Page 36 of Highlander Redeemed
Duncan sat back. “You always have my attention.”
“Only when I dinna want it.” She tried not to wince as his eyes went hard, but she did not let his reaction stop her. “I did what you bade me. Are you angry because I made your order better?”
“Nay.” But he did not look at her.
“Do not lie to me, Duncan. For a moment you did think well of what I did, but then you denied that, to yourself and to me.Why? Why would you do that? Is it because I forbid you to”—she hated that her voice wobbled—“to touch me again?”
Still he did not look at her. She started to rise, and he reached out and grabbed her arm, holding her in place. “You are right, Scotia,” he said looking at her now, but she could not read the emotion in his eyes. “What you did was smart. You used your knowledge of strategy creatively—”
Warmth began to wash through her with his words and the feel of his hand on her. She started to smile but he pressed his lips together and sighed.
“—an excellent trait in a leader, but you are not a leader. You might become one, one day, but that is a long way off.”
“And you are a leader?” she asked, getting to her feet and picking up the useless waterskin.
“When you and I are training, aye, I am. In battle, nay, I am not. I have not the knowledge and experience of Malcolm, Nicholas, Kenneth, or any of the other seasoned warriors of this clan. In battle I must do exactly as I am told. To do anything else will put other lives in danger, and likely my own, for I will not be where I am needed, or prepared to do what is needed, if I change the plan on my own.”
He looked up at her, then stood slowly, locking his gaze to hers.
“’Tis why Myles is dead,” he said, his voice quiet but his words ringing like a blacksmith’s hammer in her head. “You did not do as your chief bade you, to remain in camp where you put no one’s life at risk, where you could not draw someone else—Myles—from where he was supposed to remain and into danger. If you had not taken it into your own head to change the order Nicholas gave you, Myles would very likely be alive today, and you would not be shunned by your own clan.”
“’Twas not me who killed Myles,” she said, though her heart pounded as his accusation circled in her mind. “I did not—”
“You did not strike him down yourself? ’Tis no excuse. Hewould have been safely hidden in that tree if he had not had to climb down to follow you, to stop you from doing something even more dangerous than you had already undertaken by leaving the protection of the warriors’ camp.”
She started to deny it, but the words refused to leave her mouth. She blinked. She swallowed. She shook her head.
“I thought you were on my side. I thought you were different from the others of the clan.” She shook her head harder. “You only meant to keep me under close watch after all. Yesterday was just another ploy to bend me to your will.” She pivoted and strode through the wood, not caring how much noise she made as she remembered the feel of his kiss and his hands on her, as she remembered the way he had looked at her over the fire last night, the way her heart had softened until she struggled to remember that her purpose left no room for soft feelings for anyone. She turned back and Duncan almost crashed into her.
“And that look you gave me over the fire last night.” She poked a finger hard against his chest. “You feigned the cow eyes of an infatuated lad when ’twas only another weapon to keep me close, and I almost fell for it. I almost fell for you. I am truly an idiot, a complete bampot. I knew not how skilled you were at mummery.” He had played her as masterfully as a bard on a clarsach, a harp. He was a master of strategy in a completely different way than he had taught her.
“Scotia, none of that was—”
“Dinna lie to me!”
“I have never lied to you.” Now his ire grew. He narrowed his eyes and stood his ground. “That kiss was real. What happened yesterday, though I never meant for it to happen, was real. I ken not what the look on my face was last night, but the feelings I had ... I have ... for you are changed every bit as much as you are changed ... or at least as I thought you had changed.”
“I have—”
A cry resounded through the wood. A man’s voice in surprised pain. And then just as suddenly as it had started, it ended.
“Brodie,” Duncan said, sprinting back in the direction they had come from. Scotia followed without a word, the rush of emotion that had fueled their argument now fueling her feet. After they had covered a good distance, Duncan slowed and gave her the hand signal for silence that had irritated her so much not long ago, and another to hold her ground.
Without a thought, she ducked behind a large tree, and worked hard to quiet her rasping breath as Duncan crept forward. She tried to quiet her mind, toknowsomething of use, but all sheknewwas that Duncan was still nearby. The quiet call of a tawny owl had her peeking around the tree enough to see Duncan signaling her to join him. She moved silently, and when she was even with him, she crouched beside him. He pointed through the thick greenery.
There, at the foot of an ancient oak tree, her kinsman Brodie lay crumpled and broken upon the ground, a Welsh arrow through his heart.
SCOTIA ANDDUNCANreturned to the Glen of Caves well before sundown, just as the clan was gathering for the evening meal.
“Get something to eat, Scotia,” he said, giving her a little push toward the cook circle where a kettle bubbled over the fire, sending a mouthwatering scent through the clearing. “I must report to Nicholas.”
Scotia glanced at the council circle at the other end of the narrow clearing and found, as she’d expected, Nicholas, both Guardians, and Malcolm there.
“You’ll not tell them of our bargain,” she reminded him.
Duncan closed his eyes and sighed. “Nicholas already kens what we have been about.”
Scotia’s eyes grew big. She blinked. “He kens? You told him? You promised—”
