“Gather your things. We must move.”
Isabail gained her feet and did her best to brush the dirt from her skirts. “Move? Move where?”
A very good question. Aiden had given thought to that question many times over the past few months as he planned for the future. Nowhere in the glen would he benefit from stone walls, good storage, and a highly defensible position. But with almost sixty souls under his care, secrecy was better than defensibility. “There’s a thickly wooded area farther west. We’ll head there.”
“Why? Why not remain here?”
Aiden laid the blanket on the floor and began piling items in the middle of it: his clothes, his spare pair of boots and some personal items. “Tormod MacPherson believes his mission is to destroy the MacCurran clan. He’ll soon learn that we are camped here, and when he does, he’ll attack in full force. I cannot defend my clan against the strength of his army with little or no supplies.”
Isabail was silent for a long moment. “You fear that he’ll come looking for his missing men.”
Aiden didn’t bother to answer. He tied the corners of the blanket and swung it over his shoulder. Holding out a hand, he said, “Come.”
She did not take his hand. “What if there were no men to be found?”
“It wouldn’t matter; he will continue to hunt until he finds us.”
“Unless he believed the men were elsewhere when they died.”
He stared at her, slowly lowering his hand. “Are you suggesting we move the bodies?”
Isabail blushed. “I’ve no idea what I’m suggesting. Just thinking aloud. Is it possible to move the bodies?”
“Aye,” he said. A thoughtful frown settled on his brow. “It’s possible. Moving his men from one spot to another won’t be enough to deceive MacPherson, however. To be successful, we’ll need a wee bit of cunning.”
He dropped the blanket bundle onto the mattress. Then he grabbed Isabail by the shoulders and gave her a quick, hard kiss. “Stay here. I’ll be back anon.”
Chapter 11
“What age are you, Morag?” Magnus asked as they sat down to sup on the hare he’d snared that afternoon. He was very curious about the woman who’d nursed him back to health, and up to this point, she’d been very vague about her history.
But he was done with mystery and incertitude.
She lifted her gaze from her meal. As their gazes collided, he could see the swirl of thoughts in her green eyes. Perhaps she read the resolve in his own, because for once she did not attempt to fob him off with some whimsical retort. “I am four and twenty.”
“And where are your kin?”
She tore the meat off a leg bone with her fine white teeth and chewed. “I am shunned. I have no kin.”
Her answer wasn’t entirely surprising. After all, few women of a marriageable age lived alone in a bothy in the woods. Still, it made him wonder. “Why?”
“What did I do that warranted a shunning?”
He nodded.
“I lay with three men, two of whom were brothers.”
She said it calmly, without heat or embarrassment. There was no attempt to excuse her behavior or apologize for it. She simply stated it as fact. As beautiful as she was, he had no trouble imagining men fighting to have her. Even brothers.
He arched a brow. “At the same time?”
A faint smile rose to her lips. “Nay. One at a time. But the second brother was not pleased to find he’d shared my body with his younger kin.”
“So he involved the friar?”
“Aye.”
It was more information than she’d given him in three months of sharing an abode. Magnus was loath to cease asking her questions while she was in so generous a mood. “Did you live at the castle?”
