Rory stood in a knot of MacLeod and MacBeith warriors, as indeed he must. Everyone there had his sword drawn and wore a dangerous expression. None would act, because Murgor, the MacLeod war chief, stood with Saerla in his clutches and his sword at her throat.
Rory himself did not hold her. Leith wondered if he could. Beneath several days of dark beard, Rory’s skin had a pale, sweaty sheen that denoted pain. And new lines had appeared at the corners of his eyes.
Those eyes, though, still looked wickedly bright. They swept once, twice over Leith, measuring his condition before moving to Farlan and turning to ice.
The gulf between Rory and his former best friend, as Leith well knew, was wider than the loch at Rory’s back. And there was no hope of mending it.
“Leith?” Rory said, and it sounded ugly coming from his throat. “Ha’ they mistreated ye?”
“I ha’ been provided care.”Rhian’s gentle hands smoothing the bandages across his arm. Her lips moving down his body, tasting and caressing.
Could he live without that?
Moira aggressively came pushing up beside Farlan. She jutted her chin at her sister. “Let her go.”
Leith heard no desperation in the command, but Saerla must have. For she looked at her sister with a hint of warning.
She appeared calm, for a woman resting in the hands of her enemies. But her chest rose and fell in short breaths.
“Leith,” Rory said again, “step o’er to me.”
Farlan let go of Leith. His grip had been one of support rather than restraint, and without it, Leith’s legs wavered still more violently.
Rory, beholding it, stepped across, seized his arm, and drew him in. “Let her go.”
Murgor released Saerla. Moira leaped for her and pulled her away behind Farlan.
“The exchange is made,” Farlan said. “Let us withdraw fro’ the field.”
Rory’s lips twisted in a sneer, and antagonistic fury flowed from him. As much as he’d once loved Farlan, he now hated him.
“Mistress MacBeith,” he called to Moira, “ye canna win. Any force that places its trust in a traitor and allows women to fight is doomed from the start.”
“Fulfill the agreement,” Moira called back, “and withdraw fro’ the field.” She wanted to get her sister back to her stronghold, no doubt. And what of her wounded war chief? Leith could see Alasdair nowhere.
Fallen. Might he be dead?
“Or ha’ ye no honor?” Moira added.
“I ha’ more honor than to tak’ a turncoat to my bosom.” Rory’s fingers bit into Leith’s arm. “Come.”
They waded into the waters of the loch to the nearest of the boats that waited there. Looking back, Leith saw Alasdair being helped up from the ground. Aye, he lived. Rhian would be glad.
Rhian.
His longing for her was a livid wound. One he did not know how to bear.
He scarcely remembered, later, the trip back home, the pull across the loch in one of the wee boats, or the tramp to MacLeod’s stronghold. He did have a vague memory of Rory sneering into his face.
“Wha’ be the matter wi’ ye, man? Be ye hurt bad still?”
It is difficult to live without my heart,he wanted to say. But Rory’s green gaze looked hard and merciless. And anyway, it was not the sort of thing one said to the MacLeod.
“Wha’ ha’ they done to ye?” Rory demanded again, once they entered the stronghold and were inside his study. Apparently he did not believe Leith’s claim that he’d been treated well. “Poison? Torture?”
“Nay, none o’ that.” Leith said no more. For what beset him, he did not believe Rory could ever understand.
Chapter Forty-Seven
