The Witch and The Warrior (34 page)

“How can you be so placid about this?” he demanded, his voice rigid with fury. “Someone came into your chamber and left this here to frighten you!”

“What would you have me do, MacDunn?” Gwendolyn challenged, her feigned composure cracking. “All my life people have been leaving objects like this for me. From the time I was a little girl, my own clan would place them on the doorstep of my father's cottage, or toss them through a window, or tie them to a stick and hurl them at me as I walked. Once when I was eleven a boy threw a rough piece of iron at me, which struck me in the head.” She lifted back the thick curtain of her hair, showing him the jagged white scar that marred the edge of her hairline.

“I ran home screaming to my father,” Gwendolyn continued, “with blood pouring down my face and into my gown. I told him I hated everyone in the world except for him, and wished they all would die. And do you know what he did?”

Alex shook his head. He sure as hell knew what he would have done. He would have found the little bastard who struck her and thrashed him until he couldn't sit for a month.

“My father bathed and bandaged my wound, and then he sat and put his arms around me. And as I wept and raged, he told me it was far better to love my enemies than to hate them, and that eventually they would grow ashamed of their cruelties and stop.”

“But they never did,” Alex surmised quietly.

A bitter laugh escaped her throat. “One might think eventually they would at least realize their talismans had no power over me, because I never left. But that didn't stop them from constantly trying to expel me, with their holy relics and their pious prayers and their bags of stinking herbs, rowan branches, bones, scraps of iron, and red wool.” She turned abruptly and hurled the bone with all her might into the hearth. It clattered loudly against the grate before sinking into the cold ashes. Fighting the tears welling in her eyes, Gwendolyn laid her hands against the cool stone of the mantel and bit down hard against her trembling lip.

“I hate this, MacDunn,” she confessed brokenly. “I hate all of it, and I hate being alone to face it. But I have grown so accustomed to the fear and ostracism of others, I don't know what it is to be without it.” Her voice disintegrated into a ragged whisper as she finished, “I never will.”

Her despondency surged over him. Overwhelmed by a need to comfort her, he laid his hands on her small shoulders and turned her around to face him. She did not push him away, but instead stared up at him with wide, pain-filled eyes, like a wounded deer who cannot understand why it has been made to suffer. He wanted to ease her torment, to banish all trace of the loneliness and cruelties she had been forced to endure, and make her see that there was at least one person on this earth who neither feared nor despised her. She was a witch, yes, but he had only seen her use her magic to try to help his son. How could that make her evil? The MacSweens had convicted her of murdering her father, but Alex had long ago known that was a lie. Gwendolyn had loved her father, and his death had left her completely abandoned in a world that was determined to destroy her. If Alex hadn't stolen her for the sake of his dying son, the MacSweens would have succeeded.

And David would be dead tonight instead of sleeping peacefully with his little hand curled beside his freckled cheek.

“Gwendolyn,” he whispered, raising his hand to trace the contour of her jaw, “you are not alone.”

She shook her head. “I am, MacDunn. I always will be.”

“No,” he murmured, lowering his lips until they hovered barely a breath from hers. “Not as long as I live.”

With that solemn pledge he crushed his lips to hers, wrapping his arms around her and hauling her hard against him. He kissed her deeply, ravenously, wanting to lose himself to the pleasure of holding her and kissing her and touching her. Gwendolyn's mouth was soft and dark and wine-sweet, like ripe, sun-warmed fruit, and she smelled of summer meadows and sunlight, a scent that had driven him mad since that first time he had held her. She did not fight him as she had before, not even a little, but instead she whimpered and wrapped her arms around him, seeking the comfort of his hard body against hers. Alex complied by pressing himself against her, feeling her soft form set fire to every inch of his flesh, until his loins were throbbing and his knees were weak. He took her hand and guided it beneath his plaid, then pressed it firmly against the hardness of his thigh. She froze for a moment, her soft palm fixed against him, uncertain. And then she tentatively began to explore him, her fingers drifting up and down, flitting with agonizing curiosity across his burning skin. Up, then down, then up a little more, until finally he thought he would go mad from the need to have her take hold of him. He plunged his tongue deep into her mouth and sank his hand into the depths of her black gown, capturing the forbidden lushness of her breast. Releasing his mouth from hers, he pulled down the silver-embroidered fabric covering her shoulder with his teeth, causing her bodice to crumple to her waist. Then he lowered his head and closed his lips around the sweet peak of her breast, suckling the dark berry of her nipple until it was taut against his teasing tongue.

Gwendolyn moaned with pleasure and threw her head back, offering more of herself to Alex as she explored the smooth curve of his buttocks, the chiseled form of his thighs, the iron ridges of muscle layered across his stomach. He felt as if he had been sculpted from granite, except that he was warm and powerful as he groaned and flexed beneath the gentleness of her touch. His hand was swiftly trailing up her gown, but she was scarcely aware of it until his finger slipped inside her hot wetness just as he suckled hard upon her breast. Hot pleasure tore through her, causing her to cry out. Abandoning her shyness, she closed her hand firmly around the velvety hard length of his manhood. Alex groaned and buried his face into the soft hollow between her breasts, pulsing against her caress as he stroked her with his finger. She opened her thighs wider, offering more of herself to him, and he eagerly complied, pressing his fingers deeper into her with each languid thrust against her hand.

Alex's fingers were bathed in Gwendolyn's sweet wetness and the intricate petals of her flesh were slick and swollen, telling him how much she longed for release. Unable to bear her stroking a moment longer, he sank to his knees and lifted her gown, then pressed his face between the creamy silk of her thighs and began to lap at the rosy hot folds of her. She cried out and gripped his shoulders, struggling to remain upright, and then she sighed and opened herself even further, inviting him to seek out the hottest, deepest recesses of her body. He held her gown to her waist with one hand and cupped her buttocks with the other, pulling her closer to him as he licked and probed every delectable inch of her, inhaling the womanly fragrance of her as he took her closer to the crest of ecstasy.

Gwendolyn stood frozen, clinging helplessly to Alex's massive shoulders as his tongue flitted in and out of her. Her breath was coming in tiny gasps as her heart pounded hard against her chest, until she could almost feel the surge of her blood as it raced through her straining flesh. And still she opened herself wider, pressing herself shamelessly against Alex's mouth as he worshiped her with his tongue, wanting him to taste her faster, deeper, more, wanting it never to end, and yet knowing she could not possibly bear it another moment. She laid her hands against the roughness of his jaw and threaded her fingers into the golden thickness of his hair, holding him to her, experiencing a dark, forbidden thrill at the sight of him passionately lapping at her most intimate place. And then her pleasure began to soar. She gasped and held him even tighter. Alex responded by thrusting his finger deep inside her, filling the hollow ache that had bloomed within. In and out with his finger, up and down with his tongue, stroking and thrusting and kissing until she could no longer breathe, could no longer think, could no longer do anything except stand there clinging to him mindlessly. And still the sensations within her continued to surge and swell, higher, more, and Alex tasted her harder and faster, until suddenly sweet, pure ecstasy exploded through her, and she cried out, her entire being flushed with hot joy as she crumpled limply against him.

Alex held Gwendolyn tightly, stroking her silky hair as her breath feathered through the wrinkled fabric of his shirt and warmed his chest. His own body was hard and aching for release, but the feel of Gwendolyn resting sated in his arms was far too glorious and fragile a moment to relinquish. And so he remained as he was, kneeling upon the cool stone floor with his arms wrapped around her, resting his chin on the top of her head as he listened to her breathing gradually steady. What spell had this tiny witch cast over him, he wondered, that made him so ravenous for her? How was it that she could arouse such staggering passion in him, when no woman had been able to ignite even the flimsiest spark of desire after Flora had died? He wanted her with an intensity that was awesome, and it scarcely seemed to matter when or where. The fact that he had taken her here, in this room where Flora had suffered so hideously for so long, was ample testament to the depravity of his longing.

He closed his eyes, fighting the surge of guilt threatening to engulf him.

A sudden pounding jerked him from his thoughts.

“Alex!” called Brodick. “For God's sake, open the door! We're under attack!”

Alex released his hold on Gwendolyn and sprang to his feet. “Cover yourself,” he said harshly, barely giving her time to adjust her fallen bodice as he flung open the door.

“What's happening?” he demanded.

Brodick and Cameron stared at him in confusion, their fists still pounding against his own chamber door a few feet down the corridor. Their eyes quickly took in his rumpled hair and disheveled attire.

“It's the MacSweens,” explained Cameron, regaining his composure first. “Robert has arrived with an army. They are surrounding the castle wall.”

“How many?” Alex hastily adjusted his plaid.

“It looks like about two hundred,” Brodick replied, “but there could be more waiting in the woods.”

“Anyone left in the cottages?”

“No,” Cameron assured him. “Garrick was out looking for his dog and spotted some of Robert's men as they assembled on the east hill. He alerted everyone as he ran up to the castle, and they quietly made their way through the gate.”

“Cameron, tell Robena and Marjorie to take all the women and children into the storerooms on the lower level,” Alex ordered. “Have five warriors stand guard over them. Bordick, make certain the towers are adequately manned, and place three lines of thirty warriors each in the courtyard to wait for Robert should he breach the gate. Then both of you join me on the wall head. We will fight this battle from the higher level, and end it long before Robert and his men have a prayer of entering the castle itself. Move!”

The two warriors instantly went to carry out his orders.

Alex returned to find Gwendolyn standing before the hearth, contemplating the bone half buried in the ashes.

“So,” she murmured, “he has finally come for me.”

“Fetch David and take him to the storeroom with the other women and children. You will be safe there.”

“Safe?” she repeated, her voice mocking. She turned to face him. “Your people despise me, MacDunn. They want me either gone or dead, and Robert has just arrived to fulfill both those desires. Do you honestly believe your clan will fight to keep me here?”

“They will do as I say,” Alex assured her. “I am laird.”

“They think you are mad. They thought you were mad for bringing me here and entrusting your son to me, and they will certainly think you mad for risking their lives to protect me. They can see that David is faring better and does not need me anymore. Why should they sacrifice themselves to protect a witch?”

“I have no time for this,” Alex growled, exasperated. “Get my son and take him below!”

Gwendolyn shook her head. “I will not hide, nor will I ask your people to protect me against their will. They did nothing to provoke this attack. This is my battle, MacDunn, not theirs.” She began to move toward the door.

Alex grabbed her shoulders with brusing strength, holding her fast. “Listen well, Gwendolyn. You will take my son below and you will stay there, do you understand?”

“Can you not see this is a battle that cannot be won? Robert will not rest until he has made me prisoner once more. Why force your people to suffer and die because of me?”

“Because I protect what is mine!”

“But I am not yours, MacDunn.” Gwendolyn's gray eyes snapped fire. “I belong to no one!”

She was trembling beneath his grasp, whether from fury or fear he could not be certain. She seemed achingly beautiful to him in that moment, with her ebony veil of hair spilling wildly over the pale silk of her shoulders, and the faint flush of pleasure still coloring her exquisitely sculpted cheeks.

“You're wrong, Gwendolyn.” He released his grip on her shoulder to gently trace his fingers along the graceful curve of her chin. He crushed his mouth against hers, stifling any further protest. Then he pulled away and regarded her sternly. “Swear to me that you will take my son to the lower level with the other women and children.”

“Your people do not want to fight this war, and Robert will grant them no mercy.” She lowered her gaze, unable to face him as she finished in a tear-choked whisper, “They will be slaughtered.”

Alex cupped her chin in his hand and tilted her head up to face him. “Have faith, Gwendolyn. My people
will
be able to stand against Robert.” He released her and strode toward the door. “I trained them myself, you know.”

He studied her a final moment, then disappeared into the corridor.

Gwendolyn stood alone, listening to the first cries of battle tear through the night.

And then she raced from the chamber to fetch David.