Chapter Five

Kallum stared at the lass whose expression had given him warning of the Donnelly man’s attempt to stab him in the back. She was the brazen lass from the balcony, except today her beautiful face was mottled with bruises of various shades, and she had a blackened eye. Her upper lip had been split at some point, though that injury seemed to be healing. The anger he’d felt upon noticing her face midway through the wrestling contest, when she’d moved on the dais, returned. No man who considered himself a leader of people allowed women to be treated thus under any circumstance, and definitely not under his own roof. Clearly, the monarch ran his household without honor.

The king and his people had the audacity to call Highlanders barbarians. They disparaged the Gaelic language as crass and lower-class, then pushed English as the official, civilized language of the country. Highlanders were already forbidden to educate their children in Gaelic. The clan’s offspring had to be sent to English schools in the Lowlands lest the chief risk forfeiture of clan lands.

Despite his royal blood, it was the king who was the heathen. The man was concerned only with his own pleasure and power. No matter the face he put forward to the people, the Highland leaders suspected the monarch truly wanted control of the Highlands. Recent laws attacking Highland language and traditions were but a ruse designed to accomplish the king’s desires without initiating direct physical conflict with the clans. The man was a scoundrel.

When the king ceased his inane clapping and raised a golden goblet, Kallum felt no pride in being the recipient of the recognition.

“A toast to our champion.” The king took a healthy sip of wine, then replaced the goblet on the table beside the raised ceremonial chair that had been placed at a height above all other seats. He stepped down from his perch and walked to the front of the stand. “You have done well, soldier. You are a credit to your clan, and I will make sure the victor’s purse is delivered to your chief.”

The king summoned a royal guard.

The guard approached the king, who whispered in his ear. The guard left the stands, presumably to retrieve the promised riches, or mayhap to summon a contingent of soldiers for Kallum’s arrest.

Kallum awaited the fallout that would surely follow.

The riches would be delivered to the MacNeill laird. And him? Would he be delivered to the guard for execution? After all, he’d killed a man during tournament battle. The man had deserved to die for his cowardly act. That did not mean King James, who was known for his capricious nature and impetuous decisions, would not take the opportunity to weaken one of the stronger military clans by disposing of its army commander.

Inan must have had the same thought, for he appeared beside Kallum. He wore his sword in its sheath and held his lowered targe, emblazoned with the clan motto “seas gu daingeann,” stand firm, above a massive oak tree. The MacNeill warriors all stood firm at their seats. Each also held his shield in one hand and sword in the other pointed toward the ground. ’Twould seem his clan intended to defend his life, but ’twas an act he could not allow his kin to undertake.

He had already tried to protect Inan from possible censure of the king by refusing to take his cousin’s sword when the battle with the Donnelly warrior turned foul. If the king had seen fit to adjudge Kallum’s arming of himself against tournament etiquette, then Inan would have been found equally guilty of any alleged act of MacNeill foul play. No such rebuke would be thought of the MacClaren, whose impromptu gesture could sensibly be attributed to a desire to secure retribution for his fallen kin.

Understanding such, Kallum would not now risk the lives of others simply because he had allowed the temper he oft failed to control to rule his actions at the most inopportune and public of moments. Whatever consequence he must face, he would do so alone. Allowing his soldiers to face the royal guard on the king’s grounds would be naught but a losing battle.

The king gave Inan an indulgent smile. He, too, knew any attempt by the MacNeill army to hold off his guard would be futile, and retreat would be near impossible with Stirling Castle perched on its steep rise with only one way in or out.

When the royal guard returned, he handed the king a long, thin pouch. The king loosened the ties of the pouch and withdrew a dagger with a hilt encrusted in jewels. “’Twould seem you deserve to be doubly rewarded, MacNeill. You have proved yourself the valiant champion of my summer festival, and you have rid us of a soldier of a devious ilk who brought dishonor to my court.” The king laid the dagger across the cloth pouch and cradled them chest high in both hands. “I believe your Christian name is Kallum?”

Kallum nodded.

“Kallum MacNeill, please accept this as my personal gift to you in token of my admiration for your prowess in battle and as a thank-you for taking care of the unpleasantness caused by the Donnelly warrior.”

A hushed grumble echoed across the arena from the vicinity of the Donnelly clan, who began to chafe at the insult to their kinsman.

The king ignored the dissension and awaited Kallum’s approach for the dagger. Kallum accepted the gift and bowed to His Majesty. The king motioned for him to wait and brought forth a young maiden with porcelain skin and long, chestnut-colored hair. Kallum outwardly reacted not to her approach or her appearance. Inwardly, he dreaded this moment and racked his brain for a way to turn down the king’s female gift without pissing off Inan or making the king rethink his decision to let Kallum live. Not that the woman wasn’t comely, but he could not condone rewarding a woman as a prize, as if she held no more importance than livestock. In truth, Kallum suspected the king placed more stock in his animals than he did his women.

Seeing Kallum’s nonresponse to his offering, the king chuckled. “Methinks the warrior might prefer a lass of his own lineage.” He motioned for the woman from the balcony to step forward.

Wide-eyed, she vehemently shook her head while taking several steps backward. The princess jumped up in protest, but the king waved the princess back into her seat. The petulant lass flopped into her chair, a grand pout distorting her face.

With impatience, the king insistently motioned the reluctant attendant forward. She stepped toward him as if marching toward her own execution.

The king took one look at her face, and an appalled grimace surfaced. “Oh my, I don’t suppose this will do.” He glanced at Kallum afore grasping the lass’s chin and turning her face this way and that. “Tsk tsk, Anne. What a shame.”

Even beneath the bruises, Kallum could see the flush of embarrassment rise across the lass’s dusky cheeks. It took all his self-control not to jump over the dais and give the king a thorough thrashing. The public display was thoughtless and cruel. Kallum spoke not, but the discomfort from the pressure building in his clenched jaw caused his unoccupied hand to fist.

Inan stepped closer until their shoulders touched. His signal for Kallum to not do anything rash.

The king simply shrugged and released the lass. Anne. The name did not suit her.

She caught Kallum staring at her and notched up her chin, a look of censure in her eyes. The defiance had returned. Gone was the face of the woman concerned that a sword would imminently spear him in the back.

She had taken Kallum’s silence as a sign of rejection of her, and for some reason, the rebuke stung. The realization annoyed him. He had learned to care little about what others thought of him. He lived his life by a code he did not violate, and those who did not appreciate his ways were of little concern to him. That this slip of a female could make him feel chagrin, when grown men could not, added an additional layer of volatility to his already brewing temper.

Anticipating her husband’s desire to find Kallum another substitute with brown skin, the queen motioned a shy lass in the corner to come forward. The king grinned indulgently at the queen afore motioning the lass to stay put. The meek girl had skin of such a light hue she could be naught but of mixed lineage. The look on her face suggested she’d faint if a man so much as glanced at her, but ’twas not her timidity that motivated the king to spare her from the fate of prize. From the expression on the king’s face, his interest in her was decidedly personal. The petite lass was young enough to be his daughter—younger, mayhap—but the look he gave her was unmistakably not fatherly.

The monarch was known for his indiscretions. Rumors abounded that several of those indiscretions may have occurred with men, but the queen’s gambit suggested she saw fit to eliminate some of her competition, albeit female in nature. Since Her Majesty’s ploy had failed, she now sat with a pout as petulant as her daughter’s.

The whole scene made Kallum want to exit the king’s court and never return. When the king finally brought forth another lass of his kind and stood her next to the pale-skinned woman with the chestnut hair, Kallum began to turn away. Inan’s firm hand on the wrist that rested at his side stopped him.

He glanced at his future laird and saw the warning in his eyes: Do not do anything to put me at odds with the king. Inan’s earlier request—order—still resonated, and this silent renewal made Kallum chafe all the more.

Thoroughly reminded, Kallum stood his ground.

“Well, warrior, which is your choice?” The king waved a hand over the females.

Kallum took another look at his cousin, and a petulant impulse came upon him. Still looking at Inan, he replied, “Both.”

The shocked look on Inan’s face soothed some of Kallum’s irritation.

The king laughed and gave a staccato double clap. “Indeed!”

The smirk on the king’s face conveyed the naughty turn his thoughts had taken at Kallum’s request to have two women. At once. But Kallum did not care.

“Why, both it is.” The king gestured to the next guard on hand and whispered instructions.

Kallum spun to exit the arena.

Inan grabbed his arm. “Both?” The quizzical expression on his cousin’s face was almost comical. “How did you go from ‘the last thing I need is a maiden’ to ‘both’? What are you going to do with two women?”

Kallum gave a wicked grin. “They are not for me, cousin. They are yours. All yours.”

“What!” Inan began to sputter. “Y-you are out of your mind!”

“No, but I am out of here. Make sure the ladies get back to MacNeill land safely. I have something to take care of. I’ll meet you back at the keep in a few days.” He stormed away, ignoring Inan calling his name.

He had been given instructions not to do anything to anger the king while the MacNeills were on castle grounds. He had fulfilled that mandate so far, and he would wait until all his kinsmen left this eve to make his next move. But he would be back.

What he had planned would undoubtedly push the king way past anger and possibly land Kallum with a price on his head, but he couldn’t ignore his calling any longer. He had spent the last five years secretly liberating enslaved people across the land. After what he’d just witnessed of the treatment of the enslaved at Stirling Castle, he could no longer justify exempting the king’s holdings from his late-night campaigns.

If not for the reaction of a bold lass with a face that used to look like a goddess’s, he would now lay dead or dying on the arena floor. He took one last look over his shoulder at the bruised yet proud descendant of African queens. She stood stoically behind the princess, who was now placated because her personal attendant had been spared. Kallum silently admired the lass’s bravado and poise. Somehow in her eyes, he was a pariah who had been part of her public humiliation. The disapproval did not sit well with him.

The woman had saved his life. Though she may not think highly of him at the moment, he’d be damned if he let her spend the rest of hers enslaved.

He continued his exit from the arena, a singular thought foremost on his mind: this eve would be the last she served the royals against her will. That is, as long as the last-minute operation he had in mind went according to plan.

…

Kallum stood beneath a dark sky and adjusted the black face covering he’d pulled over his head to make sure only his eyes showed through the large opening in the front. He pulled his dark, hooded cloak tighter around his face and shoulders to shield further his visage from the glimmer of moonlight that trickled across the castle grounds. The face covering and hood served to mask his identity.

He hunched into the shrouded corners of the outer castle walls and stood outside the back door, counting the runaways he was to shepherd to the exchange point a little over a day’s travel outside Stirling. There, he’d transfer them to an escort who would convey them to freedom across the border into England. He counted ten captives in total, eight men and two women. The bruised maiden from the dais this morn was not amongst those he counted. He surveyed the group and took another count.

He looked to the man who had put himself forth as the leader of this flock. “Where is the other lass?”

The man, known by the name Jeremiah, merely stared at him with a puzzled look.

“The one who stood behind the princess in the arena this morn?” Kallum glanced about.

Was she just slow, or had she gotten intercepted?

A look of dawning comprehension spread across Jeremiah’s face. “That one is not one of us.”

The response startled Kallum. “What do you mean she is not one of you? She is a captive, is she not?”

“Aye, but she is kept separate even from those of us who worked inside the castle walls.”

Kallum considered these words with a creased brow. “And for that, you’d leave her behind? Are you a man of such low worth?” A harsh sound, half frustration half anger, escaped Kallum’s throat afore he could consciously quiet himself.

Jeremiah bristled at the insult but did not speak.

A petite lass whose words were still thick with the continent of her birth stepped forward to diffuse the tension brewing between the two men. “Warrior, she would not have come wit’ us. I tried on many times to talk wit’ her ’bout the notion of escape, but she made clear her plans require her stay put.”

“’Tis foolishness.” Kallum could not fathom such folly.

He had encountered captives in the past whose fear of the unknown kept them from seeking their freedom, but the lass had been sorely abused recently. She was daft if she’d rather suffer such rough treatment than flee to a life where she could be her own person. Kallum spun, intent on heading inside the castle, when he spied the lass in question slip out a side door.

Relieved she had come to her senses and decided to join them, Kallum took a step in her direction. When she headed the wrong way, he cursed under his breath. This lass was not only going to delay their departure but also get them caught. Tournament champion or not, he had no doubt his head would be separated from his neck once the king discovered he’d been the one to relieve His Majesty of eleven members of his human collection.

Kallum motioned to the other captives to stay put and stay quiet, then took off with silent feet to intercept the female straggler. On edge that this excursion was not going according to the necessarily tight schedule that resulted from his last-minute planning, Kallum made sure not to remove his eyes from his target lest she slip into a shadow and he lose sight of her permanently.

To her credit, the lass stayed in the darkest portions of the courtyard. Suddenly, she paused and quickly glanced in both directions. As if she sensed his presence, she stared for several heartbeats toward the spot where Kallum stood. If the lass could see him, she had the eyes of an owl, but he opted to step into the glow of the partial moon to make sure she could make out his presence.

Anticipating relief that she’d found the guide for their covert caravan, Kallum could not believe his eyes when she bolted in the opposite direction again. If she reached the back of the castle wherein the remaining clans were in the process of departing, the success of this operation was doomed. His frustration turned into anger. Was the bloody female trying to get them captured…and killed?

“Sweet Jesu!” Kallum bit off the words, making them a curse rather than a prayer, and sprinted after the lass.

He overtook her easily, grabbed her around the waist with one arm, and lifted her off her feet. She struggled, twisting desperately in his grasp and kicking her feet wildly. The pressure on his injured shoulder made him almost lose hold. He adjusted until he held her more securely. Soft sounds of frustration emanated from her. Kallum feared she’d get louder, so he clasped a hand over her mouth.

She didn’t appreciate the move and took a bite of his hand to prove it. Her teeth sank in deep and held. Kallum clenched his own teeth to contain the bellow that nearly emerged. He squeezed her rib cage and exerted as much pressure as his straining shoulder would allow. He felt her weaken slightly as she fought to breathe, but she didn’t release his hand.

Her feet continued to kick, and she wiggled constantly. Her efforts made it harder and harder for Kallum to maintain his grasp one-handed. He felt like he’d captured a wild boar and all he had to defend himself with were his bare hands. Of course, he was armed, but he’d never use a bladed weapon against a lass.

He yanked his hand roughly, but her teeth chewed deeper. Desperate to end the stalemate afore they were discovered, Kallum slid his other hand up to pry her teeth from the meal of its matching appendage. His travelling hand inadvertently caught her breast, and she yelped. His teeth-dented palm came free, but her still-kicking feet landed a strong blow to his shin. He dropped her to her feet.

Without turning, the lass shifted her hips and swung her fist backward with all her might. Right into his cods. A million piercing blades of pain shot through his groin. Grasping his package and gasping for air, Kallum sank to one knee.

The lass didn’t wait around to admire her handiwork. She bolted.

Gimpy but by no means completely incapacitated, an angry Kallum staggered to his feet and used his longer stride to bear down on the uncooperative lass. She glanced back as he reached for her. Accelerating, she dodged his grasp.

The end of the castle wall was only a few paces ahead. Her body pivoted toward the corner’s edge, but Kallum had no intention of letting her get away. If she reached that corner afore he reached her, the entire escape would be jeopardized. Plus, he now had an extremely personal score to settle with his mystery woman in addition to making her pay for putting all the other captives at risk.

Skewed after her battle with him, her cloak hung lopsided off her shoulder and billowed loosely behind her on the breeze of her momentum. When she was but a hair’s breadth from clearing the corner, Kallum snatched her waving cloak and yanked her up short. The twit lost her balance. Kallum caught her afore she tumbled to the ground, but the small bundle that had been draped over her shoulder went flying.

Having learned his lesson about her teeth and his hands, he clutched up a corner of her cloak and stuffed it into her mouth. He placed a hand firmly over the cloth crammed into her dangerous orifice and pushed her back against the wall. His chest heaved with exertion, and his cock throbbed as it swelled in a manner he was not particularly fond of.

He gritted his teeth and counted to ten—nay, twenty—afore he scolded her hide as best he could with only a deep-throated whisper at his disposal. “You currish, half-witted flax-wench! Are you trying to get us killed?”