his own well-being and hers—he slowed down and sought Ranald instead.
A good fight might beat this madness out of him. It might make him remember his reasons for being here. And his reasons for avoiding marriage completely.
* * *
His plan almost worked, too, until he heard Isobel gasp out his name as he landed face first in the dirt from a well-aimed punch. How was he ever going to ignore her when every fibre of his body and soul wanted to claim her?
* * *
‘Rurik thinks to marry her elsewhere.’
Connor stepped closer, watching the scene in the yard from above—in his favourite place and standing behind his beloved Jocelyn. He leaned nearer, placing his arms on each side of where she stood, and inhaled the scent of whatever she used to wash her hair. His body grew hard just thinking about her...taking a bath...naked. Shaking his head, he laughed at the ever-present temptation she presented to him, regardless of their decades-long marriage and age.
‘Has he finally realised she is of age to marry?’ Jocelyn asked, turning into his arms. ‘He has resisted for a long time.’
‘Two offers have come in recently. We discussed them at length which forced him to accept that it is time.’
‘And you support these matches?’ she asked. A hint of something—suspicion? sarcasm?—entered her voice as she asked.
Connor laughed. ‘Is the game on then, wife?’ Kissing her, he watched as her eyes lit with mischief. ‘So it is, then.’
He released her and looked over the side of the battlements down to the yard. Her brother had left their meeting abruptly and now he fought with one of the younger warriors, Ranald, before a shouting and cheering crowd. Even from this distance, Connor could read the distraction in Dar’s fighting style. And, if he was right, he knew the person causing it.
‘He notices her.’ He felt Jocelyn tense and waited for her to object to his guess. ‘Rurik will not be happy.’
