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She squeezed Will’s hand where it clutched hers, and he pulled her closer and took her in his arms.
‘I am sorry our night ended with this dangerous dawn, my love,’ he whispered. ‘This will soon be over, and we will get clear of them. It has been long enough, we are scattered, and they cannot find us in this. We may yet survive the day.’ Morna leant her head against his chest, staring out at the impenetrable, ghostly grey.
She narrowed her eyes as it swirled and shifted. The soft gloom seemed to deepen for a moment, and there was a second where her mind struggled to make sense of what her eyes were seeing - a black shape, huge, looming, racing towards them.
‘Will,’ she hissed, but it was too late. The side of the other ship crashed into theirs, there came a horrible scrape of wood on wood, rigging snapping and cracking and raining down and suddenly, they were under attack.
Dark figures rushed out of the fog and onto the deck. Will pushed Morna behind the water barrel. ‘Stay down,’ he shouted desperately and then rushed into the fray, sword drawn.
She couldn’t stay down and do nothing. Men were shouting and cursing and screaming. One Cranstoun staggered at her, out of the fog, sword raised, only to fall into twitching death throes at her feet. Morna reached out a shaking hand and grabbed his sword from his dead hand, sticky with blood, and scrabbled backwards again to safety.
Two men crashed into the side of the barrel and fell to the floor in a mortal struggle, right in front of her. One was Waldrick. The Cranstoun man raised his knife to strike him down, and Morna took her sword and drove it into his side, as hard as she could. She felt every inch of the skin and muscle and bone as the sword sliced inwards, like a lightning bolt of revulsion running up her arm. She drew out the sword and blood gushed, all over Waldrick, some hitting her face. Morna gagged and coughed as Waldrick’s eyes met hers but, in an instant, he was off again into the fog.
Her hand hit something behind her. A bow and quiver of arrows. She was good with a bow, and an arrow could kill a man from a distance, she would not have to feel it. She had to keep Will safe instead of cowering like a dog.
Amid the shouts and groans and violence, Morna pushed herself to her feet and pulled an arrow taut in the bow. She took a few steps forward.
The mist was thinning, and she spotted a Cranstoun, looking for someone to kill. He was alone, exposed, and so close. She braced herself against the sway of the vessel. It was one thing to take down a deer from a hiding place on solid ground, quite another to hit a target with shaking hands, fear closing her throat and the ship swaying back and forth. And this was no deer.
‘Courage now,’ she whispered as she breathed out and fired at the man’s heart. Her arrow went wide and struck the mast beside him. The man did not see it, but he had heard it, and he turned and peered through the shifting fog. Morna loaded another arrow just as he bellowed and ran at her full pelt. She held until he was almost upon her, and fired.
The arrow struck him in the heart, and he fell down, inches from her face, his face contorted in surprise and horror. She felt sick, her hands were shaking badly, the screams and shouts of fighting rushing in and out of her ears in waves. A soft beam of sunlight hit her face as both ships broke through the fog bank and into clear air. Morna searched desperately for Will but could not see him in the melee of broken bodies and men grappling with each other.
She got a hold on herself and fired off several more arrows, hitting one man in the leg and another in the hand, making him drop his sword. The forecastle would provide a better view, so she made her way to it at a run. As she reached the top of the steps, two men fighting crashed into her, sending her sprawling back down them.
Morna’s head hit the deck with a sickening crack, and everything went black.
***
Will slapped Morna’s cheeks harder as her eyelids fluttered and her face twisted in pain. Suddenly she sucked in a huge breath and sat bolt upright, only to sway over into his arms.
‘Lie down, you hit your head hard and must rest.’
‘I cannot. The Cranstouns?’ she said, her breath catching.
‘Hush now. We are clear of them. We killed too many for them to fight on, and we managed to pull away from their ship.
Morna put her hand up to her head and winced as her fingers found the lump the size of an egg in her hair.
‘Don’t my love, or you will make it bleed again,’ said Will.
‘So, Wymon got away?’ she gasped.
‘Aye, this time, but this latest treachery has only made me more resolved to crush him.’
The sun had pierced the cloud some time ago, and the sea fret which had saved their lives had rolled on out to sea. The light in Morna’s eyes was such a relief to see, for she had been unconscious for an age, and Will had started to get worried.
Morna looked up at him. ‘How many Will?’
‘Four men cut down, one unaccounted for, thought lost, over the side.’
‘I am so sorry, Will.’
‘Aye, well, it would have been more but for you and your bravery, and Cranstoun will pay for breaking the rules of a parley. Do not fash yourself, we are almost home.’ He held her close to his chest and put his chin on the top of her head. ‘My God, woman, you wield a bow as well as any man. Where did you learn to do that?’
‘I have two rough brothers and a big mouth, so learning to fight was a necessity growing up.’ Her voice was a whisper, and Will could tell that the fight had really affected her. ‘At Bannockburn, I felt so useless. Ravenna is a fighter, she would do anything, kill anyone who got between her and Cormac, but I knew I slowed her down when she was trying to get to him. I was soft and whining, and I hated myself for it.’ He stroked her hair in time to the creak of the ship rising up and down on the waves. ‘After that awful battle, Will, and what I saw lying out on that field, I was determined never to be defenceless and useless again, so I practised hard with the bow every day. I am an expert rabbit killer, deer too, but it is so different when it is a man.’
‘I know. It is an awful thing to slay a man, and you should feel it as such.’
