Page 13 of The Highlander’s Hunted Wife (Legacy of Highland Lairds #2)
13
“ H and over the lass, and ye can go on yer merry way,” one of the brigands demanded, his stained teeth like a filthy crescent moon. “That horse of yers, too.”
They dinnae ken who I am.
Hector balanced the sword in his hand, readjusting his grip. These men would soon discover who they’d dared to cross.
“Run off back into the trees, and I might let one of ye live to convey a warnin’,” Hector replied, a familiar calm sweeping through his veins.
Trained since childhood to be a warmongering laird, like his ancestors before him, no fight scared him anymore. He was good at this, with battles being second nature to him. In fact, cutting down three brigands was barely a fight at all—more of an insult to those decades of training.
However, it had been many years since he’d had something to protect, increasing the stakes of his victory.
Ye put a hand on Katie, I’ll peel ye like an apple.
“Just ride, M’Laird,” Katie whispered, her voice trembling. “Please, just ride past them.”
He could do it. If he veered off the road and into the forest, urging Lucifer into a gallop, he could circle the brigands in a matter of minutes and be out on the other end of the woods in no time at all.
“Och, we’ll give ye somethin’ to whimper about, lass,” one of the brigands said, blowing up his chance of emerging from this encounter unscathed.
“Turn around,” Hector instructed quietly. “Hold on to me. There’s nay runnin’ from this.”
Gripping him by the shirt, shaking from head to toe, Katie did as she was told without hesitation. In an awkward twist and a clumsy shuffle of limbs, made secure by his unyielding arm around her, she managed to face away from the brigands.
Letting go of her for a moment, he pulled her closer by the belt of her dress, grabbing her skirts to drag her legs over his thighs.
“Cling to me like ye did to save yer braither,” he said. “And hang on for dear life.”
She did just that, arms and legs wrapping around him, wiry muscles clenching against him. He’d have relished the sensation if he didn’t have three idiots to behead in her honor, claiming satisfaction for the vile insults they’d uttered.
With a squeeze of his thighs and a sharp whistle, the warhorse bowed his mighty head and began to walk backward. An elegant trick with a deadly purpose.
The brigands eyed one another, the man on the far right glancing uncertainly at the forest. Either he was about to bolt, or there were more of these wretches lurking behind the trees. It didn’t matter, Hector would fight wave after wave if he had to.
“Dinnae say ye werenae warned,” Hector said, lightly kicking his heels into Lucifer’s flanks, letting out a louder whistle.
The warhorse surged forward at a steady lope, gathering speed. There wasn’t enough distance for a gallop, but that wouldn’t matter—that would come later.
Pulling to the right, Lucifer crashed into the trees, his hoofs beating across the forest floor, tearing up the mossy undergrowth with his mighty tread. Hector turned the horse to the left, and Lucifer came back up onto the road, a better distance from the brigands, who were still scrambling for a plan.
Wheeling the warhorse around, Hector whistled again, giving his command to charge in the language they’d forged together throughout countless years.
Lucifer gained speed, thudding along the muddy road, heading straight for the pale and panicking brutes.
The two on each end scattered, leaving the middle man open to the taste of Hector’s broadsword. Agile despite his heft, Lucifer feinted left at the last moment, away from the brigand’s flailing rusty blade, and in a perfect upward arc, Hector delivered the fatal blow, his claymore cleaving the wretch in half.
Not bothering to wait to watch the man’s death, Hector urged Lucifer onward, chasing the first of the fleeing pair through the fir trees. The earthy, herbaceous scent really was revitalizing.
Hector’s blood was up, pounding in his ears as he picked out the shape among the frond skirts of the trees.
“Are we safe?” Katie whispered, her grip relentless.
“Soon,” he told her, gaining on the first man.
It wasn’t in his nature to strike an enemy in the back, deeming it cowardly, but he wanted this to be over with as quickly as possible. Splitting the difference, he careened past the brigand, his blade slicing through flesh like butter, and wheeled around in time to see a head fall.
Not wasting a moment, he charged back the way he’d come, soaring over the camber of the road and into the trees on the opposite side. He didn’t need to ride far. In a small dell, the brigand kneeled, head bowed, hands up in a plea for mercy.
“I didnae mean any harm,” the man begged. “I was just doin’ what the others told me to. I’m nae a bad man. Let me go, and I willnae trouble ye again. Willnae trouble anyone again.”
Hector brought Lucifer to a standstill. “Ye think I havenae heard that before? Stand up and face yer punishment like a man.”
“I have a wife!” the man yelped. “I have bairns!”
“I doubt that,” Hector replied.
The brigand slowly rose to his feet, shaking violently. “I do, Sir. I was on me way back to them.”
“Where do they live?” Hector humored him, certain he was a lying weasel.
“Whitmire,” the man replied.
Amusement pushed up Hector’s left eyebrow. “Lass, do ye ken this man?” He smirked coldly at the brigand. “What a fortunate thing for ye that ye’ve happened upon someone from yer very own village.”
Katie lifted her head nervously, glancing back over her shoulder, though her grip on Hector didn’t loosen at all. She frowned at the brigand, who had turned very pale indeed, wearing the frozen expression of a guilty man.
“He’s nae from Whitmire,” she replied with certainty. “There’s nay one in the village I dinnae ken.”
“Then put yer head down,” Hector said, his hand coming up to cradle the back of her head, pulling her to his shoulder so she wouldn’t have to see.
At the same moment, the brigand panicked. Rather than take off into the trees, which might have given him a faint chance at survival, he darted toward Lucifer. Sprinting past with his blade poised, the dagger flashed in a swipe. Hector didn’t feel a thing, and Lucifer remained unperturbed, but a sharp cry tore from Katie’s throat.
The rage was instantaneous and explosive.
Hector pulled Katie tighter to him as he turned Lucifer around. The brigand barely made it ten steps, falling mid-run. He wouldn’t be getting up again, though the fir trees would appreciate the nutrients.
“Are ye well, lass?” Hector asked urgently, leading Lucifer back to the road. He pulled back, tilting her chin up to look into her eyes. “Lass, are ye well? Did he cut ye?”
Katie blinked slowly. “I… dinnae think so. I felt somethin’… but there’s nay pain.”
Out of the shadow of the forest canopy, with the gray day offering more light to see by, Hector glanced down. Blood streaked Lucifer’s side, but the horse himself bore no wound.
Confused, Hector ran his hand along Katie’s leg from ankle to thigh, searching for the injury he was certain the brigand had inflicted. She didn’t push him away or protest, gazing at him with bewildered eyes, following his gaze downward.
“It’s ye!” she gasped suddenly, her hand flying to her mouth. “He cut ye, M’Laird.”
She hastened to draw something out of the pocket of her dress—a pristine white handkerchief. One of his grandmother’s, judging by the expensive linen. She didn’t hesitate to press it to his thigh, a star of bright red seeping through, spreading outward with some speed.
The relief that rushed through Hector stole his breath away for a moment.
I protected her. I kept her safe.
“Och, it’s nae me first injury, and it willnae be me last,” he said dismissively, grateful that it had been him and not her.
“Aye, M’Laird, but… we cannae continue if it doesnae stop bleedin’,” she insisted, worry creasing her brow as she pressed her other hand onto the handkerchief in an attempt to stem the bleeding. “I saw a boar gore a man in the thigh once. It didnae end well.”
Hector shrugged. “Luckily for us, it wasnae a boar. Dinnae fuss, lass.”
“What I mean is, blood from the thigh isnae a good sign! It starts pourin’, and it doesnae stop.” Keeping one hand on his wound, she grabbed his shirt sleeve with the other and, without bothering to ask for his permission, ripped it clean off. “Ye’ll bleed out, M’Laird. I’m quite serious.”
She applied the scrunched-up fabric to the injury, pressing down hard, the wound finally throbbing to let him know he’d been hurt.
“I had worse,” Hector told her, clicking his tongue to instruct Lucifer.
The warhorse quickened his pace, a walk stretching into a lope, stretching into a gallop that whipped the wind into Hector’s face and made the fir trees blend into a dark green blur.
“M’Laird, ye must listen to me for once!” Katie argued, jostled by the speed, desperately trying to hold onto his thigh.
“I’ll seek a healer in Inverness,” Hector replied, ignoring the fact that they had at least an hour or two ahead of them. “If we dinnae get there, we’ll be caught in a storm, and me chance of gettin’ to a healer will become impossible.”
Katie cast a wary eye toward the overcast sky, spotting the clouds that Hector himself had only noticed a moment ago—a swell of angry purplish-black, bruised and furious, threatening a downpour. As if on cue, a grumble of thunder chased the thud of Lucifer’s hoofbeats.
“If ye die, M’Laird, I’ll never forgive ye,” Katie muttered, anchoring herself with a white-knuckled hand around his belt, her other hand clamped tight around the solid muscle of his thigh, keeping that makeshift bandage firmly in place.
“I dinnae plan to,” he drawled, wondering if he ought to be so confident.
It would be the perfect irony to make it through so many battles and wars, only to be finished off by the rusty blade of a meager brigand. Still, at least it would be a noble end, to die protecting a woman, to die succeeding where he had failed before.
“Dinnae fuss,” he repeated, ignoring the little nagging voice that whispered, What a sad thing it’d be, to die now, with her so close but nae nearly close enough.
A tragedy greater than any he could imagine.