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The sheer force of the blow was devastating. The silver rings adorning his fingers tore viciously into the delicate skin of her cheek. Mabel’s head snapped hard to the side, the back of her skull slamming directly against the solid oak trunk. A blinding flash of white light exploded behind her eyes. Her left ear rang, a high-pitched whine drowning out the wind in the trees. The thick, metallic taste of warm blood flooded her mouth from a deep cut on the inside of her lip.

She sagged heavily against the ropes, dazed, her vision swimming as she desperately tried to pull air back into her paralyzed lungs.

Fergus leaned in close, too close. He grabbed her by the jaw, his thick fingers digging mercilessly into the fresh, dark bruises rapidly forming on her pale skin. He forced her head up, making her look directly into his cold, black eyes.

“Listen to me carefully, ye insolent little bitch,” Fergus hissed, his voice dropping into a terrifying, vibrating growl. “I am done playing the polite suitor. I daenae care if ye scream. I daenae care if ye cry. I will drag ye by yer hair to the altar, and if ye refuse to speak the words, I will cut out yer tongue and say them for ye. From this moment on, obedience is nae longer optional. Do ye understand me?”

He released her jaw with a violent shove, letting her head fall back against the bark. He turned his back on her, adjusting his heavy leather gloves.

“Watch her,” Fergus snapped at the guard standing nearby. “If she makes a single sound, gag her again.”

Mabel turned her head slowly, spitting a thick mouthful of blood onto the frozen dirt. Her entire face throbbed with a sickening, localized heat. The physical shock of the blow left her trembling in the freezing night air, but as she stared at Fergus’s retreating back, the terror vanished.

It was replaced by a deep, consuming, absolute hatred. She would not break. She was a MacAllister. She would fight him until her absolute final breath.

The pale, gray light of dawn broke weakly through the dense canopy of the forest, failing to warm the freezing air.

The guards untied Mabel from the oak tree. Her limbs were stiff, her joints screaming in agony as she was forced to move. They threw her roughly back onto the saddle of the bay gelding, grabbing the heavy ropes and tying her bleeding wrists securely to the thick leather pommel.

“Mount up!” Fergus ordered, effortlessly swinging up onto his own horse.

They rode strictly north. The terrain grew significantly steeper, the air turning bitter and thin as they began the brutal climb toward the Black Ridge.

Fergus rode his mount directly beside hers, keeping a steady, relentless pace. He was in excellent spirits. The violent, explosive outburst from the night before was gone, replaced by a sickening, arrogant boasting. He was energized by the absolute certainty of his victory.

“Do ye see the tree line thinning ahead of us?” Fergus asked loudly over the rhythmic clatter of heavy hooves on slate. “This is neutral territory, Mabel. Nay MacCarron patrols. Nay border guards. Gregor MacNab has ignored this stretch of land for decades because the soil is too poor to farm. We are invisible.”

Mabel kept her striking blue eyes locked rigidly forward, staring at the coarse mane of her horse. She ignored him completely.

“Caelan MacCarron allowed his emotion to cloud his judgment,” Fergus continued, unbothered by her stone-cold silence. He gestured broadly to the open, desolate forest stretching out before them. “He should have married ye the exact day William Crawford dropped ye at the gates of Blackthorn Keep. He should have secured the claim immediately. But the fool let his conscience dictate his strategy. He wanted to protect ye. He wanted to give ye time. And his pathetic weakness is precisely what allowed me to take ye right out from under his walls.”

“He is nae weak,” Mabel muttered, her voice barely a dry, cracked rasp.

“He is dead,” Fergus laughed smoothly, the sound incredibly cruel in the quiet morning air. “Or dying. While he wastes his absolute last ounce of strength defending a burning pile of stones, I am riding toward a future that will make Clan Comyn the most powerful force in the entire northern Highlands. With yer father’s lands under me absolute control, I will command the northern passes. I will dictate the trade routes to the coast. The terrifying Black Laird will be forgotten, nothing more than a cautionary tale of a man who fought for honor instead of power.”

Mabel closed her eyes against the biting wind.

She barely registered his arrogant words. Every single thought in her exhausted mind, every beat of her racing heart, was consumed by one agonizing, devastating question.

Did Caelan survive?

She remembered the massive, towering flames rising viciously above the distant walls of Blackthorn Keep. She remembered the frantic, desperate blasts of the alarm horns tearing through the dark. Caelan would not have hidden behind the walls. He would have rushed straight into the absolute center of the fighting. He commanded from the front, his heavy broadsword leading the charge. If the breach was severe, if Fergus’ men had somehow overwhelmed the courtyard, Caelan would have stood his ground until his blade shattered.

A suffocating panic clamped down hard on her chest. Had she lost him? Had she finally found a man who truly saw her, a man she loved with absolutely every ounce of her soul, only to have him slaughtered in the freezing mud while she was dragged away into the dark?

Tears pricked fiercely at the corners of her eyes, the moisture freezing against her bruised, swollen cheeks. She refused to let them fall. She inhaled a shaky breath of the freezing pine air, locking the devastating fear deep inside her chest. She refused to give Fergus Comyn the satisfaction of seeing her break.

As night finally fell on the second day of the grueling ride, the horses were utterly exhausted. Their dark coats were slick with white foam and heavy sweat, their breathing ragged as they climbed a steep, treacherous path of loose slate and dead ferns. The sun had dipped below the jagged peaks of the mountains, plunging the dense forest into deep, freezing shadows.

Suddenly, the dense trees broke apart.

They entered a small, secluded clearing at the absolute base of a massive, sheer stone cliff. Sitting squarely in the center of the clearing, swallowed by the surrounding darkness of the ridge, was a large, heavy stone structure.

The hunting lodge.

It was a brutal, ugly building. It lacked the high stone walls, the reinforced gates, and the defensive watchtowers of a true Highland fortress, but its thick, unyielding stone construction and iron-banded doors made it an impenetrable prison in the middle of nowhere. It looked abandoned. The slanted roof was heavily covered in thick, damp moss, and the narrow, arched windows were dark.

Fergus pulled his mount to a halt. A wide, satisfied smile spread across his handsome face.