Page 68 of A Constant Blaze

“My lord?” some irritating voice said beside him.

The man on the hill lifted his arm and waved.

Malcolm MacHeth, looking not a day older than twenty years old. Impossible. And untrue, for Fergus had seen him before only two days ago, still recognizably Malcolm, but no youth either.

Fergus shook himself awake, gripping the arms of his chair tightly.

Malcolm had found him again. Why? The last time he’d led him on a wild-goose chase from Kingowan, during which a message had reached him that Mairead had been “abducted.” In other words, that she’d escaped while Fergus, Brian of Kingowan, and all his men were chasing the phantom Malcolm.

And now, it seemed, Malcolm was pursuing him.

Fergus stood, his keen eyes scouring the hillside and the loch and all the surrounding countryside, for signs of men. He found none.

Interrupting the stream of questions from Aidan, his young but capable captain, Fergus uttered a few terse orders and strode forward toward the hill, beckoning.

There was a pause. Fergus actually thought he wouldn’t come, after all that. Then he moved and began to walk down the hill. Fergus smiled. Until another man rose and walked behind him. As tall as Malcolm, surely, and dark hair peeking from beneath a fine helmet. One of the sons, perhaps? Fergus’s smile broadened. If he played this properly, they’d have a MacHeth back in prison, and Fergus would be back in the king’s good graces. Providing no army of genuine MacHeths lurked in the long grass up there.

“Get two men up that hill,” Fergus murmured to his captain. “Discreetly. If there’s anyone else, bring them. If it’s a large force, sound the alarm.”

So far as he could see, Malcolm kept his attention only on Fergus himself. As they drew closer, he saw that the other man in the helmet, although young and dark and strangely familiar, was neither of the MacHeth sons and clearly no mere man-at-arms either. But it was the ever unpredictable Malcolm who concerned him most.

“Malcolm mac Aed,” he greeted him, smiling as he approached. “Itisyou! I thought I’d seen a ghost the other day at Kingowan.”

Malcolm lifted one sardonic eyebrow. He didn’t offer his hand, let alone an embrace. “Who told you I was dead?”

“Not dead, but in Ross. The unkind might call it the same thing.”

“If that were so,youwere pretty active for a dead man when you last visited Ross. You made an alliance with my family, burned my daughter-in-law’s home, and abducted her.”

There was no point in denying any of it. As a youth, at least, Malcolm had always admired the brazen along with the honest. “Be fair, my friend. She was not your daughter-in-law at the time. I was helping your sons rid themselves of a pesky Norman knight.”

“Against their will?” Malcolm said wryly. “But I haven’t come to quarrel with you on that score.”

“Or at all, I trust,” Fergus said pointedly. He wasn’t crass enough to point out the numbers of his men, all now dressed and armed, and though not threatening, clearly ready to protect their lord from sudden attack. His two scouts were already riding up the hill behind his visitors. Fergus was proud of them.

But Malcolm’s gaze didn’t waver. “You think I should just forget that you betrayed my son to the King of Scots?”

Damn, he could be a chilling bastard when he chose to be. Even when he was young, even in the midst of horseplay, the easygoing charm could vanish into this same cold, hard stare for reasons Fergus hadn’t always grasped. In truth, Malcolm had always been a dangerous man to cross. Easy to forget when he’d been incarcerated for so long. But then, Malcolm would be foolish to forget who held all the cards here.

“In truth, you’d be wise to,” Fergus said bluntly. “So that I might forget you’re here at all, against all the oaths you swore to that same King of Scots.”

“You’re on boggy ground there too, Fergus. Who gave you permission to ravage Scotland in my name?”

Fergus gave his most ferocious smile. “I’m keeping your reputation alive, Malcolm mac Aed, after you went so tamely home to Ross.”

Malcolm smiled. “With my son. If I were you, Fergus, I’d hurry back to my own lordship—I beg, your pardon,kingdom—before the King of Scots hears who really led these attacks.”

Fergus laughed. “Who will tell him, Malcolm? You?”

“Lord, no. I don’t speak to the Scottish court. Yet.Thisman, on the other hand—” He stepped aside, indicating his companion with a mocking flourish. In truth, Fergus had almost forgotten about him. “I don’t need to introduce you, do I?”

The young man bowed stiffly. “My lord. An unexpected…honor.”

“Aye, maybe,” Fergus said. He’d lost sight of his scouts on the hill for a few moments, but one was descending again. Reporting nothing, presumably, while the second man checked farther afield to be sure. He glanced at the silent man with Malcolm MacHeth. “Your face is familiar though your name eludes me. Who the devil are you?”

“Bernard de Brus,” Malcolm said gently. “Captain of the king’s garrison at Alyth. And son, as you know, to the Lord of Annandale, a friend to both the King of Scots and the King of England.”

Fergus swore under his breath. No one would doubt this boy’s word. But a flick of one finger was all it took to bring Fergus’s men closing in on them. For many reasons, he was reluctant to kill Malcolm MacHeth, but Bernard de Brus was dead the moment his name was spoken. And the beauty was, Malcolm would be blamed for that, too.

---