*In the great hall of Falkland Palace, Cameron, his prisoner, and his men stood before the king who sat in his overly large chair. The massive chamber with bright red walls had been cleared of anyone else to allow them to talk in private. After Cameron had recapped Swinton’s activities at Ravenscraig, King James’s tense gaze shifted to John Swinton. “What do you have to say in your defense, Swinton? Did you or did you not try to harm your own daughter while she was still under the guardianship of this man and after I told you to stay away from her?”
Swinton, newly released from his bindings, rubbed at his wrists as though trying to remove the stain of his capture from his flesh. “Lies! You know why I was there, Your Grace. Is it not my occupation to rid this world of all possible evil? By your own commission, you granted me that right.” Swinton’s eyes glittered brilliantly in the candlelight. “Is that not what you wish me to do?”
The king frowned. “Why would you suspect your own daughter of witchery?”
“A tale of a young woman leading animals without so much as a word or a gesture came to my attention. I knew I had to investigate, because where there are unusual events, there are usually witches. I followed the tales straight to Ravenscraig Castle, and my own daughter,” Swinton snarled. “Her mother poisoned her with her blood, and she needed to be cleansed.”
Swinton turned on Cameron with a sneer. “It’s your fault! You were too gentle with her. I tried to beat any trace of her mother out of her for years. I was succeeding until you changed her. She’s a witch, and a harlot!”
“Enough, Swinton,” the king shouted over Swinton’s rant. “I was the one who knew of your skills and needed your services elsewhere. Laird Sinclair was only a means to an end for us both.”
Cameron flattened his mouth. He did not appreciate how the king had described his role in Mariam’s care, but he had kept her safe, which had been his ultimate task when she was placed with him as his ward.
“Mariam is my daughter and I can do with her what I please,” Swinton hissed.
“I beg to disagree. Once you accepted the role as my pricker, Mariam became my responsibility, as my good wife laid out rather clearly before me. Mariam is now my concern, and no longer yours.”
Swinton’s face twisted. “Then if I am your pricker, release me and I shall resume my work here in Fife, Haddington, North Berwick, or wherever you choose to send me.”
The king sat back in his throne. A look of deep consideration creased his brow. Finally, he sighed and looked to Cameron. “I’ve become a prisoner to my own opinion. It is an unlearned man who never deviates from his position when new evidence is presented.”
“Are you speaking of the witch trials?” Cameron asked, trying to clarify the meaning behind the king’s words.
The king nodded as his gaze shifted to Swinton. “You have served me well, John Swinton, but I have decided to no longer prick those who are accused. You may remain here at court, as my guest, until I can find you new employment, but your daughter must remain in Laird Sinclair’s care until such a time that she can be settled in marriage.”
“I’ve no need of other employment. I am a gifted pricker. I’ve done so much good for you—in exposing the evil that threatens us all.”
“Be silent!” The king’s voice filled with ice.
Swinton’s eyes blazed. “I will not be silent. What will you do? Pricking is my God-given talent. I will not stop the hunting of witches until every last one has been exposed.”
With a lift of his hand, the king motioned his guards forward to restrain the wild-eyed Swinton. “Perhaps a few days in the dungeon might help you see a different future for yourself.” To the guards he said, “Take him away.”
Swinton howled his displeasure as four guards were forced to take him by the hands and feet and drag him out of the chamber.
“What will you do to him?” Cameron asked when the man’s bellows faded into silence.
The king’s face hardened. “His fate is now up to him. I do not suspect he will last long in a dungeon filled with men and women whom he has sent there by his own hand.”
We reap what we sow. The words filled Cameron’s mind for a heartbeat before the king broke into his thoughts.
“Now for an even more difficult conversation,” the king said thinly though his words were perfectly clear. “Is Mariam Swinton a witch?”
Behind him, Cameron could feel the sudden tension in his men. From the corner of his eye, he saw Peter Mason’s face pale, but the man remained quiet. Lifting his chin, Cameron met the king’s concerned gaze with nothing but confidence. “Your Grace, you trust me to protect your life, and I have done so willingly. I would ask now that you also trust me when I say Mariam is no witch. The woman simply has an affinity with animals. It is my opinion that they sense in her all that she has suffered at the hands of her father and somehow know she needs their comfort.”
The king’s lips tightened. “’Tis most unusual.”
“But not unheard of. You said so yourself ‘it is an unlearned man who never deviates from his position when new evidence is presented.’”
King James’s gaze narrowed and his face darkened. “Using my own words against me, are you?”
“Wise words should be repeated.”
The king’s features knitted as he considered what Cameron had said, until finally his expression cleared. “Then I shall trust your opinion in this matter. However, if anything else comes to my attention—any other strange stories start circulating through the shires—I will have no other recourse but to act.”
“Agreed,” Cameron said with a bow.
The king released a heavy sigh. “Though I still need to marry the girl off to someone who will be able to handle her. She is, after all, a Swinton.”
Cameron held his tongue at the barb. There was a time when Cameron had thought the same thing, but no longer. She was simply Mariam. Her surname no longer held the power to dissuade him from his current course of action. “About that situation, Your Grace, would you consider me to take on the role as both her protector and her husband?”
The king’s eyes went wide. “You would take her? She has no dowry to speak of and she will always bear the mark of her surname.”
Cameron kept his features bland. He couldn’t let the king know just how much he wanted the woman. If the king knew, he would exact some other token, not from Mariam, but from Cameron for the arrangement. But if the king assumed marriage to Mariam would be a sacrifice on Cameron’s part, the negotiations would be over quickly. “I will take her with nothing, Your Grace. And she will soon take my name as her own. Time will take care of the rest in the memories of those who once knew her as a Swinton.”
The king hesitated, then finally nodded. “So be it. The woman is yours. I’ll have the marriage contract written up tomorrow.”
Cameron opened his mouth to object, then said, “Thank you, Your Grace.” He didn’t want to wait to return to Ravenscraig, but he also knew he could not push the king much further, especially with one last request to make. “I have one other favor to ask you. ’Tis not for myself, but for this young man.” Cameron motioned Peter Mason forward. “He seeks a bride for himself. A young woman who might be in need of his aid and protection. He seeks no dowry, as his estate is flourishing. Do you have any thoughts on this matter?”
The king brightened. “As a matter of fact, I do.”
The king signaled to one of his guards to come forward. “Tell Lorraine Davies to attend me immediately. She is presently with the queen and her ladies-in-waiting in the garden.”
When the guard left, the king returned his gaze to Peter. “Lorraine is a pleasant enough young woman to look upon. She is of genteel birth, but was recently orphaned, with no family to take her.”
“I will take her,” Peter said, standing proudly before the king with his head high and his shoulders back.
The king’s brows knit. “Sight unseen?”
Peter nodded enthusiastically. “How did she come to be orphaned, if I might ask?”
“Her father was killed by a falling tree and her mother accused, tried, and hanged for using witchcraft to make the tree fall and kill the man,” the king explained.
At that moment, a young woman with sandy-blonde hair entered the room and curtsied deeply before the king. “Thank you for coming, Lorraine. I am pleased to introduce you to your bridegroom, Peter Mason.”
Bliss-filled smiles lit Peter and his young fiancée’s face as Cameron and his men left them both at the king’s side. Mason and Lorraine would be happy with each other for no other reason than that they needed each other so desperately.
*
The next morning after the betrothal papers were signed, Cameron and his men headed back to Ravenscraig, leaving John Swinton behind in the king’s dungeon. What would Mariam think about such an action? The king had been the one to place her father there, but Cameron had to tell her the news. And not only about her father’s imprisonment, but about their betrothal as well.
The thought that they would soon join their lives should have brought him comfort. Instead, he was afraid Mariam would think he was marrying her out of pity. He did feel sympathy toward her because of her past history with her father, but there were so many other emotions she brought out when she was near.
She was both infuriating and courageous; innocent and passionate; caring and resourceful. And even when she tried desperately to blend into the background, there was no hiding the radiance that enveloped her. Many members of his household had been frightened of that warmth whenever she was near.
Not him. In her presence, he’d found a sense of peace he’d never expected, and now craved. He wanted to be near her and not just for the practical purpose of keeping her safe. He wanted the two of them to build on whatever it was between them and create something bigger than either of them had imagined possible.
Would Mariam want that as well?
After all the years she’d kept herself locked away from further abuse and pain, could she allow herself to be vulnerable, and open her heart to him? There was only one way to find out.
More anxious than before to return to her, Cameron spurred his horse into a faster gait. Behind him, his men did the same, eager to see their own loved ones again.
His attention back on the last leg of their journey, Cameron suddenly noted that far above them the sky had shifted from brilliant blue to gray, with darker clouds on the horizon. A light breeze rustled through the treetops, but it did not sound like wind. Instead, the noise was slightly akin to screeching, except there were no birds in the sky. To the west of the caravan, four deer bounded past, unfazed by the presence of humans.
“Something feels wrong,” Cameron said to his second in command as he rode up beside him.
“Agreed,” Keith MacFarlane said. “We’ve both been through summer storms before.”
They were seven miles from Ravenscraig and any sort of shelter—if this truly was a storm. It was then that the air filled with a heavy, decaying scent, almost like that of rotten eggs.
“Is the woodland on fire?” Keith asked as he scoured the distance ahead.
“Looks more like the God is preparing us to face hell’s flames,” Conall replied, bringing his horse between Cameron’s and Keith’s.
Cameron’s fingers tightened around the reins he held. “Something is definitely wrong here and my gut says we need to risk going even faster.”
To a man, they all agreed and the horses lunged forward at a dead run. Within three miles of the castle, heavy, black clouds started rolling in. Within moments, Cameron and his men were enveloped.
The horses made high-pitched raspy sounds as they slowed their pace, then stopped. Terrified of the sudden darkness, they lifted their forefeet into the air, snorting their distress.
“Easy, Bucephalus.” Cameron tried to calm the horse beneath him even as his own heart thundered in his chest. Everything was pitched into darkness and it grew hard to breathe—as though the air had no life in it any longer. He forced a deep breath, realizing the air contained a gritty substance: almost like ash.
An ice-like chill slithered down his spine. Nay, it was ash that weighed the air down and made it hard to breathe. “Use anything you can to cover not only your own nose and mouth, but also your horse’s.” Cameron grabbed the edge of his shirt and tore it upward and to the side until he came away with a significant length of linen, which he tore in half. He tied one cloth about his face, blocking out the ash but not the smell of death and destruction. Ash fell like snow all around them, the sound reminding Cameron of rain.
Cameron quickly dismounted and tied the second cloth around his horse’s muzzle. “It will be all right, Bucephalus,” he soothed the terrified beast, though he doubted the truth of his own words. Nothing appeared to be right with the world.
Slowly, the darkness eased enough for Cameron to see the dim shadows of his men and their horses. The ash grew heavier, falling in sheets and gathering in a thick layer of grayish white upon the ground.
“We will have to walk the horses the rest of the way. The ground is too slick for any of us to go much faster, and visibility is low. Stay close.” Cameron grabbed the reins and led his horse forward. He could hear the others behind him as he fixed his gaze, searching through the haze ahead.
Mariam. He had to believe she and all the others were safe and well, inside the castle walls.