There would be fear in all the clan lands. The women would have to walk with men for their safety or in groups. The men would take up arms and go out into the streets and the woods. She feared it would only breed chaos from then onwards because there was a hateful killer out there and possibly even amongst them, crying with everyone and angry alongside those who could manage it.
“What happened here?” The first man who came to the road path said. Behind him were other angry men armed with sticks, pitchforks and axes.
“We found another body. Oh, the poor lass--” Ceana’s Faither told the men. Ceana watched as their angry eyes grew only angrier when they saw the frail woman's dead body in the middle of the path. Her body jolted into action as she tried to quickly reach Torcall, who was still standing by the body with bloodied hands.
Get away from them and come to me!She wanted to yell, but she feared he would not hear her above the sound of the crowd. More and more people came out of their homes with angry faces. One after the other, their bitter and angry eyes turned to Torcall.
“Did ye kill her?” The first man shouted. He was one of the town blacksmiths and was known for his temper and his loose lips.
“Nay,” Ceana’s Faither got in between the man and Torcall. He was an older man and one who was respected in the neighborhood for his valor as well. For all their hot-headedness and eagerness to fight, the younger men respected him and would not disobey him unless...
Another man found his way behind the arguments and came to stand in front of Torcall.
“See yer bloody hands. Ye killed her, did ye nae?” The man accused Torcall. Torcall chose to accuse him, hoping that Ceana’s Faither would intervene as he was the only one that seemed capable of moderating the mob that was slowly encircling him.
Angered by Torcall’s silence, he pushed Torcall hard in the chest. Torcall would have fallen over had he not seen the violent intent in the man’s eyes and heard it in his tone. Planting his feet in the ground, he had been able to stay on his feet.
“I didnae kill her. Ye can ask him,” Torcall shouted so all could hear him. He expected Ceana’s Faither to turn around and assist him, but the man was busy trying to keep others at bay.
“Ask me,” Ceana yelled as she tried to push her way into the middle of the mob. “I was there. I saw it,” she said. She had not seen all of it, but she knew Torcall was no killer. With the way he looked, there was no way he could defend himself. Worse still, she feared what he might do the more he was attacked and pushed with accusing hands.
“He tried to save her life,” Ceana yelled at the top of her voice, but she could not push her way to get to Torcall.
Torcall found himself surrounded by four men who were spoiling for a fight. While he would have attacked them despite his obvious disadvantage of being backed to a corner, those four men were not his only enemies. Everyone there except Ceana and her father were his enemies.
He looked around and saw many people, men and women, young and old, looking at the dead woman's body with remorse and seething anger. The men needed someone to battle, and the women needed someone to hate. He was the only one available to take their hate. As terrible as his decision would have been, he wished he had caught the killer or at least killed him. His body would have pacified the crowd, but he had unwittingly let the killer roam free.
Now, he was being treated as the man who had let him escape. Worse, even he did not know what the killer looked like. For all he knew, the killer could have been in their midst at that moment, or he could have been one of the four men who pushed him about.
Torcall tried to calm him. He told himself that it was unwise for him to attack because if he threw a punch, every single person there would have pounced on him. So, they pushed him, and he did nothing back to them. There were times when inaction was the best course of action; his uncle had once told him, but he had never truly understood those words until then.
“Torcall!” he heard Ceana’s voice in the crowd though he could not see her.Stay away from me,he pleaded because he did not want her rough-handed or wounded while trying to save him.
I am a man. I can protect meself,he told himself.
Ceana tried to push her way past many of the men ready to pounce on Torcall if he did wrong. Though they were all clustered together, they moved apart only after she had tapped their shoulders many times and repeated her request for them to move aside even more times.
“Torcall,” she kept calling, hoping the sound of her voice would calm his temper and trying to draw the attention away from him and onto herself. It did not work. The men barely saw her.
Suddenly, she felt a hand wrap around her arm tightly and pull her back roughly. She screamed as she jerked back to the side of a man she knew and disliked. It was Tam. She could not tell when he had gotten there, but she was quickly distracted from him as a fight erupted up ahead. Torcall had heard her scream for a moment, and he had pushed back at the mob.
“Torcall, I am without hurt,” she tried to scream to him, but he could not hear her, not above the sounds of the men who charged at him and wanted to hit him.
She tried to yank her arm out of Tam’s rigid grip, but it was impossible given his strength.
“Unhand me. I must save Torcall.” She glared at him, but he did not let go of her. Her anger did not faze him.
“They will kill ye,” Tam said to her.
“But he has done nay wrong, and they do nae ken this. They would lynch him. How can ye stand by as they try to lynch yer cousin? He is yer family. Do somethin’,” she begged him.
“A man who kills frail and unarmed women is nae worthy of bein’ called me family,” Tam told her. “Do nae involve yerself. There is nothin’ that ye can do.”
“How can ye believe that he killed those women? Ye have kent Torcall all yer life.” Ceana stopped talking for she could not pick Torcall in the crowd anymore. She wanted to fling herself into the middle of the crowd, but Tam did not let go of her.
“I ken Torcall more than ye would ever ken him, but he is a suspect, and I cannae tamper with justice and what the people want. They would take him to Laird MacGregor, who would decide if he is innocent or guilty. Nay one would believe ye for they ken that he is yer lover.”
Ceana looked on helplessly as the crowd pushed Torcall around them.
