Heart of Shadows (Hearts of the Highlands Book 2), page 18
But he needed to. And she was the only one he wanted to tell. “I left them.” He said it. He used to dream about saying it, confessing it out loud. He always wondered if it would change anything. It did. “I ran away while my enemies burned down my house and killed my entire family. I ran away.”
Tears filled her eyes instantly. He loved that she would shed them for him. He’d never had the understanding ear of anyone before. Even if he’d had one, he would never have spoken this out loud. Not even to Avalon.
“What could you have done, Torin?” she asked him, touching his face with both of her soft hands now. “You were but a babe. You were not the man you are now. You cannot blame that child for choices he made after living for only five years. ’Tis not fair, Torin. You are feeding the shame instead of slaying it.”
“I am slaying it by killing my enemy.”
“No.” She shook her head. “It will never be enough.”
“What will, then?” he asked, hoping she had an answer.
She tossed her arms around him again and walked with him back to the shore. “I do not know what will. You were a helpless babe, Torin. Your father could not stop them Why do you think you could have?”
He thought about it and then shook his head. “I do not know.” He laughed at it, and she laughed with him.
Would telling her he was a soldier of Robert the Bruce go this well?
He looked for his belt with his sword and knives. They were all gone. He stepped in front of a dripping wet, beautiful Braya Hetherington.
She shoved him away and retrieved a knife from a pocket in her breeches. Something dropped out of the trees.
Not something. Someone.
He heard Braya expel a strangled sound at the big brutish, long-haired Scot landing on his two feet to their right, a long claymore in his right hand. He was dressed in a long-sleeved léine and belted Highland plaid. Hell, he was daunting enough to make Torin wish they hadn’t come here.
“Commander Gray,” the Highlander sang, coming closer, unafraid. “Lord Rothbury received yer letter. He regrets that he is not seein’ anyone at this time.”
“And who are you?” Torin asked him.
“Commander Cainnech MacPherson.”
Adams appeared on his horse with Avalon and Archer close by. He leaped from his saddle and pushed forward, his sword drawn. “Where is Lord Rothbury? What have you done with him?”
“Gray,” Commander MacPherson’s voice went flat and laced with warning. But it was his glacial blue eyes that convinced Torin he spoke the truth. “Control yer man’s tongue before he loses it.”
“Why, I—” Adams raged and moved forward.
“Put yer sword away,” the Highlander warned on a deadly whisper, “before ye lose yer arm as well.”
“Adams!” Torin shouted at him to get his attention. When he had, he shook his head. “Let us be of a sound mind.”
Adams finally nodded and sheathed his blade.
“Our clothes.” Torin turned back to the Highlander. He missed his plaid, his pride. He was a Highlander, too. He knew how savage they were. They didn’t need to be fighting this man.
MacPherson tossed them their clothes but kept their weapons. “Ye can have these back when ye leave, which ye will do now. Hurry, before I decide to take yer horse. I assume the glorious white and chestnut mare is yers?”
Torin nodded then quickly warned him that Avalon would take his fingers.
“Avalon?” the commander frowned at him. “Where have I heard that name before?” He didn’t wait for an answer but swished his hand in front of his face and waved them away. “Go.”
They needed to get inside. Adams was cranky from sleeping against a tree all night. Torin had seen Braya rubbing her back earlier.
“I need to speak to Rothbury, Commander,” Torin insisted. He would tell him the Scots were coming. “To him and him alone. ’Tis of the—”
MacPherson’s blade cut the air and came to a stop at Torin’s throat. “I said Lord Rothbury is not seein’ anyone today.”
“Commander.”
The Highlander slipped his sharp gaze to Braya, who had somehow managed to move behind him when they were not aware. He ignored the knife she held to his throat and smiled.
“Do not think I am afraid to kill you, Scot,” she warned. “Move your blade away from him or die.”
Hell, Torin thought, this was no time to grin.
“Gray, is she yer woman?” MacPherson demanded, looking irritated now.
Torin set his eyes on her. She was already looking at him, waiting to hear his reply with dreadful anticipation.
“Aye,” he said without taking his eyes from hers. “She is my woman. Do not harm her.”
Her expression softened on him, and her grip on the hilt of her knife loosened.
Torin wasn’t certain how Commander MacPherson could tell, but he moved before any of them took their next breaths. His arm shot up. His broad fingers clamped around Braya’s wrist, lowering it and her knife from his throat. Almost at the same time, and without letting her go, he stepped behind her, managing somehow not to break her arm, and captured her other wrist as well.
“Drop it,” he commanded.
She had no choice but to obey.
Torin had seen enough. He stepped forward, but Adams rushed in swinging his sword.
“No!” Torin stretched out his arm. Braya blocked the Highlander’s body. There was nothing Adams could do with his sword without hurting Braya!
MacPherson closed one arm around Braya and brought her down with him in a low crouch. He swung one leg out, catching Adams behind his ankles and sweeping him completely off his feet.
Adams landed on his back with a hard thud.
“I do not wish to hurt ye,” the deadly Highlander said to his felled opponent.
“Ah, well, ’tis too late for that,” Adams groaned when he tried to rise.
Torin helped him stand while the commander released Braya and dusted off his plaid.
“I can do this all day, lass,” MacPherson told her. “Believe me, I have had plenty of practice.”
Torin went to stand beside her, ensuring there would be no more surprises from anyone. He couldn’t be angry with the commander. He’d protected himself against her, and himself and Braya against Adams.
“You practice often,” Torin remarked.
“Every day. We must.” He looked as if he had something more to say, like, aye, do you agree? But he said nothing more and flicked his gaze to Braya when she spoke next.
“What is a Highlander doing with Lord Rothbury? Has Rothbury turned traitor then?”
The commander sized her up with curious eyes. “There isna much of ye. Is there? Ye are more dangerous than ye look.”
“Commander—”
“Now get yer arses oot of here.”
“Commander,” Torin moved forward. “My friend needs a bed.”
MacPherson settled his eyes on him and, for an instant, Torin thought he’d seen him before—another time when he hadn’t turned Torin’s blood cold. He’d never seen anyone move the way MacPherson just had. He wanted to practice with him, not make an enemy of him.
“What is it ye dinna—” the commander stopped speaking when Torin’s brooch caught the light and nearly blinded the Highlander. “Where…” he reached out to the brooch. Torin stepped back. The commander’s eyes glinted on him. “Where did ye come by such an odd thing?”
Hell. He should have put on his mantle and kept the brooch covered. Should he tell him a story he’d made up, or the truth? MacPherson hadn’t hurt Braya. He’d protected her. Mayhap he was the kind of man who understood these things. “’Tis worthless. It has value only to me.”
“Why?”
“Why do you wish to know?” Torin challenged.
“Did ye rob it?”
“No,” Torin answered, not sure why he felt insulted. “’Twas my mother’s.”
Thankfully, that put an end to the commander’s questions. In fact, he appeared quite…shaken. His eyes glistened like sapphire seas beneath the full moon. He traced them along Torin’s face, soaking him in, admiring the strength of his shoulders.
“Commander?” Torin raised his brows. He was beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable, as if the Highlander were trying to gain entrance into Torin’s innermost thoughts.
MacPherson blinked out of whatever he was thinking about and then smiled. “Get yer horses and come with me.”
Whatever had just happened to change his mind, Torin was glad for it.
MacPherson was quiet while he led them to Lismoor Castle, but Torin caught him staring at him and his brooch while they rounded another hill, where more men became visible in the warm evening mist.
“What is it that you are looking for, Commander?” Torin asked boldly when he caught the commander staring at him yet again.
“Where are ye from?”
“Why? Why do you ask me that?”
MacPherson didn’t answer as they reached the outside wall of the small fortress. They followed him inside and brought their horses to the stable. After that, they climbed a set of stone steps and came to giant wooden doors to the east and a walkway to the west, leading to a tower. He stopped and turned to Braya and Adams. “Ye both go inside with Amish and Father Timothy here.”
They turned to find more men behind and around them.
Torin recognized the priest’s robes and went to him.
“Not ye, Gray,” MacPherson called out. “Ye stay here. There are things I must ask ye.”
“No,” Torin called back. “We all go in together or none of us will go at all and Rothbury will lose vital information about our country.”
The commander laughed and then glanced at Adams, clutching his side. “You stay here or they sleep in the forest tonight.”
Torin didn’t take too much time thinking about his answer. “Go with them!” he called out to Braya and Adams.
They went, but Braya stopped and looked over her shoulder. She met his gaze and then wiped her eyes as she entered Lismoor first.
Chapter Twenty
Torin didn’t know where the hell MacPherson was leading him or why. He looked back but could no longer see Braya. Damn it, he hadn’t wanted to leave her. He’d done it for Adams. This was what caring got you.
He looked around. Lismoor was guarded well. How had Rothbury gained so many men?
William Stone. Torin had always thought him an Englishman who had turned traitor on his king. If that was true, why did even Highlanders follow him?
“How do you know the earl?” Torin asked him as they crossed the walkway.
“He is my brother.”
Torin stopped. The earl was a Highlander? “When did he take Lismoor?”
“Two years ago.” the Highlander told him with a slant of his mouth. “And he didna take it. He is not a warrior at heart. But he can fight when he has to, and fight well.”
“Two years ago. I do not understand. I was told that William Stone was the earl.”
“He is, but his true name is Nicholas. Nicholas MacPherson.” The commander stared at him as if he were waiting for some sort of reaction from Torin.
Torin smiled then picked up his steps again. The earl must use Stone when the king needed him to sound more English. Hell. How would he explain this to Braya and Adams?
“That sweeping move you used was very impressive,” he told the commander. “Where did you learn it?”
“My wife taught it to me.”
Torin laughed. “Your wife?”
“Aye. She is the most ferocious woman I have ever met. Dinna cross her.”
Torin shook his head. “I will not.”
They reached the tower and climbed a row of narrow stairs to a door that led to another set of heavy wooden doors. They stopped, and MacPherson turned to him in the dim light before they entered.
“My mother had a brooch just like that one,” he began. “My father forged it fer her.”
Torin wasn’t sure if his heart was beating. What was MacPherson saying? Why was he talking about his mother having a brooch like Torin’s?
“The brooches are similar,” Torin told him. Were they going inside to talk or not?
“I remember the day he made it,” the commander went on. Torin wasn’t sure why he felt as if the world was about to change, or why it scared the hell out of him.
“’Twas a surprise.” The Highlander smiled, as if he were there, reliving that day. “She had no idea he had been craftin’ it fer her. But we knew. My brother and I.” He paused to take a deep breath.
Torin didn’t breathe at all.
“Fergive me,” the commander begged with a short laugh. “I dinna remember how ye signed yer name on yer letter to the earl. Is it Thomas?”
“Torin.”
Commander MacPherson’s eyes grew moist. Torin felt as if he were in a dream. One he’d had hundreds of times before. But it couldn’t be. It couldn’t be. He refused to allow his mind to entertain the idea that this could be one of his brothers. It was all just a strange manner of events—as events were sometimes wont to be. ’Twas just a brooch. There had to be a hundred of them like it. But there was only one. He had always referred to his father as a blacksmith. He had made it. There was only one.
“At first,” the commander continued, clearly trying to keep his voice from quavering, “my father couldna find her to give her the brooch.”
Torin’s eyes fill with tears as a memory flashed across his mind. He swallowed back the rush of emotions, including guilt and shame threatening to erupt from his long forgotten heart before he spoke. “We were in the garden.”
“Aye, aye, ye were in the garden with her. Ye always were, Brother.” The commander held Torin by the face, a rough, strong hand on either cheek, and stared into his eyes. “Och, hell, ’tis ye. ’Tis ye, Torin.” He dragged Torin into his tight embrace. “We thought we would never find ye. I am Cainnech, yer brother.”
Cainnech, his brother. This was real. He remembered. Nothing was more proof than that. The man squeezing the air from him was real. Cainnech, his brother. Aye. Torin recognized the strength in his brother’s eyes and the defiant, determined dip of his brow.
He lifted his arms around Mac—MacPherson.
He was Torin MacPherson. He had forgotten, but now it gave him a sense of belonging. He was a MacPherson and he had his brother back.
He had two.
“Is Lord Rothbury my brother as well?” he asked, withdrawing from their embrace.
“Aye,” Cainnech told him, his smile fading. “The babe.”
Torin shook his head in disbelief. “How did he survive? How did you survive? Where have you been?”
“They are long conversations we will have. But now, Nicky needs to see ye.” Cainnech stepped away and ran his hand down his face. “There was a tragedy early this morn. Nicky’s beloved wife died givin’ him his son. We buried her this afternoon. He is grief stricken. I canna comfort him. I believe God sent ye here to us to help him.”
“Where is he?”
Cainnech pointed to the doors. “He is in the gatherin’ hall, stayin’ as far away as possible from his babe and from the constant condolences. Losin’ Mattie has taken much from him. Mayhap gettin’ ye back will help heal him.”
Torin swiped his hands across his eyes and nodded, and then, with his heart racing, followed Cainnech through the doors.
Now Torin understood why Cainnech had been staring at him earlier because he couldn’t keep his eyes off his brother now. Their coloring was different, but Torin saw traces of himself in the subtle nuances of the commander’s expressions.
Cainnech MacPherson was a fearsome warrior. Torin was sure that any who came against him would die where they stood. He was impressive, even in the confidence of his gait.
“Do you fight for King Robert?” he asked quietly just before they entered the hall.
“Not as much as I used to. If I am needed, I will come. Now, tell me, what ye are doin’ in Northumberland.”
“Infiltrating Carlisle Castle,” Torin told him. “I am the first one in and the last one out. The king is soon to arrive to take the stronghold. I need to be there.”
His brother stared at him and hooked his brow and one corner of his mouth into an upward slant. “Then what are ye doin’ at Lismoor?”
“Keeping Miss Hetherington safe. She is a skilled warrior and a firm enemy of the Scots. She is also a…ehm…a reiver.”
“An outlaw!” his brother threw back his head and laughed. “Come! We must tell Nicholas.”
They entered the large hall, furnished in heavy, dark walnut. An enormous, cooled hearth was carved into the northern wall. There was no need of a fire on this warm summer day.
Torin looked toward the front of the hall, but the two largest chairs were empty.
Cainnech began walking toward the back of the hall, to a chair in the shadows, and a man who sat alone.
“What is it?” The young man drawled when Torin and Cainnech approached. “Leave me alone, Cain.”
“Nicky, Commander Gray has arrived.”
Torin’s baby brother looked up at him. “I am sorry, Commander. I do not want to see anyone.”
Torin slipped into the bench on the other side of him. “You have my deepest sympathies, my lord.”
The Earl of Rothbury sat forward, exposing his face to Torin.
Torin didn’t remember him, but he looked much more like Cainnech than Torin did. His eyes were slightly more silver than blue, and bloodshot and swollen.
“Long live your son,” Torin said, holding up a cup that someone set in his hands a moment ago.
Cainnech cheered along. Nicholas lifted his cup but only stared at Torin.
“I have seen you before” Nicholas insisted, “in Berwick. Two years ago. You were there before the attack.”
“Aye. I was,” Torin told them.
“You were at Berwick?” Cainnech asked him. “At the massacre of the villagers?”
“No,” Torin said quickly. “Not that. I was there. I took down the castle and killed Governor Feathers. But then I left to take his daughter to safety. I—”
“His daughter?”
“Aye, Julianna. I took her to an abbey in—”
