The Highlands, Scotland, 1280
“Doona do anything rash, Connor,” Lady Miriam said, her hazel eyes shining with pooled tears. She swept back a wisp of gray-dusted, auburn hair. Her hands were ringing themselves dry.
The mood in the room was somber and angry. Tension was thick and choking.
“Leave us, Miriam,” Malcolm said to his wife.
She hesitated, and continued to look at them. Malcolm walked over to her and reached his hand out. He touched her cheek, rested his palm against her shoulder, and nodded. She looked into his blue eyes. Her nod was slight when she turned to the door.
Once she was gone, he turned to his sons. Malcolm stared into the similar crystal blue eyes of his blood. Two of Malcolm’s sons looked like him. They were tall, broad shouldered, and blue-eyed. His youngest son and daughter had hazel eyes like their mother. His sons were hot-tempered, although Connor had a shorter fuse than all of them. His sweet Katie, though, she couldn’t hurt a fly. This is what made the recent events so much bloody worse and unfair.
“Ye must behave rationally,” he directed his comment to his oldest son, Connor, and newly appointed laird after Malcolm stepped aside six months earlier. A tight chest had been the catalyst for his family begging him to slow down.
“Rationally? Not do anything rash? Are ye mad? Katherynne! Are ye forgetting what has been done to her?” Connor’s blue eyes flashed with indignation. His temper was barely concealed underneath a mask of thin control.
“Nay! But we must think this through, Connor. Ye canna barge over to them and kill them.”
“The hell I canna!”
His brothers nodded in the background. Their faces were hard and unyielding.
“Father, what has been done to our Katie is intolerable!” Iain, the second oldest son, said.
“Intolerable? ‘Tis putting it a bit mild, doona ye think, Iain? Our sister was violated. Her innocence was brutally taken! How she still lives is a miracle after the beating she took.” Connor paused, and said through clenched teeth, “They must pay dearly for it.”
“Ye canna go killing innocents, Connor,” Malcolm said.
“I would never kill innocents, nor violate innocents!” Connor responded instantly.
“We must think this through. Think of a plan to proceed,” Kiel said, the youngest son by four years.
“What do we know about them?” Iain asked, taking advantage that Connor was quiet.
Connor now stood with his back to them and arms crossed over his chest, staring into the fireplace. Everyone saw the tension in his stance.
“They live some distance beyond the border, son. Their name is Wynton. The father, William, is earl and he has three sons and a daughter, same as I do. His wife died decades back.”
“How is it that ye know so much, Father?” Kiel asked.
“When I was laird, I had made it a point of knowing my allies’ enemies, and Sir Wynton is a verra loathed enemy of the McLeans on the borders.”
“Why did they do this to Katherynne? What would they have to gain from deflowering a young maid and potentially beginning a feud with a clan?” Kirk asked, who was not only Malcolm’s nephew, but also Connor’s second-in-command.
“It is my mistake, Kirk. I should have never taken her there to visit Cassandra McLean on the border. Katie and Cassie are good friends, near the same age. I should have never…” Malcolm’s words faded.
Connor turned back to them.
“They hate the Scots, ‘tis my guess. A young lass like Katie means nothing to them.” Connor’s own words seemed to enrage him. “They will pay for this. Mark my words. I care not what I have to do or what has to be sacrificed,” Connor said vehemently, his shoulder-length black hair moving as his hand sliced through the air and pounded on the desk.
Everyone stared at him. His brothers, his father, and his men-at-arms silently watched Connor pace.
“We’ll make them hurt like they’ve hurt Katie and damn the consequences! How old is the girl and what is her name?” Connor asked.
“I’m not sure of her name but she’s near the same age as Katie. A year or two older, I’m thinking. Mayhap she’s about twenty-one summers, or so. The McLean kept a spy in the castle,” Malcolm responded, shrugging.
“That age and she has not taken a husband? She must be a fearful looking creature.” Connor remarked.
“I doona know anything else about them,” Malcolm said.
“What are ye thinking?” Kirk asked.
“The girl. That would be their weak point, as Katie is ours.”
“Ye canna be thinking of defiling an innocent, Connor!”
“Nay, Father. I have never taken an unwilling woman to bed. What I have in mind will hurt more. She will come willingly.”
“So what is yer intent, Connor?” Iain asked.
“I will rescue her from Scottish warriors who will be kidnapping her from her home. I will seduce and bed her. It would be a worse insult if she willingly came, rather than being forced. With any luck, she’ll fall in love and make the vengeance sweeter.”
“So we’re clear, the punishment is in bedding the lass? Are ye that horrible in bed?” Kiel asked, laughing along with the men in the room.
Connor’s lips straightened and his nostrils flared.
“Always so surly,” Kiel mumbled under his breath, taunting his oldest brother.
Connor gave him a bland look.
“The vengeance lies in making her fall in love with a Scottish blackguard, who throws her out after he tells her the truth. She’ll be destroyed, as much as our Katie is. The only difference is that I willna force the girl into my bed. Her lust will be her undoing.”
“Ye’ll have to woo her, Connor. That is something ye know nothing about, bachelor brother of mine,” Iain said laughing.
“I didna say I’d marry her.”
“Nay,” Iain said laughing, “so ye’ve said time and time again that ye’ll never marry. How do ye plan on wooing a lass when ye’re always in such a foul and disgruntled mood?”
Connor glared at Iain.
“We can also ransom her, making the plan more sound,” Connor said.
“Aye. Yes. That would be good, too.” An interested light gleamed in Iain’s eyes.
Malcolm shook his head, bringing them all back to the subject.
“What, Father? Ye doona agree?” Iain asked.
He shook his head again.
“Nay, not that. That is a sound plan. It is just, as a father, I know the hurt this would cause another father. I would spare the hurt brought on to the girl and family for the acts of some or one of them, but as the father of an innocent violated lass, I want blood.”
“And ye’ll have it,” Connor said, leveling a look into his father’s eyes.
“Why nay just go and declare war?” Bruce, the third-in-command, asked.
Malcolm shook his head slowly, a sad smile played on his face. He looked at Connor and knew Connor was the only one who understood.
“Because the killing of warriors is not enough. Because the ruin of one’s children is a greater blade to cut with than that of a sword’s,” Malcolm responded, finally allowing his own bloodlust to come forward.
“I’ll gather some trusted men and they’ll take her from Wynton’s castle. At a certain point, I will play her rescuer, her savior. From there, I’ll bring her back here to Keisealle. After the maid’s carnal ruin and shame, I’ll hunt the brother who did this, and kill him.”
“We doona know which brother did it,” Kiel said.
“I’ll hunt until I have him, and if the other brothers die, well ‘tis nay so horrible. The leaves doona fall far from the tree,” Connor responded. “The girl is probably just as awful as the rest of her family.”
“McLean said his soldiers saw a small number of men when they were looking for the girls,” Malcolm said.
“Why werena the guards with them?” Iain boomed loudly.
“They didna let anyone know they were leaving, and slipped passed the guards. They wanted privacy to chat as girls do,” Malcolm responded.
After a moment, Malcolm continued.
“Ye canna tell yer mother. She is heartbroken and impossible to console. She spends day and night with Katie, worried.”
“Nay, Mother willna find out about our plan. Outside of a few other men to take the girl, no one in the clan will know who the Wynton girl is. No one must know who she is. Does Mother know the name of those responsible?”
“No. Neither does Katie. I only know because the McLean told me he saw the eldest son on his land many times taunting the soldiers into a brawl. His men doona know either, but McLean is certain it was a Wynton. Cassie said she was being held back and would have been violated next, if it hadna been for the McLean warriors they heard nearing. They carried Katie to McLean’s castle, and that was when McLean and I were first alerted. McLean was assembling men to begin the battle but I wanted to come here first,” Malcolm answered.
Connor shook his head.
“No battle. Yet. A day has passed and still, that is a day too long. Our plan would be more difficult to execute if anyone knew it was a Wynton who violated Katie, or if anyone recognizes this Wynton girl,” Connor said. “We doona want any meddlers.”
“Aye, agreed,” Kirk said.
Connor looked at all the men in the eyes before speaking.
“Let us detail the plan, and soon, the Wynton girl will be taken.”
An eye for an eye.
It wasn’t always a Highlander’s code, but it was Connor’s.