Night came on quickly, the sky so dark throughout the day it might as well have been night at that. The sight of a few glowing spots of light in the distance was the sweetest thing he could imagine at just that moment, when the notion of another night spent sheltering beneath tree boughs was more than he could take.
“And you’ll like some clean straw and a roof over your head, will ye not?” he asked his horse, patting the beast’s neck. “You’ve done well, and that’s a fact. I’ll see to it ye have plenty to eat tonight.”
The cheerful fires burning bright through windows and half-open doors stirred a longing deep within him that no amount of hot stew or mead could soothe. It was loneliness, no doubt, something he’d never had much time for. Not when there was always so much to be done.
Because he’d never allowed himself to wallow in it before now, he had no way of knowing how to manage it. Pushing it aside seemed the most likely solution—that, he knew how to do. He could push aside a great many things in pursuit of a goal.
The mist turned to a drizzle when he reached the stables on the edge of town, just before buildings began pressing in on each other. “See to it he gets rubbed down well and is kept warm. He’s been out in this muck all day.” William handed the man running the place a few extra coins. “And plenty of oats.”
The inn sat on the other side of a dividing wall, and from outward appearances looked to suit his purposes. The sound of many voices raised in spirited discussion—verging on argument in some corners—told him this might also be a likely place in which to learn anything of interest.
Though he was uncertain just what he ought to listen for. He would know it when he heard it.
If there was anywhere he’d hear something of interest, it would be among a group of men in their cups as they enjoyed supper in the inn’s dining hall.
After securing a room for the night and thanking the gods he’d filled his sporran before leaving home, he settled in at a small table and was instantly treated to a bowl of steaming stew and a flagon of ale. The service was efficient and, he noted as he caught the eye of the comely lass who’d served him, quite bonny. She flashed a hint of a beckoning smile before turning away with a giggle. Perhaps he had stopped at the right place after all.
Och, man, ye can barely hold your head up, he thought with a grimace before tucking into his meal. He would like as not prove a disappointment to her, in the state he was in—if he managed to stay awake. How could a man be so thoroughly exhausted yet not be able to sleep?
A fire blazed along the opposite wall, filling the room with almost suffocating warmth, but William welcomed it as his fingers and toes began to lose their stiffness. Once his hunger and thirst were settled, he turned his attention to the conversation around him.
He was among the Camerons, it would seem, and the MacDonnells. That meant he was near Loch Eil and would not be able to move due south much longer unless he wished to go for a long swim. If she was among any of the outer islands, it would mean paying for passage. The seer had not spoken of islands or water.
Then again, she hadn’t spoken of much in particular. She’d known he was a fool, had she not?
“I heard they were border raiders. A band of gypsies. Ye know how they are.”
William’s attention shifted to a group of men seated near the fire, all of them looking like the sort who enjoyed a good round of gossip. His time among large groups of soldiers taught him that men could be just as loose-tongued as women, sometimes more, under the right circumstances, and from the looks of it, these particular men were near ready to fall from their chairs.
“Aye, I met up with a band of ‘em myself years ago.” One of the men spat on the floor in disgust. “A filthy lot, all of ‘em. Won’t work for what they got. Think they can just steal it from the hardworkin’ folks like us.”
William frowned. He was not overfond of thieves, no matter who they were or where they came from.
“Whatever they got, they deserved it and more,” a third man swore.
“Aye, but they didn’t catch ‘em. They only got one.” A vicious laugh. “And I’m willin’ to wager she got plenty, if ye ken.”
A round of raucous laughter, again with that sharp, vicious edge. Any man who was willing to laugh about a woman being defiled and abused was hardly a man in William’s estimation—though he was quick enough a study of human nature to know that if questioned, the men would claim they hadn’t been speaking of a woman. They’d been speaking of a gypsy.
It turned his stomach.
He kept this and many other thoughts to himself in hopes of listening, instead, wishing one of them would mention a name or a village, anything that would give him a hint as to where to turn. This had to be his lass, it simply had to be. There was too much coincidence involved for it to be anyone else.
And he did not believe in coincidence.
Then again, he’d never believed in the truth of a seer’s word, and look where that had gotten him.
“I knew his da, and he was not a man to be taken lightly.”
William strained to hear, all but climbing over his table to draw nearer the group. If he approached, they would know he had a motive for doing so and would likely close their mouths tight. While half the place could hear them perfectly well, they were too tipsy to know it and would not wish to speak too freely with a stranger in their midst.
“Nay, he was a right bastard if ever there was one. Fightin’ until the day he died, he was, and I recall my mam sayin’ the devil himself would have a time of gettin’ old Angus Stuart to keep from thinkin’ he ran the place.”
The men burst out laughing again, but William did not laugh. Stuart. That would mean Jacob Stuart was the man in question, the one who’d taken a woman from these raiders.
He was not personally acquainted with the man, but he hardly needed to be under the circumstances. The hard-hearted Jacob Stuart was known to most Highlanders by reputation if nothing else.
Was this where he was meant to go? Clan Stuart sat near the Firth of Forth. It would take another few days to reach her, if she was still there at all. What if he didn’t make it in time?
He would know, would he not? Every time he closed his eyes, she would either haunt his dreams or she wouldn’t.
For the first time, he prayed to see her that night.
* * *
Help me. Please, Mother, help me. Spare me this…
His heart pounded at the sound of her voice in the darkness, the air around him still as a shroud. He moved through it with caution, unable to see even where he was about to place his foot. Not so much as a pinpoint of light shone through that impenetrable darkness. When he raised his hand, nothing appeared before his face.
Help me!
“Where are ye?” he called out, but his voice fell flat. Not a breath of air moved. He may as well have screamed a pillow. “Where can I find ye?”
Help… please… hurry…
He woke covered in sweat, sitting halfway up, his chest heaving as he struggled to take a breath. The room was as dark as it had been when he first laid head to pillow. How long ago had it been? Not long enough.
There had been no staying in that dream. That airless, lightless place. Was that where she was, whoever she was? In some dark, lifeless cell or room with no windows? No air?
No, she had not been there.
He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed, knowing that lying back down would be a waste of time by then, and not only because the linens were hopelessly tangled and soaked in sweat which would rapidly cool in the chill night air.
There would be no sleep after hearing her pleas. They tore at him even now, when he was awake and aware and could feel the wooden floor beneath his bare feet and the water in the basin as it splashed his cheeks.
She was still out there somewhere. And she needed him more than ever.
He had only to reach her before it was too late.
4
Shana knew this was coming, didn’t she?
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br /> He would not be satisfied with her living in that cell forever. These weeks had been an effort to wear her down, to make her weak and willing to go along with nearly anything so long as she could be free. Clean. Fed.
To a point, her captor’s efforts had worked. Her body ached terribly from so much time spent curled up on a stone floor. She needed movement, she needed fresh air. Even the act of walking from her cell to wherever it was this Stuart man waited for her was tiring.
She was weak, too, having eaten nothing but bread for the duration of her ordeal. The belted dress of which she had once been so fond—it had shown off her womanly curves quite nicely—now hung on her in great folds and could hardly be mistaken for the lovely, flattering garment it had once been.
Her body was so thin now. Her hair was one great matted mass when once it had shone in lustrous curls of the blackest black, and she had swung her hair from side to side as she’d danced to her brother’s fiddle. How her feet had flown, hands clapping along to the frantic rhythm of Manfri’s playing.
No one would want to see her dance now. No one would even come near enough without shrinking back in revulsion. She did not need a looking glass to know how dreadful she appeared.
Even so, she walked with her head high, as though she were a queen on her way to court.
The pair of guards who’d come to fetch her—she thought she recognized them as the men who’d taken her prisoner, and their knowing smirks only made her more certain—led her up a short flight of stone stairs into a bright courtyard. She cringed, eyes closing against the brightness of the late-day sun.
“A bit bright for ye, eh?” one of the two who led her forward chuckled, tugging the rope which bound her hands. The end of the rope sat in his clenched fist, and he gave her no slack that she might bend her arms and shield her eyes.
She gave no answer, for it did not matter. They knew her eyes hurt and it pleased them, as it would surely please the man to whom she was about to speak. She hadn’t yet met him, but she knew this as well as she knew her own name.
He would take delight in her discomfort, for it would make her more likely to give in to whatever he wanted. He thought she was that easily broken.
He had never met her, or any of her kind, if he believed this.
His home was a castle, or at least it seemed that way to her unskilled eyes. Endless hallways, tapestries and paintings on the walls, vaulted archways. There was no time to see it all, not that she would have had any desire to do so even if she wasn’t being led around by a rope.
They soon came to an open door and walked through without pausing, and she stumbled when the guard holding the rope gave it a jerk—likely for the approval of his master, who sat in a large, wooden chair before a fire.
She was not overly impressed at the first sight of him. He appeared tall, rugged, with broad shoulders and large hands which he busied in toying with a dirk. Threatening her without words, it appeared.
His eyes were the bluest blue and would have been quite striking were it not for their hardness. If they looked upon her with warmth, with tenderness, they might well have taken her breath away. She wondered how many women had fallen under their spell.
His full mouth curved into a smile whose sincerity she nearly believed as the guards pulled her before him. “Here she is,” he murmured. “Our guest.”
“Do you treat all guests as you treat me?” she replied, her tone icy, imperious.
His smile did not falter. “Better or worse, as the case may be. Ye have not found your cell welcoming, I take it?”
“I hardly expect you wished me to.”
“Tis true, I must admit.” He chuckled, and the sound was like warm honey pouring over her. How could he be so cruel yet sound so friendly and kind? “Ye are just as sharp as Alec told me. The old man is a good judge of character, but I thought ye might have worked your charms on him somehow. I was wrong.”
She lifted a shoulder in a shrug and almost wished he would get on with the business of whatever it was he planned to do with her. Waiting and wondering were enough to drive her nearly mad.
“Ye should know ye aren’t the one I’m interested in, and I’m sorry to have reduced ye to such a state.” He leaned on one bent arm, chin in his hand, while he still toyed with the dirk in the other. “They tell me ye were quite a bonny sight when they first found ye. I canna say I see it now.”
“You should have seen me days ago, then.” She smirked, and was rewarded by a sharp tug on her rope.
Jacob glanced at the guard holding the rope and gave a quick shake of his head in admonishment. “Ye ought not be so smart with me,” he muttered. “Or have ye forgotten whose cell you’ve lived in all these weeks?”
“How could I forget?”
“It could get much worse for ye down there. I’ve managed to keep the men away from ye until now, but there’s no telling how long I shall be able to so do.”
“What is it you want from me?” she blurted. “Come on with it, now. We’ve spent enough time staring at one another. Let us get on with it.”
In a flash, he was out of his chair and standing face-to-face with her, making her tilt her head back at an alarming angle to look up into his eyes.
His nose wrinkled. “Ye have a quick tongue, but that tongue might get ye into a great deal of trouble. For no one ever told ye to take care with who ye use that tongue against. I’m the man who holds your life in his hands, and ye dare speak sharply to me? To make demands?”
She couldn’t help shrinking beneath the weight of his rage. He was no longer the honey-voiced serpent waiting to strike. He’d become a bear, a wolf, claws bared and jaws snapping at the thought of tearing her apart.
“How would ye like it if I took that tongue from your filthy mouth?” He held the blade before her, moving it back and forth in a teasing motion. “What would ye think of that?”
She only shook her head while fighting back her tears. There would be no letting him see her cry. She would not allow it.
“I didna think ye would like it much, and it would go against my purposes,” he admitted with a shrug. “I need your tongue in place if you’re to tell me what I wish to know. So I’ll have to think of other places to cut ye, places you’ll wish I hadna cut.” He trailed the blade down the front of her dress, lingering near her breasts before moving lower and coming to a stop below her navel.
Their eyes met again.
He smiled.
Terror chilled her.
“What is your name?”
She stared at him as though she’d lost the ability to hear or speak.
He raised an eyebrow. “Where are your kinsmen?” The question might well have come from a lover, so softly was it spoken. Like a caress. An intimacy.
“I do not know. It’s the truth. How could I know now, that you’ve taken me from them? They might have moved on anywhere.”
“Without ye? Ye mean that little to them?” An edge of distrust and disbelief in his voice. “I doubt it. When more of my men returned to the place where you were found, the camp was gone without a trace. Where were ye planning on moving?”
While she was glad to know they’d escaped so neatly, her heart sank at the thought of them moving on so quickly without her. They had no choice, of course… but they had not come for her, either. Or even tried to. “They never told me of their plans.”
“I dinna believe ye.”
She shrugged. “I have nothing else to say.”
“Nothing?” He tapped the dirk against her stomach. The urge to make water all over the floor and his shoes was almost impossible to fight. How could he inspire such terror with only a simple motion?
In spite of this, she shook her head, her lips pressed together in a thin line.
“We’ll see how ye feel when a few of my men come to visit ye tonight,” Jacob Stuart suggested with a nasty sneer. “They have a way of convincing people to tell me what I wish to know.” He nodded to his men, who jerked Shana away from him and out the door.
&nbs
p; Her blood ran cold, and now tears swam in her eyes as they led her back to her cell. When would they come for her, these men he spoke of?
What would they do?
Her imagination spun terrible images—painful, humiliating. Each was worse than the one before. They would mark her, shame her worse than she’d already been shamed, and they would take pleasure in her pain.
Only when she was alone again did she cry weak, pitiful tears, curled in a ball with her knees against her forehead. Mother Tara, please, help me. Help me.
It felt like ages before the familiar shuffling steps rang out in the otherwise silent dungeon. Alec. She knew his name now.
“Yer supper tray,” he slurred when he reached the cell.
“You must help me.” She struggled to her feet and pressed her face to the wooden stakes. “Please. They’re going to come for me tonight, and I know not what they shall do, but I know they’re going to hurt me. I have nothing to offer them. I know nothing.”
This was not really true, but it may as well have been. She would never tell them what they wished to know, not ever. Not her name, not the names of her family nor where they had intended to move on to after raiding Stuart lands.
She stared at the old man, willing him to believe her.
“Tis none of my affair,” he decided after a long pause—though his hesitation told a different story, and Shana latched onto this slim bit of hope.
“Please, Alec. You must help me.”
His eyes met hers, searching. “How could I help ye?”
“You could let me go. Tell them I pushed you down as you delivered my meal.”
“They’d never believe it.”
“I’ll hit you. Not hard, but enough to make you bleed. Oh, please, please, this is my last chance. At least give me the chance to try. I beg you. Before they hurt me.” Tears streamed down her cheeks now, her voice all but choked with emotion.
He looked around, his tongue darting over his chapped lips. “When ye run, go straight through the courtyard. The door leading out into the woods is direct in front of ye. Just run straight.”
Highland Temptations: Boxed Set: Books 1-3 Page 21
