Highland Thirst. Lynsay Sands
Heming that put a person on guard, but Brona was glad no one was going to argue any more about saving the man.
“As sure as I can be,” Brona said as she started to lead the men to the place they would all hide, at least until Peter and Sir Heming could run for their lives and defend themselves. “I spent the day slipping in and out of passageways and taking supplies to the place I chose for us to hide in for a while. There was no sign of anyone else having used those secret passageways for many years. I cannae think my cousin or Angus would e’er miss the chance to use passages that would allow them to spy upon someone in near every room in the keep if they knew about all Rosscurrach’s secrets.”
“Nay, they would be wandering about in there all the time,” agreed Colin. “Yet, he is the laird and should have kenned about them, aye? Why didnae your da tell the mon about them?”
“Hervey is the laird here only because he is the last male kinsmon in my father’s line. My father didnae fully trust him and neither did my mother. I may have been little more than a child when my mother and then my father died, but I do recall that. Hervey did his best to deceive them about his true nature, but he failed. Unfortunately, my mother also failed to convince my father that he should choose another heir. Father felt verra strongly that the heir should be the closest male kinsmon.”
“So will the king be choosing the next laird then?”
“Weel, I suppose if Hervey doesnae have a son, aye, something like that will happen.”
Colin gave a short, harsh laugh. “Mistress, your cousin willnae be living long enough to wed and have himself a legal son. This mon’s kinsmen will soon be sending the laird to his grave. I but pray they dinnae send too many of the rest of us there as weel.”
“But how will they ken where he is or what has happened to him?”
“He will tell them when he returns home, aye?”
Brona looked at Sir Heming and then back at Colin. “Do ye think he will live?”
“Who can say, but e’en if he doesnae someone will come seeking revenge. I am that sure of it.”
“Colin, he was kidnapped, sent to sleep with a potion in his ale. Someone took his cousin and Hervey took him. How can anyone ken where Sir Hervey is?”
“Such secrets will out, mistress. If this mon was kidnapped at an inn then there is someone there who kens it. And what if this cousin ye mention gets free and comes ahunting for the truth? Nay, mistress, I fear Rosscurrach is due a reckoning for this.”
That was frightening, especially since Brona could see the sense in all Colin said. If many of the MacNachtons were like Sir Heming, she feared her people were in for a very bloody future. She had no doubt in her mind that Sir Heming was a strong and fierce warrior, and one with the cunning to stay alive in battle and gain victory over his enemies. Her idiot of a cousin Hervey had certainly made this man an implacable enemy.
When she reached the chamber set deep beneath Rosscurrach and lit a few torches, Colin, Fergus, and even Peter looked around in amazement. She had gathered rough pallets for all of them and set them around the edges of the room. She had gathered clothing, blankets, and food as well. Thor sprawled on one pallet and Havoc on another. In one corner, she had set a number of weapons, swords, and daggers she had taken from the armory, feeling that the men would need them when they were finally able to flee the keep.
“Ye brought your pets with ye?” asked Fergus as he helped Peter lie down on one of the pallets.
“I had to. Hervey and the others wouldnae care for them and I kenned that, once Hervey realized I was the one to set ye all free, he would slaughter them out of anger at me.” Brona fetched some water and rags in order to clean the wounds on Sir Heming as best as she could.
Colin settled Sir Heming on a pallet with surprising gentleness. “Aye, ’tis just what he would do. And where do ye plan to go when we can finally slip away from the keep?”
“Ah, weel, I havenae exactly decided on that yet.”
She could tell by the looks the three men gave her that they thought she was being a foolish woman, but she ignored them. Brona turned her attention to trying to clean Sir Heming’s wounds. It might have been wise to take enough time to plan where she would go and how she would get there, but she had felt there was little time for anything more than getting the men out of their prisons and to a safe place. There was also the fact that she really had nowhere to go that Hervey did not know about and could find her. It was going to take a lot of planning to decide what her next step would be.
“They did him hard this time,” murmured Colin as he stared down at Sir Heming when Brona gently removed the man’s jupon. “We heard him making some of them noises that sound like an animal again, but we ne’er thought they near killed the mon. And why would the laird think this mon would ken how to live forever? It looks like he is but a breath or two away from being dead to me.”
Brona gently set a cloth soaked in cool water over Sir Heming’s bruised and swollen eyelids. “Aye, I fear he looks the same to me. Hervey wasnae thinking clearly when he did this or mayhap he truly believes all those wild tales about the MacNachtons. He could have just lost the chance to get what he is so desperate to learn.”
“About living forever? No one can do that.”
“Weel, Sir Heming told me that his kin are long-lived, healthy, and strong. That may be what has spread that foolish tale of living forever. Hervey truly does believe it, I think. So much so that he and Angus are thinking of making a potion to drink using this mon’s blood.”
“Ere they dragged me away to my cell, I heard them say that the mon’s wounds were already healing after he drank blood from me,” said Peter. “Mayhap they arenae so mad to think such a thing.”
“I heard them say that, too,” murmured Brona, resisting the strong urge to stroke Sir Heming’s hair. “If doing such a thing works for Sir Heming then mayhap it would work for someone else. I just find it all so verra hard to believe.” She looked at Peter, who was lying on his side, wrapped tightly in a blanket, and watching the unconscious Sir Heming. “Can ye say whether he did something to your neck after he drank from ye?”
Peter grimaced. “He licked me.”
“Your wounds are closed, Peter. The slice Hervey made with his dagger is red and raw but ’tis closed. The mark left tells me it was a deep cut yet here ye sit.”
“Aye, ye have the right of it. I feared the bastard meant me to bleed my life out on the floor and there was a lot of it going there until that mon stuck his teeth in me. When he took those teeth out of me neck, he licked me. For a moment I feared he then wanted from me what the laird did, but, nay, he pushed me away and returned to glaring murder at the laird.”
“I think he licked ye to seal the wound, though how he could do that is a wonder. Yet, ’tis the only explanation for why ye are still alive.”
“Aye,” agreed Colin. “Ye should have bled your life away and quickly, too, by the looks of that knife cut.”
Brona joined the three men in staring down at Sir Heming. To all the other reasons she wanted the man to live, she could now add simple but deep curiosity. There was indeed something very strange about Sir Heming MacNachton.
Four
“He is dying, mistress.”
Brona nearly snarled at Colin, but took a few deep, slow breaths to calm herself instead. Colin was only speaking the hard, cold truth and he did not need to be snapped at because of that. They had been hiding in the bowels of Rosscurrach for two days and Sir Heming grew no better. He was so pale he would probably blend into the linen he slept upon if not for his long black hair, and his breathing had grown shallow, weaker, and less even. Her constant tending of his many wounds had done nothing to help him. There was no sign of fever or infection and, horrendous though they were, his wounds no longer bled. Yet he only grew worse. It made no sense to her.
What