Until now.
Memories of how Cailin had faced the two braggarts without hesitation, of his chivalrous actions to ensure she had food and rest flickered in her mind. Nor could she overlook how his confident actions, quick decisions, and intelligence bespoke a manof noble birth.
Elspet’s finger stilled on the crafted hilt. The sword belonged to Cailin and, God willing, she would return it to him.
With a grimace, she shoved to her feet and shifted the weapon to her other arm. Ignoring the stabbing pain in her ankle,she pushed on.
* * * *
Cailin shielded his face as he rode, damned the sharp sting of snow that had buried Kenzie’s tracks hours before. Blast it, where was she? Injured and slowed by his heavy sword, he found satisfaction in knowing that wherever the lass was, she couldn’t have traveled far.
If, indeed,she was alone.
When he’d first begun his search, he’d expected to find naught but hoof tracks leading away from the inn. Then he’d picked up her awkward steps with ease.
As he’d trailed Kenzie, he kept waiting for her steps to merge with the hooves of her accomplice’s steed. Proof she was in league with the two miscreants he’d found her with yesterday, men who’d awaited her departure from the inn and were long gone. But her tracks had remained solitary as theyheaded north.
Over time, snow had begun to fill her trail; then any signs of her passing had become undiscernible against the bulky blanket of white. That her path never wavered from its direction kept Cailin pushing on, searching for a fragment of her torn gown or broken twigs to expose signs of her passing, anything that would alert him that he was closing in on her.
What tragedy had she endured to convince her to join such a disreputable lot? Her quick wit, bearing, bravado, and, though ruined, her quality gown, assured him that she was a woman of means. More perplexing, he was a good judge of character. That he hadn’t an inkling of her deceit until too late lefthim unsettled.
Cailin tried to dismiss his draw to her beauty, the ease with which he’d been able to speak with her. Regardless of her duplicity, there was something genuine about her, an innate sense of hurt she tried to shield.
With a frustrated sigh, he shook his head. ’Twas a sad day when after her deception he’d seek a motive for her thievery.
He kicked his steed into a canter and hardened his heart. When he found Kenzie, regardless of her nobility, she’d be answering his questions. However beautiful, and though she stirred his blood, she’d proven she was a lass hecouldn’t trust.
He scowled at the steep incline ahead. How much longer until he found her? Blast it. The broadsword was proof of his claim as therightful earl.
The soft thud of hooves upon snow accompanied Cailin as he rode through the weave of leafless birch. Slashes of black smeared the white bark, thin strips he’d used many times over to start a fire or, in times of urgency, to pen a missive. But today, the majestic trees laden with snow upon their barren branches were naught but a reminder of the oncoming winter.
Cailin nudged his steed around a large copse of rocks, then guided him higher up the incline. A short distance ahead, pine, alder, and ash stood like sentinels to the windswept valley below, one as a child he’d ridden through many times over withhis father.
Tragic memories of how he’d lost his parents twisted inside. When his uncle, Gaufrid MacHugh, had stepped in to become his guardian and to run Tiran Castle until Cailin was of age, he’d been an innocent child struggling with the loss of the parents he loved, and hadbeen thankful.
A month later, Gaufrid’s decision to send him to Rome for a proper education to prepare him for the day he claimed the title of earl was one that made sense.
But ’twas a lie.
Once away from port, the ship’s captain had revealed that his uncle had paid him a handsome sum to kill Cailin. Instead, swayed by greed, the miscreant had sold Cailin to pirates, believing the lad would die at sea and his uncle none the wiser. A cruel plan that would have succeeded if the pirates hadn’t attacked a cog of the Knights Templar.
Rescued by the Brotherhood, without coin, connections, experience, or a fighting force to reclaim Tiran Castle, Cailin had remained with the Templars while he’d struggled against the grief at his parents’ death and his uncle’s betrayal. But, in the back of his mind, thoughts of one day avenging Gaufrid’s betrayal remained.
Once of age, without means, he’d set aside his thoughts of vengeance and joined the Brotherhood. There, he’d found a life he’d cherished until King Philip’s treachery two years before.
Fury slammed through Cailin at thoughts of the French monarch’s duplicity against the Templar Knights, elite warriors who’d protected him over the years. Men of honor who, in the sovereign’s desperation to replenish his coffers, he’d sacrificed without hesitation.
Though absolution was the teaching of the Church, for the wrongful accusations and slaughter of warriors who’d vowed to protect the innocent, men who’d given their lives to serve the Brotherhood’s cause, Cailin could never forgive King Philip.
With the Templars secretly disbanded, he, as many within the Brotherhood, had fled to Scotland to serve King Robert, whom few knew was a Templar. Knowledge Cailin still found incredible.
Cailin was thankful he’d gained the Bruce’s support in reclaiming his birthright, his lands and the title of Earl of Dalkirk, from his treacherous uncle, who’d supported King Robert’s adversary, Lord Comyn. More so the Bruce’s promise to send troops as soon as possible to support Cailin’s cause. With the lull in fighting the king’s bid to claim Scotland, knights that would soon arrive.
Nor had he expected his sovereign’s gift of Cailin’s father’s broadsword. A weapon he’d never again thought to see. The Bruce had explained how Father Lamond, a priest faithful to Cailin’s father, had seized the weapon, then secretly delivered the blade to the king.
A snow-littered gust of wind swept past. His horse slowed, snorted as he half-walked, half-slid down the steep incline. “Easy, boy.” He scanned the valley below.
Sparkles of sunlight glinted off the pristine white like diamonds scattered. A smile touched his mouth as he thought of the way his mother used to tell him the shimmers were magic dust sprinkled over the land by the fey.
