Across a Dark Highland Shore (Hot Highlands Romance Book 2) (2 page)

“And sometimes, little one, we dunna need such things as stones and charmed pendants to make our own magic or to bring us love. Ye’d be wise to remember that, too.” He’d smiled at her and ruffled her hair.

A vision of her lovely mum’s face rose next in her mind. “Isobel, my heart, always have hope,” her mum had said, pushing a blonde curl from Isobel’s forehead. “For a person without any hope is like a great, dead oak tree, withered and dark like the barest of winters, unaware that a green spring lies just ahead. Child, dunna be like a person who is dead before they are dead.”

Isobel yelped in pain as something hit her head and she was brought back to the present. She turned, knocking over a cup of whisky on the great table. On the floor at her feet was a small, sharp piece of flint that someone had thrown at her.

She rubbed her scalp and tried to keep the tears from spilling down her cheeks.

“Dirty hag!” one of the drunken men yelled. He was joined by others.

The cup that now lay on its side, its amber contents on the floor, belonged to Bothen, a beast of a man with shoulder-length graying hair, a bushy beard, cruel, dark eyes and bulging arms. He’d declared himself clan leader three days ago by killing two weaker men who had also been keen on taking the honor.

Bothen stared at her as blood from the meat he ate dribbled into his knotted beard. When she stood there mutely, Bothen rose from the great table. He waved the young cup bearer away, a greasy chicken leg in his fat fingers. “Nay. She will do it. Get me another whisky, hag, and be quick about it!”

When she still didn’t move her feet to do his bidding, he shoved her. She would’ve managed to stay on her feet but her sister Glynis stuck out her booted foot and tripped her. Isobel hit the stone floor hard, shielding her fall with her arms.

Laughter seemed to echo around the great hall. Ignoring jabs of pain, Isobel tried to get up but a foot on her back kept her firmly in place in her ignoble position. It belonged to her other sister Forba, who was as stout and ugly faced as Glynis. Both women openly vied for Bothen’s affections though Bothen would never marry either of them. Bothen had already had three wives; all had died mysteriously not long after marrying him. Isobel remembered that before the meal, Glynis had been combing Bothen’s hair beside a window, picking out lice before the winter light faded. Forba had pouted because she’d wanted the task.

“Dirty, worthless hag,” Forba said. “I am no’ afraid of ye.”

“Let me up, Forba. I have no quarrel with ye.” Isobel felt a trickle of blood on her face from where the stone had slashed her tender scalp.

“Nay. I willna. Ye belong
below
the rest of us, slithering on yer belly like a serpent. After all, ye have the Sight. Yer a servant of the devil. They say ye had no mum but sprung like a ragged tooth from a rock. They say yer a
witch
.”

Forba pressed her foot harder onto the small of Isobel’s small back. Isobel could see that the back of her sister’s well-made dress was peat-stained, no doubt from lying on the peat pile while entertaining one of the stable boys. She often bragged of how easy it was to seduce a man by spreading one’s legs, even with a face like her own. “How’s the view down there, shrew?” She cackled.

“I had a mum, Forba. She was kind, as ye will ne’er be. She was killed in a fire, as ye well know. I am no’ a witch! I am yer sister!”

Forba frowned and the heavy, white paint that was caked at the corners of her mouth cracked and split. “Yer no
true
sister of mine,” she hissed. “My father couldna keep his wandering cock from beneath the village whores’ skirts. That doesna make ye my sister.” Little, white flecks of paint from the creases in her angry face floated to the ground like snowflakes beside Isobel’s head. Forba finally took her foot from Isobel’s back and kicked her in the side. It took all of Isobel’s strength not to cry out.

Bothen grew bored and much to the crowd’s delight, covered himself with the dark hide of a bull, the horns and hooves still attached. Forba kept her foot on Isobel’s back as Bothen danced around, lads struck at him with sticks in mock battles, and everyone repeated a Gaelic chant that increased in intensity. The hideous spectacle was surreal and frightening from Isobel’s viewpoint on the floor, and several times Bothen’s heels came perilously close to her head. Once the house and its occupants were blessed, Bothen removed the hide, and it was singed in a vain attempt to bestow purity on the keep.

Glynis now stood next to Forba, her girth straining the fabric of her dark, wine-spilled gown. She leaned down and yanked Isobel’s golden braid so that Isobel had to sit up, clutching her side in pain from where she’d been kicked. Isobel’s hair was neatly woven into a single, glossy braid that hung down her back. It was her pride and joy, for she believed her face was rather ordinary. Many of the Mackinnon clan members had brown eyes the color of heather leaves, whereas Isobel’s were deep green and framed with dark lashes. Her olive skin had a healthy, bronze glow in the summer months from spending time outdoors in the gardens and on the moors, quite the opposite of the women with perfect lily-pale complexions who were content to spend their time indoors sewing, spinning, and cooking.

Glynis’ face was so close that Isobel could smell her sour breath and her sweat. Glynis did not believe in freshening herself with water often, or putting crushed rosemary in her hair to make it sweet-scented. Nor did she wash her hands before and after meals, as was the custom. Och, but she smelled worse than the dung heap in the courtyard. Her nose sat crookedly on her face, giving her a menacing appearance, for when she was a child, it had been broken in a fight with a boy.

Isobel knew that Glynis sometimes used cuttlefish or chalk in an attempt to soften her complexion, and she darkened her lashes with soot, but it didn’t help. Once she’d shaved her eyebrows like the ladies of high fashion, but her face had become even more frightening. One could not simply demand poise and pretty delicacy from a harsh, unkind face. Yet despite her faults, Isobel believed if Glynis could learn to show kindness, it would change her face and she would not be considered so ugly. ‘Twas her cruelty beyond anything else that made her unattractive. Kindness, smiling, laughter—such things transformed a face.
Especially kindness.

“Yer dirty with sin, Isobel. Ye pick herbs and tell future times and have visions and stink of peat. Yer a witch.”

There were loud taunts all about Isobel now, followed by a commotion in the front hall. Glynis did not release Isobel’s hair from her beastly fist as she looked toward the front of the great room, and firelight glinted off the silver rings above her thick knuckles. Isobel wondered where she’d gotten the rings. Had they belonged to one of Bothen’s former wives? Glynis had also dressed her coarse hair with an expensive, red ribbon with delicate, picoted edging; she’d bragged to everyone that it was made of fine Italian silk.

Bothen had forgotten his spilled cup of whisky and now he greeted the villager who’d brought a burning conflagration into the hall, much to everyone’s delight. There was a tradition on Hogmanay—half of a herring barrel was filled with wood shavings and tar and was nailed onto a carrying post. Then it was hoisted onto the burly shoulders of a local villager and the barrel was lit with flame and carried around the village to the keep.

The man carrying it presented a smoldering ember from the barrel to Bothen, to bring good luck to the keep for the year ahead. Everyone cheered. Everyone except Isobel.
There is no more good luck to be had for this clan
.

It was time to carry the burning barrel to a hill near the old stone chapel, set it down, and pile wood until there was a blaze of fire that lit the night with its ferocity. When the barrel finally fell to the ground, it would signal the start of the New Year. The flaming embers would be snatched up by onlookers and used to kindle a special New Year fire at their homes, kept for luck, or sent to family or friends who had moved away.

“Tell my future, witch!” Glynis said. “Tell it
now
!
Shall I marry the handsome and big-pricked Bothen?” She grinned at Bothen, who had returned to demand that his whisky cup be refilled.

Isobel gasped as a vision of Bothen’s last wife floated before her. Grear, a timid and kind woman, was a cousin to Bothen. After they’d married, she cowered whenever he was near. It was Grear’s sweet face Isobel saw now, liberally painted with white paint, and it was twisted in pain. Grear raged and clutched at her throat, gasping for breath, pointing at Bothen. Grear’s face became Glynis’ face before the vision faded.

“I asked ye to tell my future, witch! Will I marry Bothen?”

“Nay, no’ if I marry him first!” Forba cried. “Ye’ve grown far too fat and lazy fer his tastes, ye waddling sow!”

Glynis looked as if she would strike Forba. Isobel felt nothing but contempt for Glynis, who’d shown her nary a kindness, but she’d just seen her death in a vision. And while silence had always been one of her only defenses, she needed to warn her. No one deserved to die a death like that at the hands of a horrible man like Bothen. “Glynis, I tell ye, if ye marry Bothen, ye shall die by poison. Ye shall suffer the same horrible, painful death as his first three wives. He disguised the poison in the white paint they rubbed on their faces.”

There were gasps and murmurs all around. Forba started to scratch at her face. Glynis froze, half-frightened by the sudden intensity in Isobel’s face. The old castle bard, who had been playing loudly during the evening meal and afterward, silenced his clarsach, the clumsy twang of his notes fading into silence.

“Witch, yer accusing me of
murder by poison
?” Bothen sneered. “’Tis a most serious accusation.” He scratched at his natty, tangled beard. “’Tis true I killed two foolish men who vied with me to be leader of this clan. But kill my poor, adoring wives? I’d say ye’d ha’e to
prove
that.”

Glynis frowned in confusion. Fear flickered briefly in her dark eyes before cruelty returned. She smiled at Isobel, but there was no warmth in it. “Ye lie, witch, and most viciously. ‘Tis because ye’ve always hated me. Ye’ve always been jealous of me because I was auld Brodie’s favorite daughter and he ne’er cared a whit for ye. Yer just one of his village whore’s bastards. Ye’ll pay for yer lies. Ye’ll be the one to suffer, no’ me.”

She spat on the floor near Isobel’s face. “Yer own mother died in a fire. Since yer a witch, that would be a fitting death for ye as well. What think ye, Bothen the Handsome? Shall we greet the New Year with a witch burning? Would that be an appropriate punishment for her lies?”

Bothen’s eyes lit with hate. “I will bind her myself. Bring me some rope.” They were close to the great hearth and Bothen wiped the sweat from his craggy brow with his plaid. A skinny deerhound wandered over looking for scraps in the rushes and Bothen lifted his patched, leather brogan and kicked it away. It yelped piteously, and Isobel had another vision. This time she saw Bothen lying on his face, blood pooling and smearing the pristine snow beneath him.

“Bothen, dunna do this! If ye do, ye’ll die by an arrow in yer back. Ye’ll be dead and cold within the hour. Ye willna live to greet the New Year!” An icy tingle raced up Isobel’s spine.
This wasna happening.

She had barely protested when a rope was brought and Bothen lifted her roughly from the floor. He lashed her hands tightly together despite her struggles, and the taunts grew more vicious and depraved.

“Who would dare meddle with
me,
witch? Who would be addled enough to put an arrow in
my
back? How convenient that ye make up lies to try to save yer own scrawny hide.”

Isobel struggled against her ropes. “Nay, ‘tis no lie! I dunna know what it means, but I saw it! I saw yer future if ye go through with this horrible deed...”

Bothen frowned and turned to the crowd. “Mayhap we should cut the hag’s hair? I heard it said that once ye cut a witch’s hair, her power shrivels away.” He pulled a sharp dirk from his boot. “This will do.” He caressed the black-handled blade and it glinted in the firelight. Isobel herself had a black-handled knife in her room, but she used it only for peaceful purposes, such as pulling wild chamomile from the ground in warmer months. Bothen’s knife was different; it held a black aura of killing and death.

“Nay!” Isobel cried. “Nay, dunna! I see yer death within the hour!”

“Listen to the witch beg, plead, and lie,” Glynis snarled. “Yer pathetic. And now, well, Brodie’s no’ here to protect ye. Tell me, sweet half-sister, do ye see yer own flesh burning black and charred within the hour? For it shall be so. Just like yer whore of a mother. Her flesh burned and sputtered, too. She got what she deserved, and so will ye.”

“Glynis of the Fat Arse, be quiet and hold the bitch down,” Bothen said.

Glynis practically purred. “Bothen, ye may well insult my fat arse, but I know how ye like it.”

Bothen squeezed her ample buttocks and laughed as men and women crowded around Isobel and pressed her small form to the floor. Isobel stared at the sooty beams away above her head that echoed with the chatter of the crowd until someone pushed her head to the side. Her cheek rested on rotting rushes. More rotting rushes were kicked into her face and hair, and Isobel gagged. A few women did not jeer, for shame or sympathy or simply because they’d lost so much in the past few months they had no fight left in them. They watched as if they saw nothing, their eyes dead and wooden from pain and loss.