Page 30 of Warrior of the Highlands (Highlands #3)

Campbell cut his eyes to the right, discreetly studying the man riding beside him. He congratulated himself on a wise decision.

Major Nicholas Purdon was a solid soldier. He received orders without question and appeared to relish the slaughtering of papists and fools.

Campbell gave the young man a rare smile and urged his horse into a trot. The flat grazing lands skirting the castle was pleasant terrain, and made for an easy approach. A peculiar spot to build a fortress, to say the least. But someone else’s folly was his triumph.

Triumph. He allowed himself a smile. Campbell had wanted victory. He’d tried for it with a witch, but he’d finally found it with a soldier.

With Purdon at his right and one General Leslie at his left, he had mopped the countryside of MacDonalds. Together they’d chased MacColla and his family into a corner.

And together they’d slaughtered MacColla once and for all.

“You’re certain he’s dead?”

“Aye,” Purdon replied, “the big man is dead.”

Could it be true? MacColla, dead. Campbell beamed. No MacDonald was a match for sixteen hundred of his best soldiers. Not even MacColla.

“Skipness was a rout,” Purdon continued, referring to the battle Campbell’s men had just fought at Skipness Castle, on the upper reaches of the Kintyre peninsula. “’Twas a long siege, but Skipness is yours.” He nodded to the structure looming before them.

“I care not for the castle.” Campbell pulled back on his reins and looked up. Skipness was a stout, rectangular fortress, constructed of red and yellow stone. “A dour pile of rock, is it not?”

He didn’t give the major a chance to answer. He’d noticed a knot of men, studying something on the ground. And then he spotted the black boots, sticking out in an unnatural sprawl on the grass.

Campbell quickly dismounted, leaving his reins dangling.

Men surrounded the body, but Campbell could tell by the silhouette that it was a large man who lay dead on the ground.

MacColla.

Purdon caught up to him as Campbell muttered gleefully, “I care not for castles, Major, when MacColla’s head is for the taking.”

“And so you have it.” Purdon smiled. The throng parted and the soldier gestured to the body with a flourish.

“You fool.” Campbell’s low curse was a snake’s hiss. “This is not MacColla.” He nudged the man’s head with his boot, turning it side to side.

It was a tall man, with black hair, and MacColla’s arrogant nose. A man who looked like MacColla. “This is his brother.”

“Well . . .” Purdon began, treading very carefully. “Isn’t one son of Coll Ciotach the same as another?”

Campbell answered with his silence. His hand went to the sword at his side, and he was gratified to see a few of the men flinch.

The needle-thin steel made a satisfying whistle as he swept his blade diagonally before him. Then, in a single downward stroke, he knelt to plunge the sword in the throat of the dead MacDonald.

He stood once more, needing to wriggle his blade loose from the soil under the dead man’s neck.

At last Campbell turned to the major. “No,” he replied. “Not the same. Now you will find MacColla. The real MacColla, and you will kill him. And you will kill his father. And you will kill his woman.”

Campbell gazed to the southwest. Shut his eyes to the sun, low in the sky. MacColla was out there. He’d have traveled farther south. He’d be in sight of Ireland, and it would call to him.

Campbell would catch him before he could answer.

“We head south,” he said, “bleeding the country of MacDonalds as we ride.”

The witch lay naked in the dirt, hands stretched over her head, her body an offering to the moon. She was dimly aware of the rocks that dug into her skin. Dimly aware of her thirst. But the concerns of her body were not what drove her now.

Anger thrummed through Finola’s veins. She’d depleted herself, doing the Campbell’s dirty work. He’d taken her energy, her time.

Most of all, he’d taken her for granted. Feeding off her with the whimsy of a child.

But it wasn’t a child’s game he played at.

And if Campbell didn’t know that yet, she’d be the one to show him.