She was trapped in a wooden hut on an island miles from anywhere, centuries from her home. Not only that but she was developing feelings for a highlander. If that wasn’t the most ridiculous part in all this, she didn’t know what was.
She thought it must be the intensity of the situation, the fact they’d been stuck together for so long she was bound to develop some sense of connection with the man, even though there was definitely something he was hiding from her.
“What aren’t you telling me,” she said, causing him to pause from his attempts to break the door down.
“What?” he asked, barging into the door once again. “What are you talking about?”
“There’s something you’re not telling me about all this. What is it?”
He shook his head. “I have kept no secrets from you.”
“You have. I know you have. What is it? Is it about what the captain said?”
“I dinnae ken what you’re talking about.” He shoved the door again. In the distance drum beats began. “We are running out of time.”
“Then I want to know. What the captain said. About wooing me. Was he wrong? We can talk about it if you want to.”
“There is nothing to talk about.”
“So he was wrong, was he? When he said you had feelings for me?”
“Let’s get out of here first, then we’ll talk.”
He took a step back and then charged for the door with all his strength. Just as his shoulder was about to connect the door opened and he flew out, crashing headlong into the person on the other side.
He sprung to his feet a second later, grabbing hold of the figure and shoving them inside. “The dagger,” he said to Natalie, “Quick.”
“Wait,” the figure hissed. “I am here to help you.” A hood was pulled back to reveal a woman in her fifties, gray streaks running through her dark brown hair. “You must hurry if you are to get away.”
“Who are you?” Natalie asked, looking at the woman closely. “Why are you helping us?”
The woman grabbed her hands and squeezed them. “You are the one who can join the clans together, save us all from the darkness. You must not fail.”
She turned to Wallace. “Not all Frazers are allied with the darkness. Some seek the light. Come, I will take you to your ship but we must hurry. They are lighting your funeral pyre even as we speak.”
She put her hood back up, beckoning for them to follow. They struggled to keep up as she darted through long grass and between straggly brambles, passing down a steep hillside away from the sound of drums, the noise slowly fading away.
Natalie was soon out of breath, finding herself falling far behind the other two. At last Wallace stopped, turning back to look at her.
“Come on,” he said. “Hurry up if you value your life.”
“I can’t do it,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m dying here.”
“You will be if you stop,” he said, marching over to her and grabbing her around the waist, tossing her over his shoulder.
She was too shocked to say anything as he took off running. It was all she could do to hold on, herlimbs flailing as he sprinted after the hooded woman.
He kept one hand around her hips, the other shoving branches aside as they made their way through a copse of trees and then out the other side.
The last of the fog was drifting out to sea. Before them was the shoreline, the captain climbing the rope onto his ship as the tide began to pull it out onto the water.
“About time,” he called out. “Another minute and I’ve have gone without you.” He frowned. “Scarlett, is that you?”
The woman pulled back her hood. “It’s been a long time Colin.”
“It’s Captain. The name’s Captain.”
“The name you were given was Colin. I always liked that name. Now you two get onboard and get going.”
