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T wenty-five

P UT YER TEETH together and come along with me quietly if you want to live.”

The warning hissed in her ear halted Brie’s struggles and she dropped her fists against the big man’s chest. She didn’t trust him, but every good warrior knew there was a time for battle and a time to assess your enemy’s strength.

This particular enemy was stronger than most men she’d encountered.

Around them, the throngs of men jeered and laughed, many yelling out their disgusting suggestions of what he should do to her. He hoisted her to his shoulder without any sign of effort and strode from the great hall.

Much, much stronger than any man she’d encountered before.

Torquil was nowhere to be seen. Like the coward he was, he’d disappeared from the great hall as soon as he’d pronounced his verdict upon her fate.

As she’d attacked the MacDowylt, something hideous and terrifying had encased her, restraining her knife and blinding her vision, as if a blanket through which she couldn’t even breathe had been dropped over her head.

She’d seen the eyes, though. Seen them clearly before her world had gone black. Red and glowing, as if hounds from the depths of the seven hells dwelled inside Torquil’s body. She’d seen her own death promised in that glow.

“Be still,” the big man muttered as a shiver wracked her body.

He moved quickly out of the keep and across the bailey.

She heard the door of the old tower slam open and a moment later he dropped her unceremoniously on her backside, cutting off the trickle of light by kicking the door shut when she made a move in that direction.

“Don’t even think of it,” he growled. “His men would take you down before you made the outer bailey.”

He was likely right. All things considered, she wasn’t exactly working from a position of strength at the moment. It was her wits she’d need to count on now.

On hands and knees, she felt her way to the wall and followed it to a corner, where she huddled. At least here he couldn’t come at her from behind.

A thud sounded somewhere in the inky black of the small room, and the big man muttered a curse at the dark just before the flames in the fire pit came to life.

She watched him, wary of what he might do next, as he lit two large candles and set them upon the mantel.

When he turned, his face was a stern mask, his hands upon his hips.

“What do you plan to do with me?” she demanded, putting as much bravado into her words as she could muster.

“Plan?” He all but spat the word. “Of all the plans I’ve considered, none of them included a nameless shrewling who’s too witless to see her own way through the Mortal world.”

His burst of anger reignited hers.

“I’m neither nameless nor witless, you great hulking fool,” she countered, feeling much more comfortable cloaked in anger than in fear. “Both charges I’d turn back upon you, a beast of a man who’d toss a helpless woman over his shoulder to carry her off and ravage her.”

Her verbal thrust and parry might have held more weight had she been on her feet towering over him while he cowered in the corner, rather than the other way around, but she didn’t quite have the wherewithal to rise to her feet just yet.

The big man laughed, making his way over to where she sat. “A helpless woman, is it? Well then, by all I hold dear, rest assured, woman-child, I’ve no intent to claim your virginity this night.”

“For a fact you’ll no be doing any such thing. I’ll see to that my ownself,” she shot back.

He’d be in for quite a fight should he try. Though perhaps, considering his size and strength, she’d be better served by trying a different defense.

“Besides, I am a woman of the world. Whatever would give you the impression that I’m yet a virgin?”

Again he laughed, stretching out a hand to her. “Your own reaction. If I’d had any doubt of it, which I didn’t, your reaction would have set me straight enough. Now then, come out of your corner lair, Shield Maiden, and make yourself comfortable over by the fire.”

She considered refusing the hand he offered, but the shivers coursing through her body convinced her to do otherwise. Sitting by the fire actually sounded good.

He handed her a blanket that he pulled from a stack in another corner and waited, unmoving, until she had wrapped it around her and taken her seat.

“Since you assure me you have a name, perhaps we should begin there. I am called Halldor O’Donar. And you are?”

He spoke with a deep and oddly reassuring voice, with an accent she’d not encountered before.

“Where do you come from, big man? You’ve a strange sound to yer words.”

“And you’ve an insolent sound to yours. Let us say that I come from somewhere other than here. A place where we’ve the courtesy to exchange our names upon meeting.”

A flash of embarrassment sparked her mind, along with a twinge of guilt.

She looked away from his face for a moment to compose her thoughts.

“Well spoken, Halldor O’Donar, and well I deserved that rebuke.

I am Bridget MacCulloch, daughter of the House MacUlagh, descended from the Ancient Seven who ruled all this land upon which you .

. .” She stumbled to a halt as he rolled his eyes.

“A Pictish princess. I should have guessed from the way you behaved, if not from the way you look.” He shook his head and leaned back against the large stones surrounding the fireplace. “Why is it every Pict I’ve ever met felt the need to recite their lineage back to the beginning of time?”

How dare he?

“I’m no a princess but a regular woman. The MacDowylt murdered my father. Hanged him in the courtyard of this very castle, for no reason other than his having followed Malcolm instead of Torquil. I will have my satisfaction from that man, one way or another.” Her chest heaved with pent-up emotion.

“I feel for your loss, Bridget MacCulloch. And though there are no words to remove the pain of the loss you feel, I can assure you, your father sits even now in the great hall of Valhalla, surrounded by Valkyries, enjoying the rewards of a warrior’s life.”

“Bollocks.” Her father’s people might have believed that was reward enough. She did not. “I’d much prefer him to be sitting here with me.”

“We don’t always get what we prefer, now, do we? And of all the things you must settle for not having, personal revenge against Torquil MacDowylt will have to top the list.”

“I should have ended the bastard’s life when I found him sleeping in his tower.” Sleeping or whatever that had been. “With that strange sword of his only steps away, I let the perfect chance slip through my fingers.”

“A strange sword, you say?” Halldor’s head tipped to the side and he leaned forward. “Can you describe it for me?”

“Aye. Fine and shiny it was, with strange markings engraved along the length of the blade.” No point in sounding foolish by telling him that the foul thing was likely bespelled, the way it had beckoned to her when she approached it.

“Neither letter nor number the markings were, but a match to the scroll lying next to it.”

“A scroll? It was open? I suppose it would be asking too much that you’ve learned to read?”

Could the great, hulking beast of a man not go five minutes without insulting her? She could have learned to read. Often enough Jamesy had tried to sit her down to teach her, but the scrawlings in a book had never matched the lure of sword or bow.

“I ken the names of the letters and I recognize a written number when I see it. The markings upon the blade and the scroll were neither of those. They were such as I’d never seen before, all odd squiggles and sharp angled lines.

” With a demand to be touched she had barely been strong enough to resist.

Halldor stared off into the dark corners, lost in his own thoughts for the next few minutes, almost as if he’d forgotten she were even there.

She cleared her throat to remind him.

With a sigh, he leaned back against the stone, fixing her once again with his unwavering stare. “Nonetheless, I tell you in all truth, you must forgo your quest for personal revenge against Torquil MacDowylt.”

She expected as much from Torquil’s underling, no matter that he had stepped in to save her life.

“And why is that?”

“Because you’re no match for Torquil MacDowylt.”

How little Halldor O’Donar knew of her.

“I am a match for any man.”

“Well, I can believe that.” Halldor smiled, though his eyes held a curtain of sorrow. “But that is the problem, you see. Torquil MacDowylt is no longer a man.”

Their conversation was cut short by a banging on the door.

Her stomach twisted with the unwelcome punch of fear, but she rose to her feet. If the MacDowylt had changed his mind regarding her fate, she wouldn’t make it easy for him.

Halldor stood too, a deep sigh escaping his lips as he leaned in toward her. “My deepest apologies, Shield Maiden, but I do this for your own good.”

Before she could ask what he meant, he gripped the neck of her beautiful colored gown and jerked down, ripping through the layers of cloth to expose her entire body to just below her waist.

She screamed, clasping her arms in front of her in a paltry attempt to cover herself.

“On the floor,” he hissed, pulling his shirt off over his head as he made his way to the door. One look around and he quickly but silently overturned the bench by the wall before answering the insistent hammering.

She nodded and dropped to her knees. If he thought to set a proper scene, she would do her part.

“What?” he bellowed, throwing open the door. “Can you not leave a man to his pleasures?”

One of the guards Brie remembered seeing inside the hall waited there, craning his neck to cast a leer in her direction.

“Our lord Torquil would have you attend him in his solar after midday meal on the morrow.”

Halldor nodded, holding the door open much farther than he needed to do, supporting her suspicion.

“You may tell him I’ll be honored to be there. And now, if that’s all you have for me, I’ve a meal of another kind what wants attending to, eh?”

Both men laughed like drunken fools sharing a vile secret, until Halldor slammed the door shut in the other’s face, dropping the bar down to ensure it stayed shut.

When he returned to her side, he dropped a woolen blanket over her shoulders, covering her nakedness before he sat.

She looked up at him, trying to find a grateful smile but failing miserably.

“The good news is, by sunrise, word of your deflowering will have spread to every willing ear on the castle grounds.”

“That’s the good news?” She could hardly believe how her voice shook. “What, then, could possibly be the bad?”

He reached for her hand, lifting it to his face. “If we’re to do this in a way that might be convincing enough to save your life, we must do it right. That means you must be strong enough and clever enough to play your part as well.”

Trickles of fear curled in Brie’s chest at the look he gave her. She tugged at her hand, feeling a need to put distance between the two of them, but he wouldn’t let go.

“Can you do that? Can you be strong enough for what’s to come?”

She nodded, and nearly screamed again as he crushed her fingernails into the skin beside his eye, dragging them down the length of face, leaving four ragged trails of blood in their wake.