Page 3 of Rebellion's Fire

Findlaech scowled, unhappy with his orders for the first time since Cailean had joined them. But before he could open his mouth, Adam simply pushed him toward his horse. “Lanson obviously knows where Donald is—he’s riding directly for him. Go.”

With an angry huff, Findlaech leapt onto his waiting horse. “And what exactly willyoube doing while I’m warning Donald about Lanson?”

Adam threw himself into the saddle of his own, larger, gray horse. “I’ll be taking Lanson’s lady.”

*

When the attackcame, sudden, ferocious, and at first terrifyingly silent, Christian had no doubt who was responsible. There was something inevitable about it. These were the MacHeth’s men.

Christian stood well back, almost in the doorway of the collapsing tent, and adjusted the embroidered linen mask so that it fitted perfectly around her left eye and didn’t impede her vision. Desperately, she looked for a way out.

The bare-legged warriors had swarmed down the hills surrounding the camp, taking her own lounging escort by complete surprise. Brutal, merciless, they fought in bloody tunics, with only a scattering of armor among them, just a few bright, ragged wrappings around their pounding legs and slashing arms. Pale skin under gray skies.

One of them caught her particular attention. One who, although in the thick of the fighting, seemed to look directly at her. He was a grubby specimen, no better dressed than the rest of them. Long, badly tangled black hair flailed about his face and shoulders. Two combatants lunged in front of him, blocking her view as well as his, but instantly his shield came up, knocking the obstacles aside indiscriminately. At the same time, he felled his own opponent with less attention than he apparently gave to the huddle of women around Christian. He wrenched his sword free, scarlet with Gavin’s blood.

This was real. Men were dying for her. Men she knew by name.

“He’s their leader,” Alys hissed, as if afraid of being heard over the din of battle. She stood with the other women around Christian at the tent entrance. “And he’s seen us! If he knows who we are…”

Christian said, “I think we can assume that.”

“Show no fear,” Alys commanded, drawing herself up to her full height. “We must not let Sir William down. Remember who we are!”

Christian had grown used to ignoring her pronouncements. With foreboding, she watched the enemy leader. He shouted something in his own language, running into the midst of another affray, hacking ferociously with sword and shield, kicking out with his foot to bring Henry down. Christian winced.

No longer even glancing at the women, the barbarian appeared to give his full attention to finishing what he’d begun.

Several of Christian’s men lay dead, their throats slit as they’d lounged at ease in the lee of the wind. Others had been cut down as they’d reached for their weapons. Most hadn’t even been wearing armor. Only minutes could have passed since the first enemy men had poured over the hills that should have protected the camp, but already it was over.

Christian raised her eyes from the slaughter, scanning the other low, wooded slopes which ringed the camp. In the end, they’d provided more cover for the attackers than for the women, but at the time, this had seemed the perfect place to camp, to wait safely for Sir William’s main party to attack and defeat the sons of Malcolm MacHeth.

MacHeth…

There was no sign of her husband’s soldiers looming over the hills to rescue them, to turn the tables at the last possible moment. Christian’s ears rang only with the clashing of steel, the barbarous war cries of the natives, and the screaming of the wounded soldiers. Those of them still left alive.

Turning, Christian glanced up at the hill behind her. There, too, they had left it too late to escape. The women had been seen, and their only possible escape route was being cut off. Two men loped along the ridge from either side.

“We should run, escape,” Alys said. Her voice shook.

“No point,” Christian replied.

“You would say that.” Even now, the contempt dripped from her lips like sour milk. “In the name of Christ, don’t disgrace him any further. They mustn’t take you, remember? Sir William saysIshould pretend…”

Even in her terror, Alys remembered that. Christian felt vaguely irritated by the fact. William hadn’t truly bargained for this and neither had she.

So, it was over. Slowly, Christian turned back to face reality. The mask she’d taken to wearing at the king’s court to hide the disfigurement of one side of her face hadn’t brought her much luck after all.

Those of her husband’s men left alive, swords drawn but wavering, were herded inexorably back into the huddle of fearful women outside the now fully collapsed tent. Their attackers advanced menacingly.

One man moved faster, pushing his way through to the enemy’s front. Their leader, the man who’d observed them so closely from the thick of battle. At his gesture, everyone halted. He strode on alone, giving an impression of a young, incongruously calm face streaked with dirt and yet of dark eyes, even at that distance, not calm at all but deeply troubled, swirling like whirlpools.

“Drop your weapons,” he said in passable French. “Or we’ll kill all of you.”

It might have been worth it to die, just to spite William, who had still no real idea how useful, not to say necessary, Christian was to him in this venture. However, luck seemed to have sent her the local berserker. Judging by those violent eyes, he was too unstable to rely on his mercy for her people.

She opened her mouth to command the men, but before she could speak, she heard the thud of weapons hitting the ground, the clash of steel as others landed on top, and she closed her lips again in silence. The MacHeth legend had won.

As if those wild, unworldly eyes had caught her tiny gestures, the berserker glanced at her, then almost immediately away as Henry formally offered him the hilt of his sword.

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