Wee William's Woman, Book Three of the Clan MacDougall Series (8 page)

Horace finally did as ordered, keeping his hands at his sides, breathing deeply in and out through flared nostrils.

Rowan had hoped the man would have ignored his orders or tried something foolish so that he’d have the opportunity to kill him. There was still time for the fool to make a fatal error in judgment, but Rowan doubted the idiot would even try. As far as he was concerned, Horace Crawford was a coward.

Not once in the past hours had the man begged for mercy to be shown to his brothers. He also had not once asked after his wife. His lack of inquiry as to her safety did not go unnoticed by Rowan or any of his men. Were the roles reversed, Rowan was confident that he would have fought to his own death to protect his wife and brothers and at the very least he would have been worried sick over her. But not Horace. It was easy to surmise that the only one that Horace loved was Horace.

“Do no’ move until dawn breaks,” Rowan spoke to the Englishmen’s backs. “We have shown ye more mercy than ye deserve this night, Sassenachs. Do no’ tempt yer fate.”

Moments later, Rowan and his men broke away and went pounding through the forest, leaving two terrified young men quite literally shaking in their boots. The other man was enraged. He was left naked and humiliated and he swore he would someday exact his vengeance on the Highlanders who had left them for dead.

Four

“
A
gain?” Daniel asked incredulously, before sighing heavily and rolling his eyes. Strawberry blond curls bounced around the little girl’s face as she nodded in affirmation.

“But, lass, ye just went not more than three miles back.”

“But I has to go!” the child pleaded and wriggled around on the saddle in front of him.

Daniel let loose a frustrated sigh as he pulled rein and wondered what he’d done to anger God in such a manner.

“What is it now?” Wee William barked when he saw Daniel stopping again for what seemed to be the hundredth time in the past hour.

“She has to go.
Again.
” Daniel answered, at a loss for any plausible explanation as to how someone so wee as this child would need to pee as often as she did.

“Again?” Wee William shook his head and stared down at Nora. “I swear there isn’t a rock nor a tree that child hasn’t went behind in the past six hours!”

“I’m sorry William, I truly am.” Nora hoped the smile she offered would somehow soften his growing irritation toward her little sister. She slid down from Wee William’s Lap and pulled Elise from Daniel’s horse and went in search of yet another tree.

As they ambled through the low brush Nora looked for a suitable tree that was far enough away from the men yet close enough that she could keep an eye on them. These constant stops were wearing their already thin patience to a near translucent state.

“Elise! You must really try to not be such a bother!” Nora scolded the small child as they walked behind an old oak tree.

“But I has to go, Nora.”

“But do you have to go so frequently?”

“I always has to go when I’m ascared,” Elise said solemnly.

“Scared, not
a-
scared,” Nora corrected her. She couldn’t fault her sister for being frightened for she was just as nervous and just as afraid, but for quite different reasons. “Tell me why you’re scared and mayhap we can do something to help you not be so.”

“The men.” Elise offered. “They’re so big!” she spread her arms wide and nearly toppled over in doing so. Nora righted her and bade her to continue.

“And they talk funny, I don’t unnerstand what they’re saying. And they have lots of big knives!”

Nora resisted her urge to giggle, knowing full well it wouldn’t do to embarrass her sister. “They’re speaking Gaelic, and if you listen closely you’ll find it sounds rather pretty.”

Elise’s blue eyes stared up in disbelief.

“And those knives are called swords, you know that. You saw father make many of those.” Their father had been a blacksmith up until the lung fever took his life. He made everything from pots to broadswords. Elise was only four when he died, so Nora supposed she might not remember much of the blacksmith shop.

“I miss papa.” Elise’s eyes began to water.

“I miss him too,” Nora said as she tried to smooth down the strawberry blonde ringlets. “I miss him every day. But papa wouldn’t want us to cry, now. He’d want us to be brave.”

“I wanna go home.”

Nora let out a heavy sigh. “I would love to go home too, Elise. But I told you, we had to sell the blacksmith shop as well as our home.”

The money from the sale of both had barely gotten them through the first year after their father’s death. It was one more reason why she had agreed to marry Horace. The fear of starvation and freezing to death will often make a person do things they’d rather not do. There were very few appealing options available for women in such dire straits.

“Can we buy it back?” Elise asked hopefully.

“Nay, we cannot.” As appealing as the thought was, it was impossible. Thinking of her father and the life they were leaving behind was bittersweet. Nora had many fond memories of her life in Penrith, her life before Horace Crawford.

A sudden sense of foreboding flooded over her. What if the Highlanders hadn’t buried Horace and his brother’s well enough? What if a hunter stumbled upon them and realized Nora was missing? Would they assume that she had killed them? She shuddered at the thought and prayed that the scavengers and wolves would get to the bodies first and leave them unrecognizable.

“How did you hurt your eye?” Elise asked rather quietly.

Nora debated between telling the truth and lying. Elise was an innocent six-year-old little girl, far from home, and frightened.

“Did the big men hurt you?”

“Nay!” Nora exclaimed. She took a deep breath before answering. “Do you remember Horace?”

Elise nodded as she scratched the tip of her nose. “He is your husband and he doesn’t like me and John.”

“No, he was not fond of any of us.” Nora took a deep breath and let it out slowly. To say Horace wasn’t
fond
of her was an immense understatement. She was certain he despised her.

“So how did you hurt your eye?”

Nora chewed her bottom lip for a moment before answering. “Horace did this to me. But you needn’t worry overmuch.” Deciding it best to leave out the part about the Highlanders bursting into their home and carrying Horace and his brothers off into the dark winter night, Nora continued calmly. “Neither Horace nor his brothers will be bothering us ever again. They’ve been sent away and shan’t be coming back.”

“Did they go to heaven like our mammas?” Elise asked.

“I don’t know if the good Lord would see fit to allow men of their kind into Heaven, but that isn’t a question for us to ask.” For the past few hours, Nora had been quietly contemplating her own admission into Heaven. It was precarious at best.

She was uncertain if her own soul wasn’t now damned to hell for all eternity. Had she not answered in the affirmative to Wee William’s question those many hours ago, well, Horace would still be alive and she’d still be married to him and not reunited with her brother and sister. Nora had to hold on to the belief that God had sent the Highlanders as her rescuers and not as test of her commitment to her marriage.

Horace had broken every promise and vow. It didn’t make sense to Nora that she should remain steadfast and cheerful while Horace lied, stole, cheated, and beat her. Certainly that wasn’t God’s plan for her.

“Are you done?” Nora asked impatiently.

Elise nodded and stood. Nora straightened out their skirts and cloaks before taking Elise’s hand. “These men you’re so frightened of, they’ve risked much in order to help me get you away from Castle Firth.”

“Why did they do that?” Elise asked as her brow twisted into a tiny knot. “And how do you know them?”

Nora sighed, unsure exactly how to answer that question. She pondered it for a moment before smiling. “God sent them to us, Elise. He knew how sad you and John and I were, so He sent these men to help us.”

Elise’s eyes widened with surprise and excitement. “You mean they’re angels?”

“Aye, something like that.” Nora knew they were the furthest things from angels as one could get, for they were, after all, Scots. And Highlanders to boot! But thus far, they had shown nothing but kindness toward her and her siblings.

“I thought angels were small and had wings,” Elise said, uncertainty claiming her face.

“Angels come in all forms, Elise.” Nora gave her tiny hand a slight squeeze.

“Then I shouldn’t be afraid of them because they’re angels?”

“Aye, you needn’t be afraid.” Nora smiled down at her sister hoping that she’d be less afraid and now less inclined to need to relieve her bladder every three miles.

They had stopped at the edge of the clearing while Nora re-tied Elise’s cloak.

“Do angels kill people, Nora?” Elise asked.

“Nay, they do not,” Nora answered, amazed with how a child’s mind sometimes worked.

“Then why does that big man have his hands around John’s neck?”

Nora’s head nearly spun from her shoulders when she turned to see what Elise was referring to.
 
Wee William was holding John by the scruff of his neck!

She raced across the small clearing. Daniel and David were standing on either side of Wee William, who definitely had a firm hold on John’s neck while he growled at him.

“William! John!” Nora shouted as she pushed her way through the wall of men. “William! Put him down this instant!” she demanded as she pulled on Wee William’s arm.

Wee William loosened his grip slightly but kept his hold on the boy. “Yer brother here needs a lesson in manners, Nora!” he barked at her.

Nora didn’t care what the reasons were behind Wee William’s attempt at strangling John, she only wished that he would stop. Anger bubbled up as she shouted back. “You put my brother down this instant!” She continued to pull on Wee William’s arm but to no avail. “You’ll kill him!”

Wee William rolled his eyes and looked down at her. “Lass, if I wanted the little brat dead, he’d already be dead! I mean only to teach him to have some respect!”

“I’ll show you no respect, you damned heathen!” John spat out. His face was as red as a beet, not from lack of air but from anger.

Wee William growled back at him. “Listen, ye little shite! Ye better get that temper in check and rethink yer attitude, or I’ll no’ give a second thought to leavin’ ye out here to fend fer yerself!”

“I’d rather fend for myself than be anywhere near a filthy Scot!”

Nora had reached her breaking point. “William, put him down!”

“Why?” he shot back.

“So that I may beat the fool senseless!”

Wee William’s expression changed from anger to surprise in the blink of an eye. “What did ye say?” he asked as he loosened his grip.

Nora let out a harsh breath. “I said put him down so that I can beat him senseless!” She would brook no disrespect on her brother’s part toward these men who were trying to help them. “Then I shall beat
you
senseless when I’m done!”

Wee William startled and let go of John’s shirt. John fell to the ground and landed on his rear end with a thud. “Me?” Wee William asked, more than a tad bewildered by her threat.

“Aye, the both of you!” Nora shouted as she stomped her foot and thrust her fists to her hips. “John!” she said as she looked down at her brother. “I know your opinion of Scots and where it came from.”

She thrust her hand toward her brother and glared angrily down at him, stopping him before he could utter one word of protest. “’Tis foolish notions and preconceived opinions such as
that
, that keep our countries constantly at war with one another! These men have risked a great deal to help us and I will
not
have you behaving in such a disrespectful and ill-mannered fashion!”