She twisted her arm out of his grasp. “Bullshit!” She jogged over to her horse and retrieved her weapons. “I know how to use these. Remember?” She held her sword in one hand and a bow and quiver of arrows in the other. She motioned back at Kismet, already arched with hackles up, tail fully puffed, and ears flattened against her head. “Come on, Kismet.” She turned to the dog. “Karma, you stay with Graham.”
“This is not one of yer wee Highland games, woman!” Graham hurried to the Buchanan skewered with the pike and yanked it free of the man’s body. He motioned Angus toward their captor’s discarded axe and sword, then spun and faced Gray. “Why the hell did ye bring her here? Ye shouldha come for us alone.”
“Ye’ve got a lot to learn about Sinclair women, MacTavish.” Colum trotted around the clearing, rounding the horses up. He led them to shelter behind the crumbling stone structure.
Gray jerked a thumb toward Lilia with one hand while pointing at Graham with the other. “Ye will find there is no controlling them once their minds are set. Heaven knows I’ve tried and now I’ve got a daughter who’s just the same.”
“Get behind the broch!” Graham jabbed the spear toward the wall of stone, struggling not to roar aloud when Lilia didn’t move. Lore, she would be the death of him. “We dinna have time for this, Lilia. Please do as I say—just this once.”
She rolled her eyes, looped the quiver full of arrows and bow over one shoulder, and hurried past the broch. Kismet leapt up the hillside in front of her, scampering around the low-growing ground cover and stones. Lilia nimbly trotted partially up the slight incline, then paused. “I’m going for higher ground. Better vantage point for arrows. You stay safe. I didn’t come here to watch you die.”
“Come, man. We’ll shield her from below.” Angus grabbed him by the arm and pulled. “The Buchanan and his son are among the lot. I spied the ugly bastards myself. Ye’ve no time to fetch her back down now.”
If they live through this, he would turn her over his knee again.Graham hunkered down in the center of the toppled-down broch with Angus, Gray, Colum, and the two MacKenna guards. Karma stood at alert behind them, a low warning growl clicking in his throat. The remains of the circular structure would protect them—for a bit. If the MacKenna lad was right, they were evenly numbered against the Buchanans but weaker due to injuries and one surly, hardheaded woman who refused to see sense.
May the gods be with us.Graham shifted the spear to his left hand and took a sword in his right.Protect her,he silently prayed.I beg ye—above all else, protect her.
CHAPTER28
Lilia squatted down behind a boulder, propping the sword, bow, and quiver of arrows beside her. Kismet leapt to the top of the rock, pacing back and forth with a nervous twitching of her tail.
She eased up beside the cat, flattened herself along the rough curve of the stone, and peered over the rim, wishing they’d had a chance to work out some sort of battle plan but there’d been no time. Apparently, the plan was to stay alive.
She wasn’t as elevated as she would’ve liked but this vantage point would have to do. She was much closer than arrow range and might be easily spotted. But the approaching clan had been too close to leave her back exposed by climbing any higher.
The Buchanans rode into the camp as though they already ruled the land but pulled their horses to an abrupt stop when they spotted the bodies of their brethren. They drew their weapons and slowly eased their mounts several lengths back from the crumbling broch.
Six.Lilia frowned and counted again. Definitely six in the group. Logan MacKenna had apparently miscounted. Lilia shrugged. Logan was just an oversized kid—barely past his teens from what Trulie had said, anxious to prove himself to his chieftain. He’d probably gotten overexcited when he spotted the approach of the Buchanans and counted wrong. It didn’t matter. In fact, it was even better. That meant they had them outnumbered.
The overly round one in the middle had to be the chief. The men looked to him, mirroring their moves according to his. Except one. The man sitting at his left. That one had to be the chieftain’s son.
“What a face.” Lilia reached down and snagged her bow and an arrow, soundlessly placing them atop the rock in front of her. The Buchanan’s son looked like he either smelled a stink or was straining to take a shit. He sat much taller in the saddle than his father and wasn’t nearly as round. He kept scanning the area. His oversized beak of a nose twitched while his nostrils flared with every turn of his head.
“Ye made an oath to me, MacKenna.” The Buchanan shifted in the saddle, squirming from side to side as though his ass itched.
“Aye, I did at that.” Gray kept his back to the wall, taking care to stand to one side of the crude window. “That oath is broken. Ye attacked my kinsman and threatened my clan. I owe ye nothing.”
“Give me MacTavish and his witch.” The chieftain pointed a pudgy finger up the hillside.
Lilia retreated a bit more behind the boulder, a chill stealing across her when the man’s hawk-faced son looked her dead in the eye.
The Buchanan slowly lowered his hand but kept his scowl trained on Lilia. “I came here personally to restore me honor in front of me son. I’ll not be leaving this place ’til I’ve done it. Turn them over now and I will leave yer clan in peace.”
Lilia tensed as Graham stood, readied the spear in one hand, and moved closer to the window.Don’t do it, Graham. Stay back.
“The woman ye call witch is my wife,” Graham said, his tone deep and rumbling like the warning growl of a beast. “I will thank ye not to insult her.”
“And she is my good sister,” Gray added.
“And mine as well,” Colum warned.
“She is a witch—just like her kin that have poisoned the blood of yer clan.” This time it was the Buchanan’s son who spoke. “Our spies told us what goes on at yer keep, MacKenna. Speaking to demons through the hearth fires. Strange healing of those who should not live. ’Tis time to purge this land of yer evil. Reclaim it from Satan and bless it as our own.”
Shit. Witch hunters.Lilia nocked an arrow and pulled back, aiming the missile’s tip right between the son’s beady eyes. Holding her breath, she waited for Graham or one of the MacKennas to make a move.Give me the sign to part the son of a bitch’s hair.She forced the memory of Granny’s horrific recounts of witch hunters and their methods of torture to the back of her mind. This situation had evolved into something much worse than Graham insulting the chieftain. These holier-than-thou fools were threatening her loved ones. They had to be stopped. “Kismet—get down there and help them. I’m safe up here,” she whispered.
Kismet leapt from the rock, then melted into the tangled undergrowth and made her way silently down the hillside. Lilia didn’t exhale until she saw the cat reappear beside Karma. Good. Now the men had more furry firepower.
A calloused hand closed around her throat and yanked her backward, knocking the weapon from her hands. “Ye’ll not be shooting yer bewitched arrows this day, witch!”
