Highlander Enchanted(69)
The wagon lurched, and Cade peered through holes in the canvas covering at a grey sky. His seillie magic danced within him as it did each day at twilight. He counted how many times his sorcery had danced within him since he was captured.
Three nights. His magic had turned the two day trip into three at least. Was it long enough for his cousins to prepare his people? Were they close to the MacCosse lands or not yet arrived?
The voices of men outside the sheltered space came from the rear, and the snap of a whip from afore. Another lurch, and the wagon broke free from the mud trapping its wheels.
They moved forward at a crawl. He listened to ensure the men were gone before beginning to test his body.
He had little strength – but the fever was gone. His wounds had begun to heal. In the Saracen dungeon, he had grown accustomed to counting the days before an injury was no longer a threat to one’s life. The bad wound in his stomach was grown over with skin yet sensitive to the touch, as was the wound in his thigh.
I am in no danger of death, he decided.
Restless for knowledge, he nudged the healer with his foot. The man remained asleep, so Cade pushed him harder.
Bleary, bloodshot eyes opened, and the healer righted himself. “You are not dead,” he observed in a bland voice telling of his exhaustion.
“Not yet,” Cade said with a grunt. “Where are we?”
“I doona ken. Close, I believe,” came the tired reply. The healer pushed himself up and went to Cade’s side. He checked the bandages and felt Cade’s head. “I saw the sea ‘fore I slept.”
Cade was relieved to learn his magic was protecting his clan, even if he was unable to.
“Ne’er seen so much rain this season,” grumbled the healer. “Yer healing and no longer fevered. No infections. I must inform Laird Duncan.”
“Can ye not wait?” Cade asked quickly.
“’Tis yer head or mine.” The healer pushed off the canvas covering and exposed Cade to the fading light of evening filtering through a thick layer of clouds.
Determined not to confront Laird Duncan on his back, he maneuvered into a sitting position then stood. The walls of the wagon reached his waist, and he breathed in the scent of rain, ocean and earth.
The healer leapt out of the back of the wagon and navigated through the mud to the bank of the road.
Cade carefully observed the columns of men behind and then afore him. The wagons were struggling to traverse the mud, and many men were walking their horses on higher ground rather than keeping to the road. He spotted Richard’s knights and the tartans of the different clans supporting Laird Duncan’s attempt to overtake the Highlands. Farther ahead, men had begun to circle wagons and horses as they marked where they would sleep the night.
The longer he stood, the more concerned he became.
His clan had a dozen warriors, if that, and with the MacDonald’s perhaps double the number.
Laird Duncan marched with hundreds of men.
He glimpsed the grey waters of the ocean as they rounded a hill. The wagon he rode in was pulled off the road to the side and stopped beside several more. Servants and warriors alike were unloading supplies from the neighboring wagons.
Having never visited the MacCosse lands, Cade had no way to know if the expanse of hills beside the ocean was his or not or how far they were from his clan. Niall and Brian would have arrived midway through his imprisonment, assuming they road quickly and were not troubled by the storms.
Dizziness crept up upon him as he stood, and Cade knelt in the back of the wagon. He closed his eyes, bowed his head, and rolled his stiff shoulders back. He was sore and weak – but alive. In such a state, it was difficult for him to ignore the whispers of madness, the slithering of unseillie magic in his blood. Both fed off his worry and the knowledge his kin were vulnerable to the army Laird Duncan brought to crush them.
He meditated in silence, centering his thoughts and stilling his magic. Thunder grumbled in the distance. He debated attempting to control it before deciding his strength was best used to try to escape, once he discovered where he was. His mind went to Isabel, and he prayed his cousins were able to find her and protect her as well as the rest of his kin.
Dark magic strained to be free when he thought of her in danger, of her falling ever again beneath Richard’s fist. If he had learnt anything between the bouts of fever, it was that she was not a prisoner of Duncan or Richard’s. The English knight was too angry for him to possess the woman whose lands he intended to claim.
When he opened his eyes, twilight had faded into night and bonfires lit the flat area between two hills where many of the men were resting.
Cade recognized Duncan’s booming voice before the chieftain reached his wagon. He tensed, disturbed by his weakness when he needed strength.
The back of the wagon slammed open. Cade made no effort to resist the two men who grabbed him and roughly hauled him out of the wagon. They forced him to his knees before Laird Duncan and Lord Richard, whose armor was muddied from travel.
“Yer alive!” Laird Duncan sounded happy.
“’Twill be an honor to destroy your clan tomorrow,” Lord Richard added coldly. “Shall I tell you what I plan to do to your wife?”
Cade forbade himself from reacting though lightning slashed the sky nearby. He needed them to believe he was weaker than he was and posed no danger. The less they feared him, the easier he could fight them.
“These tempests are maddening,” Richard complained with a look at the sky.