Chapter 24
“No more word or any form of attack.” Catriona studied the Campbell camp below as she and Alexander paced side by side along the top of the curtain wall. The clear skies and warm touch of the sunny spring day did little to brighten her disposition or ease the sense of impending doom crushing in from all sides. “It’s been two days and still no reaction to the loss of the cannons.” She shifted her attention to Alexander’s scowling countenance, his eyes narrowed against the windy brightness of the cloudless sky. “What is his strategy?” Alexander had been in plenty of skirmishes. Surely, he’d ken Jameson Campbell’s tactics.
Alexander gave a slow shake of his head, never taking his gaze from the glen below. “I think he waits.”
“For what?” They paused at the wide landing atop the left guard tower. The battlements were higher here but the parapets atop had notches cut wider to permit the emptying of cauldrons of boiling water or fiery oil on intruders attempting to scale the fortress’s walls.
“The king’s regiment.” He paused at a wider than usual crenel, rubbing a hand across the flat shelf of the notch as though he found it lacking. “Your brother mentioned the Earl of Crestshire on the day he died.” He turned to Catriona. “Do ye know the man?”
“No. I dinna ken any Earl of Crestshire.” Catriona leaned a shoulder against the wall, snugging her arms around her waist and tucking her arisaidh tighter about her. She ached with weariness. Sleep brought her nothing but troubling dreams colored by the fear and worry of her waking hours. She’d healed from the stab wounds with the swiftness found in good health. The occasional pains she now felt were hardly worth mentioning but the inability to rest wore her down. “Maybe he leads the king’s regiment.”
“Perhaps.”
There was something about Alexander’s tone that pulled her attention from Campbell’s camp to him. “What are ye not telling me?”
“I canna be sure, mind ye, but I may know the Earl of Crestshire well.”
Catriona couldn’t tell from Alexander’s tone whether that was a good thing or bad. “Be ye enemies?”
“If the man is who I think he is, we were once close as brothers.” Alexander scratched his well-trimmed beard along his jawline, squinting one eye shut in the process. “But who’s to say? Would the English allow a man who’d fostered in the Highlands to claim the title of earl and the estate that goes along with it? An estate that lays within a stone’s throw of the palace?”
“I canna imagine what a Sassenach would do.” Catriona fidgeted in place, tracing a fingernail along the mortar in the wall. She’d never done well with waiting. Patience was not among her scarce collection of virtues.
The deep, somber sound of a horn, followed by two higher-pitched blows traveled to them on the wind.
Catriona searched the horizon. Movement at the far end of the glen, close to the southernmost pass leading to Neal lands, caught her eye. She pointed just as Alexander leaned out over the embrasure and looked. “The king’s regiment.”
“In full force,” Alexander said under his breath. “I dinna ken if the glen will hold them all.”
Soldiers poured into the valley at the front of the keep, filling every space like ants swarming across kitchen scraps. Catriona’s heart sank. She swallowed hard and did her best to bolster her waning courage to keep from dropping to her knees and weeping. All appeared lost. No way could they emerge victorious over so many. The Campbells and the English would obliterate Clan Neal, erasing them from the Highlands of Scotland. But even worse, she’d lose the man she loved and never see him again. She couldna bear the thought of what might happen to him.
“I shall go forth and speak to Campbell and the earl.”
“You cannot!” Shock filled Catriona that he’d harbor such a notion. “Ye be our chieftain. We canna risk your capture.”
Alexander pinned her with an icy stare that chilled her to the bone. “I willna send any more children to do the job I should do myself.”
Oakie’s loss still pained Alexander a great deal. He blamed himself for the boy’s death, saying he never shouldha lost his good sense in the imaginings of young lads plotting to win a battle.
“Send Alasdair,” she said. The man’s nickname was the ‘judge’ because he had an uncanny talent for settling arguments and reasoning out differences. “Name him Clan Neal’s solicitor.”
With a gentle grasping of her shoulders, Alexander pulled her close, and gave her a patient smile that neared to breaking her heart. “I must go myself to meet these men.” He gave her a conciliatory nod. “I shall take Alasdair with me. Ye’ve got the right of it there. The man is excellent at arbitration but I willna send him into the den of lions alone. 'Twould no' be proper and ye ken that as well as I.”
Farther down the path running atop the curtain wall, the door to the guard tower swung open and Magnus and Graham appeared. Both men kept their attention locked on the glen in front of the keep as they made their way to where Alexander and Catriona stood.
With a perfunctory nod to Catriona, Graham cut straight to the point as he motioned toward the two armies below. “So ye're aware?” he said to Alexander.
“Aye.” Alexander gave his brother and best friend a grim nod. “A meeting with Jameson Campbell and the Earl of Crestshire is in order with Alasdair accompanying as our clan solicitor. What say ye?”
“And the rest of us as your personal guard, aye?” Magnus added.
“And your wife,” Catriona said, knowing Alexander would ne’er allow it—or at least he’d do his best to forbid it. But she had the right to be there. If Calum had no' betrothed her to Campbell, this standoff wouldha ne’er happened. “I dinna wait well so I’ll have none of it, thank ye. I’ll be at your side.” She braced herself for Alexander’s reply. “I’ll no' have ye riding into the enemy’s camp and I’ll no' discuss it further, ye ken?” she added.
Alexander gave her a pointed look. The look said the discussion was at an end and had also veered dangerously close to breaking her oath to trusting him as chieftain. A different tactic would serve her better.
“Would ye consider allowing them, the Campbell and the Earl of Crestshire, to meet here? Within the keep?” She rested a hand to his forearm, praying he’d consider her request. “Then I’d know ye safe. I could remain in the gallery and watch over ye while ye met with them.”
Alexander gave her a perturbed look and eased away from her touch. “Ye're saying ye’d be willing to stay in the gallery and no' chirp out nary a word whilst I speak with them.”
