The Highlander's Honorable Savior (Iron Of The Highlands Series) Page 2

  “No,” she whispered to herself.

  A third man had entered the alley. Tall, he was silhouetted but for the faintest shine from his eyes. His form was vast and bulky. She shrank back against the wall, seeking some means of escape.

  As she listened, she heard the men talking.

  “Get him, Callum.”

  The two, who had fought seconds ago, stood together against the common foe. She winced as one of them struck out at the tall shape and closed her eyes in horror as she heard the wet thump of a blow hitting flesh.

  There were two of them and only one of their adversary, and she felt pity for him even as she felt filled with her greatest need – to escape. Glancing around, she spotted a narrow space behind the more aggressive of the two men. She flattened against the wall, wincing as her feet slipped in something rotten, and started running.

  “Hey!” the third man yelled. A blow sounded, and then a kick. Somebody cried out. Bonnie, reaching a space near the entry to the alley, turned and stared.

  One man was down. Her eyes told her it was one of the enemy. The bulky figure was still standing. As she watched, her remaining foe gave him a wicked punch, hitting his lower back, near the kidneys.

  She saw him double up in pain. The man hit at his head. He fell to his knees.

  As the enemy lifted his foot to kick him in the head, Bonnie heard someone shout.

  “No!”

  She felt her feet move over cobbles, and her hand – almost unbidden – grabbed a plank she’d noticed earlier, leaning by her hiding place. She swung it.

  It was only as the man cried out, falling, crumpling, to his knees, that she realized the voice yelling was her own.

  As she stared at the crumpled form on the ground in front of her, and saw him struggling to rise, the bulky man stood. He kicked the fellow, hard, and he grunted and doubled over. The man turned to her.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Bonnie stared at him. He was speaking Lowland Scots, but that was a word she’d heard. Even so, it was so surprising that she wasn’t sure she’d understood correctly. She still wasn’t sure until he took her hand and, grabbing it, he said more words which she didn’t know and then ran, half slipping, holding her hand, through the alley.

  Bonnie held the hand that held hers, not knowing why she did, and they ran down the alley together, out into the light.

  When she got to the end of it, she doubled over, hands on her knees, drawing breath.

  “Thank you,” she said. She looked up at the man. She could see him for the first time.

  Tall and broad-shouldered, he had pale auburn hair that seemed almost blonde where the sunlight had bronzed it. He had brown eyes under a high brow, and a long, well-chiseled face that reminded her, faintly, of carvings she’d seen on the outside of a cathedral. She stared.

  As she watched, she saw his expression change. His eyes narrowed, his lips parted. She recognized that look.

  Heart thudding, she whirled around and ran, feeling desperate.

  Would nobody stop hunting her?

  She slipped on the cobbles and gathered her threadbare skirt into her hands and slipped and coughed and ran.

  As the street widened she slowed a little, feeling herself start to weary. She coughed again, feeling her lungs burn. Then her foot twisted and she fell down a small bank towards a canal.

  Screaming, she tumbled down the bank and came to rest there, lying beside the edge. The canal flowed past her, dampening the edges of her hair. She lay for a moment, then sat.

  “This is better.”

  As her head cleared, thoughts came to her. She was stuck here, but she didn’t have to stay. The canal was quiet, the banks at least resembling the grass and slopes of her home. She stood and, wincing, for her ankle pained her, started to walk.

  The canal twisted and turned, leading abruptly into fields.

  Bonnie sat down at the edge of a field, where a tree stood, marking the boundary of the place. She closed her eyes, too tired even for weeping. Her feet were wet, her dress dirtied and torn. Her chest hurt. She was bruised, weary and hurt.

  “Why will they always be around?”

  She started to cry. Tears ran down her face uncontrollably. She meant people who hunted her, men who got that look in their eyes when they saw her, who wished to cause her pain, suffering and humiliation. She was never safe. It seemed she never would be.

  She closed her eyes, finally slowing down in tears.

  She was so tired, she wanted to sleep here. At least in these fields, there was nobody. It was safe, or safer than it had been in the town. She had been running for so long.

  Bonnie closed her eyes and let the sound of the wind in the grass lull her to sleep.

  When she opened her eyes again, it took her a moment to remember where she was. It took her another moment to truly wake, and then a third before she saw the person in the field.

  Her eyes looked straight into his and she shut hers for a moment, not wanting to believe this was real. With brown eyes, pale auburn hair and a straight jaw, it was the man from the alley.

  She wanted to scream, but when she opened her mouth all that came out was a soundless cry.

  “Please. Leave me.”

  The man blinked. It seemed to take a moment for him to register she’d spoken to him. It took another moment for him to react. He frowned.

  “I mean no harm.”

  This time, the words came out haltingly, in Gaelic. Bonnie frowned at him. It was as strange as if he’d suddenly changed color and, for a moment, the strangeness and her wonder at it was stronger than her terror.

  “Why should I believe that?”

  He raised a brow. This time, he looked confused. Bonnie would have laughed at the expression that crossed his face, except for the fact that in his moment of confusion she had her moment to escape. Pushing herself backwards, her back to the tree bole, she got to her feet and ran.

  He turned around as she ran to a path she spotted on her left-hand side.

  “No! Wait!”

  The man was on his feet now, too. He shouted other things, which were in words she didn’t understand. She ran and ran until she slipped.

  “No!” she cried out in frustration. He was almost upon her but she couldn’t run anymore because she couldn’t get to her feet – her ankle throbbed and burned, and trying to get up made her eyes fill with tears from the pain of it.

  To her amazement, instead of dragging her to her feet, he crouched down beside her. She looked up at him, too shocked for weeping.

  “Are you alright?”

  “My ankle aches,” she whispered.

  “Will you let me help you?”

  Again, his words were so strange that they made her tense, sitting upright. Nobody had ever offered to help her before. She was filled with a hesitant mistrust.

  Nobody would offer to help you, the words from her neighbor, Mrs. Marlaw, came back to her. You’re a devil’s child.

  If there was no way anybody would offer to help her, then there was no way that this man could be speaking truly. He was just trying to lull her, make her lower her guard. Then he would hurt her and abandon her, the way others did.

  “Why should I do that?”

  She answered the question without realizing she spoke to him. Why would anybody want to help her? Why would he want to help her?

  He raised a brow. “Well, I reckon that’s a good question,” he said in his halting way. He grinned, showing white teeth. “I would probably ask it too.”

  She felt that same hesitant curiosity as he spoke to her. Despite herself, she found that she couldn’t be entirely afraid of this person. “Will you leave me be?” she asked.

  “I won’t do a thing to harm you.”

  She frowned. This was even more confusing than anything else he’d said. Harming her was why he was here, was it not? Another part of her mind reminded her, as she looked into his eyes, that he had saved her from the thugs. However, was his point not simply to get her for his own us
e?

  “If you’re not going to hurt me, then go?”

  She hadn’t meant it to sound like that – so hesitant. Yet she couldn’t help the fact that she was still frightened. He frowned, but the expression in his brown eyes was strangely soft.

  “I’d go, lass, if you wanted. But you cannot get far like this.”

  “I can.”

  Grimacing with effort, she got to her feet. She put weight on her ankle and dark lights flashed in front of her eyes from the pain, but she continued on. She took two steps, gasping, and then another two. Step, stop. Breathe. Step.

  “Lass!” the man called after her. He was still crouched where she had fallen – he hadn’t moved. As she watched, he shook his head. “Lass. Please…let me help?”

  She paused. What was the matter with him? He was looking the way people looked when something terrible happened. Why was he doing that? He wasn’t chasing her, either, though – which seemed to mean he at least meant the part about not hurting.

  As she hesitated, he covered his face with his hands.

  Biting her lip against the pain in her leg, she took another step. She allowed her tears to run down her face as she walked now, since by now he was too far down the path to notice. She was stuck out here on the outskirts of a town as hostile as any she had seen. She hadn’t eaten all day and she hadn’t had a proper night’s sleep for a week. She was utterly exhausted. She had nowhere to go.

  “I don’t know what to do.”

  She took another five or six steps, and then sat down by the bole of a tree again, pressing her back to it. She looked down the path, but could see nobody. She leaned back and closed her eyes. She was in pain, but the dull throbbing of her ankle was secondary now to the pressures of exhaustion that weighed down on her like lead.

  She must have fallen asleep, because when she opened her eyes it was to find the man on the ground beside her, eyes closed, fast asleep.

  Trying To Talk

  Arthur lay where he was, under the tree. Two feet away, slumbered the most beautiful creature – male or female – he’d ever laid eyes on before. Dark hair hung down to curl against the soft skin on her shoulders. Her pale skinned face was marked by a bruise, her eyes shut. Her lips, a dusky red, formed a little circle as she breathed with the slow, even pace of peaceful sleep.

  By, she’s a looker.

  She was more than that, but his tired brain reached for the first term that came to him. She was…indescribable. Stunning. He hadn’t seen a woman for a while, but it wasn’t bodily longings that held him captive. It felt like the feeling he got when he saw beautiful carvings or fabric – a kind of appreciation that touched his soul.

  It would have been so easy to stay here, in the clearing, all day, watching her. That would have been the choice he’d have taken, if it was open to him, but as it happened, it wasn’t. Arthur didn’t know what to do. If he moved, he would almost certainly disturb her. However, he couldn’t stay here forever! Not when those thugs – or others like them – were here. He wanted to help her as well. She’d been pursued by the two men, so it was clear that it wasn’t safe for her. He had to help her, and he understandably couldn’t risk leaving her alone here. He wondered how she’d got drawn away from her family. He wanted to get her back to safety.

  “Hello?” he whispered, loud enough to wake. That seemed the logical approach. Going down on his knees, a little behind her, he whispered the word lightly over her ear. If he was clearly friendly, surely she wouldn’t be terrified?

  I reckon she has good reason to be afraid of most men.

  He sighed. There were times he could have beaten the heads down the necks of most of his own gender – so many of them seemed cruel and wicked. They thought that, because they were stronger, they had the right to bully and intimidate. They did so with no thought for who they hurt. The two in the alley were of the latter sort, and he was grimly happy he’d handed out some of their medicine to them.

  “Hello?” he said again.

  The effect was remarkable, swift and startling. She shot upright, eyes round as saucers. As he watched, she got to her feet. Turning to face him, she dropped to one knee, her eyes wet and pleading.

  She said a word.

  Arthur scratched his head. He had very little knowledge of Highland Scots anymore. He felt his eyes tighten up, trying to cast his mind back for the meaning of the word. She repeated the word, followed by more, and suddenly the meaning was clear.

  Please. Don’t hurt me.

  Arthur shook his head, feeling horrified that she even thought she had to ask him that. “Lass, of course I won’t,” he said in Lowland Scots. “I want tae help ye, nae tae hurt ye.” He felt a little frustrated, if he was to be truthful about it. He had just saved her, hadn’t he?

  “I don’t know you.”

  She said it in Lowland Scots, which both surprised him and affronted him a little. She didn’t need to show him how much better she was than him! He could speak her language! She didn’t need to change to his.

  “No,” he agreed, still speaking Lowland Scots because, for now, it seemed easier. “You don’t.”

  “You could be one of them.”

  He sighed and felt his patience fray. “I’m not one of them. I knocked them unconscious,” he reminded her, with a touch of pride.

  “You did,” she agreed. “But you’re…another of them.” She spat and stood. Her eyes were dark pieces of coal and her body was stiff with tension and anger.

  “No I am not!” this time he felt a surge of offense. “I would never behave like that!” he yelled. “I wouldn’t so much as shout at a woman…”

  He trailed off, going red in the face. Here he was, shouting at her as if he was a traveling tinker, yelling out his services. He looked at his toes. To his surprise, he heard a giggle. He looked up.

  “Well, I suppose you noticed that one,” she said, looking up and meeting his gaze. “So you’re no hypocrite.”

  Her lips were grinning, but her eyes were watchful. He nodded.

  “I did. I’m sorry. I might yell at a woman – sometimes. But I’d never hurt one.”

  She smiled at him, and this time, her smile was bigger. She nodded. “I trust you,” she said. “You didn’t lie when I caught you out.”

  He felt as if he might weep. Those three words meant so much. Suddenly, his whole body felt limp. It was worse than if he’d spent the whole day drawing sails in the storm, and then suddenly, in the morning, the calm had come, and surprised them. He nodded. He felt like that – as if he’d spent all night wrestling a force to find it mysteriously gone, through no act of his.

  “I’m honored.”

  He meant it. With every part of him, he felt that way. Her trust honored him, and he felt he didn’t deserve it. She seemed not to take it seriously. Her eyes became watchful again. He swallowed hard.

  “Lass,” he said gently. “Where’s your family?”

  She looked blankly at him. He thought perhaps she hadn’t understood, and felt a moment’s frustration. How to convey the idea of a family?

  “Your people,” he said, making a circumlocutory gesture with one hand. “Mother, father. Brothers?” His hand measured the height of a tall man, then the level of small children. He looked at her inquiringly, wondering how else he might convey the meaning, if she still hadn’t understood him. He thought she might still not, but then she spoke.

  “I have no family.” Her voice was hard.

  Arthur stared, helplessly. She had no family? Nobody to protect her? His mind turned from the immediate difficulties of their plight and wondered, instead, how she might have got here. Had she truly traveled down that dangerous road alone? He looked at her with newfound amazement.

  “I will go now,” she said. She turned away, black hair swinging. The thought cut through him like a whetted dagger.

  “No!” he shouted it, surprising himself. When she turned around to face him, a startled look stretching her eyes, he made sure to moderate his tone more carefully. “No,” h
e said. “I mean…please. Stay.”

  She stared at him as if she didn’t understand what he’d said. Then, slowly, she took a step forward. She watched his face, as if she still didn’t know whether or not she trusted him. Then she cleared her throat.

  “You have no food.”

  It was a statement. She rummaged in her pocket, and drew out something rectangular. He squinted at it. It looked a little like the dry ration – ship’s biscuit – they got on board. He took it. It was.

  “You need to eat.”

  He looked at her gaunt face, dirt coloring the cheekbones, eyes wary, and shook his head swiftly. “No,” he said. “Take it. Please.”

  He could find food here. He had his pay in his pocket. It was more than enough to set him up for a month on land, enabling him to have time to find labor here. She had nothing, as far as he knew – only the hard rock-like biscuit she had in her hand. She held it out to him, insisting.

  “You helped me.” She said. “Take it.”

  He felt like she’d stabbed him. He couldn’t let her offer him her only food! What he’d done was surely what any man in his right mind would do. He looked away, trying not to show how upset he was

  “Please, lass…” he said gently. “You need it. I have wages. I can find food. I…oh, for pity’s sake – what am I thinking? I’m going to buy bread. For both of us. Now.”

  He felt the weight of silver pennies in his pocket and could have slapped his own face for not having thought of it earlier! He should have already gone to get it. Another thought struck him, reminding him it wasn’t his own selfishness that had stopped him. How was he going to run off and leave her here, a lass on her own in the middle of nowhere? He looked around, a little desperately.

  “Lass,” he said gently. “If we went together, do you think you could bear to go back into town? I’d keep you with me for every minute.” If he were her, he’d want to steer clear of the place for the rest of his life. He hoped he could make her feel safe to go back.

  She looked up at him and he wasn’t sure if she’d actually understood him. He struggled with himself, trying to decide what to do next. Should he explain again, or should he simply take her with him, not giving her any choice in the matter? In which case, wouldn’t he be as frightening and uncaring as everybody else?