Page 23 of Taken by the Devilish Highlander (Taken by Highland Devils #7)

“ T here’s been no invitation. Surely that’s concerning?”

“It’s on its way, certainly.”

“Certainly,” another voice said. “But perhaps we should prepare for the possibility that it’s not.”

Archer put up a hand, silencing the men in his council chamber. The topic of Ryder McKenzie’s marriage to Morgana had been front and center on the agenda today, though Archer didn’t understand what all the fuss was.

“The man just got married,” he told the room. “I’m sure he has other things on his mind than a wedding party.”

A few men smiled with him, knowing exactly what Archer was insinuating, but Lennox scowled at the joke.

“We must take this seriously, my Laird,” he said. “I have it on good authority that invitations are being sent for his ceilidh. If ye daenae receive one, it’s a clear sign.”

“A sign of what?” Elijah asked. He seemed just as frustrated with Lennox as Archer was.

“Any number of things,” Lennox answered, but before he could elaborate, O’Brien chimed in, ever the optimist.

“Perhaps the invitation was lost.”

Archer glanced at the man sideways, but no one responded. Lennox jumped into the silence, eager to drive home his point.

“Not getting an invitation is a sure snub. It means the man doesn’t respect ye. It means he doesnae believe he needs ye on his side to rule his clan.”

“And, so what?” Archer asked. If this new Laird McKenzie didn’t want to invite him to a party, it was no skin off Archer’s back.

He hated those celebrations anyway. He would be forced to make nice with fellow Lairds and compliment some mediocre food.

He usually spent the whole evening wondering how soon he could leave.

“Ye want the man to think ye weak?” Lennox asked, and the label instantly made Archer’s blood boil.

“Weak?” Archer asked, a threat in his voice, and Lennox quickly backed off, sensing he had crossed into dangerous territory.

“Of course, ye arenae weak,” Egan Stewart said, always the peacemaker.

Elijah stepped forward from where he had been pacing in front of the tall windows.

“Perhaps Lennox has a point.” Archer glared at him. Was Elijah really agreeing with Lennox? He waited, wondering if his man-at-arm was playing with them. Perhaps he would agree with Lennox only to humiliate him in the next sentence. “Not getting an invitation might be an early sign of trouble.”

“And what trouble is that?” Archer asked.

He was growing more irritated by the second, finding it harder and harder to stay put in his chair while these men invented problems. Archer knew what real trouble looked like.

It was an opposing army bearing down on you with double the number of men you had.

It was a sneak attack when your army was sleeping.

A wedding invitation was hardly a crisis.

“If McKenzie doesn’t respect ye, he could see ye as a target,” Elijah explained. “He’s a new Laird eager to prove himself. What better way than to launch an attack, try to claim new territory for his own?”

“You mean war?” Lord O’Brien asked, and suddenly the men at the table were all talking. They raised their voices over each other, everyone expressing their anxieties and fears about another conflict.

“That’s enough,” Archer called out, and he heard his voice echoing back to him. “There willnae be war. I’ll attend this ceildih whether I get an invitation or not. I willnae let a piece of paper stop me from showing me face.”

“That would be unwise, my Laird,” Lennox warned.

Suddenly, the men were arguing again, though this time they were yelling at each other.

Some of the men agreed with Archer, believing that an appearance at the wedding party was crucial to establish his place among the clan leaders.

Others spoke of disrespect, of the anger it could elicit in McKenzie if he showed up uninvited.

Archer didn’t have the patience to hear the men out. He felt tension building in his neck and a pain forming at the base of his skull. The angry voices around him made the pain worse, and he rubbed the bridge of his nose, trying to force it away.

“It willnae do any good to argue,” he said, and a few of the men quieted down as he spoke. “I’ve made up me mind—I’m going.”

He pressed himself to his feet, but as he did so, he felt the floor lurch beneath him. Archer gripped the arms of his chair as he regained his balance, the iron tinge of blood in his nose. He heard the distant screams of men on the battlefield, a horn calling soldiers to formation.

“My Laird?” Elijah asked. He was suddenly at his elbow, steadying him. Archer looked out to the council table, where most of the men were now staring at him. Some of them had seen him unsteady on his feet, had seen the early signs of another one of his episodes.

Archer yanked his elbow from Elijah’s grip and scowled at him.

“I’m fine,” he barked. “Which is more than I can say for the men in this room. Ye are meant to advise me, not argue with each other like school children.”

He pushed past Elijah and toward the door, but leaving the council chamber didn’t make him feel any better. Anger and unease still churned in his chest, and Archer was forced to come to terms with the decision he had just made.

Ye just told your whole council ye’re going to McKenzie Castle.

Archer growled and slapped his hand against the wall, instantly regretting it as pain radiated down his arm from the unforgiving stone.

Still, he figured he deserved it. After all, he had just made a decision that affected someone else, someone he preferred to keep right here within his castle walls.

Ye dobber. When ye go back there, ye’ll have to bring Feya home.

She was headed to the healing chamber when a shadow crossed in front of her. She looked up to see the scowling form of Archer striding down the hallway.

“What is it?” She asked, but the man only set his jaw and shook his head.

It was like he grew angrier when he saw her, the darkness in his eyes deepening.

Feya had been thinking about Archer’s darkness ever since dinner last night, when she had watched him go from a happy, carefree man into a shell of himself, retreating inward.

“Come on,” she said. She wasn’t sure what gave her the courage, but Feya grabbed Archer’s sleeve and pulled him to a stop. He allowed himself to be spun around, and Feya began pulling him down the hallway in a new direction.

“What are ye doin’, lass?” he asked, but she was pleased to see his anger was softening a bit.

“New treatment,” she said, but she didn’t elaborate.

Ever since treating Archer in the bathtub she had been brainstorming new ways to help him with his soldier’s heart.

She stayed up late thinking of unorthodox treatments that she might try.

This one was inspired by a distant memory of her grandmother when her brother Tormond was in a particularly grumpy mood.

She turned into a stairwell and led him down the winding stone steps. She felt Archer’s presence behind her and his heavy footsteps descending. At any point, he could have turned away, but his continued presence made Feya even more confident in her plan.

“Ye ken I have things to do,” Archer grumbled as she pushed outside to the expansive castle grounds.

“Aye,” Feya told him, glancing over her shoulder. “But ye cannae do them well if ye are too angry to think straight.”

He rolled his eyes but didn’t protest. Feya scanned the tree line for the small break in the trees that Ayla had shown her earlier.

She guided Archer toward it and walked down a small path, feeling the temperature drop as they entered the shade of the trees.

The path led to a small cabin, long abandoned, where Ayla said a gardener used to live before a larger house was built for the man’s family.

The log structure had a clearing in the front where wildflowers grew along the path. There, Feya had arranged logs into a pile, choosing a flat surface where someone could have stable footing. She crossed toward the cabin where a heavy axe leaned against the wall.

“Do ye plan to kill me?” Archer asked as she lifted the axe with two hands, careful to turn the sharp blade away from her legs. A bubble of laughter emerged from her chest, and they shared a smile.

“Cut,” she said, holding the handle out to him.

Archer stared at her, watching her strain beneath the axe’s weight.

“Go on,” she urged, speaking through gritted teeth as the muscles in her arms strained. “If ye daenae take this, I’m bound to drop it on your toe.”

He reached out with one hand and wrapped his fingers around the smooth wood of the axe.

“Ye brought me here to chop wood?” he asked. He scanned the nearby tree stump and the cross-section of tree she had already set atop it. “It’s a servant’s job.”

“Swing until ye feel no more anger,” Feya said, holding her ground.

She raised her eyebrows, challenging him to protest. When Tormond was eleven or twelve, her grandmother gave him a stick to pound against her rug, cleaning the dirty fabric and releasing the boy’s anger at the same time.

Now, Feya applied a similar concept to the man in front of her.

He hesitated for a moment, but then the corner of his mouth ticked up, and she saw him wrap both hands in position.

His muscles flexed as he stepped toward the log and raised the axe over his head.

With a slice of strength and skill he brought the sharp blade down on the wood, splitting it instantly in two.

“Again,” Feya said.

He strode forward and set the log he had just halved on its side. Then he stepped back and swung again. This time, he didn’t need Feya’s prodding to keep going. He quickly righted the log and brought the blade down. Then he immediately grabbed another log from the pile.

Archer swung with speed, throwing his whole body into the gesture.

He locked his eyes on the work in front of him and took on a singularity of purpose, seeing nothing except for that wood and the axe in his hands.

He went crazy on the logs, causing them to fly in all sorts of directions.

Soon he was grunting as metal hit wood and then he was crying out, vocalizing his anger and his frustration.

“Good,” Feya said, though she wasn’t sure the man could hear her.

He was too overcome with the task, and he continued without pauses.

Feya watched the muscles of his arms bulge against his shirt and the strong set of his legs.

Sweat began to form on his forehead, but Archer only wiped it away and continued swinging.

Eventually, when the pile was nearly decimated, he swung his final cut, slicing through the log like butter as his blade went deep into the tree stump beneath it.

Archer released the handle, leaving the axe planted in the makeshift stand, and he stumbled toward an overturned log that he used as a seat.

His chest rose and fell as he caught his breath, and hair hung down in front of his face that had come lose from where it was tied.

“Feel better?” Feya asked, unable to hold back her smile. Archer looked up with a smile of his own, his eyes sparkling with mischief.

“Aye,” he said. “But I could feel even better.” And then he stood up and closed the distance between them, dropping his mouth down to Feya’s in an enthusiastic kiss.