CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
John kept his back stiff as he rode. He felt Gillian’s eyes on him. It made him sweat. They’d reach MacKenzie territory tonight, find welcome at a keep or a fortified house large enough to offer Gillian a proper bed. She’d sleep among the women, and he’d sleep with the men. He’d make certain it was so for the rest of the journey, ensure there were few opportunities to speak to her alone.
Helikedtalking to her. She was witty and observant. There were hidden depths to Gillian MacLeod that no one else had discovered. Just him. It made her even more beautiful, more desirable. If he’d known that ten months ago, would it have made a difference? Her father had told him to stay away from his daughter. Even Fia, his friend, his champion, had warned him off. They hadn’t even been properly introduced. But Gillian, in her own shy, determined, unique way, had found him. He almost groaned aloud. Why was it that whenever he kissed a woman at a masquerade ball, it had life-changing consequences? Twice now. He knew why Dorothea had tried to seduce him, but why Gillian, and why him?“All my life people have told me how to choose, what to do, and I have allowed it. But now—”
But now, indeed.
It would be very easy to fall in love with Gillian MacLeod.
And what then? His hands tightened on the reins as his garron snorted and sidestepped anxiously. He looked quickly at the beast, saw its ears were flat against its shaggy head. A prickle of warning shot through him. John looked around, realized that the woods were deathly silent, that the usual sound of birdsong was absent. The hair rose on the back of his neck.
With a roar he turned the horse, kicked it to a gallop, and raced to cover the gap between himself and the MacLeods. He bellowed a warning as he drew his sword. He saw Gillian, her eyes wide as she stared at him through the warriors that surrounded her.
The first ragged marauder broke the cover of the trees, riding hard for the MacLeods, then another and another appeared. Callum was bellowing commands, drawing his own sword, and the ring around Gillian tightened, became a wall of steel and muscle.
The faces of the attackers were masked or painted. Heathens, savages . . . John felt a forgotten desperation rise in his breast, forced it down, concentrated.
“Get to safety!” John screamed.
But it was already too late. The marauders were upon them.
* * *
Gillian saw John galloping toward them, his sword in his hand, screaming a warning.
Danger.
Callum grabbed her reins even as he ordered the others to surround her, protect her. But John was outside the circle, exposed. What clan? Who dared to attack MacLeods? But their plaids were ragged and mismatched, from no clan at all that she could see. Her stomach caved against her spine. Outlaws and thieves.
The first ones to reach them slashed the lead ropes on the pack horse and dragged the terrified beast off the road and into the wood.
Others set upon her escort with methodical precision, two men or more against each MacLeod.
Gillian drew her dirk as her men closed even tighter around her, protecting her with their own lives, fighting desperately.
Men on both sides screamed as they were wounded, and fell to the road. Blood flowed over the dust, and she saw death and agony. Horses reared, and weapons clashed.
Three of the marauders went down under MacLeod steel, but the others didn’t retreat.
She saw Tam deliver a vicious sword slash that knocked one of his assailants to the ground. Keir was bellowing the MacLeod battle cry as he plied his blade against three men. Callum fought another, and another after that.
And John—she turned to look for him. Terror stopped her breath in her throat. He was fighting two men, trying to reach the MacLeods, and her. When he dispatched them, two more took their places.
She cried out as Lachlan fell, knocked off his horse in a spray of blood. One of his attackers reached for Gillian, grabbed for her reins, and she slashed her dirk across his hand. He bellowed a curse and fell back. She saw Ewan fall, and Keir. She was exposed now, the attackers reaching for her
“Gillian!” She heard John’s bellow, saw him spurring his rearing garron forward, slashing at the enemies that blocked his way to her. Tam fell from his garron and lay still, and there were four MacLeods down, wounded, possibly even dead.
Marauders surrounded her, and she knew a dirk would never be enough. She shoved it back into her sleeve and reached for the bow on her saddle, snapped the ties that held it in place, nocked an arrow and fired. One of the attackers grunted as he fell from his saddle. She fired again, hit another man, so close now that she saw his eyes widen above the mask that covered his mouth before he fell.
A hand reached for her reins, and she bit back a cry and raised the arrow in her hand to stab him.
“Gillian, it’s me!”
She met John’s eyes, stopped the deadly point just in time. She stared at him, the arrow still clutched in her fist. She forced herself to drop it. There was blood on her hand, and she stared at it in horror. Whose blood was it? She twisted in the saddle. She had to help, find bandages,fix this. . .
John wrapped his arm around her waist and hauled her onto his lap. “We’ve got to get out of here,” he said. “There’s too many—” He held her against him with one hand, swung his sword with the other, cleared a path, and kicked the garron hard.
She felt the horse leap under them and bolt off the path into the wood. She looked over her shoulder, over his, at the desperate fight behind them. She couldn’t see her kinsmen, not any of them. Tears blurred her vision, and she struggled in John’s grip, fought him, trying to stop the racing garron, or climb off. “Go back!” she screamed. She tried to take hold of the reins herself, but he wouldn’t let her. Her hands were still slippery, bloody. “I need to go back—Ewan and Keir are injured, and—”
