Master of the Highlands

Page 12

Lily ran. She cursed herself for not keeping up with any kind of workout regimen as very quickly the crisp air began to sear her lungs. A dull ache set in her throat, her body fighting to get enough oxygen to her unfit muscles. Small rocks bit into her feet—she wasn’t used to going without shoes and the soles of her feet were already becoming raw. She tried to concentrate on the rhythm of her pumping legs, as they raced toward what she thought was the direction of the road.
Lily stumbled on a rut in the path. She struggled to regain her footing, her efforts in vain as she slipped on a patch of grass that was already glistening with dew in the moonlight. She landed hard on her hands and knees and pain shot up her arms, reigniting the searing agony in her shoulder that had only just subsided into a dull ache. Between enduring her fall, the fever, and all the panic and fear that she had been struggling to keep in check, Lily crumpled onto the ground in a flood of exhaustion and loneliness. Resting her head on the cool damp earth, Lily let the tears come.
She didn’t know how much time had passed when the crying finally started to feel like it had run its course. Between shuddering sobs, Lily caught a glimpse of a road ahead of her. Though unpaved, it appeared well traveled. She’d made it. It was surely just an easy, albeit long walk back to her cottage now. “Keep it together, you dope, ” she mumbled aloud, wiping her eyes and nose. “You ’re safe now, so stop feeling so sorry for yourself. ”
Disregarding the cold damp that seeped through the fabric of her skirt, Lily settled cross-legged in the rocky grass to spend a moment gathering her wits. “Drama queen,” Lily chided herself, as much to hear a voice in the silence as to bring her situation back to normal. Breathing deeply, she looked around, awed at the beauty around her—the sky was a velvety black, dotted with more stars than she had ever seen before. The moon hung low in the sky, a perfect crescent throwing soft light across the rough terrain. The night was gorgeous. It was brisk, but if she got going now, she could be back in time for a late, hot supper. One of those tasty Highland steaks and a tall pint of beer.
Roused by the thought, Lily stood. She shook the dirt and dampness from her skirt, and sniffling one last time, she looked to her right and left trying to decide which way to go. Not yet ready to part with the glorious moon in the sky, she took a left on the road and began to walk.
Ewen ignored the knock on his door. He despised interruptions. The hour before supper was always his time to steal some much needed solitude and Kat should have known better than to disrupt his thoughts.
While Ewen had been busy doing some verbal jousting with Monk that morning, his uncle Donald had somehow managed to discreetly pilfer a manuscript from the tent of the unctuous general. It turned out to be potential attack plans from Cromwell himself, and Ewen was finding it to be a real gem.
The knock sounded again. Ewen tore himself from his reading with a low growl. “What?”
The door cracked open and Kat eased her way into the room. Head bowed, she barely made eye contact with the chief. Ewen chastised himself—the poor maid was clearly nervous. He softened his voice. “It’s fine, Kat. Please.
What’s the urgent matter?”
“Th-the woman. She’s gone.”
“What woman?” Ewen had only a tenuous grip on his patience and wanted Kat to make her point and be done with it.
“The lass. With the hair. Lily. She’s not to be found. ”
Ewen slammed his hands onto the table and Kat recoiled. The warrior shut his eyes and took a deep breath, visibly working to keep his anger in check. “Thank you, Kat,” he murmured. “I will handle this. ”
He cursed himself. Had he really been momentarily smitten with such a reckless woman? Beauty or no, he had no patience for outright stupidity. She had no notion of the dangers that lay outside the castle keep. The last thing the laird wanted to do that evening was leave the warmth of his whisky and private rooms to go in search of a foolish woman.
Dawn was beginning to break when she heard the voices. Lily had walked for what felt like miles the night before, followed by an impromptu rest at the side of the road that had accidentally turned into an extended nap. She couldn ’t figure out why with all her walking she still hadn’t run into any signs of civilization. Ewen and his men must have taken her much farther into the remote Highlands than she realized. No matter, she thought with groggy anticipation. Where there are voices, there ’s civilization. She ’d ask whoever they were for a lift to the nearest phone, where she could call a taxi. All vacation she had seen buses rattling through the village, but now that she needed one of them, they were nowhere in sight.
The notion that she ’d be eating a hot breakfast in as little as an hour roused Lily. Blood sausage, runny eggs, and porridge had never seemed so appealing. Positively famished, she mused that she ’d even settle for some haggis.
She stood up slowly, mentally promising her aching body that tonight, instead of sleeping in cold damp grass, she would ditch her rented croft, leave the Highlands, and check herself into the best five -star hotel she could find in Edinburgh. Visions of a hot shower, cable TV, and room service featuring a good old American-style hamburger got her sore muscles working again.
The morning was clear. Lily felt she was seeing the world through new eyes. Having used her wits to escape danger made her feel empowered—as if she was now in touch with an inner strength that had lain dormant through years of computer work, commuter lanes, pizza deliveries, and the other banal facts of her life in Silicon Valley. Exulting in this newfound clarity, she took in every detail around her. The sun was rising from behind low craggy mountains, throwing shards of bright white light across the greens and browns of the glen. Distant birds called to each other, their melodic songs echoing through the serenity of the Highland morning. Lily admired a nearby patch of thistle, as yet untouched by the rays of sunlight, thick drops of nighttime dew still glistening on its spiky purple buds. Smiling, she inhaled deeply, wondering if thistle had a distinctive fragrance.
Instead, it was the stink of sour whisky that assaulted her senses. Her smile faltering, she suddenly felt the heat of someone standing close behind her. Lily spun around, and there stood the ugliest man she had ever seen.
Chapter 8
Lily liked to imagine that her grandmother had raised her right, and she prided herself on her ability to find hidden reserves of graciousness and civility in moments like these. Undeterred by the rotting teeth and pocked face glaring at her, she gathered her wits and was just about to bid the man good morning when he reached out and grabbed her hard by the arms. A sense of shocked unreality washed over her. This wasn ’t supposed to happen. The Scottish people were kind, hospitable to wayward tourists like her. So why did he have a death grip on her arms?
She took a good look at the person standing before her. His bloodshot eyes were large and round, framed by a notably small face. A nervous tick in his brows exaggerated a low, deeply furrowed forehead. He was breathing through his mouth, the stench of whisky panting out through brown and yellow teeth. Lily’s stomach lurched when she noticed that his left ear was hanging by thin membranes of skin. From the crusty brown scabs around the wound, Lily estimated that someone had tried to rip off his ear no more than a couple of days ago.
He had been too close for Lily to notice his clothing before. Her knees buckled at the sight of his uniform, her shoulders hunching as his grip on her arms became the primary source of support keeping her from becoming a crumpled heap on the ground. A red coat. He was wearing a red coat. Tarnished pewter buttons closed the jacket tight to the waist where it flared out and came to rest grazing just atop his knees. Deep crimson sweat stains radiated out from under his arms, while dark red, brown, and black patches mottled what was once a white cravat, attesting to days of exposure to blood and filth. White gaiters, also badly stained, covered his calves, a single pewter button by each ankle holding them in place over scuffed black leather shoes. Lily didn ’t know much about period costumes or battle reenactment societies, but the bloodstains on his clothing were terrifyingly authentic.
The previous night flashed before Lily’s eyes. Men in traditional Highland garb, the castle, talk of Cromwell and seventeenth-century battles. Had something actually happened at that labyrinth? Panic tore through her, her breath coming in short gasps as the horror of what was happening to her began to crush down. Just think through this, Lily, she goaded herself. You are a smart woman. You are a rational woman. You were born in the twentieth century, and if you can get yourself into this, you can get right back out of it.
She systematically ran through possible circumstances. Had she injured her head when she fell at the maze? Perhaps her concussion led to some sort of brain damage akin to amnesia.
Or maybe she was lying in a hospital bed somewhere and this was all a nightmare. Lily could feel bruises blooming where the soldier’s hands closed around her arms like a vise. The sheer pain of his grip ruled out dreaming as a possibility. No nightmare could hurt this much.
There was always insanity. All the evidence surrounding her pointed to 1600s Scotland. Perhaps she was of this time and this place and it was madness that made her believe that her reality was a high-tech America years in the future. No, she couldn’t accept that. She had too much knowledge that would surely be farfetched by seventeenth-century standards, had too many memories that could be recalled at an instant. There was just too much Lily—vibrant and close to the surface—for her to be crazy. She had to imagine that truly insane people might have delusions, but that they just couldn ’t conjure up that much and that detailed a personal history.
Lily kept remembering Gram MacMartin ’s ballad of the boy who claimed to come from the future, and chided herself that it was just a silly song. Surely her grandmother hadn’t believed the words. The echoes of Clan Cameron in its
lyrics played at the edge of her mind. A lad with hair of gold, and the laird he called brother. Red and green plaid. And now men in coats of flame.
Lily’s panic turned to desperate regret as she remembered the downright hospitable reception she had gotten at the Cameron castle. She longed to be back there, comparatively safe within those dank stone walls. Even if she would’ve had to temporarily adopt a false persona, there would’ve been a few who knew who she really was. Perhaps Ewen or his brother might have even helped her back to the labyrinth so that she could sort out where she was. Or when. She crushed that last thought. Either way, she needed to find her way back, and she couldn ’t imagine confiding anything about her true origins to this drunken lout of a soldier.