Thorgren wanted to punish them all for not fighting harder to fend off their attackers, and he swung his arm again only for the man to dodge the blow and gesture wildly to someone huddled near a blackened wall.
A chilling realization swept Thorgren as he recognized the haggard face of a raider he had left behind with half of his men when their encampment had been attacked by Highlanders last November—Clan Mackay joined with their long-time enemies Clan Sutherland, no less!
His raiders charged to fight to the death while Thorgren had hauled onto his ship Tira and a comely redheaded wench, who had incredibly escaped by throwing herself over the railing…and yet here was one of those men alive.
He didn’t wait for the coward to creep forward, but strode over and grabbed him by a thin shoulder to shake him violently. “Was it you who brought the Highlanders down upon us?”
“F-forgive me, Thorgren, they threatened tae cut our throats!”
“Our?”
“Aye, there was one other but they must have killed him after I stabbed a guard and jumped overboard—och, I can still his cries for mercy suddenly silenced. They came here tae rescue the lass and I will gladly give you their names, but first swear you’ll spare my life—aagh!”
His jaw clenched with rage, Thorgren had yanked a knife from his belt and sliced into the man’s upper chest while holding him fast.
“I swear tae kill you quickly if you tell me their names, or else you will die very slowly?—”
“G-Gavin MacLachlan, aye, he was the one in command! There was a red-haired younger man, too, who f-forced us tae accompany him tae Dumbarton where he asked the Scots king for warships. They were tae return there afterward—ah, God!”
Thorgren had dug the blade deeper, his voice harsh against the man’s ear. “MacLachlan, you say? I know of him from years ago when he was a raider—the devil of the seas, they called him, but the other one?”
“Errol Sutherland! Y-your lass was tae become his wife until she was abducted from her family—but I know no more! Spare me, I beg you—noooo!”
His agonized plea became dying whimpers as Thorgren cut him from breastbone to groin, the man collapsing in a pool of blood upon the ground.
“Traitor! I dinna need tae hear anything more from the likes of you,” he ground out as he sheathed his knife and fixed his gaze upon the assembled men who stared back at him, theirfaces white with terror. “You will rebuild the settlement while I’m gone tae fetch what is mine. No one takes what belongs tae me,no one! Now leave my sight, I dinna want tae look upon you any longer!”
At once the raiders scattered, some slipping in the mud, which made Thorgren grunt out a laugh even though he felt no humor. He wiped his bloodied hand upon his fur cloak and made his way back to the shore.
With Tira so near to giving birth, he doubted the Highlanders would have sailed straight for Dumbarton, but instead stopped somewhere along the northern coast of Scotland, he was certain of it. Yet where?
“Gavin MacLachlan,” Thorgren muttered to himself, intuition twisting his gut.
The former raider renowned for his legendary exploits upon the sea had become a baron of Argyll, the castle granted to him by King Robert the Bruce one of the most formidable along the western Scottish coast.
A challenge to be sure, Thorgren considered as he strode toward the two birlinns hauled up onto the beach, but stealth and surprise had always served him well. Why not now?
There were sheltered coves and inlets aplenty where he and his men would bide their time until he discovered if Tira, indeed, had been taken to Castle MacLachlan—though Thorgren’s instincts screamed that he would surely find her there…along with his son.
Aye, Tira’s stomach wouldn’t have grown so big if she didn’t have a strong male child inside her or mayhap even born by now—by Odin, his heir and he would have him back!
He had planned to wed the wench upon his return to Hoy, but now Thorgren felt his loins stiffen at the sight of a dark-haired lass waiting for him at the prow of the nearest ship…a lasswho hadn’t protested or shed a single tear at his lusty attentions as had Tira.
No, this one with her full ripe breasts had jumped into his arms when he and his men had raided her village and brazenly kissed him full upon the mouth. A surprising response he had never encountered before, Thorgren groaning as he felt himself grow even harder.
He didn’t need Tira Cheyne any longer—and he wouldn’t let her live, either, once he found her…as revenge for the humiliation he had suffered at the hands of his Scots enemies.
Aye, she would die knowing he had regained their son—no,hisson alone, who would grow up tall and strong and powerfully built to become as fearsome an Orkney raider as Thorgren…
“Though mayhap prettier,” he muttered to himself, rubbing his nose, flattened years ago by an enemy’s sword hilt right before Thorgren had skewered him to a wall.
Yet the smiling lass who jumped overboard in knee-deep water to wade toward him didn’t seem to mind, Roslin’s hardened nipples outlined against her damp tunic.
Their rousing coupling nothing like with Tira, who had wept whenever he touched her and fought him…though that had brought him pleasure enough until she would grow stiff as a plank beneath him—aye, by all the gods in Asgard, he couldn’t wait to be rid of her forever!
Errol blinked openhis eyes to the sound of birds chirping outside the window above him, a waft of fresh air further reviving him.
Groggily, he propped himself on one elbow, though the sudden movement cost him at the dull pain in his head—ah, God, could Gavin’s captain have struck him any harder?
