She held her breath as the machine came closer and closer and then she tensed as an explosion sounded. Before she could take a breath, a burning bomb landed on the wall outside her window. Fire and sparks shot at her as Alana leaped away from the opening, slamming the shutter closed.
Eleanor pulled her away from the window, ashen. “Are you burned?”
Alana touched her cheek, where a spark had burned her. “I’ll be fine.”
Eleanor ran to the table, seized the pitcher and returned. She wet her sleeve and laid the cool cloth on her tiny burn.
“Will Nairn fall?” Alana asked. She trembled with fear. It was one thing to calmly speculate about its fall—and being freed—when all was as it should be, another to do so when under attack.
“We cannot remain here, like this!” Eleanor cried.
Her grandmother was the calmest, wisest and most courageous woman Alana knew. But she was frightened now.
Alana silently agreed. She ran to the door and banged on it. “Sir John! You must let us out! We cannot remain here, trapped like rabbits in a cage, a wolf at the door! We need to know what is happening and we can help defend the castle.” She banged on the door again, furiously, desperately.
There was no answer. Alana pulled on the door handle, but the door remained bolted from outside. She turned, wide-eyed. “He is gone.”
Eleanor was pale. They stared at each other, shocked.
“They have left us here?” Alana finally gasped.
“He must be helping defend the keep,” Eleanor said slowly.
“And if we are overrun? Who will defend us?” Alana cried. Her mind raced as she rushed back to the window and opened the shutter. Iain was surely a part of this attack, but she had yet to see him. How could she get word to him?
“Alana! Do not go near the window!” Eleanor begged.
Alana ignored her. Enemy soldiers had thrown ladders up against the walls to the left of the siege engine. She saw from their dress that they were Highlanders, but Buchan’s archers were on the ramparts, firing down at them. Thank God, she thought, with a flooding of relief. Finally someone was on the north walls, above them, defending them.
She saw one of the Highlanders struck by multiple arrows in his chest and arms. Screaming, he fell from the ladder to a certain death.
But another Highlander was aggressively scaling the wall. If he was not shot, he would soon climb over the ramparts.
Alana whirled. “The Highlanders are coming. Should I pen a message for Iain?”
“We must do something,” Eleanor cried, quickly sitting at the table. She took parchment and a quill from the drawer and began to write.
Alana remained huddled in the corner, not far from the window. She did not know how she would get the message to Iain, and it was becoming harder to think.
The battering ram exploded against the north gate another time, so loudly, so powerfully, that Alana felt the floor shift beneath her feet. She jumped.
And then a face appeared outside her window.
It was inches away. Alana gasped, for one moment shocked, as the man stared into the chamber. Their gazes locked.
And then she realized that his eyes were wide and lifeless eyes, his face contorted in pain and death. And then he vanished.
She ran to the window and leaned out. A ladder was beneath her, and the Highlander was falling like a leaf twisting in the wind. She looked away as he hit the ground below her.
Alana gripped the ledge of the windowsill, stunned. No one else was attempting to scale that ladder. She inhaled. Was she brave enough to attempt to go down?
She was afraid of falling, of being shot—and of leaving Eleanor alone.
Eleanor had come to stand beside her. “It is too dangerous!”
And then, from the corner of her eye, Alana saw Iain.
She whirled. She would never mistake him on his black charger, sword raised, long hair flying in the wind. He was galloping from the west, toward the north gate. He paused, his horse rearing, and she knew he was shouting at his men. More Highlanders were on more ladders now, and more men were pushing the battering ram.
