“Nay. Ye dinna ken how to protect yerself.” Magnus shook his head again.
The other three men took a step back. They knew what was coming. Saoirse held a blade at Magnus’s throat and another under his plaid by his bollocks. Magnus stood like a statue, utterly unprepared for a knife-wielding bride to draw her blades on him.
“Tell me how I dinna ken how to protect maself.” She pressed just enough to touch his skin without nicking it in either place. She withdrew them and stepped back. “If ma da and uncles didna teach all the lasses how to defend themselves, then ma mama and aunts would have. Auntie Mairghread may be the one who competes at the Highland Gatherings and is thebest-knownknife thrower, but Auntie Siùsan is just as good. I believe ye taught her, and she taught me.”
“I’m nae—” Magnus stopped when Alex cleared his throat and shook his head.
“Saoirse, I agree with Magnus, but I ken we willna change yer mind. He’ll worry the entire way there if he thinks ye willna forgive him for leaving ye behind, or worse, fears ye following. But he’s right aboot nae being able to concentrate on the battlefield if he fears someone reaching ye. If Magnus agrees, ye come, but under these conditions.”
“If he agrees?” Saoirse looked around. “Mayhap Mama would like to hear these conditions.”
“Saoirse,” Alex warned. The last thing he needed was his wife joining the conversation. If she and Saoirse joined forces, they’d be the ones leading the charge. “This isnae aboot ye. Ye wish to come to make sure if aught happens, Magnus can be tended to. If he canna concentrate for fear of ye being harmed, then he willna live long enough to have ye tend to him. This is aboot conditions he can live with and still keep himself alive.”
Saoirse looked up at Magnus and found a pair of distraught blue-hazel eyes peering down at her. She nearly reconsidered, but something stronger pushed her not to relent. She wasn’t blessed with the gift of second sight, but something told her they would need a healer. That meant her.
“What are yer conditions, Da?” Saoirse continued to look up at Magnus.
“Ye wear a pair of breeks and cover yer hair. Ye go into the tree branches with yer bow and arrow along with all yer dirks. Ye listen to Wiley and Tate, who will be livid aboot being left behind but who will guard ye.”
Saoirse’s lip thinned, and she shook her head. “Nay. Thormud and Tate always partner while Blake and Torquil always do. Wiley and Kirk can stay with me. I willna split up Thor and Tate.”
“I’ll stay with the lass, too.” Everyone turned toward the English voice approaching. After more than a score of years in the Highlands, Dedric Hartley's voice still held an accent. A lad when the English stole him from his border clan and forced him to the English royal court, he’d remained a Scot in his heart. When his tenure as a knight to King Edward I ended, he returned to Scotland and the MacLellans. It wasn’t long after that he met and married Isabella Dunbar. They moved north and joined the Sinclairs. He was one of the senior-most guards among the Sinclair warriors. He was also Kirk and Keira’s father.
“Thank ye, Ric.” Saoirse smiled at him. He was much like an uncle to all the Sinclair children, and Keira and Kirk were her cousins, as far as Saoirse was concerned.
“Yes, well, I have a soft spot for women with such blonde hair.” Ric shrugged. He looked at Magnus and offered the new husband a sympathetic smile. “They’re all cut from the same mold. Don’t fight it. You’ll still lose and just wind up exhausted. We’re better with our women at our sides, anyway.”
“Ye’re better off leaving us to run the keep,” Ceit said as she came to join them. She pinched Tavish’s ribs as he walked beside her. “And ye can take this one when ye scarper off. I dinna need him under foot.”
“Yer feet arenae what ye like to have me under.” Tavish may have whispered, but everyone heard. “Wheest,seillean beag. Stop buzzing.” Tavish had called his wife “little bee” since they met. He said her tongue could sting, but her love was sweeter than honey.
“Take him with ye.” Ceit jested, but she leaned against her husband as he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. Her arms went around his waist as though she might keep him from ever leaving. None of the wives were excited at the prospect of watching their husbands ride away. Saoirse spied Blake holding Cerys against his chest as they whispered, near the fireplace. Cerys nodded at something Blake said, but they remained wrapped in each other’s arms as she burrowed her face against her husband’s chest.
As much truth as Saoirse spoke about the men needing a healer, she knew she insisted because she wanted to avoid the very scenes she saw with her aunt and uncle and with her cousin. But she wondered if she was jumping out of the pan and into the fire. Would she be able to say goodbye to Magnus when the battle began? Perhaps she should remain at Dunbeath. The decision tore at her, but the nagging sense that she needed to be there didn’t dim.
“We’ll take the tray this evening.” Saoirse supposed the couples in her family would do the same. The Great Hall would be nearly empty since the married couples with men riding out in the morning would prefer their privacy too.
“Are ye taking this one, too?” Ceit’s tone continued to jest, but her anxiousness was clear as she looked up at Tavish.
Liam mulled it over. He intended to send Callum as his representative since his oldest son was the clan’s tánaiste and his heir. Mòr would want to be there since the threat was to his mentee, and Alex had a right as Óg’s father-by-marriage. He’d intended to remain with Tavish as his second-in-command at home. He shifted his gaze to Óg and knew his decision.
“Aye. We all go, lads. Ceit, ye and yer sisters can run this clan with ease. Ye’ve done it before. Let there be nay confusion in anyone’s mind that the Sinclairs are loyal to their allies, and nay one threatens our family without facingallof our wrath.Familia prima.”
“Semper familiar.” Liam spoke the first half of their family motto alone, but seven voices finished it. Just as Alex considered Magnus his son with no qualifiers, Liam saw his daughters-by-marriage the same way. They were his daughters and sisters to one another.
“Come,seillean beag.Help me pack,” Tavish whispered. He rubbed his wife’s back, and she hadn’t lessened her hold. The couple bickered on purpose, as it had been their dynamic since the beginning, but no one doubted their devotion to one another. All of Liam’s children loved their partners as much as they did the day they married, and their desire for one another never dimmed. If anything, it had only multiplied over the score of years they’d all been married.
Liam made his way to his chamber to prepare. He loathed riding away from home and separating his family. In the nearly forty years he’d been laird, it hadn’t gotten any easier. He hated knowing he was taking his sons and grandsons into danger. He despised leaving the women behind to worry. And he feared the day he wouldn’t return with all of his family. But it was the duty he’d been born into.
Kyla,mo ghràidh, I need yer guidance again. Would that ye could be here to tell me in person. But I feel ye with me always. Watch over our family, ma love. Ye ken I canna do this without ye. I dinna think they’re ready for me to join ye yet, but I long for the day we’ll reunite. I promised ye this lifetime and the next.
When he reached his chamber, he ran his hand over the carved doorjamb he’d created for Kyla as a wedding gift. It replicated the woodland scene she’d stitched on a leine she made for their wedding. On the left, there was a raven, a deerhound, a bear, and a boar with an “L” overlapping a “K”. On the right was an eagle, a red stag, and a wildcat. The same initials appeared but in reverse, the “K” overlapping the “L.” She’d worried about future generations disliking the letters, but it was their children who swore it was the most special part. Liam shook his head, clearing the wistfulness from his mind, but he would never let go of Kyla. They were the beginning of the Highland legacy that was the Clan Sinclair. He would ride out with three generations of Sinclair warriors to defend their family. He truly wondered whose death wish was so strong that they would take on his clan.
CHAPTER18
Saoirse and Magnus soaked in a massive wood and copper tub. Carpenters built the early tubs for the laird’s family so large to accommodate the men’s stature. The fact that their wives were so much more petite meant there was room for them to share. It hadn’t taken Liam long to realize that he needed several tubs to accommodate his growing family once his four sons married. His sons were more like him than they realized since he and Kyla had often shared their baths.
“Saoirse, I still dinna agree that ye should come.” Magnus’s arms rested on the top of her thighs as she reclined against him, seated between his legs.
