Page 30 of Wolf Pack

“Aye, we would be thrilled to have you stay with us. Honored, truly,” Agnes said.

“Aye,” Dawy said, smiling.

She hoped Alasdair would allow it and hoped this wasn’t a mistake. That she and her cousins wouldn’t get in the couple’s way or wear them out. It would be extra mouths to feed, too, so they had to do whatever they could to ensure it wasn’t a strain on Dawy and Agnes.

She watched as Alasdair listened to the man and then turned to look at Isobel, and he nodded. “You are all mutually agreeable that you stay with the MacEachens?” Alasdair asked.

“Oh, aye,” Agnes said.

Dawy quickly agreed.

“We can do it until they no longer need us,” Isobel said, “but I will pull guard duty also at the keep.” She wanted to prove her worth that she could do multiple tasks as she did at home.

“Aye. I want you to be at the keep so you can learn more of our ways, meet more of our people, and become part of the pack,” Alasdair said.

“Oh, I agree.” For now, she liked being part of a smaller family unit and getting to know the rest of the pack members over time. She guessed she was a little apprehensive that some might not like that they had lived with Viking raiders. “We heard fighting above the cliffs. Did you engage the marauders?”

“We saw them early on and were prepared to protect our people. Not so last year. We lost seven of our people while trying to get our villagers and crofters into the keep. The boy who attacked Drummond lost his da in the fight.”

“I’m so sorry.” She realized that the other six people most likely had families, too, who would resent the Icelanders in their midst. “Did you see our longship from the cliffs?”

“When Conall was with you, I thought I had. The fog rolled in, and I didna see the ship again and believed it had just been my imagination as small as it was. But I had watchers observing the ocean in case you had been sailing there.”

Isobel smiled. “You were a wolf.”

“Aye.”

She shook her head. “When you surrounded us as wolves, I didna know what to think.”

“When we smelled that you were wolves also, we were just as surprised. We didna smell you on the beach after you got rid of the guard. The wind had taken your scents out to sea,” Alasdair said.

Then riders came into the keep and looked over the newcomers. Alasdair greeted them and gave introductions to Erik and his men to Isobel. “They have a castle a couple of days' ride from here.”

Immediately, she smelled that Erik and his men were white wolves, and she wondered where they were originally from.

Erik smiled. “So we meet. We were with Alasdair when you killed the guard on the beach. We were much impressed.” Then he turned to Alasdair. “The people who had escaped the village and hid from the marauders have returned. They are eager for their people to return home.”

“Good.” Alasdair said to Rory, “See that they get an escort home. You can also take our villagers to their homes.”

“Aye. Right away.”

Isobel noticed a familiar scent wafting through the inner bailey as people began to gather to leave. It was the smell of human beings, the same ones she had seen on the beach when the Vikings had taken them captive. She was relieved to know that Alasdair and his men had rescued them.

Then another group of people assembled with them, but these smelled like wolves.

Rory organized a group of guards and secured a wagon for the women and children. Then, they departed from the castle grounds.

“The ones taken prisoner were human,” Isobel said.

“Aye, worthy of saving, but it made it difficult to go about our business as wolves.”

“We had to live like that always,” Isobel said.

“Conall didna tell us that.”

“Aye, we had lived with a human clan.”

“That would have been challenging and dangerous.”

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