Page 1 of Beloved Enemy
Prologue
1301
Kingswood
In the Highlands
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After three days in the gaol beneath Kingswood, the woman was brought to stand before the high table in the great hall. She was striking in some odd manner, disheveled and of a bloodless façade, her fate about to be judged, and yet she managed to stand before him with a glimmer of hope in her pale gray eyes. And frankly, none would deny, she still managed to evoke a bit of awe for how eye-catching she was, with her high cheekbones, flawless complexion, her willowy figure, and the wealth of blonde hair falling wildly around her shoulders.
But witches did that, did they not? Made themselves bonny or something more, all the more effortless to ensnare, entrap, and enslave, Reid supposed.
Reid sat at table surrounded by his officers, and Kingswood’s steward and priest, willing, aye, but nae happy to pronounce her guilty of witchcraft. They—the peasants and mayhap some of his army as well—would demand that she be put to death. He could not gainsay their want, distasteful though it was. The woman—witch—had come to life before their eyes. Many had sworn to it, frightful and babbling about how she’d simply materialized.
“Came over time,” Thomas had said. “Could’ve put my hand through her form at first, so... frothy was she.”
“She filled in,” Etta, one of the weaver’s had said, “as if she were being stitched together on the spot, quick like.”
“Speaks in that odious tongue,” added Aulay. “Never heard the like.”
“Fire breathed from her eyes,” the lad, Donaidh, had proclaimed.
This last, Reid was wont to dismiss. Even his fellow complainants had turned dubious gazes upon Donaidh, as if questioning if he’d witnessed the same distressing event as they had.
Inexplicably, the witch had requested that Marcus McInnes be called as her witness. She’d claimed he alone could prove that she was not a witch.
Having known the laird of Balla Àrd for nearly a score of years, Reid had scoffed at her desperate attempt, one he’d been willing at first to dismiss as lunacy and desperation. Aye, she might have met him, might have charmed him with her beauty, but Marcus was no fool, would not have allowed himself to be ensnared by her spell—at least not outside a bedchamber, Reid was certain. Upon further reflection, however, and simply to protect himself from reprisal, he’d sent word round to Marcus anyway, telling him of the woman who called herself—most improbably—Autumn Winters, hardly expecting a reply, naught much more than a terse missive to tell Reid to go to hell with his scheming and japing.
Reid was as surprised as any when Marcus arrived this morning, quite displeased and befuddled he’d said, but reluctant to have an innocent die if there was a reasonable explanation. More likely, Marcus felt a wee responsible since it had been his name called as a character witness.
She would be found out now, though, Reid thought smugly, even as it didn’t sit well with him to have her killed, as was his only choice. He almost wished she would take herself away, as mysteriously as she’d brought herself here, take her black magic and leave Kingswood of her own accord.
After subjecting her to an expression of smug disdain, Reid slowly turned his gaze to the right.
The witch’s gaze followed.
A figure stepped from the shadows.
At first he was simply a dark shape and form. But with each step forward he took, coming into the light provided by the open door, his face and figure were revealed..
The witch inhaled a sharp breath, and her face was arrested in a mask of stunned joy. A strangled cry burst from deep in her chest.
But Marcus McInnes’s gaze reflected none of the same. Reid watched carefully and saw not one hint of recognition.
The witch was unperturbed by Marcus’s indifference and ran toward him, lifting her arms.
Marcus reacted by unsheathing his sword. Though he didn’t aim it directly at her, it served as a fine deterrent to slow down her impetuous rush forward.
Reid Nicholson’s soldiers, the only other people present in the hall, stalled her further.
Two of the Nicholson soldiers, Artur and Hugh, surged forward, their drawn blades extending into the space between Marcus and the witch before she would have reached him. Their blades crossed and held, with the witch, Autumn, trapped on one side.
She wasn’t deterred though. As Reid watched, coming to his feet, the gladness of her reaction to Marcus’s presence dropped her to her knees. She tipped her face up to him, over those silver blades.
“Oh, thank God you’re here,” she said. “I love you. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.” She spoke urgently, her strange English given a desperate tone. “I love you, Marcus.” And when McInnes said nothing, she said his name with a pleading voice. “Marcus. You know me,” she said brokenly.
Slowly, Marcus strode forward, waving his hand in front of him to move the swords between them. When he stood directlyin front of her, the muscles around his eyes tightened, causing a piercing, unyielding focus that seemed to bore straight into her, through her.
