Highland Outlaw (Campbell Trilogy #2)(26)

“What are you doing?”

“The whisky will help wash away the poison.”

Lizzie had heard of this but never seen it done. Having splashed claret on an open cut before by accident, she couldn't imagine … it would be excruciating. “Are you sure this is necessary?”

“I've seen it help, my lady,” Robbie added.

Lizzie swallowed and braced herself. “Do it.”

Patrick's eyes opened as a guttural cry emitted from deep in his lungs. The sound cut her to the quick. His guardsmen held him down, but it was horrible to watch as his body twisted with pain. Finally, after what seemed an interminable time, he stilled.

The healer took out the needle and fine silk thread. “This is going to take a while. I need you to hold the wound closed as I stitch it together.” She looked to the guardsmen. “You'll need to keep him very still. The tissue around the wound is tender and will cause him a great deal of pain.”

Lizzie felt as if she didn't breathe for an hour, every inch of her body on edge as the healer worked down the gash methodically. It was a long, painstaking process that taxed every ounce of her strength. When the healer was finished, they applied a salve and a fresh linen bandage over the wound.

“I don't understand how he walked around for weeks with a wound like that. It must have pained him something fierce,” the healer said, shaking her head.

“The captain doesn't feel pain like most men,” Robbie said admiringly. “He's endured far worse.”

“Aye,” added one of the older warriors. “See that right there?” He pointed to a round scar on Patrick's shoulder. “Took a hagbut shot in his sword arm and fought for hours afterwards.”

Lizzie clamped her lips tightly together. “Everyone feels pain,” she said. “Some are just too blasted stubborn to admit it.” Now the men gaped at her as if she'd blasphemed. “I'll make sure to tell your captain exactly that when he wakes up.”

Gazing at the handsome but incredibly pale face of the man lying on the pallet, she prayed she had the opportunity to give him that piece of her mind.

He didn't want to remember.

Patrick struggled against the images, against sleep, but the dream kept coming. Faster now. Barreling toward him with the force of an avalanche. There was nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. He couldn't escape the memories …

Of a deep sleep and the sweet sound of his mother's voice sifting through his dreams.

Except that it hadn't been a dream.

“Wake up, Patty! Get dressed. Hurry, my love.”

His mother's voice, he realized, except that it didn't sound like her at all. His mother was happiness and light, not anxiety and terror. He opened his eyes. Her pale face lit by a single candle appeared like an apparition floating in a sea of black.

He knew from her expression that something was wrong. Terribly wrong.

A cry tore through the night from outside: “They're coming!”

Campbells. The Campbells were coming for them.

He remembered the bitter taste of fear. And the shame. He was ten years old. Almost a man. He shouldn't be scared. He was a warrior like his father. And like his father one day, he would be chieftain to his cousin Alasdair Roy.

He could still feel her hand cradling his face with tenderness. Could still see the green eyes that mirrored his own, gazing at him so lovingly. “I need you to be brave, my love.” She'd known—she always knew what he was feeling. “Take your brothers and run deep into the forest. Hide there until someone comes to get you when it's safe.”

He didn't want to go. The forest was haunted and rife with faeries.

But he hid his fear and nodded. “But what about you?”

“I'll not leave your father. Don't worry.” She pressed her hand on his face. “Annie and I will be safe.”

His mother was a Campbell born. Sister to the Laird of Glenorchy, the man who'd sworn to clear the MacGregors from their land.

He shook his head mulishly. “I won't leave you.”

“You must,” she said sternly, more sternly then she'd ever spoken to him. “I need you to take care of your brothers. I'm counting on you.”

And he could not—would not—disappoint her.

In his dream he wanted to argue, wanted to beg her to come with them, but his dream wouldn't listen. So he'd left his mother behind, taking the sword that she'd given him— a real one of steel, not of wood like he normally used—and ran, leading the seven-year-old Gregor and five-year-old Iain into the trees until he thought his lungs would burst.

He'd gone about a mile before he remembered his badge. The chieftain's badge his father had just given him. The badge that had been passed down in his family for generations. “Guard it well, my son.” His legacy. The symbol of his clan. He wanted to throw up with shame. How could he have forgotten it? His father had trusted him; he couldn't let him down.

It doesn't matter! Patrick shouted to the boy in his dream. But the boy couldn't hear him. The boy thought nothing was more important to him than the badge.

God, how wrong he was.

Patrick left his brothers with a stern warning for them not to move and turned back for his treasured badge.

He smelled the smoke first. It filled the night with a black, thick haze, burning his throat as he ran toward the keep. He was running harder now, the heavy sword etching a deep line in the dirt beside him.