Page 18 of The Unencumbered Warrior (Highland Wishes Trilogy #1)

T he sky hung heavy, a thick blanket of gray that pressed low over the village like a warning.

The air smelled of wood smoke and distant frost. It was the kind of day that made folks restless, wary of shadows that might stretch longer than they should.

Gossip of witch burnings spread faster than the fire that fed them, and even laughter seemed to have grown cautious.

Ingrid adjusted the shawl around her shoulders as she stepped outside her cottage.

The chill bit harder than it had the day before, and she wondered if an early snow would fall while they were at market.

Their last trip before winter set in. A quiet ache stirred in her—an odd mix of urgency and dread.

The commotion near the village edge pulled her steps forward. A man, muddied and staggering, had come from the woods. His clothes hung off him like they’d been soaked and dried too many times without care. His eyes were hollow, his cheeks sharp with hunger.

“I ask only for food,” he rasped, voice raw. “I will be on my way. I want no trouble.”

No one answered. Instead, people turned their backs, mumbled excuses, disappeared into doorways.

He tried again. “My wife had nothing more than a small mark since birth. They all loved her, until they feared her. I couldn’t stop them.” His voice cracked. “I buried what was left of her and ran.”

Still, no one moved. Even the few with compassion in their eyes dared not risk stepping forward.

Ingrid’s hands tightened into fists at her sides. She turned back toward her cottage, heart pounding. She gathered food—bread, dried meat, cheese—filling a sack and slipped it beneath her cloak along with two of her recently finished wool blankets.

She meant to follow the man before he vanished back into the forest, meant to offer him not just food but kindness, a sliver of decency in a world gone mad. But as she reached the edge of the trees, a hand caught her arm.

“I won’t let you go alone,” Raff said, his voice low but resolute. “Not now. Not with what’s out there.”

Ingrid opened her mouth to argue, but the look in his eyes held firm. Besides, she was relieved to have him by her side.

They followed the faint trail of broken brush and snapped branches into the woods. Ingrid clutched the cloth bundle and blankets to her chest, eyes scanning the gloom.

“He’s not far,” Raff murmured. “His steps were weak. He would not have made it far.”

They found him just beyond a copse of fir trees, huddled beside a fallen log.

At first, it seemed he was alone, his arms wrapped protectively around something.

But as Raff and Ingrid drew closer, the bundle shifted—a woman.

Frail, her face smudged with dirt, her eyes glassy with exhaustion. She flinched at the sight of them.

The man rose quickly, shielding her behind him, though he looked ready to collapse. “I told you, she’s gone,” he said, voice cracking. “But I lied. I had to. I was desperate.”

Raff stepped forward, slow and steady. “We’re not here to harm you.”

“She’s not a witch,” the man said hoarsely. “It’s only a mark. She’s had it since she was a bairn. No more than a speck. But when fear takes root, folks forget who you are.”

Ingrid knelt and offered the food. The woman’s lips trembled as she reached for it.

Raff watched them. The woman’s pale hand shook as she took the bread, her eyes darting with the wildness of someone who was being hunted. She clutched the man’s arm as if afraid he’d vanish too. It was the mark, nothing more than a small patch of dark skin on her cheek, that had condemned her.

And all Raff could think was Ingrid has one too. Not the same, but she bore a mark that others might twist into something dark. Her fingers. A birth trait, harmless and wholly hers. But in the wrong eyes, in the wrong mood, it could be enough.

A chill deeper than the air stole through him.

This was what fear did. It made neighbors into judges, friends into cowards.

He watched Ingrid offer the woman a soft word and a steady touch, and the worry dug in deeper. He couldn’t, wouldn’t, let this happen to her.

Not while he drew breath.

The woman ate slowly, chewing as if each bite might vanish. The man hovered beside her, a trembling hand stroking her back, whispering soft reassurances. Ingrid made sure he ate as well, forcing meat into his hand.

“You need the strength,” she said softly.

He nodded, teary-eyed, and took the meat.

Raff stood watch, eyes on the trees, listening for more than birdsong.

Ingrid turned away briefly, to snatch up the two blankets she had brought with her. She went and knelt beside the woman and gently shook out one of the thick wool blankets, her kind hand having woven its every thread.

“I made this,” she said quietly, wrapping it around the woman’s narrow shoulders. “It’ll keep the cold from stealing more of your strength.”

The woman flinched at the first touch of it, then stilled. Her fingers curled into the fabric as if afraid it would be taken back. She lowered her face, pressing her cheek into the wool, her body trembling—but this time from relief.

Ingrid’s eyes glistened with tears, fighting to keep them from falling, but she said nothing more. She only laid a hand gently on the woman’s arm. Then before she rose to stand beside Raff, she handed the other blanket to the man.

Raff looked at her, at the calm on her face, the strength in her quiet defiance of fear, and his chest ached with love for her and pride that she was his wife.

“They can’t stay here,” Ingrid said softly, watching the way the man now held his wife as if she’d crumple without him.

“I know,” Raff replied. “But there’s a place.

” He turned to the man. “There’s an old dwelling about a day’s walk from here, deeper into the woods.

It’s hidden well and still sound. I used it a few winters back when I was on the run from men with more blade than brains.

No one will think to look for you there. ”

The man looked up, cautious hope flickering in his eyes. “Truly?”

Raff nodded. “You’ll find shelter and a stream not far off. Stay hidden and wait for this madness to pass.”

The man clutched his wife close, tears in his eyes and his voice breaking as he whispered, “You both have been more than generous, more than kind. I cannot find words adequate enough to thank you. You have my everlasting gratitude.”

Raff gave a tight nod. “Stay safe.”

They walked back to the village in silence, their hands locked tightly as they passed beneath skeletal branches. The sky above had grown heavier, as though snow waited just beyond its seams.

“It could happen to anyone,” Ingrid said at last, her voice thin.

“I know,” Raff said. And then, after a pause, “I worry for you.”

She stopped walking but didn’t look at him.

Raff didn’t mean to say more, but the fear in his chest had teeth now. “That woman had a mark. So do you. Yours is different, but to someone already afraid, it wouldn’t matter.”

She looked at him then, her eyes searching his.

“I won’t let it happen,” he said, his jaw tight.

“I know,” she whispered. “But it could.”

And there, in the still hush of the trees, the weight of the madness hung between them.

By the time Raff and Ingrid emerged from the woods, dusk had begun to smother the gray day, folding the village into long shadows and cold stillness.

Smoke curled from chimneys, the scent sharp and bitter, but few dared linger outside.

Doors closed quickly when they passed, shutters clicked into place.

A cluster of villagers stood in the center of the village, murmuring in tight circles. The talk stopped when Raff and Ingrid approached. Faces turned, some curious, others cautious—one or two downright hostile.

“Did you help him?” someone called out. “The stranger?”

Raff didn’t answer, just kept walking, Ingrid beside him. He could feel their gazes following, feel the weight of unspoken questions thick as fog.

“It might have been wiser to turn him away before he crossed the threshold,” Tolan, the smithy, said.

“Don’t matter now,” Latham said. “He’s gone, and he’s not our worry.”

“But what if he wasn’t alone?” a woman asked, clutching her shawl tight at her throat. “What if he lied and brought the witch with him?”

That sparked another round of muttering, heads nodding, voices rising.

“Enough!” Raff turned to face them. The group turned silent. “You’re letting fear speak louder than reason. That’s dangerous. More dangerous than any mark.”

No one responded. They just shifted uncomfortably, eyes darting to one another, to Ingrid, then away again. It wasn’t shouting or pitchforks, but suspicion had a way of settling in like frost, silent and spreading.

He turned back to Ingrid, her face pale but steady.

As they reached her cottage, she spoke in a hushed voice. “They looked at me differently.”

“Some, not all.”

“One is enough to cause trouble.”

“I know,” Raff repeated, gently. “But I see you clearly. I always have.”

She managed a faint smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

Behind them, the village held its breath, waiting, watching, wondering who might be next.