Highland Sword E-Book

May McGoldrick

• Herausgeber: Book Duo Creative
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Serie: The Royal Highlander Novels
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 421

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

   Scottish pride, persuasion, and passion—this is Highland romance at its breathtaking best.   From USA Today bestselling author May McGoldrick comes Highland Sword, the third book in the Royal Highlander series.   A VOW FOR VENGEANCE  Fleeing to the Highlands after her father's murder, fiery Morrigan Drummond has a score to settle with Sir Rupert Burney, the English spymaster responsible for his death. Trained to fight alongside the other rebels determined to break Britain's hold on Scotland, she swears to avenge her father's death—until a chance encounter with a barrister as proud and principled as she is presents her with a hard choice…and a bittersweet temptation.     A PLEA FOR PASSION   Aidan Grant has never encountered another woman like dangerous beauty Morrigan—and he has the bruises to prove it. Yet she could be the key to defending two innocent men, as well as striking a death blow to the reprehensible Burney. Convincing Morrigan to help him will take time, but Aidan is willing to wait if it means victory over corrupt government forces and freedom for his people…and Morrigan's hand in marriage. Can two warriors committed to a cause stand down long enough to open their hearts to a love fierce enough to last…forever? 

Leseprobe

HIGHLAND SWORD

ROYAL HIGHLANDER SERIES

BOOK III

MAY MCGOLDRICK

withJAN COFFEY

Book Duo Creative

Thank you for choosing Highland Sword. In the event that you appreciate this book, please consider sharing the good word(s) by leaving a review, or connect with the authors.

Highland Sword. Copyright © 2023 by Nikoo and James McGoldrick

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher: Book Duo Creative.

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Sir Walter Scott

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Epilogue

Edition Note

Author’s Note

About the Author

Also by May McGoldrick, Jan Coffey & Nik James

To our loyal May McGoldrick readers

Resurrectionists all!

ChapterOne

CINAED

Dalmigavie Castle, the Highlands

September 1820

The afternoon sun cast a golden glow over the high-walled garden beside the keep. The scents of autumn—rich and earthy—hung in the air, filling Cinaed’s senses. His mother paused before a pair of rose bushes. The leaves were beginning to grow spotted and yellow, but a few red blooms lingered steadfastly in the protected space.

Caroline of Brunswick, Queen of England and Ireland, turned her gaze to him. Cinaed could see she was trying to keep up a cheerful façade, but her smile had been growing dimmer, her eyes mistier. She was leaving in the morning, and they both knew the likelihood of them ever meeting again was slight.

“If I could do it over, live my life over, I wouldn’t make the mistake of letting you go. I would have been smarter. Fought harder.”

Regrets almost always came too late, Cinaed mused. But he couldn’t help his feelings. She’d made choices that didn’t involve a four-year-old boy she’d sent off to be raised by strangers. All those years left their scars.

Growing up, he’d simply been Cinaed Mackintosh, orphaned son of a sailor and Anne, the laird’s sister. At the age of nine years, he’d been cast out by the only family he knew to become a ship’s boy. No home. Unwanted. For years, he’d blamed Lachlan Mackintosh. No longer. The laird of Dalmigavie had a lad thrown at his feet. A boy who brought danger to his door.

Cinaed now knew why the Mackintosh clan protected him. He was the grandson of Teàrlach, the Bonnie Prince. He was the son of Scotland.

Caroline took his arm, and they walked in silence between the beds of flowers. The purples and yellows and reds were fading. Any night now, a killing frost would lay them all to waste.

“Family can inflict the deepest cuts and the sharpest pain. Disloyalty. Jealousy. Vindictiveness. The marks they leave rarely show to those on the outside. If you can survive, you become hardened to the world perhaps, but stronger.”

He had become stronger, but she had no idea of what it cost him.

“I’ve survived,” she continued. “As you have. I’m queen of a great land. You’ve made yourself into the man you are today. Master and commander of the seas. A hero to your people.”

Cinaed thought about his lost ship, the Highland Crown. Of the men lost in that wreck. Not long ago, he thought he would be returning to the sea. Taking Isabella to Halifax. Building a life with her. All those plans, however, were now swept away by an ever-changing tide.

“For so many in the Highlands and throughout all of Scotland,” she said, her voice growing stronger, “you are the future. You are the promise of a new rising. You embody the hope of a better world.”

It was no secret a radical war of change was upon them. Passions were running high. From the streets of Glasgow and Edinburgh to the docks and manufactories of Inverness. From the rolling farms of the Borders to the rocky coasts of the Northern Isles. Every week, protestors were assembling in the face of armed dragoons and being cut down by them.

“The time is now,” she asserted. “You are the Highland prince emerging from the mists of the past with the royal blood of the Stuarts flowing in your veins. You are the warrior king who will set to rights the villainy of⁠—”

He held up a hand and stopped her. “I have no desire to be king.”

“Everything lies ready before you. We have important friends, both here and abroad. In coming here, I have affirmed who you are, who your father and grandfather were. Your time is now. Your people and your kingdom await. It is your destiny.”

“I shall decide my own destiny. No one else.”

“Not a fortnight ago, I watched powerful clan chieftains gather here at Dalmigavie to swear their allegiance to you. They’re ready to go into battle for you against their English overlords.”

“I’ll not sacrifice Scottish blood in a futile campaign like the one that ended on Culloden Moor. I’ll not blithely lead these Highlanders on a doomed, romantic quest that will crush us for another hundred years. War alone will not free Scotland from the oppressive yoke of England.”

“Nations need leaders. Scotland needs a king to follow. They need you. A symbol to believe in. With you as their king, they will avenge the spilt blood of their ancestors, their fathers and mothers, their brothers and sisters.”

Vengeance. This is what it came down to for Caroline. It was woven into the fabric of her soul. Vengeance for what her family did to her. Vengeance for the public venom of her husband. Vengeance for all those loveless years in exile.

“They have a king, despicable as he is. But no matter how desperate you are to see him gone, King George and his henchmen will never be ousted by a Highland revolt.”

“Revolutions move earth and heaven. They pull down dynasties. But people can’t rule themselves. They need a ruler.”

“Not a ruler but a leader,” Cinaed corrected. “What I want is justice for Scotland. I wish for a free and independent voice for its people. But to do this, we need a path that will unite the Highlanders of the north with the Lowlanders of the south. We need to become one Scotland.”

Cinaed gazed at the silent figure standing before him. His earliest memory of her was of a young woman dancing with him in a garden like this one. The warm sunlight enveloped them as she sang a lilting French song and held him to her. She lived in a fairy tale.

She wanted reparation for what she’d lost. Caroline wanted her son to be king. She believed it was his by right. This was the world she had always lived in. It was all she’d ever known. Kings and courts. Power and conflict. Blood and passion. Thrust and parry. And revenge.

“I know who I am. And I know the path I must follow. I am the son of Scotland, and I’ll do what I must, but I’ll do it in the way that is best for the people.”

ChapterTwo

MORRIGAN

Inverness, the Scottish Highlands

October 1820

Morrigan Drummond stared at the half-dozen flyers posted to the wall of the abandoned malt house. Caricatures of Cinaed Mackintosh. Here in Inverness, within view of Maggot Green, where he heroically fought English dragoons trying to set the town on fire. She studied each unflattering depiction before peeling it off the bricks.

Unflattering was not the right term. Ruthless and false were closer to it.

One flyer showed Cinaed with a filthy boot pressed on the neck of a bairn. In front of him, ragged, starving people waited in a line to hand him their last ha’pennies from moth-eaten purses. Another showed what was supposed to be the son of Scotland’s head on the body of a spider and a score of frightened poor folk caught in his web, about to be devoured. One more, depicting him, fat and drunken, with two Highland maidens on his lap as he leered lecherously at a third. Each sketch was worse than the last. All offensive. In every picture, he wore a tarnished and dented crown.

Morrigan had seen caricatures similar to these the last two times she came to Inverness. While Searc Mackintosh and the fighters who escorted them from Dalmigavie Castle were off seeing to their business—she’d collected copies of the flyers. She found them pasted on walls throughout the town, and the same thought nagged at her. There was something more in this series of colored etchings than the obvious insults. Shadow figures lurked in the backgrounds of each one.

Back in Edinburgh, she was a fan of political caricatures. For her, they were a kind of puzzle. They nearly all conveyed an obvious insult, but the better ones also contained subtle messages crying out to be discovered. The best artists used their platform to go beyond what he was ordered to draw.

This artist was talented, in many ways as good as those who worked for newspapers and publishers in Edinburgh and Glasgow. But Morrigan still needed to study his work more carefully.

A tall shadow blocked the late morning sun, and Morrigan stepped aside to make room for Blair Mackintosh. The leader of the fighters from Dalmigavie glowered at the flyers. “I’m looking forward to stuffing these down the throats of the bastards behind them.”

With a scornful glance at the busy street, he ripped what was left of the caricatures off the wall.

“Not bastards. One bastard,” Morrigan corrected, folding the ones she’d peeled off and tucking them into her jacket. “This is the artwork of one person.”

This much she’d deciphered. The use of curved lines to indicate motion, a similarity in certain faces, the somewhat grotesque exaggeration of older figures all supported her contention.

“Aye, but it takes more than one to print them.” With the battered face of a brawler, Blair looked dangerous even when he wasn’t angry. The fierce expression darkening his features now threatened violence. “And to pay for them.”

The Highlander didn’t care about details. He wasn’t interested in subtle messages. On their last trip to Inverness, he’d called on every printing house in town. Whether the proprietors were being handsomely paid or were simply too afraid, no one was admitting anything. No one would confess they’d had anything to do with the scurrilous caricatures, though each of them was quick to point the finger at someone else.

Morrigan wasn’t surprised when one shop owner suggested the flyers weren’t even being printed in Inverness. Searc Mackintosh, the little bulldog of a man who had a piece of every illicit business transaction on the east coast of the Highlands, had his men questioning printers in other cities. The more Cinaed’s name and popularity spread through the northern lands, the more virulent the campaign against him would become.

Morrigan was no politician. Still, she knew that while one person was drawing the caricatures, many stood to profit from planting the seeds of distrust regarding the son of Scotland. And not just the English military commands at Fort George and Fort William. The bloody aristocrats who were evicting thousands of families week after week, month after month, burning whole villages . . . they too had much to gain.

Perhaps not today, but someone would eventually pay the price. Of that, she was certain. It wasn’t only the Mackintosh clan that were ready to defend their beloved native son. Many others in clans across the Highlands believed in Cinaed. In what he stood for.

“Searc wants to leave no later than noon. I need to help the men load up the carts. Stay close, lass.”

Morrigan understood what the Highlander was telling her. He wanted her within a stone’s throw of Searc’s house. Coming to Inverness with the Mackintosh fighters was a privilege that she’d earned, and she wasn’t about to jeopardize it. She was smart, capable, and strong. And too restless to remain cooped up within the stout walls of Dalmigavie Castle.

She gestured down the crowded street toward the center of town. “I’ll not go farther than the bookseller’s shop.”

Blair gave her a final nod and turned away.

As she watched him stride off toward Searc’s house through the bustling throng of carters, vendors, and ragged, tired refugees, Morrigan thought of how much her life had changed in these recent months. She was fortunate to be standing here. The outwardly quiet life she’d been living in Edinburgh had been destroyed in a single afternoon’s attack. A hussar’s bullet had killed her father as he tried to protect his patients in his own surgery, and then they’d fled north.

Her stepmother Isabella was now married to Cinaed, and a bounty was being offered for the two of them. As a result, anyone connected to them was at risk of being taken by the British authorities.

Morrigan bent down and picked up one of the torn flyers. This one showed Cinaed, again as a fat king with his crown askew, seated in a throne that was being carried through a crowd of people by clan chiefs with the faces of wolves. Ahead of them, a passage toward a distant palace was being cleared by club-wielding brutes. On all sides, scores of people were looking on in fear and anguish. She felt her frustration rising as she looked from the sheet to the poor, harried Highland folk passing by this side street in the Maggot. They were trying to turn the people against Cinaed . . . those who needed him most.

“Sparrow?” the deep voice of a man called from a few paces off. “Robert Sparrow.”

Morrigan didn’t turn, but as she slid the flyer into her jacket, the reply came from someone closer to her.

“Aye, by my auld heart.”

She stiffened.

“You two are a welcome sight to these sore eyes.”

A trap door in her stomach opened, and her heart fell through it.

The name was strange to her, but she’d have known the voice if he’d whispered from the very gates of hell. She shot a quick glance over her shoulder. He was older, worn by the years, but she recognized him. Hell was where he belonged, with the rest of Satan’s legions.

An old, painful sensation swept through her, a knife sliding between her ribs and into her chest. Cold lethargy slithered like an oily liquid through her body, seeping into spaces between her bones and her flesh. Numbness oozed into every joint, and pooled chill and dark in her belly. Then came fear. Her heart raced with the onset of memories. She forced herself to breathe.

“I was about to give up hope of you ever coming.”

Anger sparked, quickly rising like a wildfire into her face, consuming her fear. Her breaths quickened, scorching her chest as they forced their way from her body.

Morrigan turned her head slowly in his direction. He stood with two other men by the brick wall. Gentlemen, by the way they were dressed. One was tall and broad-shouldered. The other stood half a head taller than his companion. They were speaking in low voices now.

The old myths told of swords and bows and spears that sang when the time came for vengeance. Hidden inside her boot, the keen-edged sgian dubh, forged by the smith at Dalmigavie Castle, pressed against her calf.

Morrigan heard its song. She heard the call to act. It was time.

ChapterThree

AIDAN

The Maggot, a tough and nasty-smelling neighborhood in Inverness, was little more than a rabbit warren of crumbling cottages, deserted warehouses, and ruined malt houses. On one side of the flat, muddy green used for drying wash, the blackened skeleton of a recently burned distillery stared with vacant eyes at the River Ness.

And everywhere, the poor milled about, crowded into shacks and decrepit houses and filthy alleyways. Mangy dogs and ragged children scavenged for anything of value on the riverbank. All of these Highland folk were victims of the clearances and of the lingering effects of the fateful Jacobite rebellion that had ended here, on a bloody field outside of Inverness, decades ago.

“You’re my only chance, Mr. Grant. The only one I trust to keep me safe. You must keep me safe.”

“I must do nothing,” Aidan retorted sharply. “To be frank, I’d as soon feed you to a pack of hungry dogs, but I’m afraid they’d sicken and die from the effects of you.”

Robert Sparrow, as he was calling himself at the moment, had good reason to fear for his life. So many people wanted him dead that likenesses of him had been circulating among the societies of reformers in cities to the south. But that hadn’t stopped him from moving north and continuing his work in the employment of the British authorities, assisting them in their spying and entrapment operations.

Many Scots, including the throng of poor folk trudging by them now, would certainly relish the prospect of killing this collaborator. Aidan didn’t particularly blame them.

“Beg pardon, sir. I misspoke. I . . . I’m pleading with you. I’m desperate. I’m trying to make amends for my mistakes.”

Aidan thought of those who’d already been transported or hanged in the cities south of here. It was too late for them. But two more still waited to stand in the dock. It was for their sake alone that he listened.

“You’re the only one I know with a shred of honor. You’re the only one able to get me out of this trouble I’m in.” A wracking cough from deep in his chest shook the man’s body, leaving him gasping.

“What trouble?”

Sparrow was somewhat unsteady on his feet, and he leaned heavily on an ivory-headed cane. Middle of height and build, he was pale, almost ashen, and he was sweating profusely beneath his old-fashioned wig and tall beaver hat. Under the sturdy travel cloak, Aidan caught sight of a suit of forest green and a gold brocade waistcoat. A thistle pin held a stock and cravat in place. He dressed well, courtesy of the blood money received from the hands of his British masters, but not so well as to attract unwanted attention. He held a soiled handkerchief in one hand that he used constantly, dabbing at the pinched corners of his mouth.

“I’ve only just arrived in Inverness, and I can see all their eyes on me. They know who I am.”

A group of young dockworkers coming up from the waterfront passed them, and the informer shrank away, using the tall figure of Aidan’s brother Sebastian as a shield.

“They want me dead. Everyone wants me dead.” Fear was written across Sparrow’s face. “Please. Help me.”

“You’re afraid? Go to your masters.”

“I can’t. The English are after me too. I can’t go to them.”

“Why? What have you to fear from them?”

Sparrow glanced at two red-coated soldiers passing by. “I told them I’d done so much already. I couldn’t help them anymore.”

Aidan was certain the people working for Sir Rupert Burney, the director of Home Office activities in Scotland, had not taken the news too well. The decision to retire was not for an informer to make.

“Their response?”

“They told me to take the coach to Aberdeen. There’d be a packet sailing to Africa. To the new Cape colony. They were giving me land there. And money to make a go of it.”

“Why didn’t you go?”

“A friend sent word. Their plan was to punch a few holes in me and leave me under a dock.” He clutched the cane tightly in his fist. “So I bolted. Wrote to you.”

It was true that if the English thought there was a chance Sparrow would expose their underhanded actions, an assassin would cut out the double crosser’s tongue and then put a dagger in his heart. The Home Office didn’t look favorably on those who changed sides.

“Why did you write to me?”

“You’re the best.”

Aidan leaned forward, devouring the space between them. “Don’t you dare flatter me.”

Sparrow pressed against the wall and raised his hand in defense. “Sir, everyone knows who you are and what you stand for. For a decade now, you’ve argued for abolition, for better wages, for reform. You’re the best lawyer Scotland has. You’re the only one brave enough to stand up to Sir Rupert Burney.”

What Henry Brougham, the queen’s legal defender, was doing in Parliament, Aidan had been trying to do in Scotland. Both men wanted the same thing, a voice for their people.

“I also know the weavers’ leadership committee and their people sent for you to come represent the Chattan brothers in their trial.”

Edmund and George Chattan had been languishing in a cell, charged with planning an attack on the Lord Mayor’s offices in Elgin at the time of the Military Governor’s visit. The trial was not to take place in Elgin but in Inverness at the beginning of next month. Aidan had already met with the two this week. The brothers swore they’d been tricked by a fellow member of their reform committee . . . someone like Sparrow.

“You still haven’t told me why I should help you.”

“I told you in my letter. I have information. I can help you with names, places. I know the very one who was responsible for setting up the Chattans. He’s gone, moved on already. But I’m here, and I can testify for you.”

Robert Sparrow was a thief. An art forger. A villain who for years had committed his petty crimes with impunity by playing his part as an informer and an agent provocateur. His actions in entrapping leaders of the reform movement in Edinburgh had led to executions. He’d been moved north for a reason. Aidan had no doubt he had firsthand knowledge of government spying operations in the Highlands. His testimony could help Aidan.

It was impossible to ignore Sebastian’s imposing figure beside him. Aidan’s brother had been against coming here and listening to this viper.

“If I had one whit of assurance that you would help us, I would throw a rope around your neck and drag you to some safe house until the trial. But as my brother would no doubt remind me, you can’t put a leash on a snake.”

“I swear to you . . .” Another cough wracked Sparrow’s body, cutting off his words. “I swear that I’ll help you. No one knows what I know. No one has seen what I’ve seen. No one has done it as long as I have. I’ll tell you exactly who gave all of us orders and what those orders were. The Chattan fools were only one case. There are others being lured into traps right now.”

Aidan fixed his stare on the man with the same intensity he’d used on a hundred witnesses in scores of court cases.

“You still haven’t said one word that would help me convince a jury that you matter, or that you’re telling the truth, or that you were even working for the government as a provocateur.”

“March twenty-first. I called together the committee in Glasgow. Everyone was arrested at that meeting. My partner was John King, a weaver working for the Home Office. April fourth. My plan incited three score men in Germiston to seize weapons from the Carron Ironworks in Falkirk. You had clients that were part of that committee. The dragoons were waiting for them. I was sent to Elgin right after.”

Aidan exchanged another look with Sebastian. This was the kind of information that would influence a jury.

“We’ll take you.”

“I can’t stay in Inverness. I won’t be safe here.”

“I said we’ll take you,” Aidan repeated more sharply.

“I need to fetch my bag. I’m staying at an inn by the river. I’d feel safer if you came with me.”

Aidan heard knuckles cracking. He didn’t need to look to know it was Sebastian, squeezing his hand into a tight fist.

“Go ahead of us. And do it before we change our minds.”

The informer opened his mouth to argue but quickly snapped it shut, recognizing Aidan was done negotiating. He pulled up the collar of his coat and hurried along.

“He’s playing you for a fool.” Sebastian scowled as Sparrow edged past a group of street urchins.

“I need him.”

“You think he’ll stand before a magistrate and testify against the Home Office? He won’t. This is a bloody mistake, and you know it.”

“He’s already given me more for this case than I had.”

“Too trusting, as always. The cur is using you to slip out of the grip of his English paymasters. Either that, or he’s setting you up.”

His brother fell in step with Aidan as they started along the busy thoroughfare. The two of them were the only survivors of the father and four sons who’d gone off to fight against Napoleon, though Sebastian had lost an arm at Waterloo. After the war, Aidan quickly found that opposing the English government in politics and in the courts was a dangerous business, and his younger brother took it upon himself to become his protector. Aidan trusted Sebastian’s judgment, but right now, the Chattan brothers’ lives depended on Sparrow’s testimony.

“We came. I spoke to him. And I have you beside me. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

“You need to be smarter, or I’ll be beside you on an English gallows.”

A woman carrying a basket filled with wet clothes nearly careened into Aidan, but his brother pulled him out of the way.

“Come now. What did the bard say? Screw your courage to the sticking place⁠—”

“How about if I screw my boot in your ear?” Sebastian scoffed. “I fear nothing.”

“Watch him there,” Aidan said as Sparrow turned down a side street. They quickened their steps.

By the time they reached the corner, the villain was some distance ahead of them. He was moving with a determined step, turning his head neither left nor right, like a wounded soldier lurching back toward his own lines. He was clearly laboring for breath, his shoulders rising and falling as he moved.

“He’s moving as if the Grim Reaper is on his tail.”

“He’s thinking we’re his only chance,” Aidan replied. “He wants to get his things before we change our mind.”

“If he turns into that alleyway halfway down, I still say it’s a trap.”

“Don’t you think using this rogue to trap us in the middle of the day in an alley is a wee bit far-fetched?”

“You’ve forgotten High Street in Edinburgh. Midday.”

He was right. In plain daylight. A ship’s master who’d had his ship seized for transporting Africans to sugar plantations in the West Indies had attacked Aidan with a knife. Sebastian knocked him down with a single blow and disarmed him.

“And how about the Crown & Anchor? London.”

That was in broad daylight as well. And within shouting distance of the Temple Bar. Aidan was on his way to meet his brother when two footpads attempted to waylay him. Sebastian had seen them from the doorway of the tavern and came to his aid. They turned out to be servants of Lord Horsley, another Tory foe whose nose Aidan had figuratively tweaked.

“The alley next to the Palace at Westminster. What time of the day was that?”

Blast. “And in every case, the two of us fought off the blackguards. Except at Westminster, where I was holding my own fairly well until you showed up.”

Sebastian’s answer was another grunt.

The truth was, Aidan could have been beaten to death that day. He couldn’t prove it, but he was certain those assailants had been hired by the Home Office.

Aidan definitely had his enemies. And he knew he was more than just a burr under their gilded saddles. He was part of a reform movement that could unhorse the power of those in charge entirely. Many people in London, powerful men like Lord Sidmouth and his cronies, thought nothing of using a club or a dagger to eliminate foes like him.

“We’re at home. We’re in the heart of the Highlands. There are more sympathizers for the cause here than in the streets of . . .” He paused, motioning to a woman who was striding along in Sparrow’s wake. “If she’s unafraid of these back streets on her own, then I say the two of us have no reason to worry.”

Now that he’d noticed her, Aidan paid closer attention. A grey dress was visible beneath her long coat. A single dark braid of hair hung like a rope from under an oversized knitted tam. She carried nothing in her hands, which he noted were fisted as they swung at her sides.

She moved with the smooth, lithe ease of a young fencer, but she had a purposeful manner in her gait. Aidan glanced ahead at Sparrow and realized she was closing quickly on him.

The informer’s words came to him, along with his own thoughts—there were many people who would readily take the sword of justice into their own hands.

At that moment, Sparrow turned into the alley without a glance back at them. The woman slowed for the briefest of seconds, bent down, and reached into her boot. He saw the flash of the knife’s blade as she pressed it into the folds of her coat. In an instant she too had disappeared into the alley.

“You go after him,” Aidan shouted, starting to run. “I’ll stop her.”

She whirled as they stormed into alley. Intent as she was on Sparrow, they’d caught her by surprise. The alley was short and dark, and the brick walls on either side glistened with moisture and slick green patches. Aidan went after the knife he’d seen in her hand, knocking it from her grip as she raised it. His momentum drove him into her, and he grasped her arms to keep them both from falling.

Sebastian raced past them, and she struggled fiercely to wrench her arms free. Her dark eyes flashed. Even in the dank dimness of the alley, her beauty was stunning.

“Let go of me.”

“I’m afraid I—” he started to say but got no further.

Her knee came up sharply, knocking his bollocks halfway to Nairn. As he gasped for air, she nearly connected with another kick to the side of his knee, but he managed to deflect the blow, yanking her booted foot upwards and upending her.

Bloody hell. He was fighting with a woman. She was on the ground for only an instant. Springing to her feet, she glanced once at the end of the alleyway and then darted toward her knife, which lay on a tangle of discarded netting along the base of the wall.

Woman or she-devil, he thought, he wasn’t about to let her use him for a pin cushion.

She reached out to snatch up the weapon, but Aidan caught hold of her coat, pulling her back. She spun away, yanking herself free of his grasp and falling on her face as she slid across the ground. Immediately, she was on her knees. She reached up to touch her rapidly swelling lip.

He staggered toward her, wincing at the pain between his legs. He leaned down to take her hand and help her up. Another mistake.

Without an inkling of warning, she reared back and butted him, planting her forehead squarely in his eye and knocking him onto his backside.

He sat for a few moments, dazed. When the cobwebs began to clear, she was gone. He looked around, but one of his eyes was not functioning. He touched it, but it was already swollen shut.

Aidan groaned and struggled to his feet. He scanned the alley with his one good eye, searching for any remnant of his manly self-respect. He spotted her knife and picked it up. Finding his hat where it had fallen, he sagged back against the wall.

A moment later, Sebastian came down the alley with Sparrow alongside of him. He paused by where Aidan sat in a heap, not even trying to hide his smirk.

“Perhaps next time, you should run after the sickly men, and I’ll fight the women.”

ChapterFour

MORRIGAN

At Searc’s house between Maggot Green and the Citadel Quay docks, the Mackintosh men were tying down tarps on the loaded wagons. Morrigan nudged her horse a few yards down the lane toward the river. With her hat pulled low on her forehead and the collar of her coat turned up, she was doing her best to hide her face.

In the alleyway, she’d held her own and delivered more than the rogue had expected. Still, the cobblestone had left its mark. She couldn’t tell the extent of her injuries, except it hurt to move her jaw. The bloody handkerchief tucked into her sleeve bore the evidence of the cut inside her lip. She ran her tongue along her teeth. She was lucky none of them had come loose.

She’d been careless, but even now she felt the heat rise in her face. A sudden rage had possessed her, and, hot for revenge, she’d been paying no attention to what was behind her. She was unaware of the two men following “Robert Sparrow.” They had to be the same two who’d been speaking with him by the green.

Morrigan took a few deep breaths to calm herself, forcing her mind clear of his face, his voice. The blackguard was in Inverness, but for how long, she didn’t know. Perhaps the next time she came into the city, she’d search him out and finish what she’d intended to do today.

One way or another, she would finish it. She’d killed once. The day they were fleeing their house on Infirmary Street in Edinburgh, she’d driven a knife into a man’s heart to save the life of Maisie, Isabella’s sister. She could kill again. Vengeance called for it. Justice demanded it. She’d do it if only to stop her nightmares. But would she be free when she left him lying in his own blood?

Her neck was already stiffening, and Morrigan rolled her head from side to side, stretching the muscles and thinking about the clash in the alley.

Morrigan was a skilled fighter. Since arriving at Dalmigavie, she’d been going to the training yard an hour before the men showed up four or five times a week. Some days Blair worked with her himself. Other days he put one of the Mackintosh fighters in charge of training her. Knife, pistol, even hand-to-hand, she could hold her own. She had the blessing of Isabella and Maisie. Both of them—and their husbands—agreed it was important that Morrigan be able to defend herself. Their enemies were numerous and too close to ignore. And being inside the walls of Dalmigavie didn’t guarantee their safety either. Only two months ago, Maisie had been stabbed in a stairwell of the castle. She’d recovered fully, thank God, but all of them were far more cautious as a result.

A screech behind her startled Morrigan, and she reached down to find the empty sheath in her boot. Blast, she’d need to have the blacksmith make her another sgian dubh. Two urchins raced up the lane in a running battle, using sticks for swords.

Searc barreled out of his house with Blair on his heels. He stomped around the wagons, pulling at tarps and ropes. With a grunt of approval, he climbed onto his horse and scowled back at Morrigan.

Black eyes peered from under his tall hat and bristling brows, and she fought the inclination to look away. Searc saw, heard, and knew everything and everyone. If he found out what she’d done—chasing a man into an alley and getting into a fight—he wouldn’t be happy. Not that he was ever happy, but it would be detrimental to the trust she’d established with the Mackintosh clan leaders.

They were ready to depart for Dalmigavie. A dozen Mackintosh men—their weapons handily concealed inside coats and saddlebags—lined up behind the wagons.

“Ready, lass?” Blair called to her.

Her jaw ached, and she didn’t trust her swollen lip to form any intelligible words. She nodded and nudged her horse, joining the line behind the carts.

A steady rain began to fall as they left Inverness and started the winding climb into the mountains toward Dalmigavie. The riders around her pulled their collars up and filed along, mostly in silence. The relative solitude of the ride suited Morrigan perfectly. If the men around her noticed the bruising on her face, they said nothing. She welcomed the drops of rain that cooled her heated skin.

Before they got back to Dalmigavie, however, Morrigan knew she’d need to come up with a believable story to explain her face. Telling the truth wasn’t an option.

Night had fallen by the time they dismounted by the stables inside the curtained wall of the castle. Torches lit the courtyard, sizzling and hissing in the falling rain. A stable hand offered to take her horse. Morrigan handed the mare off reluctantly. She wasn’t looking forward to facing Isabella and Maisie.

Six years ago, the three women had become a family, of sorts, when Isabella married Morrigan’s father and brought Maisie, her sister, with her. The relationship between them all had been a curious one. Sometimes strained, but for the most part defined by a cordial distance. Everything changed this past spring after they fled Edinburgh. Their bond now was one of true friendship and sisterhood. The three were closer than if they had shared the same birth mother.

Searc marched stiff-legged toward her, barking, “Be sure to tell Isabella you’re back. The woman has been fretting since we left, I’d wager.”

Searc was in charge while Cinaed and Lachlan, the Mackintosh laird, were traveling through the Highlands with Niall Campbell, Maisie’s husband. But walking into the Great Hall with a battered face wasn’t what she had in mind. Before word reached her sisters that the caravan had arrived, Morrigan needed to get up to her room and inspect the damage.

“Tell her I’ll see her later, if you please. I need to change out of these wet clothes first.”

Morrigan ran off before Searc could argue.

As she left the yard, others were emerging from the keep to help unload the carts.

Over the past month, this was the third trip they’d made to Inverness. By all accounts, Searc had his hand in dozens of businesses, but he’d also used the opportunity to bring back supplies. Morrigan knew the “supplies” consisted mostly of weapons, shot, and powder. It was no secret Dalmigavie was in danger of attack by troops stationed at Fort George and Fort Williams.

Before those regiments were prepared to attack the Mackintosh stronghold, however, there needed to be a build-up of troop numbers in the forts. And so far, Searc’s spies confirmed no additional reinforcements had been sent north.

The noises from the Great Hall became muffled in the stairwell as Morrigan hurried up to her bedchamber. Safely inside, she dropped the latch in place and lit a candle. She peeled off her coat, tossed her hat on a chair, and moved to the mirror.

“Blast,” she murmured, cringing at the sight of her reflection in the glass. Her bottom lip was the size of a fat mouse. Dried blood clung to the corner of her mouth. Her forehead and chin were marked, red and rough, and a shadow stained her puffy cheek and jaw. She prayed some of it was dirt that would wash away, but she wasn’t particularly hopeful.

“Morrigan?” Maisie called, knocking sharply. “Unlatch the door and let me in.”

Too soon. Too soon. She looked around her in panic. The dried blood made everything look worse than it was. If she could only wash her face.

The rapping on the door grew louder and more persistent. Over the years, Maisie’s sweet demeanor and beautiful face had fooled many into thinking she was quiet and docile. But they were so wrong. Kicking this door open was not beyond her. Morrigan needed to act quickly.

“You didn’t have to come after me. I’m changing into a dry dress.” She moved the candle to a side table where it would shed less light in the room.

“Open. Please. Now.”

“Just a moment.” Morrigan pulled open the wardrobe and grabbed a clean shift and the first dress her fingers brushed against. She tossed it over her shoulder, hoping her face was partially covered and unlatched the door. She turned away as Maisie stormed in.

“What happened today?”

“Nothing. I just returned.”

“Morrigan?”

“I went to Inverness. It rained.” She hurried to a screen standing in the corner of the room. “I need to change out of these wet things.”

“I knew it. Searc was right. Something did happen.”

Morrigan hid behind the partition. “Searc? I spoke to him a moment ago. I told him I had to change.”

“Searc sent me up here.”

Undoing the fasteners on her dress, she winced as she bumped her jaw. Maisie was moving around the bedchamber, and Morrigan heard her lighting the fire in the hearth.

“What’s wrong with him? I didn’t give him a single reason to complain about me today.”

“Exactly. You gave him no reason to complain, and that alarmed him. On the way back, not once did you ride ahead or wander off on your own.”

Maisie fell silent beyond the screen. Morrigan peeked over the top and found the younger woman inspecting her coat and hat.

“He’s certain something must have happened in Inverness that he doesn’t know about.”

Damn that Searc. Such a meddling busybody. Morrigan shoved the wet dress down over her hips and was startled when Maisie appeared beside her, holding the candle up.

She gasped. “Who did this to you?”

There was nowhere she could go. It was useless to turn around. Morrigan was trapped. “No one.”

“Were you attacked?”

“Not attacked. It was an accident. I stumbled. Fell on my face. It’s nothing. Really.”

Maisie tried to reach up and touch her face, but Morrigan pushed her hand away.

“Where did you fall?”

“In Inverness. Where else?”

“I don’t believe it for one instant. I’ve never seen you trip and fall. Not once.”

“Well, you have proof of it now.” She exchanged the dry shift she’d draped over the top of the partition with her wet dress. “Let me change. I’m getting chilled.”

“You’re lying.” Maisie wasn’t budging. She lifted the candle closer to Morrigan’s face, inspecting every bump and scratch.

“Why should I lie?”

“So you don’t lose your freedom. So you can continue to come and go as you please.”

“You’re reading far too much into this.”

“Am I?” Maisie scoffed. “We’ve been here before. You and I had this same conversation in Edinburgh. Except it was you questioning me. And we promised each other there’d be no more lies. Remember?”

Maisie was right. Morrigan had confronted her in the stairwell of the house on Infirmary Street after one of the reform protests this past winter. They’d had a very similar conversation because she was concerned about the bloodied condition of the other’s clothing. She’d been ready to tear apart whoever was responsible for hurting her. Maisie looked ready to do the same for her now.

“We vowed to be sisters and be honest with each other. Have you forgotten?”

It was more than her face that was bruised right now. Morrigan wanted to tell her the truth. But she couldn’t. Her past was complicated. The years—and her father—had taught her that silence was the best path. In order to heal, she had to forget. But Maisie wasn’t going anywhere unless Morrigan could concoct a better story.

“Very well. I didn’t just fall. I was chasing after someone when I fell. But Searc can’t know. You have to promise me.”

“You chased after someone?” Isabella’s dismayed cry came from the far side of the room. “Where was Blair? You were to stay with the Mackintosh men the entire time.”

Morrigan closed her eyes and shook her head. She hadn’t heard the bedroom door open again. Of course, both women would come up here. Here was a lesson learned. From now on, regardless of what kind of day she had, she’d be certain to torment Searc.

Isabella poked her head around the edge of the screen, holding another candle.

“For the love of God!” Morrigan exploded. “Why don’t we invite everyone up from the Great Hall?”

She pushed Maisie toward her older sister.

“The two of you will have to wait until I change.”

They followed her order, but that wasn’t the end of the inquisition.

“Is she hurt?” Isabella asked Maisie.

“I’d say!”

“No, I’m not!” Morrigan denied loudly. She draped the wet shift over the screen. Quickly, she began pulling on the dry one.

“You’ll see, as soon as she comes out of hiding,” Maisie retorted. “Her mouth is bruised, and her lip is badly swollen.”

“You’re exaggerating.” Morrigan tried to make less of it.

“I’m not,” Maisie contradicted. “I think her nose is broken. It looks quite crooked to me.”

“My nose has never been straight, thank you.”

“There was nothing wrong with your nose before,” Isabella replied, her tone rising with concern.

“I think she may have lost teeth, but the swollen lip makes it difficult to tell.”

The wet dress disappeared over the top of the screen.

“This is ridiculous. I didn’t lose any teeth.”

“Whom were you chasing?” Isabella demanded.

Morrigan shoved her arms into the sleeves of the clean dress. She knew she had only one chance at an explanation. It had to be believable. Would she chase after a child trying to pick her pocket? That wouldn’t do. There were too many hungry children on the streets who would do anything to survive. Was she accosted by a sailor or a tradesman? No, that would simply get Blair and Searc in trouble.

“Look at all the blood!” Maisie exclaimed.

She must have found the handkerchief in the pocket. Morrigan had to face these two. There was no avoiding it. She stepped around the divider as she buttoned her dress.

Isabella stood staring for a few moments, speechless. Her anger was evident in the scarlet rash spreading from her throat into her cheeks. Unlike Morrigan, the young doctor used to be adept at controlling her temper, but she was a different woman from the one she once was.

“Who did this to you? By heaven, I’m going to make them suffer. They were supposed to take care of you. Protect you. Watch you every minute.”

Morrigan imagined Isabella rushing down to the Great Hall in search of Blair and Searc and the other men with every intention of thrashing them soundly.

“It looks far worse than it is,” Morrigan said calmly. “Let me wash my face first and you’ll see.”

It took a few moments for the young doctor to quiet her temper, but after inhaling a few deep breaths, the protective tigress in Isabella subsided slightly, allowing the physician in her to surface. She sat Morrigan in a chair by the hearth and held the candle closer. “Tell me what hurts.”

“Nothing hurts.” She forced herself not to flinch when Isabella touched the side of her chin.

“I know of no woman who is physically tougher than you, my love. But right now, I need to see how much damage was done.”

Morrigan gave herself over to Isabella’s ministrations. Her head was moved from side to side. Her mouth was opened gingerly, her teeth checked. The bruise on her forehead touched. Maisie placed a towel and bowl of water at her sister’s elbow. The care continued. The cut on her lip was cleaned. She had a scratch on the side of her face that she hadn’t even been aware of, and there were other cuts and bruises on her wrist and hand, all from trying to control the fall.

“You’re going to need to keep cold compresses on your face to reduce the swelling.”

Looking up into Isabella’s focused and caring expression, emotions rose and filled Morrigan’s chest. There was so much she wanted to talk about and confide in these two women. But she couldn’t. Before they came into her life, she had only her father. He was a busy man, a dedicated radical and an activist who fought for the rights of common folk who were suffering from economic hardship. He pushed for reform and a voice for the people in government through assemblies, marches, and protests.

When it came to issues of their own lives, however, he didn’t want any discussions. He wanted their problems buried, and Morrigan had followed his lead. She’d kept her own counsel and refused to wallow in past things she couldn’t change. But he was gone now, and she’d been left to deal with the squalid aspects of life. It had never been easy. But it was worse now, especially today, seeing that foul man standing a dozen steps away. Robert Sparrow. Knowing he still lived and breathed brought back the same anger and hurt she’d felt at Maggot Green.

“You are hurting. And I’m not only talking of your bruises. Why don’t you tell me what’s wrong?”

Isabella’s soft voice pierced Morrigan’s heart. She wanted desperately to talk about the past, but the tightness in her throat wouldn’t allow the words to form.

Maisie’s voice cut into the momentary silence. “Are these the reason you were chasing after someone today?”

The flyers she’d stuffed into her coat. Maisie was unfolding them. One trouble was replaced by another. Morrigan shook her head once at the younger woman, but it was too late. Isabella saw the pages.