“Stay back!” Laird Macgillivray warned, the blade pressing hard enough against Dunn’s skin to draw a drop of blood. “Stay back or I will kill him.”
Had it not been for Blaine, Dunn could have escaped Laird Macgillivray’s grasp, but the man still stood in front of him, sword in hand.
“Well?” Dunn asked him, so casually that one would have thought he was under no threat of death. “Will ye kill me, Blaine? If so, hurry up.”
Blaine watched him for a few moments in silence. Then, he gave a small shrug and stepped back. “Nay. I think I prefer ye alive.”
Dunn grinned. So, he had left the ropes loose on purpose, it seemed, and he was still alive, which could only mean he had been the one to call his brothers there. Otherwise, they would not have spared him.
“Good man,” Dunn said, before he spun around and out of Laird Macgillivray’s grasp. Surprised by the sudden movement, Laird Macgillivray could do little other than step back, putting some space between them, blade clutched tightly in his hand.
He was afraid, Dunn could tell. He didn’t want to engage him in combat, not directly.
“Enough!”
The shout cut through the air and everyone turned to look at its source—Laird McCoy, who was advancing towards Elayne. He, too, had a knife in his hand, ready to strike.
Elayne’s eyes widened in horror as Laird McCoy approached. She knew what was about to happen. They all did. Heart stuttering in his chest, Dunn took a few stumbling steps forward, a plea catching in his throat as he tried to reach for Laird McCoy.
But the man was too far and Dunn was still disoriented by the blow to his head. He would never reach him in time. He would never be able to stop him from taking Elayne’s life.
Swift as a bolt of lightning, his brother Evander, the war leader of their clan, crossed the distance between him and Laird McCoy. Out of the four brothers, he was the one who never hesitated before a kill, who did what had to be done like he was born for it, like he had been carved into a weapon before he was even born. It showed in the tattoos scattered across his skin: one for each man he had ever killed.
Without so much as a grunt, Evander plunged his blade deep in Laird McCoy’s back. The man came to a halt with a gasp, his feet swaying under him as his eyes widened, realization dawning on him with every stuttering breath he took.
Blood pooled in the corners of his mouth and bloomed over his clothes. Beneath him, Elayne, still bound to the chair, tried her best to pull back from the drops that dripped on her, her face distorted with equal measures of disgust and horror. When Evander grasped Laird McCoy’s shoulder and removed the blade, the latter collapsed to the floor. With one last sigh, his eyes glazed over, the life finally leaving his body.
Laird Macgillivray was the only one standing now, and he was surely painfully aware of it when everyone turned to look at him. Taking a few steps back, he cowered in the corner of the room, but there was nowhere for him to go. There was no escape where he had fled. Dunn’s brothers stood like a wall in front of the door, blocking his escape.
Evander advanced towards him, adjusting his grip on the blade, but he came to a stop when Elayne screamed.
“Wait!” she pleaded, voice breaking. “Wait, please, ye cannae kill him. He’s me faither.”
“He would have gladly killed ye had it nae been fer the alliance,” Evander pointed out, harsh and painfully honest as always.
“Still, I cannae bear tae watch him die,” said Elayne. With a sigh, Dunn walked to her and began to work on the knots that bound her hands, pulling her into his arms when she was finally free. Tears glistened in her eyes, but her voice was now level, even as her bottom lip trembled. “Keep him imprisoned, but dinnae kill him. I am beggin’ ye. He is the only family I have left.”
“Elayne, he’s nae,” Dunn said softly, brushing the hair that had fallen out of her updo away from her face. “We are family now. Ye’re nae alone.”
Elayne turned her gaze to Dunn, eyes wide and pleading. “I ken that,” she said. “But I still dinnae wish fer him tae die. Dunn, please. Dinnae kill him.”
Though Dunn couldn’t imagine how Elayne still held love in her heart for that vile man, he couldn’t help but nod in agreement. He couldn’t do this to her, not when she looked so devastated at the thought of her father dying. It would wreck her, he knew, to see him bleed out on that floor like Laird McCoy.
“Evander,” he said softly, nodding at him to step back.
For a moment, Evander hesitated and Dunn couldn’t help but wonder if he would go against his wishes. In the end, his brother only sighed and put his blade back in its sheath. Just when both Dunn and Elayne sighed in relief, though, he turned back to Laird Macgillivray and punched him hard across the cheek, the blow so powerful that it knocked the man out.
Hissing quietly, Evander tried to shake the pain off his knuckles. Dunn felt Elayne go rigid beside him as she watched but all he could do was tighten his hold on her, offering as much comfort as he could.
“I’ll make sure he ends up in a cell,” Blaine said as he grabbed one of the ropes he had used on them to tie the laird’s hands instead. This time, Dunn noticed, the knots were much more secure.
Perhaps Evander’s display of violence was not the most reassuring thing for Elayne, but the more she looked at her father, still breathing in the corner of the room, the calmer she became. Dunn pressed a soft kiss to her forehead, pulling her gaze away from the man. The best thing she could do now was to forget about all this, difficult as it would surely be.
Once Blaine had the laird removed from the room and taken to the cells beneath the castle, the rest of them left as well, since none wished to stay in that small, dark room, surrounded by bodies. There would be a lot of work to do now, Dunn knew, but before anything else, he wanted Elayne to meet her new family.
“I wish the circumstances were better,” he said, as all of them entered the great hall to discuss what to do next. “But it is what it is. Elayne, I’m sure ye ken this already, but these are me braithers, Alec the eldest one and laird of our clan, the second one is Bran who is the Mackintosh clan’s advisor, and me third braither is Evander.”
As he spoke, Dunn pointed to each of the men, who bowed their heads in greeting. Still, he could sense the apprehension that rolled off Elayne in waves. He could hardly blame her. After everything she had seen and gone through, he couldn’t expect her to be warm and welcoming.
