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{ Prologue }
Stirlingshire,Scotland, in the scattered lands between the Highlands and the Lowlands
March 1816
The stench of smoke wafted past him, singeing his nostrils.
Smoke that wasn’t right.
Smoke that reeked of scorched brandy and silk and peat. Smoke that reeked of an inferno, not of a cooking fire.
Hell.
Robby set his heels into his horse’s flanks, sending the gelding thundering up the last craggily hill.
If he was too late there’d be hell to pay with Bournestein.
Lifting himself straight up on the stirrups, he peeked over the top edge of the outcropping of stones his horse was navigating.
Bloody Zeus.
His horse jumped over the last cut of rocks and landed on flat ground only to rear at the blast of heat. The beast was going nowhere near the blazes of the buildings going up in smoke and ash.
One, two, three, four, five. Five bloody buildings in flames.
Robby flew off his saddle, running to the man holding a torch at the edge of the glade, the one barking orders at the brutes running about the structures of the farm. All the ruffians held torches. Two were arguing in the midst of the buildings with a man and a woman standing and waving their arms about frantically. The skirts of another woman disappeared beyond the corner of the cottage. The man and woman were both dressed well—not farmers.
He didn’t recognize either of them and Mr. Wilson and his family weren’t to be seen.
The whole bloody farm was being cleared.
“Ye be one of Bournestein’s bastards?”
Robby turned back to the brute in front of him, staring down at the man’s ratty eyes crowding a nose that took up half his face. He’d seen so many rats in his day—scroungers for the most vile, revolting jobs—he could identify one a furlong away.
Fury started pulsating across Robby’s forehead. “What blasted idiocy is this—do you know how many barrels of brandy are in the Godforsaken barn? You torch it and there’ll be no salvaging what’s left.”
The rat smirked. “I ‘eard Bournestein was storing here. But I don’t rightly give a donkey’s ass. That’s not my job.” He spit on the ground next to Robby’s feet, a brown slime that hung onto the blades of grass curled by the heat.
Robby looked over his shoulder at the ruffians running from structure to structure, lighting more corners to flames. The dry thatched roofs caught blaze far too easily. The woman arguing in the middle of the buildings spun and sprinted away from the brute arguing with her companion.
Robby looked to the rat. “What’s your name?”
“Molson.” He said it without pause—no fear of any retribution being attached to his name.
“Molson, it’s going to be your blasted worry when Bournestein finds out his latest shipment went to ashes.”
The rat chuckled, his eyes aglow as they watched the flames lick higher. Not just a rat. A sadistic rat. “I answer to a ‘igher authority than Bournestein, boy. This land been needed to be cleared for two years now. If ye knew what was good for ye, ye might try switching loyalties. ”
He looked at Robby, his ratty eyes squinting for a full second before he thrust his torch into Robby’s palm.
Without thinking, Robby grasped the rough wood of the torch to keep it from burning his jacket, yet sparks still splattered onto his arm, singeing tiny holes into the dark wool.
“Ye need to go help the boys—they can’t light this place fast enough fer my liking. I’m sure yer good at torchin’, what with Bournestein’s way of business.”
Robby froze. Molson knew far too much about Bournestein and his business. Or was it that Robby knew too little about who Bournestein was dealing with these days?
Robby had been up in the Highlands too long, shepherding the smuggled shipments of spirits and silk and whatever else Bournestein could make a profit from into the land. Arranging places to hide the bounty as it moved along the countryside. Mr. Wilson’s farm was just one cog in the great wheel of Bournestein’s smuggling operation—an operation that had apparently grossly expanded in the last year if this random brute knew of Bournestein.
