Page 2 of Draped in Plaid
“Sixteen traitorous guards. They staged a coup. We pushed them back, but not without havoc. Ye’ve only just missed the fight.”
“Only just?” Rory looked around the courtyard, taking in the disarray. “Looks as though control was lost some time ago. Where is Tomas?”
A hush fell over the courtyard and the guard who’d so boldly addressed Rory a moment ago looked to the ground. “Dead, my laird.”
Dead? Heaven help us…“Poor Tomas…” I whispered.
The steward of Dunleod had been so loyal to Rory. Known him since he was a lad, and perhaps the one person my husband had trusted most out of his clan. After all, he’d left Tomas in charge of Dunleod while we were away.
I jerked my gaze toward Rory, shifting in my saddle so that my knee touched his. This news would be devastating to him.
Rory was stone-faced, pale. Fury lit his eyes. “Dead? How? Why am I only finding this out now?”
The guard shook his head. “We sent word, ye’ll have passed the messenger on the road. He was killed by Ranulf. Stabbed in the back, my laird. ’Tis part of how he kept everyone in line. Each morning he…” The guard choked up. “He took a new prisoner. If one person so much as strayed from what he ordered, even just to use the privy, the prisoner was executed. One prisoner was my brother, Angus.”
I gasped, my hand involuntarily coming to my mouth. What horrors these people had endured. Ranulf was a madman… And Rory would feel completely to blame for it all. I could hear him now… If he’d only been able to save his laird and lady, if he’d not abandoned the clan… Oh, but how could I make this better for him?
Rory was silent a long moment, then finally asked, his voice filled with grief, “Have the dead been tended?”
“Aye, my laird. We’ve buried them in the clan cemetery.”
“I will go and pay my respects,” Rory said. “Secure the gate. I want every man on duty. No one is to come in or out. There will be no more deaths this day. We must restore order.”
Rory dismounted, turning toward me. He circled my waist with his hands and pulled me slowly from my horse. I noticed a slight tremble in his grip, probably a combination of fear, anger and sorrow.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered against his ear.
Tears pricked his eyes, and he nodded, though he did not voice his sadness. Rory pressed his forehead to mine for a few labored breaths, his eyes squeezed shut. I clung to the front of his shirt, not knowing what to say, and wanting so very badly to give him the comfort he needed.
“We will find him. He will not hurt another,” I said.
Rory nodded slightly.
Ranulf was a spoiled child in a man’s body with the temper of the devil. Unable to see the truth, or unwilling rather. He’d not wanted to accept that Rory was his father. He’d not wanted to accept that he was not yet the laird of the clan. He’d tried everything he could to thwart Rory, and Rory had only ever given him love and respect in return. Taking him into his home, training him, allowing him to join us as a family, and all the while, the arsehole was planning his revenge.
And now, those plans had come to fruition.
My blood boiled for the loss of lives, for the pain my husband felt at the betrayal of his own son.
If I ever were to get my hands on Ranulf, I’d throttle him. Pummel him to the ground. Make him pay for how he’d hurt Rory and the people of the MacLeod clan. For the lives he’d taken unnecessarily. I’d crush him.
I longed to whisk Rory to modern day Edinburgh, where he’d found me. To remain there, cozy in my little town house, drinking wine before the fire after a long day of working in my herbal shop. To stroll the Royal Mile, grab a bite to eat at my favorite pub… Toilet paper, hot, running water, aspirin… But we had a duty here. A calling.
This moment,thiswas what I hated most about living in the past—the violence, the helplessness. For certain, we had all that in modern times, too, but there seemed to be more law and order, more awareness of society’s expectations. In modern times, a son wouldn’t simply kill his father’s estate planner in order to get to the land, not unless he was a psychopath.
Well, maybe that explained it all. Ranulf couldn’t be reasoned with, couldn’t be expected to follow societal norms, or logic. No, because he was unhinged. A live wire in a time where no one was ready to handle such things.
Rory grabbed my hand. “Will ye come with me?”
“I’ll never leave your side.”
Rory took my hand in his and led me toward the kirk and beyond where all the dead of the clan were buried. Fresh mounds of turned earth, four of them.
We knelt on the ground, quietly mumbling our prayers. Tears streamed down my face, and I knew they were streaming down Rory’s, too.
After some time passed, we stood, and Rory walked with long, urgent steps, my hand still clutched in his grasp. We spoke to no one on our way back to the castle, or through the halls to his study. He tugged me inside, barred the door and then pressed me up against its solid surface.
Again, he pressed his forehead to mine, eyes closed as he dragged in a heavy breath.
