Warrior’s Redemption (36 page)

Indeed, it was these moments for which she had been forced to perfect the art of truthful deception.

Returning to the spot where she had lain when the battle had begun, she dropped to her knees. The tears rolling
down her cheeks were no falsity. She wept for those who suffered. For those who’d lost their lives so needlessly. For the younger brother she had lost, though in truth, he had been lost to her long before the battle here. She wept for the horror of the life she would return to.

Lying back, she rested her head against the root of a tree and closed her eyes. Her only possible defense in Torquil’s view would be found in her having been lost in the grip of the visions during the battle. While the matter of her escape from Tordenet Castle in the first place would certainly compound his anger, she would walk that fine line when the time came to explain.

For now, she must retreat to the only place of shelter afforded her.

After pushing all that had happened from her mind, she silently called upon Skald to show her what was to come. Even as the darkness of another vision descended, she recognized the pounding of hooves nearby, the shouts of men.

But their arrival was too late to catch her. Already her mind had escaped to the crossroads that represented the future. Already her soul floated in the eyes of the warrior who would be her savior.

T
HE HEAVY, MURKY
dark strangled him, suffocating him as it coalesced around his naked body. Its thick, sticky tendrils tightened their thorny hold, piercing into his tender skin, wrapping around him as if he were some sort of otherworld mummy.

Torquil MacDowylt fought against their overpowering strength, marshalling his will to tear them from his body. His struggles only seemed to intensify their movement. For each piece of the squirming, stinking menace he ripped away, two more replaced it, thicker, tighter, and more deadly than before.

Though his strength faded, he would not give up. He could not give up. He fought for his life.

Desperation crowded his mind as the tendrils closed over his face. He screamed, instantly regretting the explosion of air rushing from his chest even as the long, dark fingerlings tightened around him, immobilizing him and preventing his next inhale.

A sudden explosion of sound battered his ears and the tendrils burst apart, tiny pieces of them merging and re-forming above him as his body was flung away from them. It was as if he’d been catapulted into the air by some invisible giant hand.

His body flew through the dark at impossible speeds, beyond his ability to control. Beyond his ability to understand.

A second explosion slammed his body to a stop, this one a burst of light rather than of sound. Light brighter than any fire he’d ever seen.

“My lord Torquil?”

A voice filled with hesitancy. A voice he recognized. Captain of his personal guard, Ulfr.

“I . . .” His voice cracked as he tried to answer, his throat on fire with pain.

“Our lord, Torquil of Katanes, lives!” Ulfr’s triumphant
shout reverberated in Torquil’s ears. “Lie still, my lord. Fetch his things to me, William!”

Torquil waited a moment longer, struggling to gather his bearings. The last thing he remembered was Malcolm’s face. So close to his own . . . and yet, not his.

He remembered now. He’d been the wolf! His half brother’s puny neck had been so close to his muzzle he could see it snapping within his jaws. Malcolm’s strength had begun to weaken. He could all but taste the pleasure of his detested brother’s death.

But then . . .

His eyes flickered open and he pushed up to one elbow, his other hand covering a spot on his neck.

His brother’s wife had attacked him. Though he could not imagine how she’d managed it, the bitch had done something to him that had ripped the Magic from his body and plummeted him to the mercies of the between worlds.

“Where is she?” he managed at last, surprised by the raspy sound of his voice. Where, in fact, were they all?

“She sleeps, Master. We’ve been unable to awaken her.”

“Sleeps?” With Ulfr’s arm to assist him, Torquil made his way to his feet.

The last dregs of whatever had possessed him scattered from his mind as he straightened to survey the clearing, shivering as he did.

By Odin, but he was cold! And little wonder, since
he was completely naked. Where was Dermid? His brother had carried his clothing after he’d made his physical transformation into the wolf.

“I need . . .” He struggled to form the words. Pain radiated from his neck up through his face, and his jaw shivered from the cold gripping him.

“Allow me, my lord.”

With a nod of permission, Torquil raised his arms, allowing Ulfr to drop a tunic down over his head, followed by his plaid and a heavy fur draped over his shoulders.

The delay had been what he needed. He could feel his strength returning and with it, his determination.

“Take me to her,” he ordered.

The Lady Danielle, wife of his brother Malcolm, would pay for her crime against him now. He would wring the life from her with his bare hands. After, of course, she disclosed to him how she’d been able to do whatever it was she’d done to him.

“This way, my lord.”

As he followed Ulfr across the clearing, he took stock of his surroundings for the first time.

The men who had accompanied him were dead. Yes, he remembered that now. Another crime to lay at Malcolm’s feet. To his left, the crumpled body of his youngest brother, Dermid.

A pity, that. The weak-minded lad had been easily controlled to perform Torquil’s bidding. No matter, really. There were others who would substitute as well.

As he approached the woman’s body propped against the large tree, his irritation spiked. His sister, Christiana, laid there, not the woman he sought.

He realized as he scanned the clearing that none of the others were here. The bodies were those of his men only.

“Malcolm? The women?” He looked askance in Ulfr’s direction. “Where have they gone?”

The captain of his personal guard shook his head. “There were none here when we arrived but those you see now, my lord. Only you and Lady Christiana, and we have not been able to awaken her from her sleep.”

Torquil strode to the spot where his half sister lay.

Little wonder Ulfr and his men hadn’t been able to awaken her. It wasn’t sleep that claimed her at the moment. Though her body was present in the clearing, her spirit was gone, flying freely on the wings of her Vision. She would not awaken until Skald released her back into this world.

The red blotches staining her cheeks, the darting of her eyes beneath the delicate sweep of her lashes, the almost imperceptible movement of her full, soft lips, all these were sure signs that Christiana inhabited a vision of the future.

Her ability to see the future was the one gift she’d inherited from the bloodline of their ancient ancestor, Odin. The one gift he wanted for himself above all others. It was the only reason he allowed her to live and the one reason he would never allow her to leave Tordenet Castle.

“Bring her,” he ordered, fisting his hand as he turned his back. “We return to Tordenet.”

Though he was by no means finished with Malcolm, there would be no use in following after his brother now. He would wait, preparing himself, building his strength. In time, with the proper planning, he would have his revenge. Malcolm and all the MacGahan would fall to him, as would everyone else. With his powers and Christiana’s Vision to guide him, he would one day return the world to the way it should be. The way it had been when the Ancient ones walked the land. He, Torquil of Katanes, heir of Odin, would take his rightful place as ruler of all.

Fantasy.
Temptation.
Adventure.

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