Return Of The Highlanders: The Guardian Part 30

"One day I'll give ye hours of confession over cups of whiskey, if ye like," Ian said. "But right now I need a different kind of help."

"What kind is that?" the priest asked.

"Are ye on good terms with the MacKinnons?"

"Whether I am or no, I serve all the clans in these parts," Father Brian said with a shrug. "As a matter of fact, I was planning to visit the MacKinnons next, as I do every year."

"Will the MacKinnons let ye into Knock Castle?" Ian asked.

"If they have sins to confess or weddings to be blessed, they'll open their gates to me," Father Brian said. "Why do ye ask?"

Ian's stomach knotted at the priest's mention of weddings to be blessed. He hated to think that Murdoc's plan to wed Sileas to Angus might serve as the key to the gate.

"Murdoc MacKinnon is holding my wife at Knock Castle," Ian said between clenched teeth. "I need to get her out. Will ye help me, Father?"

When the priest did not answer at once, Ian said. "He plans to give her to Angus MacKinnon."

"Ach, not Angus. I've seen what that man has done to young la.s.ses," the priest said, his eyes snapping with anger. "What would ye have me do?"

"We'll talk on the way." Ian hoped a plan would come to him soon. G.o.d had sent him Father Brian, and that was a start.

Ian crossed himself before he left the church. Please, G.o.d, keep her safe until I can get to her.

CHAPTER 36.

Sileas's eyes widened when she saw the woman leaning against the wall by the stairs that led down to the kitchens.

"Dina," she whispered. "What are ye doing here?"

"One of the MacKinnon men took a liking to me," Dina said. "I had nowhere else to go."

"I'm sorry for it." Though Sileas had reason to wish the worst for Dina, she was unhappy to see any woman living in this h.e.l.lhole.

"I am sorry to see ye here as well," Dina said.

"Will ye help me then?"

"I can't get ye out," Dina said. "They're keeping guards at the gate."

"Then I need to find a way to divert them until Ian comes for me," she said.

"You're that sure he'll come for ye?" Dina asked.

"I am."

"I wouldn't have done what I did if I knew ye wanted Ian," Dina said. "Since ye weren't giving him what he wanted, I saw no harm in it."

They were interrupted by Murdoc's bellow from across the hall. "Where's our dinner?"

When his metal cup hit the wall by Sileas's head, she and Dina started down. It was dark on the stairs, but there was light and the sound of voices and pans coming from the kitchen below.

"I have some poison," Dina said close to Sileas's ear.

"Poison?" Sileas halted and turned to stare at Dina. "How did ye get poison?"

"Tearlag gave it to me," Dina said. "I went to see her to ask for a charm before I came here. I didn't tell her where I was going, but she said, A la.s.s as foolish as you is likely to need something stronger than a good luck charm.' "

Dina leaned down and reached into the side of her boot. "That's when she gave me this wee vial. We can pour it in the ale, aye?"

"I don't want to murder them all," Sileas said.

"Tearlag said a drop or two will make a man ill." Dina handed her the vial. "The pitchers of ale will be on a tray by the door. I'll distract the men in the kitchen while ye do it."

"How will ye do that?"

Dina laughed. "You'll see. Nothing could be easier."

Sileas followed Dina under the low vaulted ceiling of the undercroft into the noisy kitchen. She stayed by the door while Dina crossed the kitchen, hips swaying, toward a beefy man who had a cleaver in his hand and was shouting orders to the other kitchen servants.

He stopped shouting midsentence when he saw Dina coming.

"I'm starving, Donald," she said with a purr in her voice. She laid her hand on the cook's shoulder. "Do ye have something... special... for a hungry la.s.s?"

Everyone else in the kitchen paused in the midst of their tasks to watch Dina as she leaned closer to the cook and spoke to him in a low, suggestive voice. Sileas saw a half-dozen pitchers of ale on the table next to her, ready to be taken into the hall. Turning her back to the room, she pulled the tiny stopper from the vial.

How many drops should she put in each? It was hard to guess how much each man would drink from the shared pitchers. Her hands shook as she poured a few drops into each.

"What are ye doing there?" The harsh voice behind her startled Sileas, and she spilled the rest of the poison into the last pitcher.

"Murdoc told her to bring more ale to the table," Dina said, "so you'd best let her go."

Sileas lifted the tray and hurried out of the kitchen, slos.h.i.+ng ale. At the bottom of the stairs, she paused to draw in a deep breath to steady herself. It would do no good to poison the ale if she spilled it all on the floor.

Before she could get to the table, men started s.n.a.t.c.hing pitchers from her tray.

"Stop it, ye animals!" she shouted and lifted her tray higher, fearful they would take it all.

She had only one pitcher left when she reached the table-but it was the one with the extra poison. She tried to hide her smile as she set it between Murdoc and Angus.

Another man shoved her aside and grabbed the last pitcher. Fury burned in her chest as she watched ale drip off his chin while he gulped the ale straight from the pitcher.

"Take my ale, will ye?" Angus punched the man in the belly and jerked the pitcher from his hands.

Hope rose in her heart as Angus lifted the pitcher to his mouth-and sank again when nothing came out of the pitcher. Angus threw it against the hearth and commenced to beat the man who took it about the head.

"Get more," Murdoc said and slapped her behind hard enough to sting through the layers of her gown. "And tell that worthless cook I'll take my dirk to him if he doesn't get food up here now."

She had made a grave error. What she should have done was saved all the poison for Murdoc and killed him. Without him, the other men would run around confused, like a chicken with its ugly head cut off.

Murdoc turned and caught her glaring at him. "What are ye doing looking at me?" he said and slammed his fist on the table. "Go!"

Sileas stood against the wall with Dina, watching the men eat and waiting for them to show some sign of illness. Her time was running out.

She chewed her lip. "Why isn't the poison working, Dina?"

"I don't know. Maybe it's too soon."

Sileas jumped when Murdoc stood and banged his cup on the table. When he had the men's attention, he shouted, " 'Tis time for a wedding!"

He scanned the room until he found Sileas and then motioned her to come forward. When she did not move, he nodded to two burly men.

"I've heard Angus can't perform unless a woman is screaming and crying," Dina said, squeezing her hand. "So lie still."

Sileas looked frantically for a means of escape as the two men came toward her. Despite Dina's warning, she screamed as they dragged her across the hall to stand before Murdoc and Angus.

"You'll say your vows now," Murdoc said.

"I won't," Sileas said, meeting his eyes. "If ye couldn't make me do it at thirteen, ye must know ye cannot now."

"Perhaps ye will be more willing after the bedding." Murdoc shrugged. "But if not, all we truly need is a MacKinnon child by ye."

"My husband Ian will kill ye if ye let a man touch me," she said. "And the MacDonalds won't rest while ye hold Knock Castle."

"Ye are so naive it pains me," Murdoc said, shaking his head. "Hugh MacDonald and I made an agreement. I get you and Knock Castle in exchange for killing his nephew Connor."

A well of anger rose up from deep inside her. With it came words she did not know were there.

"In the name of my mother, I curse ye, Murdoc MacKinnon," she shouted, stretching out her arm and pointing at Murdoc. Then she turned slowly and swung her arm in a wide circle. "I curse every one of ye! Ye shall suffer for s.n.a.t.c.hing me from my husband and for taking what belongs to me and my clan. Every one of ye shall suffer!"

The hall went quiet. Every man's eyes were upon her, and a few crossed themselves.

"Angus!" Murdoc's deep voice broke the silence, filling the hall and reverberating in her chest. "Take her upstairs."

Panic flooded through her when Angus picked her up with one arm and tossed her over his shoulder. With her head hanging down, blood pounded in her ears as she screamed and beat her fists on his back. The men's laughter faded as he climbed the enclosed spiral staircase that led to the family's private rooms above.

When Angus carried her into the bedchamber that had been her mother's, true hysteria took her. It blinded her to everything but the image in her mind of her mother lying on the bed with blood soaking her s.h.i.+ft and the sheets beneath her. Sileas saw the tiny droplets that fell from the bed to the floor as her mother died.

Sileas clawed and screeched like a wild animal. When she sank her teeth into Angus's hand, he let go long enough for her to scramble off the bed and sprint for the door.

She ran headlong into Murdoc in the doorway. He held her fast.

"No, not here," she pleaded, flailing her arms and legs. "Please, not here, not where she died."

Murdoc did not heed her pleading any more than he had her mother's.

How many times had she stood on the other side of the door and heard her mother weeping? Her mother had suffered the attentions of two husbands who wanted an heir to this castle and did not care if they killed her in the process.

For years, Sileas had pushed the memories of her mother's suffering to the far recesses of her mind. Her mother had seemed so unlike her-beautiful, frail, compliant. In truth, Sileas had blamed her mother for the choices that had led to their misery. Now she realized her mother must have felt as trapped as she did now.

As Murdoc dragged her back to the bed, she saw her mother's strawberry blond hair fanned out on the pillow, its beauty a stark contrast to the dark blood on the sheets. The smell of blood and the sweat of illness filled her nose. She saw the deathly pale skin and limp arms of a woman too weak to weep anymore.

When Murdoc dropped her on her back on the bed, Sileas felt her body sink into the mattress, heavy with the weight of her grief. She saw her mother as she had the very last time, with her eyes open but unseeing, and one thin arm stretched out across the bed, as if she were still hoping someone would take her hand and rescue her from the nightmare that was her life.

In the end, it was G.o.d who had mercy and took her to join her dead babes.

Sileas lay unblinking, her gaze fixed on the beams of the ceiling. She felt immune to the men now, drenched in grief for her mother, grief that she had denied until now.

CHAPTER 37.

The darkening sky increased Ian's sense of urgency as he scanned the top of the walls of Knock Castle.

"Only two men on the wall," his father said beside him.

Ian nodded. "Are ye ready, Father Brian?"

"Aye."

Ian climbed into the handcart and crouched down next to the barrel of wine. G.o.d's bones, what was he doing?

"We should have used the horse cart, so da and I could go in with ye," Niall complained, not for the first time.

"The guards would be more suspicious of a large cart," Ian said. "I'll open the gate for ye to join us as soon as I can."

The truth was that Ian did not know if there were two men or forty waiting on the other side of the gate, and there was no point in all of them being killed.

"G.o.d be with ye," Father Brian said, and flung the tarp over Ian as if he were spreading a cloth over an altar. Then he tucked it around Ian and made sure it didn't cover the wine barrel.

Their trick was as old as the ancient Greeks. It seemed unlikely, however, that Murdoc or Angus had studied the cla.s.sics.

Father Brian grunted as he picked up the handles and pushed the cart forward. 'Twas a good thing the priest was a strong man, for it was a hundred yards from the trees to the castle out on the headland.

With the wine barrel slos.h.i.+ng next to his head, Ian wondered if the Trojans had been as cramped in their wooden horse. He held on to the edges of the tarp to keep it in place as the cart b.u.mped over the boards of the drawbridge. When Father Brian brought the cart to a jerking halt and dropped the handles to the ground, Ian had to brace his feet against the sides to keep from sliding out the back.

Through a hole he poked in the tarp with the point of his dirk, he watched the priest bang on the wooden gate. A voice responded from the other side, but Ian couldn't distinguish the words.

"I am making my rounds of Skye, as I do every year," Father Brian said in his deep, rumbling voice. He gestured toward the cart. "I've a barrel of wine from the monastery on Iona I was bringing to my bishop, but it's too far to carry. I'm willing to sell it to ye."