In between swings, he shuddered.
As if riding one of the Devil’s spawns wasn’t enough, he’d be expected to learn to fight on one of them. Christ, he had a hard enough time keeping his seat withtwowhite-knuckled hands gripping the reins. It seemed even the most docile of beasts turned into a wild, bucking stallion when Thom was around. Even the small hobbyhorse he’d ridden here had tried to nip him.
By the time he’d arrived late last night, he’d been in a foul mood. A mood that hadn’t improved any on coming face-to-face with the hero of the hour. Hell, after what Douglas had done, probably of the year.
Decade.
Age, blast it.
There had already been some dramatic tales of trickery and subterfuge in the retaking of castles by Bruce and his men the past few years—including three by Jamie at Douglas Castle, Randolph (with James’s help) at Linlithgow, and Bruce himself at Perth Castle—but this one was the biggest, most important yet. Maybe more so because it had surprised everyone.
Even the Bruce.
The assault on the castle had been a rogue mission. Douglas had watched the garrison, seen an opportunity, and seized upon it.
With Edinburgh Castle under siege, the garrison at Roxburgh had assumed Bruce’s attention was focused in that direction. It was, but Douglas’s wasn’t. Taking advantage of the Shrove Tuesday “carnival”—the farewell to meat—Douglas and about threescore of his men disguised themselves in black cloaks, crawled on their hands and knees across a field to mix in among the grazing oxen, and scaled the walls with their newly invented rope ladders. Taken by surprise, most of the garrison had surrendered. A handful of men, including the Gascon keeper of the castle, Guillemin Fiennes, had attempted to take refuge in one of the towers, but a one-in-a-million arrow shot by the Highlander Gregor MacGregor had struck the commander below the eye as he attempted to peek out an arrow slit. He’d surrendered, and the garrison had been permitted to slink back to England in defeat.
Thom had lifted a brow at that. A brow Douglas had seen and asked if he had a problem with it. To which Thom had been unable to stop himself from sarcastically questioning whether all the larders had been full. A reference to Jamie’s most famous “black” deed, where he’d tossed the bodies of the English garrison into the larder of Douglas Castle and set it on fire.
Douglas had been livid, and for one moment, Thom thought they would come to blows again. Hell, after a lifetime of having to keep his thoughts to himself and deferring to the “lord,” he would have welcomed it. He wouldn’t last two minutes against Douglas with a sword, but when it came to brawling, he could hold his own with anyone.
Brute strength.
Aye, he had that, which is why it had grated when Douglas had ignored him and turned to Carrick to tell him where his men could find thehammersand other tools to get to work, while they went to the Hall to accept homage from the nobles and other landowners in the area.
Thom took another powerful swing with the blasted hammer against the section of wall and heard a crack. Good, it was finally loosening.
They’d been working on this section of the wall all morning, digging a deep trench underneath, and then loosening the stone with the hammer and picks. They were almost ready to set fire to the wooden supports. With a little luck, the whole thing would buckle and collapse into itself. But it was by no means exact. He just hoped he was far enough away when it all came down.
“Careful,” he said to one of the men. “You don’t want to hit that section too hard. It’s already weakened.”
The man had stopped to look at him, and his eyes widened at something over Thom’s shoulder. “If that lass is real, I’d give my left bollock to have her looking at me the way she’s looking at you. Is she yours?”
Thom looked over his shoulder and froze. The sight that met his eyes was so unexpected he didn’t have time to prepare himself. For one moment, he was that lad again who looked up at the tower and thought he saw a princess. And all the longing, all the admiration, all the feelings came rushing back to him in a torrential wave.
Ella.
He stiffened, remembering. Nay, not Ella, Elizabeth.LadyElizabeth to him. That part of his life was over. “She is not mine.”
She never had been.
But what the hell was she doing here? In the middle of his work site, damn it! There were unstable walls everywhere; didn’t she realize how dangerous it was?
And why the hell was she looking at him as if he were a beast in a menagerie?
She started to sway as if she was woozy. Instinctively—as he’d done it so many times before—he lurched forward, thinking to catch her. But she was too far away.
He must have realized what she was going to do, because he was already running toward her as she reached out to brace herself on a post. A post that had been set up to support an unstable wall.
He shouted for her to get out of the way, but it was too late. In slow-moving horror he watched as a section of the wall gave way.
She stood there, frozen in horror as dust, rock, and debris came flying down upon her.
Oh God, the stone was going to hit her head. Heart in his throat, Thom leapt forward, shoving her harshly out of the way and taking her to the ground.
They landed hard, his body on top of hers, braced protectively to take the brunt of the falling stone. He grunted in pain as a sizable rock hit the edge of his shoulder. A few smaller rocks peppered his back, legs, and the arm that was protecting his head. Next time, he would remember not to remove his helm. But it was hot work, and he’d been getting sweaty...
Sweaty.
