Captured by the Pirate Laird (29 page)

Planks
clattered to bridge the gap between the ships. Ruairi was the first to dash
across.

“I
thought ye’d never arrive,” Calum said without looking back. “I’ve nearly got
them licked.”

“We
followed the galleon’s wake down the sound.”

“Aye?”

Ruairi
pushed through and charged down the steps, beating down the tiring English.
With a wave of fresh Scotchmen flooding across, Calum stopped and scanned the mayhem.
Wharton was nowhere in sight. Calum raced along the main deck, slashing his
sword as he ran toward the bow of the ship. He crashed through the portal to
the officer’s quarters, barreled down the corridor and pressed his ear to the
captain’s cabin door.

Someone
moved within. Calum’s gut clenched with hate. Memory of his naked body being stretched
on the rack seared through his mind. A low growl erupted from the back of his
throat. Calum kicked in the door.

Wharton
stood behind the table, a sword in one hand and a spiked mace swinging on a
chain in the other. Wharton chuckled. “You’ve come to allow me to carry out
your sentence, have you, Scot?”

Calum
crept forward. “I’ve come to cut yer throat.”

“Before
I disembowel you, tell me...” Wharton narrowed his eyes. “Where is my wife?”

Calum’s
heart squeezed at the mention of Anne and he blinked. Where was she? Wharton
didn’t know? Calum rounded the table, training his claymore on the baron’s
heart. “She’s no’ in Carlisle?”

Wharton
sidestepped—a quick move for such a large man. “I assumed your men had spirited
her away.
You
obviously would have
been unable to do it given your physical state.” Calum’s eyes followed him as he
scooted around the cabin. “It appears you’ve recovered from my hospitality. I
should have finished you on the whipping post.”

Wharton
reached up and grasped the edge of the desk. Using his weight, he pulled it
forward. Books tumbled and crashed to the floor as it toppled. Calum jumped
aside and it smashed into the table.

Calum
wanted blood. With a roar, he leapt over the wooden splinters and swung his sword,
aiming for the heart. Wharton proved skilled with a blade and deflected the
blow, following it with a slam of the mace. Bone crunched as the iron spikes
imbedded in Calum’s flesh. Searing pain incensed him. He swung up with his
dirk. Wharton countered. They fought, swords clashing. Calum thrust his dirk
for a killing blow, but the bastard had a keen eye and lithe feet. Calum
slashed a cut through Wharton’s arm only to be met with the iron prongs of a
mace to his thigh.

Calum’s
muscles burned. He’d been fighting for ages while Wharton hid in the cabin. Ruairi’s
voice boomed from the doorway. Wharton glanced away. Calum moved in for a blow
to his heart. Wharton deflected the claymore but it gashed the big man’s side.
He fell backward and flung the mace out. The chain wrapped around Calum’s arm.
Wharton crashed into the glass windows. Glass shattered, and Wharton’s bulk
pulled Calum through the gaping hole. Airborne, Calum twisted and wrenched his
arm from the mace before he hit the water. Wharton bellowed, his hands grasped for
Calum as if he could stop the baron’s fall.

Ice
cold water gripped Calum’s lungs, ripping his breath away. The impact pulled
the sword from his hand. Calum clenched his fist around his dirk. Kicking, his
lungs screamed with the need to breathe as he fought his way to the surface. His
mind spun and his head twitched with his need for air. Stars crossed his vision.
His consciousness flicked out and in. He burst through the waves and gasped,
heaving in the salty air.

His
vision cleared. He spun full circle. Wharton had not yet surfaced. A piece of
wood bobbed in the water, and Calum swam to it. He again scanned the waves for
Wharton, but the sight of flames leaping from the castle yanked his mind from
his obsession for vengeance.

Wharton
broke through the frigid water, wheezing and gasping. He’d never been this cold
in his life. Even the chill of chasing Highlanders through the snow had not
sucked the life out of him like this frigid sea.

He’d
lost his weapons when he’d slammed into the water. Hitting with his back, the
water slapped him like falling onto a sheet of ice. His skin stung. The current
pulled him rolling over and over. In the dark, he lost his orientation, and it
was only by the grace of God his head had surfaced.

He
floated on his back and let the current pull him southwards away from the
ships. From what he could see, the English ship was lost, going down in a heap
of flames. Denton was his last hope.

Wharton
shivered. He recalled the Scot’s face when he’d asked the heathen about Anne. The
Highlander had looked too shocked for it to be a lie. The man knew nothing of
Anne’s whereabouts.

Something
hit Wharton’s head with a hollow wooden thud. Rubbing away the pain, he looked
up.
A boat
. He reached up and pulled
himself around to the side. Holding on, the skiff nearly capsized as he swung
his leg up. Clutching the far side with all his strength, he rolled into the
boat. Water sloshed in the bottom of the skiff and he lay there and stared at
the black clouds.

If
Anne was not with the Scot, where was she? Had she gone back to Southampton?
Who had assisted her? Surely she could not have escaped without help. He
coughed. Denton would find her if he had to force the man to spend the rest of
his miserable life tracking the wench. Wharton would pay the henchman. And then
Lady Anne would pay for the embarrassment she had caused him—with her lovely flesh.

***

Anne
crouched in the boat, trembling as a cold wind swept across them. She
shuddered. The burning English galleon sat low in the water, and the
Sea Dragon
listed to one side.

The
rumble of war and fire was deadened by the scraping of the fourth ship’s hull
against the English. Anne gasped. Was it the enemy? If an English ship, Calum
would have no chance.

Dougal
MacKenzie’s deep voice roared over the tumult. “’Tis Ruairi from Lewis. I’d
recognize that pennant anywhere.”

Anne
saw the blue and white lion fluttering in the firelight. Calum’s infamous brother
had come. She scanned the confusion aboard the English galleon and thought she
saw Calum running across the deck, claymore in hand. The skiff had traveled
about half the distance to the ships and the fighting was more discernable now.

The
clouds parted and streams of moonlight shone down, reflecting against the black
water. Acrid smoke swirled above them, pushed by the breeze. An empty skiff
bobbed in the distance—a peaceful remnant of the frantic scene on the sinking
ship ahead.

Anne
jolted in her seat when two men crashed through the window at the bow of the English
galleon. She watched them plunge into the sea and Rorie’s hand grasped her
shoulder. “We’re nearly across. The English ship will be lost soon and all will
be adrift.”

Anne
nodded and looked toward the shore. The keep loomed a dark silhouette against
the night sky, until a bonfire ignited the outer bailey gate. Blazing arrows
soared over the baily walls. With a wave of dread that made her teeth chatter, Anne
pictured Mara and all the other women and children who were within. Soon smoke
would engulf them.

“Row
faster!” she shouted.

***

Calum
slipped his dirk into his belt and kicked toward the shore. Sea salt burned the
wounds in his side and leg, but he bore down and blocked it from his mind. The
English soldiers were already upon the keep. The men he sent to guard it would
need reinforcements soon. The roar of battle still raged on the English ship.
He looked back over his shoulder. Ruairi’s ship was launching skiffs. Good.
They had seen the fires ignite up at the castle.

Calum’s
strength bled out of him, sapped by the frigid water. Raised island tough, he
could withstand the cold longer than most, but he wasn’t impervious to it. His
muscles weighed him down like lead as he leaned more weight onto the wooden board
under his chest and used his arms and legs to push himself to shore.

The
warmer water of the shallows welcomed him. Until his ears rang from a blast. Over
his shoulder, a powder keg exploded on the English ship. She was going down
fast in a shower of flames. A giant wave crashed over him, sending his body in
a spiral to the depths. He hit the sandy bottom and used his legs to spring up.
His head shot through the surface only to be pummeled by another angry swell,
but he swam into it this time.

Men
swam toward the shore, bellowing for help, reaching for anything that floated
to help them battle the icy cold. The clash of swords on deck transitioned to a
fight for survival. Garbled cries erupted from those who could not swim and
shrieks of stabbing, icy pain echoed from those who could.

Calum
scanned the chaos. A skiff laden with men rowed away from the wreckage. It sat
low in the water with its human cargo. But the sailors in the water saw a
chance for rescue and swam to it, clamping onto the boat’s edge. Calum swore he
heard Dougal MacKenzie’s deep bass voice bellow across the sound. “Let go, ye
bastards, ye’ll capsize us all!”

The
freezing men paid him no mind and tried to pull their bodies over the side. The
boat tipped and swung back. A high-pitched scream carried on the wind. More
swimmers arrived, all trying to board. The boat flipped and a woman’s scream
was muffled by a dousing of icy water.

Anne
.

Shards
of ice cut through his gut.
I cannot
swim.
Anne’s words filled his head. Calum let the lifesaving piece of wood
slip from under him as he swam back into a sea of utter confusion.

***

The
whole sky exploded with the blast from the English galleon. Bodies sailed through
the fire lit air with legs and arms flailing in futile attempts grasp at
anything that would stop them from rocketing toward the sea. Blood curdling
screams chilled Anne’s bones as helpless men thrashed, hitting the water with
painful slaps and dunking splashes as if human cannonballs had been launched.

Anne
clutched her fists under her chin. Had Calum been caught in the blast? Was he
one of the men now fighting for his life? Or…or was he one of the dead? She closed
her eyes.
Dear God, please no
.

Rorie
and the men tried to steer the skiff away from the mass of splashing men. Many
had started swimming to the shore, but others were flailing, drowning. Anne
turned to Rorie. “We must help them.”

“The
boat is already overfull. We cannot take even one more. Our best option to help
them is to make the shore quickly and push the skiff back out.”

Anne
didn’t like the answer, but could see no other choice. She gripped the edge of
the skiff with determination. The fires on Brochel burned brighter. Rorie and
his guard were needed there now.

The
remains of the English galleon slipped into the sound with a loud groan
followed by a deathly sucking rumble. A mob of swimmers advanced on the skiff.
Their icy fingers grabbed for hers and Anne pulled her hands back with a shriek.

Dougal
MacKenzie batted one man away with his oar. “Let go ye bastards, ye’ll capsize
us all.”

But
it was too late. Dozens of men reached for the edge of the skiff and tried to
climb aboard. The boat teetered up and slapped down. Anne grabbed for Rorie’s
arm and screamed. The capsized swimmers grew frantic and slapped at each other
to gain a hold on the tiny boat. In a flash, Anne’s body hurled from the skiff.
Shrieking, she curled into a ball and hit the water with a splash.

A
million needles stabbed her flesh. Icy water enveloped her. She opened her
mouth to cry out and salty water flooded in, burning her throat and lungs. Arms
and legs lashing out, she fought for the surface. Her head shook as her body
screamed with the need for air.

Blackness
surrounded her. Anne strained to pull herself upward. She shot through the
surface coughing up salt water. She gasped a breath of air just as her body again
sank under the surface. She reached out, desperately trying to grab for
anything to keep her afloat. She felt something—an arm—and grabbed it. With a
jerk, the arm yanked away. A hand reached out and pushed her down.

Anne’s
lungs shuddered with the need for air as she sank deeper into the icy sea. Her
limbs dragged against her straining muscles. She needed to see Calum. She was
so close, she couldn’t let the sea claim her now. With renewed effort she
kicked her legs and stretched for the glowing surface above her.

Blackness
clouded her vision. The more she fought, the deeper she sank into the cold
depths. She reached her hands up. This could not be the end.

Something
grabbed her from behind. Anne wanted fight, but her limbs had lost their strength.
She could barely move. The world spun. Then her head broke the surface. She
sucked in a lifesaving gasp of air.

“You’re
going to be all right, lass.”

Calum!
He wrapped his arm around her torso. She tried to speak but only coughed up
salty water.

“We’re
nearly there now.” His soothing voice calmed her as she heaved in and out
sucking in sweet air.

As
her coughing ebbed, she tried to talk through her quick breaths. “Ca-lum.
You…you…are alive!”

“Aye,
and so are you.”

“I-I…”

“Save
yer breath. I’ve almost got ye to the shore.”

Calum
cradled her in his arms as he staggered onto the beach. Anne had never been so
happy to be on dry land. He carried her to the pile of driftwood where the
Beltane festival had been and set her down. “Hide here. I must defend the
keep.”

Anne’s
teeth chattered. “I-I want to go with you.”

“Nay.
No one will find ye here. We’ll make quick work of the English scoundrels and
I’ll be back for ye.”

Calum
squeezed her tight and kissed her fiercely. Turning away, he sped up the hill.
Anne scanned the beach. Sodden men stumbled from the surf, sputtering and
coughing. Some knelt upon the smooth stones, catching their breath—others lay
face down, lifeless, pushed only by the surf.

***

Calum
hated to leave Anne alone, but he could not turn his back on his people. Jaw
set, he pulled the dirk from his belt and called to the men who littered the
beach. “Use any weapon ye can find! To the keep, men.”

An
English sailor looked up at him and rolled to his side. Calum planted his feet
and pointed his dirk at the man’s throat. “Stay down and ye’ll be spared. The
sailor exposed his bare palms in front of his face, signaling his surrender.

Calum
hesitated and surveyed the beach. Ruairi had fought through the surf, claymore
in hand. Leave it to his brother to hold onto his weapon. “Go—save yer keep. Me
men will defend the beach.”

“Thank
you.”

Pain
thrumming across his skin, wet clothes clung to his skin as Calum raced for the
path leading to Brochel. John fell in beside him. “I kent I should have stayed
with the keep.”

“I
dunna want one pillager left standing.”

“Aye,
and as I said afore, if they touch our women, I’ll cut off their ballocks and
stuff them down their throats while they’re still alive.”

Calum
ran up the hill, ignoring his wounds and the sharp burn of his muscles. He
could not tire. At the top, fire still smoldered at the wooden gates. The
bodies of English soldiers skewered by arrows littered the ground. His gaze
darted to the bailey walls. The women were gone—he knew they would have fled to
the hidden chamber behind the solar.

He
crept forward and nabbed a cutlass from a dead man. John did the same. With a
running leap, Calum barreled over the flames and raced to the great hall. A dim
fire from the hearth illuminated the brawl of shadowed figures fighting to the
death.

John
and Ian shot past him and charged up the stairwell. MacLeods followed Calum, armed
with wood axes, fishing nets and sturdy driftwood. Some had been lucky enough
to find discarded cutlasses and knives. They poured into the hall and Calum eyed
his target. Black hair, gaunt face, with his teeth bared in a murderous scowl,
Denton clashed with William MacLeod, pushing the Scotsman back, clearly toying
with him.

Calum’s
gut clamped into a rock hard ball. He could no longer feel the cold from his
wet clothing nor feel the burns and stings of his wounds. With a fevered stare,
he curled his lip over his teeth. Fire surged through his limbs. He roared and
broke into a run.

Denton
drew his sword back for the killing plunge. His blade sliced forward. Calum
leapt the remaining distance and deflected the blow with the cutlass just as Denton’s
sword tip skimmed William’s midsection.

Whipping
his weapon back, Denton snapped his glare to Calum. “You? Wharton should have
let me rip your limbs from your body on the rack.”