The shout came through the mist like an arrow. Frida whirled around to see Mirrie running up the hill towards her; her brown hair flying and her grey shawl gaping over her shoulders.
Mirrie who should be tucked up by the fire, keeping warm.
“Whatever is it?” she cried, walking as quickly as she could to greet her.
“Come quickly,” Mirrie repeated, gasping for breath. “A band of warriors have been spotted. And they’re coming straight for Ember Hall.”
Chapter Two
The air smelleddifferent in England.
Mayhap because it was not laced with the scent of blood and despair.
Not yet anyway, Callum reflected, giving his tiring horse a loose rein as they trotted up yet another hill. The landscape here was all rolling hills and woodland. On a different day, the view might have lifted his heart. But he had not yet become so immune to violence that he could approach this particular mission with anything other than gravitas.
Besides which, the fog was so heavy it was difficult to see any further than the brown tips of his horse’s ears. But as they approached the summit, the mist thinned, allowing him to take stock of the whereabouts of his small band of men.
Up ahead was Gregor. Thick-necked, strong-headed and silent. They had met just days earlier; Gregor delivering the encoded parchment to Callum at what remained of Kielder Castle, a twitch in his jaw indicating his displeasure at having to wait for Callum to break the seal. It was clear from the off that Gregor wanted sole charge of this mission—to be the man giving the orders and the man swinging the sword.
Beside him, riding so close that occasionally their knees knocked together, was young Arlo; a farmer’s lad he had known since birth. Arlo had seen fewer than seventeen summers. He was brave and honest, but not yet as strong as he would one day become.
God willing he would live that long.
Bringing up the rear was Andrew. His friend. A warrior. A lover of women. A teller of tales.
Callum would trust Andrew with his life.
He would not, however, trust him to stay quiet for any length of time. Right now, Andrew was singing a bawdy song about an inn-keeper’s wife that made even Callum’s reluctant lips twitch into a smile. They had been riding long and hard. Mayhap they needed some cheer.
Callum flicked his eyes down to the youthful face of his companion. Fair-skinned Arlo was turning the colour of beetroot as Andrew’s lyrics floated through the wispy mist towards them.
He cleared his throat. “If you’ve changed your mind…” he began.
Arlo’s response was swift. “I haven’t.”
“’Tis a bloody business, assassinating a man in his own home.” Callum saw no sense in softening his words.
“He deserves it. They all deserve it.” Arlo’s voice broke and sympathy tugged at Callum’s heavily barricaded heart. The lad had seen both his parents cut down during the siege of Kielder Castle; Callum’s ancestral home on his father’s side.
“You’re not wrong, lad,” he muttered.
Ahead of them, Gregor swivelled in his saddle. “What’s this? Are we to take them all out?”
“Nay.” Callum’s voice came out in a growl. “Then we would be no better than they are.”
Gregor shrugged his muscular shoulders. A warrior through and through, he wore his heavy mail shirt as if it weighed nothing. “The English have taken our lands, our women, our children. Everything. And ye ask me to stay my hand?”
“Not I,” Callum corrected, resisting the urge to trot up alongside him. “Our orders come directly from the Bruce.”
Gregor’s response was unintelligible, but Callum knew that for now, at least, he had won.
Evoking the Bruce’s name usually had that effect.
The party fell into silence as they rode into the trees; the only sound the steady clop of muffled hoofbeats and occasional lowing from cattle in distant fields.
“Will ye make us ride much further before we slake our thirst? My horse is parched.” Andrew pushed his dapple-grey mare into the narrow gap between Callum and Arlo.
“Methinks ’tis you that is parched,” Callum replied drily, ducking his head beneath a low-hanging branch. “And it is not much further. If my sources are accurate, the house we seek is on the other side of this hill.”
