Page 16 of So Close To Heaven
This new sound was different, urgent, a lone rider, moving fast. One of the scouts, undoubtedly. And scouts only rode like that when something was wrong.
Alaric straightened in the saddle, his body tensing. He felt Ivy shift, too, her spine stiffening as she pushed herself more upright against him.
“What is—?” she began.
“Laird!” came the shout, ringing across the slow-moving line of men.
He kneed the stallion and moved from the middle of the column toward the front. A scout came riding through the trees from further east—Struan, one of the younger scouts, lean and quick, with a keen eye and a stronger sense of urgency than most. His mount was lathered and panting, flanks streaked with sweat, and he hauled the beast to a jarring stop just before them, chest heaving as he leaned low over the saddle horn.
“The priory,” he said. “Coire Sionna is empty, my lord. Half-burned. A shell.”
“Recently burned?” Alaric asked.
“Seems so, but nae just today,” said Struan. “Mayhap yesterday or the day before.”
“English?” Mathar questioned, having come to Alaric’s side.
Struan shook his head. “Canna say. Too dark to ken.”
Alaric nodded and instructed Mathar, “We’ll take the cavalry to the priory. Advise the foot soldiers to be vigilant. Keep them along the eastern edge of the wood, off the main road until we’ve swept the ground proper.”
Mathar gave a grim nod.
“Send half a dozen scouts ahead to circle wide and make certain we’re nae riding into a trap. I want eyes on the hillocks and the rise behind the ruins. If there’s English lurking nearby, I’d have them found before they ken we’re here.”
“Aye, laird,” Mathar obliged.
“And if they find signs of English—fresh prints, dung, campsites—I want word swift. We’ll nae linger near smoke-stained stone if it draws carrion.” He would not abide near the burnt priory if it risked drawing danger to his men.
Mathar gave another curt nod and turned sharply, already barking orders down the line.
Alaric nudged the stallion into motion, guiding it through the darkening trees with one hand while he braced the other securely around Ivy. He didn’t dare a full gallop, not with the woman in his arms. But the pace was hard enough that the trees blurred on either side in their rush. Still, he did something he’d never done before, allowing several riders to outpace him.
He was always the first into battle. The first into the breach. The first into the unknown. But not tonight, not with her pressed to him, warm and vulnerable and entirely unfit for war. He kept to the center of the column, eyes sharp, pulse steady, everymuscle poised to react. A thousand choices lay ahead if danger surfaced—and none of them left room for hesitation.
Unbidden, his thoughts turned dark. What if there were some English still nearby? What if they’d torched the place only to return in the night, seeking to finish what they’d begun? Or to use what remained as either their camp or as a launching place?
He cast a glance downward at the small shape in his arms. Despite her round belly, she leaned over the pommel, allowing him to lean into her back, their urgency surely felt by his steed. He considered that she had no armor, no weapon, no notion of survival, he might guess.
What would he do if steel rang through the trees again? If arrows flew or the night erupted with English war cries? He couldn’t fight with her in his arms. Couldn’t leave her either. He would have to make a choice—and quickly. Dismount, hide her? Find shelter amid stone or shadow? Hope she kept still. Hope she survived the decision.
His jaw clenched as the trees thinned, and the scent of scorched wood began to taint the wind.
The priory came into view all at once—stone bathed in silver moonlight, the outline of its once-proud walls jagged and blackened, like broken teeth in a ruined mouth.
Alaric reined in with those who’d stopped ahead of him.
The skeletal remains of the chapel loomed ahead, its roof gone, the bell tower toppled. Half the compound lay in charred ruin, the other half cloaked in silence. No candlelight. No sign of nuns, or life. Just a softly lifting smoke, winding through the shattered rafters like a ghost reluctant to leave.
Alaric drew the stallion to a halt, his eyes narrowing as he studied the smoldering timbers. The fire hadn’t burned hot or recent enough to send up flames, but the warmth still clung to the stones, and thin threads of smoke rose from blackened beams and all the other collapsed wood areas.
It wasn’t fresh, he decided soon enough, it just hadn’t happened today. A day past, perhaps two, long enough ago for survivors to have fled. But just to be sure, he turned toward the man at his side, Calum. “Take a few men and look inside for bodies. Or survivors,” he thought to add, but that hope seemed futile.
In truth, he didn’t know yet if the fire had been intentional or even malicious. He only supposed it was, assuming that if not, he might have found nuns and the priory’s lay persons lingering—tending the wounded, salvaging what they could, clinging to the remnants of their sanctuary. But there was nothing. No voices in prayer, no rustle of habits, no soft footfalls in the ash, only silence. Even the crackle of a fire had quieted by now.
His eyes raked the yard and fields and dark forest edges around the priory. He discerned no movement, no riders, no threat. But he didn’t always trust the quiet.
Behind them, hooves thudded softly as Mathar and the rest of the riders approached. But Alaric kept his gaze ahead, on the ruined priory, the scorched altar visible through the crumbled door.
