Page 24 of When a Highlander Weds a Hellion
The salty breeze blew in from the ocean as Katreine sat on the beach with her mother. She stole a sideways glance at her, and her breath caught in her throat. Her mother was so very frail looking. Suddenly, she turned to Katreine and took her hand. “I have made yer father vow to me that ye will be able to wed for love. We pushed Lenora toward Brodee before she even kenned him, and look what happened to her in the end. Ye must come to truly ken the man ye think ye will wed, as I kenned in my heart that yer father was good, honorable, and true. Vow this to me, Kat.”
“I vow it, Mama,” she said.
As the memory faded, Katreine flipped onto her back and closed her eyes, but the minute she started to feel light in the water, the sound of the war horn being blown ripped through the silence. God’s teeth! Without hesitation, she turned onto her belly and started swimming to the shore, pushing her legs and arms as fast as they would go. Her lungs burned and her side cramped as she scrambled onto the beach, grasped her dagger that was lying on her clothes, and snatched up her gown. She did not bother with her slippers.
She raced through the woods toward her home, tugging on her gown as she went while gripping her dagger. When she reached where the forest met the road, she gasped at the sight of hundreds of Blackswell warriors on warhorses, approaching her home in two long lines from the left. The drawbridge to the castle was up, and from the other side, in the safety of the inner keep, the thundering of her clan’s own warhorses resounded in the night.
Even if she ran toward the gate, she feared the approaching Blackswells would simply run her down, but she could not hide and do nothing as her family possibly engaged in battle. Had the Blackswells decided war between the clans was inevitable? She could not believe they were willing to give up their half of Derthshire by fighting her family. Where was Broch? Maybe he’d talked reason into them, but if so, then why were so many warriors here? Dear God, had they harmed Broch?
She looked to the right and thought. If she picked her way through the woods, she could make it to the bridge and jump into the moat. Her family would throw a rope to get her out. Decision made, she turned toward her home, but as she did, a stick snapped behind her and she was grabbed. She twisted away, losing her balance and her dagger in the process, and she fell through the branches onto the dirt road. A horse neighed loudly, and all she saw was the blur of hooves as the horse reared onto its hind legs, so near her face that she felt the push of air.
When she looked up and over her right shoulder, a powerful black destrier loomed above her with his hooves kicking at the air. “God above!” a voice yelled, and then the destrier’s feet swooped down so close to her that for a moment, her gown was pinned under a hoof. When the horse neighed again and danced backward, she scrambled to her knees to grasp her dagger she’d dropped, but before she could gain her feet, hands came under her arms and she was pulled up to standing.
She looked up and met Broch’s incredulous face. His eyes seemed to glow with fear which turned swiftly to anger as he stared at her. “Ye,” he said, his voice a rumble of restrained power. “Ye…” He swept his gaze over the length of her body, and she had the oddest notion he was assuring himself that she was not harmed. When his stance seemed to relax, she was almost certain of it, and a bubble of joy expanded in her chest. “Ye,” he said again, “are either a fool or ye’re unaccountably reckless.”
She was so glad to see him here and alive that without thought, she hugged him and said, “I’m unaccountably reckless.”
His hand came to her hair, and he pushed it off one shoulder and over her ear while he leaned close. His lips grazed her lobe. “I like a reckless lass,” he whispered, his warm breath fanning her sensitive skin.
She shivered with a sharp pull of desire, and then someone cleared their throat and she remembered in a flash that she was standing in the middle of the road with the Blackswells pressing down on her family. She turned, knowing the Blackswell army was there before her, and squared her shoulders.
The first person she saw was William, Broch’s companion, at whom she smiled, but then she saw Brodee sitting on his horse so smugly beside his father’s. Behind them by ten paces, their warriors had halted. She tilted up her chin. “It will do ye no good now to try to snatch me and force me to wed ye, Brodee Blackswell,” she spat. “Ye have broken the king’s edict by marching here to start a war with my family.”
An amused look skittered across the man’s face, taking Katreine by surprise. A piece of white cloth tied to a stick was dangled in her face as Brodee leaned forward. “We’ve nae broken any edict, lass,” he said. She had a hard time tearing her disbelieving gaze away from the white cloth.
“Ye are nae here to force me to wed ye, either?”
“Nay. We’re here for ye to wed my brother,” he said, his gaze becoming intense and moving to Broch, who stiffened behind her. She glanced over her shoulder, only just realizing Broch had positioned himself directly behind her and had drawn his sword. She gave him a smile, appreciative beyond words that he would risk himself for her, but then she turned to face Brodee and Laird Blackswell once more. Behind her, she heard the drawbridge creaking as it lowered.
“Hold up the peace flags,” Broch commanded, and to her shock, Brodee did as Broch ordered and held the flag high.
A hundred questions flew through her mind. “What brother?” she demanded of Brodee. “Ye dunnae have one. What trickery is this? What lies have ye told Broch?” She was sure they must have fed him nothing but untruths and now they’d drawn him here. What was their plan?
“Brodee,” Broch said, his voice a lethal warning.
The look of hatred that settled on Brodee’s features as he stared at Broch made gooseflesh sweep Katreine’s arms.
“Aye, Brother?” Brodee snarled.
“Brother?” Katreine repeated, looking back at Broch in disbelief. That could not be so! Broch was a MacLeod, not a—She gasped as the possibility, the awful possibility, sunk in. He had said himself he did not know who his father was. “No!” she burst out, feeling as if her hope for the future was slipping away before she’d ever had a chance to see if it was real.
“Katreine,” Broch said gently, pain in his voice.The pain of the truth. She clenched her teeth on a scream as horses’ hooves pounded toward them. She turned fully to Broch. Maybe even if he had discovered impossibly that he was the son of Blackswell, he was still honorable as she had first thought.
“Tell me,” she implored him, locking her gaze with his. “Tell me ye have uncovered the truth as I told ye. Tell me ye are nae here to force me to wed ye. Tell me ye have nae become a Blackswell in spirit, as well as name, in one short sennight.”
The frustrated look he gave her said it all, but devil take the man, he spoke anyway, making her heart squeeze into a tight little ball of sorrow for what might have been. “They are nae raiding yer land, Katreine. They are innocent; therefore, I kinnae write to the king on yer behalf.”
“I will nae wed ye…ye Blackswell!” she hissed, turning on her heel with a thundering heart to rush toward her father and her brothers, who were approaching. She was halted by an iron grip to her wrist. She turned toward Broch, intent on flaying him with words, but he stepped to her, cupped her neck, and brought their faces a hairsbreadth apart.
“Ye can refuse to wed me,” Broch said, “but if ye do, ye will be responsible for yer family losing Derthshire and possibly much more. The king is a fair man, but he is nae a forgiving man when one of his subjects disobeys his rulings. It may be that he simply takes Derthshire away from yer family. It may be that he takes the castle. It may be that he demands a life—mayhap nae yers but mayhap one of yer brothers or yer father.”
Katreine shuddered inwardly at the possibility.
“Katreine?” her father said over her shoulder, so that she knew her family had reached them.
“Release my sister, MacLeod!” Donell yelled.
Broch’s gaze flicked over her shoulder for one moment, his face becoming implacable, his eyes steely. “If yer sister demands it, I will,” he assured Donell in a calm but firm tone.
