To Tempt Highland Fate (The Mac Coinnach Brothers) (42 page)

Chapter 6

             
The next day, James and Maura were had packed a few sparse belongings and were ready to leave.  Their horses were saddled and waiting, with their warm breath hanging in a cloud in the chilly early morning air.  James helped Maura onto her mount, then pulled Willa aside a few paces from where she stood. She could tell from the look on his face that this was going to be his ‘serious talking-to’.  She grinned, because she really didn’t mind.  It felt so good to have family, especially a brother like James.  A brother who truly wanted her in his life, and who even cared enough to lecture her about her safety.  Not, of course, that he could stop her from doing what she really wanted if she set her mind to it, but it was sweet, all the same.

             
He grasped her by the arms and shook her slightly so that she looked up at him.  She tried to keep from smiling, but she suddenly felt almost giddy.  Perhaps she was losing her mind after all, and just didn’t realize it yet.

             
“Are ye sure about this Willa?” he asked her seriously.  “Ye ken I’d never leave ye here alone if yer no’ completely at ease with it.”

             
Willa looked into her brother’s handsome face and deep blue eyes, the color of the evening sky, just like hers.  “I’m
completely
at ease, James.  And besides, I won’t be alone.  I have my mysterious warrior to keep me company”, she teased.  Though there was more truth to that then she’d admit to him.

             
James narrowed his eyes.  “I dinna think he’ll be out of that bed for at least several more days.  At the verra earliest.  If he survives. Verra likely longer; but ye have the dagger I gave ye?”

             
“Yes, James.”

             
“And the knife?”

             
“Yes.”

             
“And the…”

             
“Yes!” she laughed and shoved him towards the horses.  “I have a whole arsenal of weapons at the ready.  Some of which I’m not even sure how to use.  I shall be perfectly safe.”

             
“And Willa…”

             
“Yes James?”

             
“Ye ken no’ to leave the boundaries, ye remember where they are?  Where I showed ye?”

             
“Yes, and I have no reason to go that far.  Everything I need is right here.  Stop worrying like a mother hen, I’m a grown woman, I’ve survived this long without you, and you’ll only be away for a matter of days!”

             
“I ken, but I’ll no’ rest until I return to find ye safe.”  James heaved a sigh and looked uncertain before he finally mounted his horse. As he and Maura turned to leave, Maura gave Willa a smile and a wicked wink before turning back to catch her husband glancing between them.  He gave his wife an accusing frown, and threw Willa one last glare of warning before spurring his mount forward to catch his very unrepentant wife, who was already riding away.

             
Willa smiled and watched them until they rode out of sight through the trees and beyond a grassy rise, then she went back into the house.  A big part of her, she had to admit, was very worried about James and Maura travelling so soon after the attack.  They should be safe enough, as long as they stayed away from roads and any well-traveled trails, but now that they were out of her sight, her mind was unsettled.  She shook herself. 
Nothing I can do now but wait
. 

             
She was more than glad to at least have someone with her. 
If
he would only wake up.  Suddenly all but alone and in charge for the first time in… well, a while… she at first didn’t know what to do with herself.  After pacing in and out of the cottage door a few times, she swept a few crumbs off the table, straightened the jars on the shelf, went outside to pace around the dooryard and check on her horse, and finally went to check on her patient.  In truth, she was excited and a little afraid to have his care all to herself.  She could stroke his hair while he slept, and take as much time as she wanted washing the beautiful hard lines of his body, all without worrying someone would come in and catch her ogling the man like a besotted maid.  But if something went wrong, if he got worse… no, she wouldn’t even think about that.

             
She filled a shallow bowl with warm water from the kettle near the fire and found a clean rag, bringing them both into the small room where the warrior lay, still sleeping.  She set the bowl on the bedside table and stood looking at him for a moment.  Would he ever wake again?  And when he did, what might he say to her?  What would he be like?  She couldn’t wait to know. 

             
Willa dipped the rag into the water and held the end to his lips, parting them gently with her thumb and squeezing the water slowly into his mouth.  He swallowed convulsively and she smiled, happy he was drinking more easily every day.  She dipped the rag again and again until she was satisfied he’d had enough.  Then she settled on the edge of the bed and ran the damp cloth over his forehead and down his neck to help cool his fever.  With her other hand, she smoothed back lengths of his thick, wavy hair.  It was so soft in her fingers, such a contrast to the harsh masculinity of his face, with the square chin and high cheekbones, and the hard muscular planes of his body.  Unable to stop herself, she traced her fingers along the bold lines of his jaw, pausing at the divot in his chin, then drew them across firm, full lips, and then ever so gently swept them over his long, thick lashes.  His eyelids fluttered, but he did not waken. 

             
He fascinated her.  She was utterly bewitched.  “Who are you, beautiful man?” she said just above a whisper as her hand moved over the thick contours of his arm, tracing the striking black dragon wrapped around it.  “Won’t you wake up and look at me?”  Willa sighed as yet another inexplicable wave of tenderness washed over her, a deep longing of sorts.  And yet she could not quite understand it, how could she be having feelings of
longing
for a man who had not yet spoken a word to her, in truth had not so much as looked at her?  And yet she felt the urge to lie beside him and press her body to his.  To taste his lips… touch his skin.  It ran through her blood, tingling to the tips of her fingers like lightning. 

             
Shaking herself from her thoughts before she broke down and acted on them, she gathered the bowl and rag and went to do the many small tasks that she hoped would take up the long hours of the next several days.  There was water to fetch, her horse to tend, a stew to make, and washing to do.  Then it would be time to tend her patient again.  And she should probably bathe him again…

Chapter
7

             
Drust came awake with a start, his eyes flying open as if from the sudden ending of a dream.  He was drenched in sweat and God, he ached all over.  For a moment he thought he was still asleep, that
this
was a dream, but then he turned his head, and the dusty daylight streaming through an open window stung his bleary eyes.  The sun… a window… 
A window?

             
Where the hell am I?
 

             
The last thing he remembered… what was it?  Ah yes, he was dying.  He had been stumbling and groping his way through a seemingly endless black tunnel, and then he finally, finally saw light… had he reached it?  He couldn’t remember… he must have collapsed.  He had lost a lot of blood from where the sword had slashed his side… even in the dark of the tunnel where he could see nothing at all, he had felt it oozing through his fingers where he pressed one hand against the wound, feeling his way through the dark passages with the other, all the while his body growing weaker, his eyes heavier... his breaths shallower…

             
Drust carefully lifted his throbbing head just a little and looked down at his body.  The wound had been dressed, and he was clean and lying in a bed.  With clean white sheets.  Someone had been caring for him. 

             
A woman?

              He thought he remembered a woman, glimpsed from beneath his barely cracked-open lids, but his head still felt too foggy and he couldn’t be sure if she was real or only an image from a fever dream.  Aye, come to think of it, she had been far too beautiful to be real.  Almost like an angel.  He remembered how soft and cool her touch had been on his hot skin, how her voice had soothed him.  He looked up and saw the thatched ceiling.  It seemed vaguely familiar, as if he’d looked at it before like this, but he couldn’t quite remember.  Had he been awake before now?

             
He tested his strength, trying to sit up, and quickly realized his hands were tied to the bed posts. 

             
What the hell? 

             
Was he a prisoner? A prisoner in a bed with soft white sheets?  He fell back against the pillow with a soft groan, weak and trembling, his head throbbing mercilessly.  Weak, so damned weak!  He would almost rather be dead.

             
Almost
.

             
One thing was certain, he wasn’t going anywhere for a while. Even if he weren’t tied up. 

             
Why the
hell
am I tied up?

             
Struggling to focus his mind, he reached out for his brothers Bren and Eian, but he could not sense them.  He was a good distance from Creagmor, then.  Or they were dead. 

             
No, not dead.  I’d know, wouldn’t I?

             
When they were within a few miles of one another, he and his brothers could sometimes communicate, in a fashion, with their thoughts.  Or at least sense each other’s presence.  It was one of the many gifts bestowed on their family long ago.

             
In truth, he didn’t know how many miles he might have traveled in the underground tunnels, or what had happened since to bring him to wherever he was now.  But at least he was alive, which was much more than he had expected when he attacked Mored, the dark sorcerer that plagued the Mac Coinnach clan with his evil ambition for ever more power.  Drust had been certain of a fight to the death: his own.

             
Mored had stolen the enchanted Dragon Ring, and without it, Bren’s soulmate would have been lost to him forever, sent forward to a time where no one could find her.  Only the ring could bring her back.  Drust had risked his own life to retrieve the ring, unable to watch his older brother suffer so, and figuring it was the best way he could help the clan. 

             
What had happened after he was gone? 

             
Bren had the ring… Drust had ripped it away from Mored and thrown it to his brother.  He saw Bren reach for it just as he fell into the depths of the cave.  Had Bren been able to use it find his mate again?  He hoped so… he had seen his brother’s indescribable pain when he knew she was gone.  Felt it like a dark shroud around his soul.  Drust knew in that moment that he never wanted to experience anything even close to that.  He would
never
be so foolish to give away his heart and leave himself vulnerable to such horrible grief.  Aye, Bren would think him dead and mourn him, his brother.  But that sorrow would pass. 
Och!  Of course it would, because he had not died, after all
.  But to lose one’s soulmate… he doubted time would heal such pain.  No, he was damned happy it was Bren and not him that had such a burden to bear.