“Ah, aye, there is that.”
“Let us hope we find our quarry.”
Chapter Two
Emily did not think she had ever hurt so badly, or been so afraid. She was exhausted and heartsore. Her arm burned and her leg throbbed in such a way she constantly had to bite back a cry. She knew her sister and David were dead even though she had not seen them fall but she was sure she had heard screams. They had not begun searching for their son, either. There was also no way they could have held off ten men for long, not men who had made it clear they wanted everyone in the house dead. All she wanted to do was curl up on a soft bed and cry but she had Neddy to care for.
She looked down at the boy sleeping curled up at her side, her wide skirts as his blanket. He looked so much like his father that she felt a stab of loss. David had been a good man. His son had the same thick wavy black hair, a sweet little face, and big brown eyes that could convince people to give him anything he wanted. Fortunately, he was not yet old enough to understand the power of those eyes. She prayed he was also not old enough to fully understand what had happened to his parents.
Lightly stroking his hair, she closed her eyes. They were safe at the moment. She needed someone with skill to tend her wounds but, for now, they were safe. Now was not the time to fret. Now was the time to plan. As soon as she felt sure those men who had attacked them were gone, they would run again. She just wished she knew where they could run to.
For a moment the pain in her leg and shoulder was pushed aside by the pain in her heart. Her sister and her husband were certainly dead. Every time she tried to think of them as merely wounded her mind mocked her. The shooting had ended and the taint of wood smoke still hung in the air. The last time she saw them Annabel and David were still desperately trying to hold off their attackers. Her sister had ordered her to take little Neddy and run. She had not wanted to leave them, had desperately wanted to stay and fight, but both David and Annabel had grown equally desperate in their pleas for her to save Neddy. The look in David’s eyes had convinced her to go, that look of desperate sadness. It was a plea she had had to obey and she was certain it had cost her. Tears clouded her eyes as the surety that she would never see her sister again swept over her.
She wanted to go back and look, to see if what she feared was true, but then she felt her nephew wriggle closer to her side. Emily could not risk him. If David and Annabel were dead, they had given their lives to save young Neddy, she firmly reminded herself. Done what any loving parent would do. She could not toss away that sacrifice with a foolish action, one driven solely by emotion. The sweet little boy had no skill in protecting himself.
“Mama? Papa?”
Her nephew’s query, spoken in a soft tear-choked voice, acted like an arrow to her heart. She did not know how to explain it all to him. Emily held him closer and began to sort through a number of ways to explain that Mama and Papa were gone. A flicker of hope attempted to spring to life in her chest but good sense ruthlessly smothered it. Then a sound broke through her grief-ridden thoughts.
Emily quickly hid Neddy beneath her wide skirts. The sound she had heard had now clarified itself into male voices. She sat as still as possible and listened carefully as the voices drew nearer. Her fear receded a little because the men spoke differently than the ones who had attacked her family. Those men had not had what sounded very much like a Scots accent.
That made no sense, she thought as she pressed deeper into the hole dug inside a tree hollow. What were Scotsmen doing wandering around the hills of Arkansas? Annabel had often complained about being so completely out of place, so alone despite David always being at her side. The farther west they had traveled the more separated from it all she had felt. Annabel had missed society far more than she ever did or could. She had constantly repeated stories of the places she had gone, the events she had attended, the food and people there, and the fashions she had shopped for. Emily had begun to fear her sister would fall permanently into her world of memories. These men were definitely not ones who had grown up in these hills or come from any sort of high society. She grasped the knife she had placed by her side and waited, tense and wary, as the men drew closer.
Suddenly she fell back into the memory of the attack she had just fled from. The men had ridden up to the cabin so fast David had barely made it inside, barring the door behind him. Emily had stood silenced by shock as her sister had tossed a rifle to her husband then grabbed one of her own and loaded it. Then the shooting had begun. The men outside had demanded her sister hand over her only child. After some colorful threats that had made her blood run cold the shooting had begun and there had been little lag in the assault. Emily had done her best to keep Neddy shielded and safe, sheltered from the bullets filling the air. Soon both Annabel and David were wounded and then someone had tried to set the cabin alight. Annabel had ordered Emily to take Neddy and run, run and hide.
Tears filled her eyes. She had not wanted to leave Annabel and David, had been sure she would never see them again if she did run. The terrified child clinging to her was all that had given her the strength to move, to run and hide as ordered. It was what her sister needed. The knowledge that someone was taking her child to a safe place would give Annabel the strength to keep fighting. It was during the time Emily had been getting Neddy into the root cellar that she had been wounded. Now, with the smell of smoke beginning to fade and the sound of shooting silent for too long, she knew her duty was to keep Neddy alive and safe. She tightened the grip on the knife by her side.
“Let us just hope we find our quarry alive,” said a man with a deep voice that was too close to the opening of her hiding place.
Quarry ?she thought. That was a word a hunter used. Gritting her teeth over the pain in her leg, she rose carefully to her knees. Determined to protect her nephew, she held the knife at the ready and kept her mind clear. She knew she could not battle all of the men but she would make it cost them dearly to take Neddy from her.
* * *
Iain saw the shadow of the opening in the tree and moved closer as he signaled to his brother to help him shift the broken tree limb. As soon as it was moved he saw the opening more clearly. The trunk of the tree was thick enough to make a hollow that could easily hide a child but it was too shadowed to see if it did.
He got on his knees and edged closer. When he stuck his head inside he did so slowly and was glad of it when he felt cold steel touch his throat. He glanced down and calmly met the narrowed gaze of a woman.
“I mean no harm,” he said. “I am nay one of the men who burned the cabin.” He fought a wince as the blade trembled in what appeared to be a small hand and the point scraped painfully over his skin. “My brothers and I smelled the smoke and came to help.” He reminded himself he was speaking to a survivor and kept his voice as soft and pleasant as he could.
“The people who lived there?” There was a hint of dread in her voice as she asked and he suspected she already knew what he would answer.
“Could ye move the blade aside? It makes talking a wee bit uncomfortable.”
“Oh. I beg your pardon.”
He warily rubbed his hand over his throat when the knife was pulled away and swallowed a laugh over how polite she had sounded. “I fear the people in the cabin are dead.” A sound much like a moan choked by a sob reached his ears and he grimaced, knowing he had probably been too blunt, but he had no idea how else he could have answered her question. “We have buried them. Come out and I will show ye where they are.” He inched back and held out his hand.
Emily hesitated a moment but then decided she had few choices left. She had already been found and the man had made no threatening move. Toward her or Neddy. Although she had no idea of what she could do now, she knew she could not remain huddled in a shallow hole dug inside the trunk of a dying tree. Trying desperately to keep Neddy hidden by her skirts she allowed the man to pull her out. The shadows helped. They kept Neddy hidden but it added an awkwardness to her movements that she could not hide.
“Are ye hurt?” he asked as she stood up but kept her right hand tight against her skirts.
“A small wound already bandaged. I will be fine.” She looked in the direction of the house and fought the urge to collapse, to weep. “Annabel and David are dead.”
“Aye.” He decided he would never tell her how. “I am Iain MacEnroy and this is my brother Robbie. My other brother, Matthew, is at the cabin collecting all that can be salvaged and I have yet another brother, Duncan, watching over our wagons.”
She nodded but her thoughts were centered on how to keep Neddy hidden until she was absolutely certain these men were safe. “I am Emily Stanton. I thank you for burying my sister and her husband.”
Iain frowned. There was a distinct English accent to the woman’s words, which held that cool politeness her class was so well known for. He told himself not to let that trouble him. He had known some decent English men and women in his time. There were also a lot of them coming to America, as desperately in need of a better life as he was.
