by Alisa Adams
Rane did not say anything for a long moment as he held her in his arms, loving the feel of her there. He had a smile on his face as he looked at his men. They were grinning back at him.
“Aye, my love, there were horses from the San Gabriel. However, about there being no treasure?” He paused. “That...isnae...exactly true…” Rane said slowly.
Gillis stilled in his arms. She slowly looked up at him with her mouth open.
Rane looked down at her and smiled.
He put a finger to his lips.
Behind him his men started laughing and cheering.
Rane pulled Gillis closer and kissed her deeply as she wrapped her arms tightly around him.
This love they had found with one another was all the treasure that mattered to either of them.
20
The wedding was extravagant.
Gillis and Aria were in gowns made of the finest silk as they walked among the guests in the great hall. Their husbands talked with their men, all of whom were dressed in black, of course.
Rane stole a glance at his wife as she talked to his men. Her gown shimmered in the candlelight. It was a soft silver color, matching her eyes, He saw the glint of fine silver thread that was embroidered throughout the silver, silk skirts, and tightly-fitting bodice and sleeves. What he thought was embroidered vines were tiny horses galloping all over the silk in elaborate, matching embroidery. Gillis looked over at him and smiled. Her grey eyes shone with love.
Rane smiled back at her.
She was radiant.
She was everything.
The hall was crowded with guests from all over the Highlands, it seemed. He would never have guessed that her family was so large.
Rane was interested in finally meeting the infamous four Ross sisters, who were his wife’s’ cousins. They brought their children with them, a small army of little boys and little girls. The women and their husbands were most interested in the Kinloch horses. Rane was thrilled to discuss some cross-breeding with their Clydesdales, and some of the other horses, including the big, black Frisian warhorse stallions that Gillis’s friends Kaithria, Swan, Cat, and Neely brought.
Overall, he was tremendously pleased to be part of this very large family, all of whom were horse lovers like himself, and Gillis, of course, who was most interested in keeping them all healthy.
Aunt Hextilda approached him with two other older women that looked to be her own age. One of them was actually, impossibly, smaller than Hextilda. The other was almost as tall as he was.
“Rane,” Hextilda called out as she came closer. She turned to the two women with her. “I would like tae introduce ye tae Gillis’s other aunts. This is Burunhild MacDonell and Agnes Gunn,” she announced.
Rane bowed over the hand of each of the two older women. Aunt Agnes Gunn was a tall, imposing woman with pitch-black hair. She spoke in a high voice and wore a gown with a high lace collar. She giggled when he had bowed over her hand. Then she narrowed her eyes and looked down her nose at him. She slowly pulled an ornate, delicate little white pipe out of her skirt pocket. The tiny ceramic bowl was sculpted to look like a lady’s hand holding a bowl of tobacco. She stuck the pipe in the side of her lips as she looked him up and down.
“Is it true ye almost got our Gillis killed, young man?” she said in a high-pitched, nasally voice.
Hexy nudged her elbow hard in Agnes’s ribs. “Wheest, ye old windbag! Smoke yer pipe and wheesht!”
Agnes peered down at Hextilda. “Dinnae be calling me a windbag, ye wee elf!”
Hextilda sighed and pulled the smaller of the two women forward. “Burnie?” she shouted. “This is Gillis’s new husband,” she said loudly into the tiny woman’s’ ear.
Burnie turned and looked at Hexy. Her hair was so thin that Rane could see the pink of her scalp in between the sparseness of the white hairs that stuck up randomly in quivering little spirals on her head. There were brown aging spots here and there on the pinkness of her round scalp, which reminded him of a fragile bird's egg.
“Her new husband, Hexy?” Burnie asked with confusion. “Did she have an old husband, then?” Burnie turned to look at Rane. “Ye are vera handsome!”
Rane stared down at the tiny woman. He noticed something moving under her shawl. “Aunt Burnie?” he spoke loudly. “Do ye have a small dog ye carry with ye, as Hextilda does?”
Burnie looked back at him and smiled. “Och, nay. George is a cat,” she said with a pleased smile. She reached under her shawl to pull the cat out. She held him up for Rane to see. The cat let out a loud, tragic-sounding mewl as it dangled there in her hands.
“Burnie! Nay! I told ye not tae bring George!” Aunt Hexy cried just as Duke let out a loud yap and scrambled out of her shawl.
Rane watched with a large grin as the ugliest cat he had ever seen leaped out of Burnie’s hands to run across the great hall. The cat seemed to be missing quite a bit of fur on parts of its body. Its tail was bent at an odd angle and tied with a pretty piece of fabric that seemed to be an effort to hold the tail straight but obviously was not working.
Hexy’s tiny little dog, Duke, took off after the cat, yipping and yapping gleefully. Rane heard another dog bark. This one had a deep, loud bark. He saw a huge, greyish dog the size of a small pony scooting around and through the legs of the crowd to join Duke.
Someone shouted, “Beans! Come back here!” and then several children were running after the large dog who was running after the small dog, who was running after the cat. Quite a few adults joined in the pursuit as well.
Rane could not help but laugh.
He happened to look over and his eyes met his wife’s. She was laughing as well. His beautiful new wife beckoned mischievously to him from where she stood amidst the crowd of people celebrating in the candlelight great hall. They stared at each, as if no one else was there. Not barking dogs or mewling cats or laughing, boisterous children.
Rane’s attention was broken by a smallish figure near her. It was Pilop, hovering behind her. His head was wrapped in a bandage and his eyes were still black and blue. He proudly wore a Kinloch black kilt and boots with a black jacket and a clean white shirt. Once he had healed a bit, he had dedicated himself to being Gillis’s private guard, whether she or Rane wanted him to. The small man swore he would make sure that nothing ever happened to her ever again. He was a man bent on earning forgiveness. Rane had not been confident that he should not go to gaol, but Gillis had argued for him. She had said that Pilop had never harmed any of the horses and had no part in Mr. Nisbit’s death. Like Mr. Nisbit and even Gillis herself, poor Pilop had been threatened and beaten to go along with evil Ingelram’s plans. Rane watched as Pilop glared at anyone who came too close to Gillis; his hand was on the small sword at his side as he puffed out his chest and strutted proudly behind the new Lady MacLeod.
Rane grinned and headed in Gillis’s direction. As he did so, he walked past Aria and Gaufid, who could not keep their hands off each other. He whispered to his brother that perhaps Gaufid should take his new wife to their bedchamber. He clapped him on the shoulder and grinned, stating that there were small children in the hall. Then he laughed and winked and continued on.
Rane’s eyes went back to his wife as he walked towards her, holding her eyes captive as he walked past his men who were intent on congratulating him, trying to stop him to talk to him and offer him a cup of ale. Instead, Rane just smiled and continued straight to her. When he reached her, he held his hand out to her. She stared up at him with a blissfully happy smile and placed her hand instantly in his, closing her fingers around his hand with a sigh.
“Greetings, Husband,” Gillis said to him in a husky, playful voice. She ran her hand down the lapel of his black jacket. He looked so handsome in his black kilt and tall boots and black velvet jacket. With his dark hair and dark eyes, her husband stood out in the room, and not because of the width of his broad shoulders or chest or that he stood taller than the rest. There was something about him, some confident air tha
t all recognized that this man was a leader of men. She sighed and felt fire race through her as she admired her husband.
“Greetings, Wife,” Rane said back to her. He looked at Pilop, who stood behind her, shadowing her. “I shall guard her now, Pilop. Thank ye.” Rane nodded to the small man. “Go have some food and drink. Enjoy.”
Rane closed his fingers around his wife’s hand and led her up the stairs.
“Tonight we have our wedding night in our bedchamber,” he said to her as they walked along the upper hallway. “But I thought we would take a trip tae Smoo Cave tomorrow and spend some time under that waterfall…”
Rane stopped at the door to their bedchamber and pulled her into his arms. He took her lips with his and kissed her long and deep and thoroughly. The fire within his body reached out and enveloped her.
Gillis strained up towards him, wanting more of him. More of his lips, his arms, his chest—everything.
She wanted it all.
Gillis looked up at him with a grin. “Can we go inside our bedchamber, my love? I believe I just saw Aunt Hexy and that elegant-looking older warrior sneaking towards her bedchamber.” She giggled as Rane stared wide-eyed, seeing the older couple scamper down the hall as well. He pulled her inside their room and back into his arms.
“Husband, I should like to visit Smoo Cave vera much,” Gillis said with a sigh as she pulled her lips from his, “but I think we will be remaining in our bedchamber for the next few days…” She grinned as she reached up and pulled him back down for another kiss.
Rane backed her towards the bed until they fell on it together.
Indeed, they did not come out of their bedchamber for several days...
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The preview of my next book!
The Spanish ship San Gabriel
Around 150 years ago
Off the coast of Kinlochervie, Northwest Highlands
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The storm raged as if it was a woman screaming, dying in pain and anger at the injustices of the world. Her dying voice was heard in the winds moaning and keeling. Her tears were the rain that battered the lonely ship that fought through the stormy sea. The waves lifted the ship higher and higher and then tossed it back down into the dark trough of the sea. The angry storm would not give up the ship. She was intent on breaking it, and smashing it upon the rocks of the shore.
The young girl clutched the black horse’s neck fearfully as she stared around the dimly lit lower deck of the ship. A single lantern hung from a wooden beam and swung wildly with the tossing of the ship, making grotesque shadows along the floors, walls, and on the horses themselves.
Each of the horses was tied in narrow, low-walled boxes with barely any room to move about. They were screaming and tossing their heads as they struggled to keep their footing as the ship rode up and down the huge waves.
The ship suddenly teetered left and then right as it fought to stay upright, making loud groans and moans as the wooden sailing vessel fought the waves of the raging sea.
The young girl's heart raced with fear at the sudden sharp sound of a deafening loud crack as wood snapped. A loud crashing boom followed as another mast crashed and fell onto the deck of the ship.
The girl could hear the shouts coming from the decks above her. Voices of her home country and voices of the rolling burr of her mother's country. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut as she buried her face in her horse’s familiar-smelling fur.
They had taken him—her mother’s beautiful black horse. They had killed her mother when she tried to stop them and she had watched it all. When they had turned their lustful eyes on her, she had fled. When they left, the young girl had followed them, sneaking onto this ship to find a way to free her horse and bring him back home. They had had no right to take him. The army needs him, they had said. But he is not a warhorse! she had pleaded to their deaf ears. They were taking him far north. To Scotland, they had said.
The young girl looked down at all the gold necklaces hanging around her neck. More filled her pockets. She had found them on the ship and taken them. It serves those men right, for killing my mother and taking her horse, she thought. Then she looked down further to her feet with horror. The water was coming in; it was up to her ankles, soaking the bottom of her gown.
We are sinking!
She looked around frantically. She must free the horses. She could not let them drown. She scurried around, desperate to keep her balance on the tossing ship as she untied each horse. She opened the back of each makeshift narrow stall and then hurried back to her black horse. She climbed onto his back and clutched its mane as he nickered back to her. She hugged him tightly and closed her eyes as the ship rode the next wave up, up, and then hurtling back down, and twirling sideways.
It felt like they were falling from the sky.
And then there was a crash, so loud, so ear-splitting that the horses’ screams were drowned out as the ship broke apart as it was smashed against the rocks. Water began pouring in the side of the vessel where the jagged planks were split open and broken apart. The ship was then pushed sideways with another horrible cracking sound, and the hole opened up wider.
She looked at the water spewing angrily into the ship, swirling around the horses. Above her, she heard the screaming of the men on the decks. She then heard the commanding voice of the captain telling the men to stay calm, to free the horses, and get the gold to the cave near the harbor.
“Now!” she pleaded with her horse. “We must go now!”
He took her direction, struggling out of his narrow confinement, swimming through the swirling waters and out towards the jagged hole in the side of the ship. She looked out into the black waters where angry waves frothed and foamed in the open sea. So this is Scotland, she thought to herself.
And now she knew where the gold would be hidden if she needed more than what she had already taken!
She took one look back and saw that several of the horses were following her.
“Jump!” she ordered her horse.
She squeezed her eyes shut and clung tightly to his neck as she felt him bunch his muscles and launch them out into the waves.
Just as they jumped out, before she had closed her eyes, she caught a glimpse of the rugged cliffs of the shoreline.
Aye, she thought, so this is Scotland, the land of my mother…
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Afterword
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Beasts of the Highlands
Book #1
Highlander’s Lionheart
Book #2
Highlander’s Scarred Angel
Book #3
Highlander’s Wounded Beast
Book #4
Highlander’s Fierce Wolf
Book #5
Highlander’s Heart of Steel
Book #6
Highlander’s Golden Jewel
Book #7
Highlander’s Venomous Snake
Book #8
Taming a Highland Stallion (this book)
Want more romance?
Turn the page to read the prologue of Catriona’s
story in “Highlander’s Venomous Snake.”
Prologue
Sanside House
Western Caithness
Scottish Highlands
1700s
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Summer...
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“What are ye doing in my bedchamber?” Lady Catriona MacKay croaked weakly in alarm from where she lay in her bed.
She tried in vain to summon the strength to sit up to stop the intruder, but when she was unable to do that she bit her lower lip, looking around the room. Seeing nothing helpful, she tried to pull herself up by holding onto the bed coverings, but even that small movement took too much energy. Sweat poured down her face. She reached around her bed for something, anything. She grabbed a pillow and tried to throw it at the tall, dark Highlander with the straight, shoulder-length black hair and tawny, golden-brown eyes coming towards her bed.
Caden Zahrah Keith kicked the pillow away. It had been a feeble throw that had landed on the floor.
