Bride of Mist (The Warrior Daughters of Rivenloch Book 3) Page 2

  But Dougal never looked back. He rode like the wind toward Kirkoswald.

  Once again, it was up to Dougal to do what his brother could not. Pick up the reins when Gaufrid dropped them. Pay heed to the matters the laird neglected. Heal the wounds he inflicted. Hold the clan together.

  He never resented what he was required to do on his brother’s behalf. It only troubled him when Gaufrid tried to get in his way.

  Even at Urramach’s thundering pace, it took a long and anxious quarter of an hour to reach the village.

  Nothing could have prepared him for the devastation.

  He was too late. The fire was already out. Not because it had been extinguished. But because there was nothing left to burn.

  The flames had fed on everything in the village. Every thatched roof. Every wattle fence. Every wooden post. Nothing remained but flattened and charred shadows of what had been.

  Wisps of white smoke coiled from the smoldering black bones of the cottages, like final gasps of the fire that had greedily consumed the flesh of Kirkoswald.

  As he removed his helm and rode gingerly through the village, Dougal noticed something else.

  Silence.

  Where were the fiends who had wrought such destruction?

  And where were the villagers?

  There should be lasses wailing over their lost homes. Men calling out orders for buckets of water. Children bawling in fright.

  Where was everyone?

  Only one structure remained standing. The church.

  Its roof was gone. Black beams protruded upward from the scorched and crumbling stone walls, like fingers reaching for heaven. The high and slim stained glass windows had cracked from the heat. Through the fissures leaked threads of smoke. The thick oak double doors were still intact.

  He dismounted and slowly climbed the stone steps.

  What he saw made his blood run cold. Wedged through the twin handles of the doors, locking them together, was a pair of heavy blacksmith tongs.

  Later he would learn he’d burned his fingers as he wrested the tongs from the door. But in the moment, he was numb.

  When he tried to push the doors inward, he was met with resistance. And then the odor hit him. A sweet, sulfur, acrid smell.

  Unmistakable.

  Unforgettable.

  The horrible stench of burnt flesh.

  Dread gripped his throat like a vise. It took all of his strength to shove the doors inward just a few inches. And then he saw why.

  Bodies were piled up against the doors.

  Bodies with charred skulls and twisted limbs.

  Their clothing had melded with their flesh.

  Nothing but black holes gaped where their eyes had been.

  Their bony fingers grasped and clawed at an unseen enemy.

  Their teeth opened wide in silent screams.

  The church had been set on fire. And the only exit had been blocked.

  They’d been burned alive. Intentionally.

  Men. Women. Children. The entire village.

  Stunned sick and weakened by horror, Dougal sank to his knees. His grief was too deep for words or tears.

  He’d known these people. He’d brought them food when they were hungry. Helped them bring new livestock into the world. Celebrated their weddings with them. Only two days ago, he’d sent the castle midwife to assist the birthing mother here. They’d been christening the bairn in the church when the attackers came.

  Dougal’s heart sank as he realized that somewhere among the bodies was a wee lass only two days old.

  Suddenly he couldn’t breathe. His chest ached, as if a mill stone pressed upon his ribs. As if they would crack under the unbearable weight of tragedy.

  When at last he was able to draw in a ragged gasp, it came with the sudden, searing pain of guilt.

  This was his fault.

  He was supposed to protect the villagers. They depended on him to keep them safe. His brother couldn’t do it. So it was up to Dougal alone. He was supposed to look after them.

  But he hadn’t. He’d failed them.

  He’d allowed vandals to destroy their village. To murder them all.

  They were dead because of him.

  Behind him, Urramach neighed and stamped at the ground, anxious to be away from this noxious place of death.

  For a long while, Dougal couldn’t move. He was frozen by grief. Burdened by remorse. Dead inside.

  But deep within the smoldering ruins of his heart began to burn a hot ember of rage. Rage for the ones who had done this. For their wanton slaughter and savage cruelty. The mindless, senseless violence perpetrated against innocent victims.

  The ember slowly bloomed to life. Burning higher and hotter. Purifying his guilt with fiery intention. Coalescing into a single white-hot flame of vengeance.

  He steeled his jaw. Narrowed his eyes. Clenched his fists. And rose like a phoenix from the ashes of annihilation.

  “Mac Giric,” he hissed between his teeth like a bitter vow. That was the badge the Fortanachs had found. That was the clan that must pay.

  Dougal the noble warrior was no more. The man who rode east like a demon possessed was a new champion.

  Forged in the fires of retribution, he was ruthless.

  Unforgiving.

  Deadly.

  Chapter 2

  Creagor, The Borders

  Feiyan la Nuit couldn’t breathe.

  In the blink of an eye, the unimaginable had happened. The friendly tournament melee had been transformed into a bloody battleground.

  The first tournament at Creagor, celebrating the recent union between her Rivenloch cousin Jenefer and Morgan Mor mac Giric, was supposed to finish with a lighthearted free-for-all with blunted blades.

  At least that was how it started.

  The clang of metal weapons and the playful taunting of jovial opponents filled the balmy spring air. More than a hundred competitors had come from faraway lands to test their mettle against the infamous Rivenloch warriors. They now joined in the mock battle, young and old alike. Even Feiyan’s nephews were allowed to take part, since the worst they would likely suffer were a few scrapes and bruises.

  Feiyan grinned as she sparred with a large mac Giric knight, confounding him as she pitted her pair of blunt, forked sais from the East against his dulled longsword.

  Then, out of nowhere, a sharp claymore intruded upon their sport.

  Whistling through the air, it landed with killing force.

  Breaking swords.

  Breaking bones.

  Hacking through chain mail and gambeson.

  Savagely wounding and slashing everything in its path.

  Shrieks of disbelief and screams of pain suddenly rent the air. But they didn’t stop the one wielding the blade. They only fueled his fury.

  The brutal knight behind the cruel attack was large, dark, aggressive, and merciless. He swung his great blade in wide swaths, like a ruthless reaper harvesting souls. And though Feiyan couldn’t discern his face in the shadows of his black helm, she could feel the pure rage and beastly violence emanating from his armor.

  It was his final blow, striking her cousin Hallie’s head—a blow that knocked off Hallie’s helm and sent her to the ground with a horrible, deadly thud—that stopped Feiyan’s breath.

  In one fateful instant, fierce and vital Hallie was rendered still. Silent.

  For Feiyan, time slowed to a crawl.

  Her eyes widened while her brain tried to deny what she saw. Weighed down in the moment, she couldn’t drag her gaze away from the dreadful sight.

  Outside sounds grew muffled, until all she could hear was the sluggish pounding of her own heart, like dull blows beating the drum of her soul.

  It wasn’t possible.

  Hallie couldn’t be dead.

  The three Rivenloch cousins—Hallie, Feiyan, and Jenefer—were as close as sisters. From the time they were small, they’d done everything together.

  Made mischief.

  Battled foes.


  Grown to womanhood.

  The three of them were an unstoppable force.

  That Hallie could be gone forever—and so suddenly—was unimaginable.

  Yet there she lay, motionless on the ground.

  Even the monster responsible for her defeat seemed stricken by what he’d done. Jarred from his furious onslaught, he dropped his claymore with a ragged gasp. Staggered back. And fled.

  Some of her clan bolted after him in pursuit, shaking their useless, dulled weapons. But before anyone could reach him, the man swung up onto an enormous black charger and dug his heels into the horse’s flanks. Man and beast thundered across the sod, disappearing out the palisade gates of Creagor.

  Meanwhile, a knight sank to his knees beside Hallie. Morgan Mor mac Giric’s right hand man, Colban an Curaidh. Colban the Champion. The Highlander Hallie had once captured. The man Hallie’s matchmaking sister had called The One.

  He wouldn’t accept that Hallie was dead. Whether by a miracle born of desperation, the man’s stubbornness, or the sheer strength of his love, Colban somehow managed to breathe life back into the woman without whom he couldn’t live.

  At Hallie’s first gasp of precious breath, Feiyan’s heart swelled with gratitude.

  Her chest ached.

  Her eyes filled with tears.

  But while everyone else crowded around, exclaiming in awe and relief—murmuring over Hallie, sighing over Colban and the power of love—Feiyan backed away, trembling.

  Not with fear now. But with rage.

  An intruder had burst into her world.

  Threatened the ones she loved.

  Rained destruction and mayhem down on her clan.

  Nearly stolen her cousin from her.

  He must pay.

  She would make him pay.

  As she retreated, separating herself from the crowd, her gaze alit on a great sword abandoned on the field, sharp and bloody and damning. His claymore.

  The fiend had left it behind.

  Feiyan tucked her sais away and quietly picked up the strange blade. She studied the hilt. The crossbar was carved with an insignia. A great oak tree with a single word below it. She traced a finger over the letters. Mac DARRAGH.

  She had the savage’s name.

  With that, she could hunt him down.

  Urramach chewed up the muddy road at neck-breaking speed. Branches whipped at the horse’s sides. Trees passed in a blur. Every impact of hoof on sod sent a shudder through Dougal’s chain mail. And a shiver through his soul.

  The wind rushed by his ears, whispering the harsh accusation.

  Murderer.

  No matter how fast he rode, Dougal couldn’t outrun the truth that pursued him. He couldn’t escape what he’d just done.

  Never had he imagined the moment of sweet reckoning would turn so bitter.

  Never had he imagined, when he finally reached the mac Giric’s stronghold, three days of pent-up hunger for vengeance would erupt in violence so overwhelming, it would render him blind. With his head swimming in a blood-red miasma of rage, he’d surged forward into the heart of danger like a wild animal. Slashing with his sword again and again. Hacking, breaking, destroying everything in his path.

  For one glorious instant on the field of battle, holding his blade aloft, he’d felt like an avenging angel. Felt his ache for justice rewarded. Felt the weight of all the souls he’d lost at Kirkoswald lifted from his shoulders. Doing God’s work, he’d sliced through the ranks of the mac Giric devils. Punishing them with an eye for an eye.

  He meant to continue until he cut down every last one of them or died in the attempt. At least then he’d know he’d done everything he could to make things right.

  Then he struck the woman.

  The pale beauty of her face and the golden spill of her hair as she fell to the ground reminded him of the ones he’d left behind. The fallen lasses. The silenced children. The ones he’d been too late to save.

  And when the woman’s innocent lips exhaled their last breath, the red haze had suddenly lifted from his eyes.

  Bloody hell. What was he doing?

  A shuddering had begun deep inside him then.

  Not fear.

  Not revulsion.

  But pure horror.

  For the first time in three days, he saw clearly. What he saw was that he’d become the monster he despised.

  His chest sank. The claymore dropped from his nerveless fingers. He staggered under the crushing weight of the atrocity he’d committed.

  But ultimately, his instinct for survival took over.

  Now, riding for his life through the darkening wood, he realized how rash and reckless he’d been in coming here. His judgment had been clouded by anguish. His thirst for revenge had been fed by grief and guilt.

  Nothing had come of it but tragedy. More death. More suffering.

  Despite tearing up the ground to flee Creagor, he knew that no amount of distance he put between himself and his sin would diminish the truth.

  Dougal was no better than the savages he’d set out to punish.

  Feiyan had to act now.

  The monster had to be stopped.

  And time was of the essence.

  It didn’t matter that Hallie had survived. The brute with the claymore had intended to kill her. He’d intended to kill everyone on the field.

  Under different circumstances, Feiyan would have rounded up Hallie and Jenefer for the journey. The three cousins did almost everything together, working hand-in-hand to mete out justice and protect the clan.

  But for the first time in her life, she realized that where she was going, her cousins couldn’t follow. This particular kind of revenge required stealth, speed, shrewdness, and nerves of steel. A cold heart and a steady hand. Qualities only Feiyan possessed.

  Hallie was cool, measured, and thoughtful. She would likely try to reason with the villain, hoping to make him see the error of his ways, and get herself killed for her efforts.

  Jenefer was brash and hotheaded. She would strike first, ask questions later, and end up with her head in a noose.

  Besides, her cousins’ lives had changed. They were married now. They had husbands, leadership, new responsibilities. Now that the immediate threat was gone, they wouldn’t want to tag along on Feiyan’s mission of vengeance.

  It was time for her to prove herself. To prove to her illustrious cousins and to the clan that Feiyan la Nuit was worthy to be a warrior daughter of Rivenloch.

  All her life, she’d been considered the wee lass of the three. Small and dark-haired, she’d always stood in the shadow of her towering, golden cousins. When she was noticed, she was seen as young, quiet, harmless. Sometimes she wasn’t seen at all.

  No one remembered that it was Feiyan last year who had escaped Creagor on her own, stealing past the guard, when the three cousins were taken hostage. That she’d been the one to warn Rivenloch of the English attack.

  But it was that same invisibility that would serve her well now.

  Besides, she knew something about herself that not even her cousins suspected.

  Of the three of them, Feiyan was the most ruthless.

  The most cunning.

  The most deadly.

  The same demure manner that allowed Feiyan to disappear in the wake of her magnificent cousins also enabled her to steal up on her enemy, to do what needed to be done, quietly and efficiently.

  It was up to her—and her alone—to take on the unsavory task of assassination. She was the only one with the will and the nerve to do it. And the safety of the clan depended upon it.

  She studied the claymore once more before dropping it back on the sod. Then she slipped through the crowd toward the pavilion where her weapons were stored.

  She armed herself for battle, hiding her exotic blades in the secret folds and pockets of her dark green gambeson. As she tucked away her yan zi fei dao, her swallow tail darts, she furrowed her brows.

  Mac Darragh. That name belonged to a clan in the west of Scotland,
by the sea near Ayr, more than a hundred miles away. What quarrel could a Westlander possibly have with the border clan at Creagor?

  It didn’t matter. He’d tried to slaughter her clansmen and her cousin. He deserved to die.

  She donned her leaf-colored mask and coif and pulled the dark green hood over her head, leaving only her eyes visible. Then she shouldered her pack of belongings, and disappeared into the shadows of the wood.

  There was only one westward road wide enough to accommodate a fugitive on horseback. Situated several miles north of Creagor, the main thoroughfare roughly followed the river.

  By the time she reached the road hours later, the sun was already setting. On foot, she was clearly no match for a rider.

  But she had several advantages.

  She was patient. Persistent. Tireless. Motivated. Unafraid of the dark. And she knew several detours through the forest that would shave hours off her journey.

  She was also blessed by a nearly full moon, which would guide her when night fell. She didn’t intend to sleep until justice was served. Until the monster’s cold blood dripped down her hot blade of revenge.

  As she’d expected, the ground was gouged and scarred by the charger’s heavy hooves. The man had made no effort to disguise his passage, riding at a reckless speed to elude pursuit.

  Also as expected, he was headed west, probably fleeing toward Ayr.

  Fortunately, Feiyan knew a shorter path through the wood.

  It would still be a long while before she’d catch up to a man on horseback. Maybe a day. Maybe two. But she would catch up to him.

  She’d be damned if she’d let the Westland devil run loose through her Scotland.

  Dougal couldn’t keep up this manic pace forever. He’d already run Urramach half to death to get to Creagor in three days. The return trip to the coast would surely finish the animal.

  Still, there was no time to waste. The bright moon was not his friend tonight. Sooner or later, the mac Giric men would catch up with him. He’d killed one of their womenfolk. And he’d left behind the claymore that had done the deed. A blade that damned all of Darragh.