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12
Murdoch had been right to keep his troops quiet. The men under his command had obeyed his order to the letter, had lain in the darkness perfectly still, and almost crawled to within range of the rebels before making their presence known.
However, the rebels had been well-trained too, and as the guards pursued them into the forest, they found themselves slowed down by many trip wires, which the rebels had strung between the tree trunks after leaving their horses. These caused injuries and delays, enabling the rest of the rebels to cut their horses’ hobbles, mount up, and ride away.
* * *
Murdoch cursed roundly when Dougie came back and told him what had happened. He had had a lucky escape when one of the robbers almost stabbed him in the heart, but his hard leather doublet deflected the blow, and it glanced off him, enabling him to move in and stab his opponent in the stomach. He did not think it was a serious wound, though, since the rebel was well-armored and the blade did not sink in very deeply. However, it gave him time and space to concentrate on the others.
It took only moments for the fracas to be over, and when Murdoch looked around, he could see two men whom he thought were dead and three wounded ones. The rest of the rebels appeared to have disappeared into thin air.
“Where did they go?” he asked Dougie, exasperated.
Dougie sighed. “It was unbelievable, Murdoch,” he replied, shaking his head irritably. “They strung trip wires a’ over the place. Our men kept fallin’ doon, an’ we couldnae ride before we could cut them a’. But we did get one o’ them, a wee lad. Can ye believe it? They are usin’ boys now.” He sounded horrified.
“Good work, Dougie,” Murdoch said angrily. “Maybe he can help us to find out what is going on!”
They marched into the woods, where the guards had set up a temporary camp. Inside a makeshift tent, the boy had been seated on a wooden crate taken from the store, and on another one lay two sharp knives, a pair of tweezers, a thumbscrew, and a length of rope. The boy wore a mask over the lower half of his face, but the eyes above it, instead of being wide and frightened, were furious.
They were dark blue and looked very familiar, and for a moment he and Murdoch stared at each other as realization suddenly dawned on him. This person was not a boy. His skin was too smooth, and that scent was so familiar… He stepped forward and pulled the mask off the person’s face and then tore away the hat. A river of wavy red hair tumbled down Keira’s back as she glared at him, her eyes blazing with rage.
He stood, staring at her stupidly for a moment.This cannot be happening,he thought.My eyes are playing tricks on me. Maybe I am in shock after the fight.
He blinked and looked at the boy—no, he reminded himself, this was not a boy. It was Keira McTavish, and her face was flushed and smeared with dirt, wearing boy clothes that were torn and muddy. And why did he find her even more desirable than ever? There was something wrong with him.
“What the hell do you think you are doing?” he demanded. “Do these bloody bandits work for you?”
He stepped forward and stared down at her, hoping that his height and bulk would intimidate her. Then he remembered that Keira was made of sterner stuff. This tactic had not worked the first time he had tried it, and it did not work now.
Her answer was a ringing silence.
Keira was terrified, but she would not let her gaze drop from his. He would not know how scared she was under any circumstances. She glanced for a split second at the thumbscrews, ropes, and pincers on the crate beside him, but her mask of rage did not change. Her mouth remained firmly shut. She had developed a technique of out-staring people by gazing fixedly at a spot between their eyes. She found that it nearly always worked, and it worked now, as Murdoch’s gaze dropped to the ground and he turned away.
However, he had only given her his back in order to pick up the thumbscrews, and she watched in horror as he silently dangled them in front of her. They would not only be horrifically painful, but they would cripple her hands for life.
A fire had been lit just behind him, but not just to keep the men warm, for she knew that the pincers could now be heated. After that they would be applied to her flesh, searing it and disfiguring her in the most excruciating way possible.
Murdoch had not been able to frighten her before, but as she looked at the instruments of torture dangling from his hands, he could see the terror on her face, even though she tried very hard to hide it with a brave show of defiance. He felt utterly ashamed of himself as he saw her blanch.
I will not give my men up,Keira thought. The image of the many hungry children that she had seen on the estate gave her courage. She held out her hands, and he looked down at them in disbelief.
Murdoch had never had to and never intended to use the implements. Displaying them to the criminal, rebel or bandit had usually been enough, and he knew that faced with the choice of torturing Keira or not torturing her, he could only show her mercy. He was not the sadist she obviously thought he was, as she looked up at him with her bottom lip clamped between her teeth to stop it from trembling.
Her hands were still held out toward him, and suddenly she said, “Are you going to use them or not?”
“That depends on you,” he answered, his glare boring into her eyes. “Are you going to give me the answers I seek or not?”
Keira could not hide the tears of fear in her eyes, but she was defiant to the last. “No. Kill me. Do what you like to me. If you turn me over to my father then I am dead anyway, so do as you wish.”
She felt powerless and completely without hope as she dropped her hands onto her thighs, then combed them roughly through her hair in a gesture of complete agitation.
I am never going to get any answers doing things this way,Murdoch thought.
He went over to Dougie and passed his hands over his eyes. “What do I do now?” he asked, with a mixture of exasperation and anger. “I cannot get anything out of her at all. I might if I tortured her, but I cannot.” He looked distressed, and Dougie put a hand on his shoulder and chuckled.
“Women are no’ like us, Murdoch,” he observed. “Their minds dinnae work the same way. Ye see, wi’ a man, ye can just walk up tae him an’ threaten him, insult him, or even punch him. Then ye will either get a straight answer or he will punch ye back, but women are much gentler creatures. Ye must flatter them, or charm them, or even make them think ye agree wi’ them before ye get tae the point.”
“Sympathize, you mean?” Murdoch asked hopefully, seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.
