Highlander Enchanted(2)

“Nay,” Cade agreed. “’Tis not.”

“What ‘tis it?” Father Adam’s voice was too loud for their situation. He was to be forgiven, however, because of his age, which rendered his eyes weak and his hearing even weaker. The only non-seillie in the clan, he relied upon the men around him to explain the magic he could not sense.

“The wind speaks to us, Father,” Niall replied.

“No more rain, Cade. Yer foul mood is worse than yer wine,” Father Adam grumbled.

“Tis not a storm, Father.” Cade glanced at the sky. His magic played out across the heavens, altering the weather according to his mood. He had been concerned of late, hence the previous fortnight of hard rain.

“Then what?” Father Adam asked.

She is coming. The message, accompanied by the faint tickle of the wind, swept across Cade and his cousins.

“That canna be good,” Brian, the third member of his trusted advisors, murmured from his right. With a pleasant face women swooned over, he was unlike Niall in appearance but no less deadly in battle. Niall and Brian were close enough to his age for them all to have been raised together under the tutelage of Father Adam.

“Nothin’ good ne’er came from a woman,” Niall agreed.

“Unless she has gold,” Cade said.

A horse bearing two forms appeared on the road at the bottom of the hill, and they grew still and quiet once more, observing the ancient gelding and its ill-dressed riders.

“There isna room for gold,” Cade said. “Ye assured ye read it well?” He twisted from his position to see the elderly priest leaning on his cane behind him.

“Me eyes are no’ so good, but yea,” came the response. The priest of Norman birth had wandered the Highlands preaching Christianity for many years before being adopted by Cade’s father. Since becoming a clan member, he had the task of reading the written word to the rest of the clan. “A great lord sent message of a precious gift destined for clan MacDonald from the English court as reward for MacDonald sending all his warriors to the Crusades.”

“Methinks ye are too old to see yer own nose, Father.” A hardened man of battle, Niall’s tone carried warmth he reserved for his priest and cousins.

“’Tis yer wine. That swill willna keep a man young.”

Always the wine. Cade snorted. “In time, old man, ye’ll ‘ave yer good wine. I am land rich and gold poor.”

“Yer land poor, too, cousin,” Niall pointed out. “We’ll be cast out ‘fore winter.”

“Yea but I have a plan.” Cade scowled at the reminder of the dire situation of his clan. He left the Highlands with his cousins when they were barely men to fight for gold and titles in the Crusades, only to come away poorer than before.

When Cade returned bearing nothing more than the warrior name Black Cade, it was to a clan with no chief, no land, no gold and no home. His father’s death and empty coffers had sentenced his clan to wander the countryside and rob passersby to survive. Cade had since improved their lot in the three years he had been home by selling his sword and making allies of lairds who paid him in grain, sheep and silver.

His greatest triumph since leaving the Holy Lands: the keep where his clan was housed, albeit for a short time. Had he more gold, he could possess it longer. Robbing travelers kept his kin fed but wasn’t enough to buy them a home, and he had finally agreed to humor the proposal of a wealthy clan chieftain who wished to marry his daughter off to Cade.

Even so, he had not given up hope of finding the gold to allow his clan to remain where they were, close to the seillie’s ancestral lands lost by his wastrel of a father.

The streak of darkness within him, leftover from the Holy Lands, stirred, and black clouds began to form overhead in response.

“Cease yer worry, cousin,” Brian murmured to him.

With his emotions written across the sky, Cade was unable to hide his concern from his cousins. He focused once more on the scene beneath the small hill where his raiding party waited. He was expecting a wagon filled with gold or other precious items.

Instead, there were two people on horseback with not a saddlebag in sight.

“What d’ye want us to do?” Niall crouched beside him. The rugged, muscle bound man was uglier than usual when he frowned.

“Take ‘em to the keep. Perchance we can ransom them, if they ‘ave no gold. I’ll scout behind them t’see if there’s more.” Disappointed, Cade shook his head and climbed to his feet. He easily stood a head taller than the members of his clan. His cousins alone came close to his height. “Englishmen canna be trusted, even in their letters.”

He moved a short distance away from the overlook, where their horses waited, and slung his muscular frame into the saddle of his favorite warhorse, a gelding with a tan coat. “Adam,” he called to the priest.

The robed man did not move, and Cade realized how much the priest had aged recently. He barely saw and heard much anymore.

“Niall, tell the old man t’stay here this time!” Cade said in irritation.

Niall waved to show he heard and tapped the elder on the shoulder.

Wheeling his horse, Cade maneuvered through the forest. The sky had grown dark in response to his agitation. The first rays of morning stretched across the eastern sky, though clouds were racing towards the blue and sun.