Page 10 of Highlander's Sinless Nymph
Edward cut across her harshly. It seemed that he was struggling to control an incandescent rage held just below the surface.
“Yer faither,” he demanded, “who is he?”
“My––my father?” Charlotte stuttered. She was bewildered and terrified by this sudden, savage change in the Scotsman. It would have been obvious to someone with the meanest intelligence that Edward was almost uncontrollably livid.
“Am I nae speaking clearly enough fer ye, Sassenach?” Edward shot back at her. “Can ye nae understand me heathen Scottish brogue, is that it? Aye, yer faither, lass, who is he?”
Charlotte flinched and gasped in alarm as Edward pulled a couple of rocks towards him––one of which was larger and had a slight depression in it. She took a step away, her heart racing.
He is like every other man! Like my father! Not to be trusted! Vile when their temper is up!
Edward opened up the leather packet that he had brought with him from the cave, tipped the ingredients onto the makeshift bowl and began to pound them up with the smaller stone.
“My father,” she said, “is a Captain in the English army, Captain Adair Bolton. What has that––”
Edward smashed the stone into the bowl so hard that a chunk of it broke off and flew into the night.
“Ach, the one name that is like poison dripped into me ears!” he roared, discontinuing the mashing of the poultice ingredients.
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand why––” she tried.
“Did ye nae think that the mention of the English army might nae be a bit of a sore spot fer a Scotsman?” Edward snapped. His eyes were shining with rage. The scar through his eyebrow made him look even more formidable and dangerous than he doubtless was.
“Of––of course,” Charlotte stammered, though she could not help but think that it had not been the mere mention of the English that had thrown this ruggedly handsome young Highlander into a rage.
It was the citation of my name, my family name.
Edward was staring into the fire, his jaw clenched, one fist bunched tight in his lap. The other hand was squeezing the stone he had been using as a pestle as if he might wring blood from it.
He looked up at her, his eyes turned suddenly hard and dark as coal. His mouth worked as if he wanted to spit insults at her. Charlotte actually took a step back from him, so palpable was his wrath. It was like standing too close to a forge.
Then Edward blinked. He seemed to see her––no longer blinded by whatever fury had overtaken his senses––and his brows unknitted a little.
“Ach!” he said, smashing the stone back into the rudimentary bowl and starting to grind up the ingredients in it with a renewed vigor. “It’s nae yer fault that yer related to such a––to abastard!”
Hard words. It is almost as if he harbors a grievance solely for my father. As if there is a score between them…
* * *
Edward sat, unseeing, his brain full of hot acid.
O’ course, it should come as nay surprise that this woman kens nothin’ of the history that lies betwixt her faither and me clan. I doubt it is somethin’ he talks of over dinner.
This vendetta between the MacQuarrie clan and Captain Bolton had all started because Captain Bolton had decided to kidnap Aisla MacAlpein and hold her hostage. He had heard, correctly, that the MacQuarrie clan had been raising funds in support of the Jacobite cause.
A good cause, perhaps, but nae worth the price we paid.
The English captain had decided that the best way to get the clan to give up their support of King James VII and his Stuart descendants was to use Lady MacQuarrie as a bartering chip. His proposed bargain was a simple one: the MacQuarrie clan would halt their support of James VII and, in return, Lady MacQuarrie would be spared.
And what a sharp lesson that was for our clan, in learning a little of the nature of the man who has set himself against us.
When Laird MacQuarrie had refused to stop his support of the man he saw as the true King of Scotland––thinking that the English Captain was bluffing, Captain Bolton had, without any compunction whatsoever, ordered Aisla MacAlpein to be hung outside the fort that he had been occupying at the time.
Edward forced himself not to imagine the body of his mother swinging in the breeze, her legs kicking helplessly as she tried to find a purchase on thin air. None of the MacQuarrie clan had been present for the execution, so quickly had the order been given, but Captain Bolton had had a detailed report sent by messenger to the Laird.
Heartless bastard!
In response to this, the grieving MacQuarrie clan had cried for vengeance. However, some of their neighboring allied clans called for caution and prudence.
