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‘Can’t we take some horses?’ she whispered.
‘No. They might get spooked and make too much noise. We have the Devil’s luck getting this far without being discovered.’ Conall closed the gates with a soft thud and grabbed some nearby boulders to wedge them shut. ‘Don’t want them blowing open and making it obvious someone has left. The longer it takes them to realise, the further away we can get. It is a clear night, so at least we can see where we are going. Come on.’ He raced off down the path away from the castle, dragging her along behind him.
‘Are we going to Dunslair?’
‘Aye, but first, we have to get across the water. I came here by boat, and we’ll get out of here by boat.’
‘Then we need to go south. There’s a fishing village that way. ‘Tis not a long crossing over the firth from what I’ve heard from my brothers, but we cannot swim over as the waters are dangerous with strong currents.’
‘Right, south it is then. How far?’
‘I’ve been there once or twice. Half a day’s ride at least, longer on foot and by morning, they will let loose the dogs on us, Conall.’
‘Then we have to put them off the scent. We find a river and walk in it.’
‘This way then,’ she said, tugging on his hand.
All the way up the hill away from the castle, Kenna talked and talked. It was fear making her tongue wag, he could tell. ‘You know dogs can still track you in the wet. Walking the river is not going to put them off, and when we get out of the water, they can pick up our tracks.’
‘So we have to outrun them.’
‘I doubt we can do that either. My father trains them well for hunting, and they always get their prey before it goes to ground. Fast they are, and vicious. But we don’t have to outrun the dogs, Conall, we merely have to out-climb them, take a shortcut, and I know just the place.’
Conall’s ears strained for the sound of the alarm being raised, but he heard nothing. At the top of the hill, Kenna tugged on his hand, pulling him to a standstill.
She turned and looked back at Sgathach Dun.
‘Kenna, we have to keep going.’
‘Conall, it’s my home.’
‘It has been a prison and a hell hole for both of us. Whatever is out there in the dark can’t be half as bad as what you’re leaving behind. Trust me, I will keep you safe, I swear. Now hurry, we have to press on.’
Kenna looked back at the castle, squatting in its marsh. Conall was right. Whatever happened now, she was never going back. She was going to put Sgathach Dun behind her for good or die trying.
Chapter Twelve
Kenna sat on the bank of the river, trying to get her breath back after a hard night. Conall had set a punishing pace, and the full moon had helped their progress in putting distance between them and Sgathach Dun. They had found the river and followed it as far as it went, with Kenna insisting they were going in the right direction. Conall swore she was an owl. She could see so well in the dark.
The river’s course had taken them inside thick forest full of fallen logs and dense undergrowth, ancient, mossy and impenetrable. They got soaked from pushing back wet branches, and their shoes filled with mud. It was hard going on foot and would be lethal for horses to navigate, so their pursuers would have to leave them behind to follow on or go around it. Even so, it slowed them down, as they had to go carefully in the half-light of the moon to avoid turning an ankle on the rough ground.
Next, they had reached a sheer rock face leading up, and by then, it was dawn. Kenna had insisted they go up and not around, dangerous though it was, and Conall had done her bidding. She knew these lands far better than he did, and she seemed to know an awful lot about tracking with dogs. Climbing up where the dogs could not follow was the best way to put them off the scent, she said. He thought he was surely going to slip and fall on the way up, but Kenna had no fear of it at all.
‘Kenna, take your time, or you will fall. Stop rushing it,’ he shouted.
‘I am going fast to get upwind of you, Conall, for you stink,’ she said, smiling back at him. She had hoisted up her skirts and sped upwards, as sure-footed as a mountain goat. It was an impressive sight, as were her legs, long, slim and pale in the dawn light. He had a brief thought that they would look even better wrapped around his back and then berated himself for it. To think of such a thing now, when they were fleeing for their lives. Still, it was good to know he had some life left in him after what he’d been through. But she was right. He did stink. Weeks in a wet hole would do that for you.
When they got to the top, panting from their exertions, Conall looked at her with admiration. ‘That was a sight to behold, Kenna. Did you do that many times before?’
‘Oh aye, when I could get out this far. I have been up it many times.’
‘Why risk it? It is dangerous.’
‘When things got really bad with my father and such like, I would climb up here and think of throwing myself off.’
Conall looked out at the tops of the trees and beyond to the wetlands shining where the sun hit the water. There was a heaviness in his heart, for her and for himself.
‘Kenna, I…I’ve always known I was capable of killing a man.’ Thankfully she did not say anything. She just looked at him steadily as he continued. ‘It didn’t feel how I imagined it would. I’ve been around fighting men all my life, heard them talk of battles and such. I thought I understood the horror of it, Kenna, the mud and the blood and the fear that men feel. But last night, the way he struggled, I …I knew Euan’s life was leaving him, and I felt none of it.’
