Page 12 of The Winter Laird

Reilly spun around with lightning speed, bringing his arm up as his sword clashed with another, cutting off any other words.

Chapter 3

Brianagh scrambled backward, belatedly realizing she wasn’t inside the cave anymore, and tripped over the hem of her skirt. Reilly spewed Gaelic at the man who seemingly appeared from nowhere, and who now swung a sword at Reilly’s head. Reilly deftly avoided the violent hacking and returned parry for parry.

Historical actors were a crazy bunch, it seemed. Especially this one—his clothes were fashioned the same as Reilly’s, although not nearly as nice. His tunic was torn in various places, and his bushy beard looked to be full of last night’s dinner.

Gross.

She became aware of their conversation—taking place completely in Gaelic—and was grateful to Reilly for teaching her his native tongue. Although, after a moment of really listening to what they were saying, she rather wished to be a bit more ignorant. Her opinion of them was quickly firming—crazy seemed a mild term.

“There is no one here to save you, O’Malley, so give up now. The rest will come—oof!—from their posts soon!” the half-deranged man snarled as he dodged a swing. “We’ve been expecting you, with MacWilliam marrying.”

“You want to be the one who took what is MacWilliam’s? You would die a painful death by his hand!” Reilly growled.

“I think not,” the man shot back as he narrowly avoided the business end of Reilly’s sword.

Brianagh tried not to gag as Dirty Beard’s smell wafted past her. She scanned her surroundings and saw nothing but trees. She wondered if they were going off-script; no one else had arrived. She certainly hoped they weren’t discussing her; Reilly hadn’t mentioned that he told his group anything about her, and he didn’t inform her that she was cast to play some sort of major role.

“Dagger in hand!” Reilly barked to her, in English. “No screaming. We don’t want the attention.”

She fumbled for the blade and pulled it out, ready. For what, though, she had no idea. In her opinion, this took reenactment too far—the swords were most definitely real; the clash of metal-on-metal was too loud to deny that. They also looked pretty sharp. One false move and either could be skewered. She shuddered at that unpleasantry, then refocused as Dirty Beard sliced Reilly’s arm. The sight of blood alarmed her. She took a step forward but froze at the look on Reilly’s face.

Brianagh watched, open-mouthed. She’d never seen such fury.

“Your body will be proof enough that Burke will not have her,” Reilly said as he thrust the sword into the man’s belly.

Brianagh stifled her scream, then turned and retched as Reilly quickly cleaned his sword on the dead man’s tunic.

Holy mother of God; Reilly just killed a man, she thought hysterically. She looked up at him, panicked.

Reilly wasted no time. He dragged the man into the trees and his eyes scanned the forest. He whistled sharply as he returned to her side and grabbed her hand. “We have to get out of here before the others arrive,” he said grimly. “It was us or him, Brianagh. I promise to explain later.” She heard the pounding of hooves before she saw it. The most enormous black horse she’d ever seen skidded to a halt in front of Reilly, snorting and shaking its head in greeting.

Reilly wrapped an arm around her waist, and in one ridiculously Hollywood move, swung onto the beast and pulled her up with him. He placed her in front of him, squeezed the horse with his thighs, and gave a “Yah!” as an arrow whizzed past her head.

Her last coherent thought before slipping into a dead faint was that this wasn’t how she expected her day to go when Reilly suggested they take a drive to amonolithic structurethis morning.

* * *

Brianagh’s headpounded as she slowly woke. She was lying on something cold and unyielding. She felt around gingerly.

Dirt.

“Brianagh, open your eyes.”

Although Reilly’s voice seemed close by, when her eyes adjusted to the twilight around her, she didn’t see him. She sat up and her head spun. “What happened?” she asked in a shaky voice. “How did we get out of the cave?”

Reilly squatted in front of her and offered what looked to be a cup made out of tree bark. She peered at the water inside suspiciously. “It’s from a creek just up the way,” he explained. “We are on Burke’s land. We have at least two more hours of fast riding before we get to safety. He’s a cruel laird, and unfortunately, a smart one too. But once we get to the O’Rourke side—”

“O’Rourke side of what?”

“Ireland. O’Rourke—your clan—is a safe place.” He took the cup from her and helped her stand. “I’ll tell you more later, but we have to stay ahead of Burke’s men.”

“They really don’t like trespassers,” she said as she brushed off her skirts.

“Actually,” Reilly replied as he hoisted her onto the stallion, “he’d love nothing more than for you to stay.”

“Then why were his thick-skulled men shooting arrows at us and trying to hack you with a sword?”

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