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Rory, his father, and Conall all jumped from their seats at once.

“Injured,” Rory’s father yelled. “How?”

“An attack just outside the west wall,” the man said before retreating. Rory never looked back. The three of them, and every man in the hall save the servants, ran from the hall. Its door was locked behind them and Lady Catrina held out her hand. “Come with me, Lady Freya.”

She said it so calmly, as if the lady had asked her to come with her for an after-supper stroll along the parapets. Freya stared at the door through which Rory fled. Would he be in danger? Aye, it seemed likely.

“We will be safe,” Lady Catrina said as they walked toward the same tower where her chamber had been prepared.

“I do not worry for us,” Freya said, trying not to think of another attack. One that had claimed the lives of so many. That had claimed the life of her father. “It is Rory,” she added quickly, “and the others for which I fear.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

CONALL

“I will kill each and every one of them,” Conall roared to his cousin.

After chasing the reivers for some time, finally they had the bastards in their sights. Conall spurred his mount forward, Rory on one side of him, his uncle Bryce on the other. Putting thoughts of the steward aside, he prepared for battle.

“There are more of them,” Bryce yelled. “We should have rounded up more men.”

That was the tricky thing with a hot trod. For it to be legal, the retaliation must be immediate. And though they had no evidence of stolen goods, another qualification, two things were certain. These men had come from across the border, for they were clearly Scots. And they’d attacked Thomas and two others, who had been patrolling the eastern wall. Why Thomas had been doing so, they had not waited around to find out. The healer was with him now, and if he or any of the others lived, they would learn more of what had happened.

Either way, these reivers would die tonight. No one attacked Conall’s family and lived to tell the tale. His father once warned him that seeking justice to the extent that he did could get him killed. So be it. If he were killed righting a wrong, Conall would consider his life well spent.

“At the risk of losing them?” Rory shouted back. “Nay. We catch them. Now.”

At his words, all three of them and the twenty men at their back, who had been in the hall or seen the injured be brought to the keep, pressed forward. In the darkness, with only moonlight as their guide, the reivers had an advantage. They attacked in the night, always. They knew this land better than anyone, living off it as they did.

But his Uncle Bryce’s brother had run with reivers like these. His uncle knew their tricks too. So when they fled into the woods, Bryce pointed ahead to the road. And then turned back to the men, pointing also to the thicket.

“Take them at the road,” Bryce yelled to him and Rory. “We will send them to you.”

Heart pounding, Conall welcomed the blood coursing through his veins. He welcomed his body’s preparation for what was to come. As branches broke beneath them and the sounds of horses’ hooves methodically hitting the ground rang out into the night, Conall tightened his grip on the reins. His fingers itched for his sword.

“They will come out up ahead,” Rory shouted sometime later.

It was a gamble. The reivers could also cross the river and head east instead of north. But as they were Scots, it was more likely they would ride north. Once they reached the river, his uncle surmised, they would turn back to the road assuming they were still being followed. Which they were, by most of the men.

But not the ones who would avenge Thomas and the others.

Eight of them moved into position. He exchanged a glance with Rory, who nodded. This was not a capture-and-release. It might have been, had a sheep been stolen. Or barrels of grain been intercepted on the way to Bristol. But Uncle Bryce’s best friend, Bristol Manor’s steward, and, most importantly, a good man lay near death. His throat slit.

There was little cover here. They kept their well-trained mounts as silent as possible, but once the reivers left the cover of trees, they would be seen. Indeed, even now the roar of hooves sounded. Echoed their warning. Conall, as Rory did, unsheathed his sword.

The reivers did not see them until it was too late. By then, he and the others had charged into the woods. Conall’s hands no longer shook as they had during the first deadly raid he’d been a part of ten summers ago. Then, he’d thought about each action. Conall had dismounted, an assault on horseback taking much more skill. The first man he killed, or thought he’d killed, had actually been finished off by his older brother. Breac had been in battle before, whereas Conall had not. And that experience had made all the difference.

A training yard could never properly prepare one for the chaos of a real fight. That was something else he’d learned, a lesson that had only paid off because Conall never, ever passed on an opportunity for battle. Much to his mother’s dismay, if there was an injustice to be avenged—whether it was his fight or nay—Conall welcomed it.

And so now, more so than even many of his cousins, Conall could take down as many, if not more, men than his father or uncles. Indeed, when the other men caught their reivers from the rear, they found a field of blood, and less than half of the men who had attacked them remained alive.

Finally dismounting, Conall reached up to where the leader, marked as such by his constantly shouted orders, sat. Conall pulled him down with one swift motion and took advantage of his lack of armor. The padded gambeson no match for the full force of his sword, Conall sent the man swiftly to hell. Tossing him onto the ground, he looked to where his sword arm was needed.

However, courtesy of their flank, it seemed it was not needed at all. Rory stepped over the leader, his face spattered with blood, and leaned down to clean his sword on the tunic of the man Conall had just killed.

“Injuries?” he asked.

His uncle Bryce, dismounting, answered. “Hamon suffered a scratch.”