“It’s in your hands whether he lives or dies, or stays as he is with one foot in each place,” the old woman had said.
Doubt and homesickness opened a cavern inside her. She remembered how it felt to be filled with pain too great for her tortured mind and body, hoping someone would find her, forgive her, heal her. But now she feared Alasdair Og’s darkness would consume her, and she would be as lost as he.
This time forever.
CHAPTER EIGHT
John went out to the bailey to look for Dair, since he hadn’t seen him return. A small group of clansmen stood near the empty wagons.
“Anyone seen Dair?”
“I saw him go through the kitchen a while ago. At leasthe’ssafe.” Niall Sinclair muttered. He jerked his thumb toward two men who stood over the prone figure of Ruari Sinclair, who lay stretched on his back in the dirt, his panicked gaze fixed on the sky, his throat working. There were bloodstains on his shirt and fresh wounds on his face and hands.
John frowned. “Was there a fight?” The other men were bloody as well, their expressions grim. They looked like warriors returning from a battle they’d lost.
Angus Mor wiped a smear of gore from his cheek and pointed at the open door of the stable. “There’s a terrible beast in there—something ferocious, with claws long enough to rip a man’s throat out. Poor Jock is trapped in there with it. We’ve tried to save him, but it’s no use. The creature’s got him.”
“I think it’s a wolf,” Niall said. “Or a wildcat.”
“Or a she-bear,” Angus suggested.
“It’s not from this world,” Ruari whispered, struggling to sit up. “Look at my face—it nearly took my eye out with one swipe of its mighty paw!”
A scream of pure terror rang out from the dark recesses of the stable.
Angus Mor hung his head. “Poor Jock. Who’ll tell Morag that her man won’t be coming home again?”
“We’ll give him a fine burial if it doesna eat him,” Niall said sadly.
Another cry rang out, followed by a guttural growl. The hair on the back of John’s neck rose.
“AchDhia,help me!” Jock pleaded from inside the stable.
“It’s toying with him, drawing it out, torturing him,” Ruari said in a harsh whisper. The others nodded sorrowfully.
“Surely no beast of any size is a match for half a dozen Sinclairs,” John said.
“There’s really only the three of us here—four if ye include Wee Alex, Angus’s lad, and he’s only got ten summers,” Niall muttered.
“I’m twelve,” the lad piped, sticking his thumbs in his belt.
“We’ve got to do something,” John insisted, but Angus shook his head.
“Mayhap they don’t have such beasties in England, but here—” Angus’s jaw quivered. “Nay—there’s naught to be done for Jock.”
“Alex, go inside and fetch down an axe from the wall,” John ordered Angus’s young son. “Bring a sword, too.”
“And a long lance and a heavy targe,” Niall added.
“All that will just make the creature mad,” Angus hissed. They winced as Jock screeched again.
Wee Alex came back with an eating knife and a fireplace poker. “It’s all I could reach,” he said.
Another cry issued from the stable, a bloodcurdling animal howl, followed by a human one. Jock Murray burst out of the dark mouth of the building, his plaid flying around his bloodied shins, his face flushed and scratched. He didn’t stop to talk. He kept on running, straight out the gate and down the hill toward the village.
A bristling white beast chased Jock as far as the doorway, then stopped to regard the men in the bailey. The creature’s back arched, and its ears flattened against a huge head as it growled curses at them.
The clansmen stared at it in slack-jawed silence.
