“She protected me.”
“She’s no’ here now.” He moved more quickly than she thought him capable of, grabbed her arm and forced her against the wall, his other hand splayed over her face, fingers gripping the sides of her head in a punishing show of strength. “Ye are mine and ye owe me. I’ll make ye hurt as yer damn bird hurt me.”
Mariota tried to scream, but he flattened his palm against her nose and mouth, denying her breath. He meant to kill her, and she was on her own. But she’d beaten him before, once by herself and once with Valkyrie’s help. She’d do it again.
She tried to twist away, but it was a ruse. He fell for it, stepping wide to contain her as she writhed. With no mercy, she kneed him between the legs. She couldn’t believe he fell for the same maneuver again. She went into her chamber and bolted the door as his howl echoed down the hallway. She suspected it could be heard in the great hall. In moments, running footsteps proved her right.
Two MacKay men reached her door as she opened it, followed by two more and several women.
“He attacked me again,” she said. “I stopped him.”
The women took in Alber lying on the floor, hands between his legs cupping himself, tears mixing with the blood seeping from his face from his fall, and laughed. “Ye got him good, lass.”
“Get him away from me. Please. Lock him in his chamber and tell my da what he did.”
“We’ll take care of him,” one of the men said, nodded to the others and they dragged Alber down the hall toward the stairs. In moments, she heard the hard thump, thump, thump that told her they dragged himdownthem, too. It seemed she wasn’t the only one who disliked him. But where were they taking him? To her da?
“Did he hurt ye?” One of the older women asked in a sympathetic tone, reaching out to touch her arm.
“He tried,” Mariota told her and the others who remained. “I didna let him.”
“Ye are a braw lass,” one of the others said.
“Thank ye, but I dinna think he’s entirely recovered from the injuries he got from attacking me yesterday.” She shrugged and winced. “I’d like to go rest now.”
With understanding nods, they left her in her chamber. There, she gave in to a fit of shakes, angry tears stinging the corners of her eyes. She was out of time. Once Alber was well, no matter what her father might do, he’d come after her.
A knock on her door startled her. Not Alber again, please! Nay, he wouldn’t knock. “Who is it?”
“Yer da sent me to guard yer door, lass.” She recognized the voice of one of the men who’d carried off Alber. So, she was confined to her chamber after all. Da might think it was for her safety, but she knew better. Alber would find her alone eventually. Or her da would find her a husband whether she liked it or not.
Left with no alternative, she waited until midnight, made a rope out of bedsheets and with her few belongings wrapped in a spare plaid tied on her back, she climbed out of her window and down to the bailey. The night was quiet and the guards’ attention was outside the walls, not inside, so she was able to sneak to the mews and free Valkyrie. The stable tempted her, but she knew she’d never get out with her horse. Keeping to the shadows, she turned for the postern gate, and once through it, made her way on foot to the village, staying under the trees and out of sight of the guards on the keep’s walls. She knew the value of a horse to each villager, and she hated to do it, but she was desperate. She saddled and stole one she knew, vowing to return it as soon as she could, led it quietly away from the village and the MacKay keep before mounting it, and rode into the night.
Stellanand his men continued to hunt, making their way slowly back toward the keep with the buck tied over the back of one of the horses. They stopped once to field dress the buck when he was certain they were far enough into Sutherland territory the MacKays wouldn’t dare follow. Hoisting it up by its hind legs and a rope slung over a tree branch, they cut its throat and drained the last of its blood, gutted it and left the entrails for the local predators. Then they moved away and found a spot near a burn to get some sleep before continuing their journey home.
Stellan woke to a guard’s hand on his shoulder, early sunlight in his eyes, and the sound of a horse moving nearby rustling in the undergrowth beyond their camp, headed their way. With no fire to warn of their presence, he expected the rider would be on them in moments. He stood and toed two more men awake. “Someone’s coming,” he told them quietly.
They nodded, got up, and soundlessly reached for weapons.
Stellan couldn’t have been more surprised when he saw a lass on horseback with a hawk in jesses gripping her fist stumble on their camp. Her long hair tumbled around her shoulders, amber threads among the rich brown catching the eastern glow. She looked half asleep and barely aware enough to avoid getting knocked off her horse by tree branches as she rode.
“Lass,” he said softly as he grasped the horse’s bridle to keep her from jerking awake and galloping away. They were covered in deer blood and would frighten her when she noticed it.
“What? Ach! Who are ye? Let me go.”
“I’ll let ye go when ye are awake enough to ride safely. I’m Stellan. Who are ye?”
She studied him, her moss-green eyes widening as she took in his and his men’s bloody clothes.
No amount of dunking in a shallow burn would remove all of it, though they’d tried.
“Did ye kill the men following me?”
Stellan straightened, alert to more trouble. “Men are following ye? Who?”
“MacKays.” She looked around as if looking for the men—or for a way out.
Tormund came up and gave her a nod before turning to Stellan. “Likely ’tis why that lot were so close to our border last night, aye? Searching for her and found our buck.”
