Highlander Betrayed (Guardians of the Targe) (28 page)

J
EANETTE LAY ON
the corridor floor trying to remember how she got there. Her head ached fiercely when she touched it and her hand came away smeared with blood. What had happened to her?

Quickly she surveyed her body for more injuries but other than a tenderness on her backside, and some scrapes on her hands where she must have broken her fall, her head seemed to have the only real wound. She pushed herself up and as she spied the closed door in front of her it all came rushing back.

Rowan. The Targe stone. A sudden fierce pressure like a slap from a hand she could not see, knocking the door into her, shutting her out of the chamber. What had Rowan done?

She got to her feet, pausing only for a second as her vision darkened at the edges, then cleared again. She reached for the latch and pushed but the door resisted.

“Rowan?” she called. “Open the door!”

There was an odd rushing sound from within, but nothing from Rowan. Jeanette pushed the door again, setting her shoulder to it, but still it would not open. The rushing sound grew louder and Jeanette went from irritated to worried.

“Rowan, if you can hear me, try to pull the energy back into you!” she shouted through the thick door. “Try!” She banged on the door with her fist. If Rowan could pull her gift back, even a little bit, Jeanette might be able to get the door open. She banged on the door, harder. “Rowan!”

“Jeanette?”

It was her turn to be startled, but the results were far different.

“You are hurt!” Helen said, dropping her bucket of ashes to the floor as she rushed to Jeanette’s side. “What happened?”

“No time to explain.” Jeanette wiped the trickle of blood from her brow with the back of her hand. “I need help getting this door open. Is Da above?”

“Aye!”

“Fetch him quickly. Tell him—” She did not wish to reveal that Rowan was the new Guardian yet, not until her cousin could bring hope and confidence to the clan instead of danger. “Tell him I am hurt, and that Rowan may be, too.”

Helen sprinted up the stairs without any more questions. Kenneth was roaring down the stairs almost immediately, skidding
to a halt by Jeanette’s side, Helen on his heels. He reached toward Jeanette’s injury but she stopped him.

“I am fine. I need the door opened, Da,” Jeanette said to him. “But it will not budge. Rowan is within.”

Understanding dawned in his eyes. He tested the door, then put his shoulder to it and shoved. It opened, but only a little and Kenneth was hard pressed to keep it from slamming shut again. Jeanette slid through, quickly getting clear of the door this time. She froze at the whirlwind of destruction in the room, rapidly raising her arm to shield her face from flying debris.

Rowan stood just where she had been when Jeanette startled her, the Targe stone raised to the ceiling in her outstretched hands. Wind battered everything in the room except Rowan. The furniture had been displaced, the mattress cover lay in tatters on the floor. The heather that had filled it tumbled in the air, separating Jeanette from Rowan.

Jeanette waded into the vortex but could not reach Rowan. She backed away, sheltering against the wall near the door.

“Rowan! Look at me!” she shouted. Kenneth’s shouts joined hers and finally, slowly, as if she fought the wind, too, Rowan turned her head. Her lips were moving but Jeanette could hear nothing but the raging wind.

Jeanette rifled through all the Targe lore she had in her head but could remember nothing to help in this situation.

“Nicholas,” Kenneth said, his face red from his efforts to keep the door open. “Helen,” he said over his shoulder, “tell the guard I need Nicholas here now! Then fetch Uilliam and Duncan. Jeanette, come out while I can still hold the door.”

“Nay, Da, I shall stay here.”

Kenneth reached through the narrow opening and grabbed her arm, jerking her through the door and into the sudden calm of the corridor. He let the door slam behind him. “Wheesht, Jeanette,” he said to her, though she said nothing. “We cannot risk your life. You are the keeper of the lore, if not the Guardian of the Targe. Rowan will need you.”

“But we cannot leave her in there, Da. She cannot help herself.”

“And neither can we help her. But I believe Nicholas can.”

“Why?”

“He was the one who was able to reach her when she became Guardian. He was able to break her hold upon Elspet when none of us could. I do not understand it. I do not like it, but if he can help Rowan, then we have no choice but to let him.”

Jeanette agreed. “ ’Tis certainly worth a try.”

N
ICHOLAS HAD EXPLORED
every part of the hut that served as his gaol and found no way out. The walls were sturdily built. The door was guarded at all times. It had been a cold night and he had learned to appreciate the usefulness of his plaid, which served as his bed and his blanket quite well. A lass had brought him bannocks and ale to break his fast but he had no appetite for them.

His guard had been relieved by another man before dawn. Nicholas had listened carefully, his ear against the door, as the two spoke briefly, and discovered that Uilliam was leading a group of warriors this morning to search for Archie.

Nicholas itched to get out of the dark, confining space and go with them. But no one had come for him. He was stuck, waiting, captive.

“Let him out! Let him out! Let him out!” a woman’s voice screeched, echoing through the bailey. “The chief says let him out!” she said as she arrived outside the door.

“Uilliam said—” The guard looked from Helen to the door he guarded and back.

“Rowan is in trouble. The chief said to bring him to the tower, and you are to come with him! Open the door! ’Tis no time to waste, man!”

“What sort of trouble?” Nicholas asked as the guard rattled the lock and opened the door.

Helen stood there, wringing her hands. “I do not ken exactly, but Jeanette is injured and something terrible is happening to Rowan. Kenneth said to fetch you. Come!” she said racing toward the tower.

Nicholas took a quick look at the guard, who motioned for him to follow the woman. The two men sprinted after her.

Nicholas exited the stair a floor earlier than he had expected and was shocked at the large bruised lump on Jeanette’s forehead, a cut right in the middle of it. Kenneth scowled at him even as he motioned Nicholas close to the door they stood near. An eerie sound, like wind whistling on a winter’s night, came from behind it.

“Rowan is inside, lad,” Kenneth said. “We cannot get to her. You did, yesterday, in Elspet’s chamber.” He looked over Nicholas’s shoulder where Helen and the guard stood listening, then he looked back at Nicholas with raised eyebrows. Nicholas understood all too well what Kenneth did not want made public.

“I did,” Nicholas said. “I shall do so again.”

Kenneth put a shoulder to the door and shoved with all his might, tendons standing out underneath his skin, his teeth clenched, and a mighty grunt escaping him. The door barely budged.

“Is it barred?” Nicholas asked as he joined Kenneth against the door.

“Not exactly,” the chief said.

With two of them the door moved, but not much.

“Again,” Nicholas said, pushing harder this time. The door opened just far enough for the sound of the wind to hit him. Debris flew through the crack, hitting him in the face. His curiosity turned to fear. “Again!” The door opened further, almost enough for Nicholas to squeeze through, already far enough for him to see the chaos inside the chamber. “Again!” and it opened further still. He squeezed through and let the door slam shut behind him.

Immediately he was battered by wind and bits of he knew not what.

“Rowan!” he called to her. “Love, you must stop!”

He realized the wind was circling her, leaving her in a calm in the center of the storm. He set his back against the wind and fought
against it as he sidled toward her, speaking to her all the time. “Rowan, love, you must fight this. You are strong. You are the Guardian. It is your place to command the Targe. Take command now. Calm this wind.” He repeated himself as he drew closer to her until he thought to step into the calm only to find the chaos stayed upon him, closing in around her, too, sweeping both of them up in the wind until Nicholas could neither see nor hear anything but the windstorm engulfing them.

“Rowan!” he reached for her, pulling her rigid body hard against him, trying to ground her in the physical world. The force she drew scared him, for she seemed lost in it or perhaps even held captive by it.

“Rowan, look at me!” He found her face with his hands and held her nose to nose with him. “Open your eyes! Rowan, you must stop! Do not let it control you.” He kissed her, hoping to rouse her from her trance. “You. Must. Control. It. Open your eyes, love. Look at me. Look at me!”

His fear was mounting with the ferocity of the wind. The door began to shake, banging against its frame. The sharp sound of a window shattering skated on the wind. He ran his hands up her arms, still raised over her head. He tried to pull them down but for all his strength she did not budge. He ran his hands out to hers, but when he tried to touch the stone pain seared through his fingers, throwing him away from her.

He battled the wind back to her side and took her face in his hands again.

“You must not bring down these walls, Rowan. You would not survive and then where would the clan be? Where would I be?” He kissed her again, a veil of her hair falling between their lips. “I have only just found you. I need you to come back to me.” He would not let whatever this force was have her. She was his and he would not lose her.

“She is mine!” he finally yelled into the chaos. “You cannot have her!” He wrapped his arms around her, and tucked his head next to hers, holding her close to his pounding heart. “You are the Guardian of the Targe, Rowan. Your clan needs you. I need you to come back to me, love.”

He did not know what else to do so he held her close, sheltering her from the maelstrom, slowly running his hands up and down her back, hoping, praying, that she would be comforted by his presence and find her way out of whatever darkness she was lost in.

“Rowan?” he whispered, his lips next to her ear. “Rowan? Do not abandon those who count on you. Do not abandon me. I do not ken what I will do if you do not come back to me.”

As if a candle had been snuffed, the wind ceased. All of the airborne debris fell to the earth like raindrops. Rowan collapsed, her arms falling to her sides finally, the Targe stone clattering to the floor. She would have fallen had he not already been holding her tightly against him. He sank to the ground and pulled her into his lap, cradling her there, murmuring nonsense to her as he smoothed her tangled hair away from her face to find tear tracks over her wind-roughened cheeks.

“Kenneth!” he called. The door slammed open, banging against the wall as the chief and Jeanette surged into the chamber.

“Holy mother of God,” Kenneth muttered, taking in the destruction. “Does she live?” he asked, hunkering down next to Nicholas and reaching to touch Rowan’s face. Jeanette knelt on the other side of Nicholas.

“She is breathing,” she said.

For that Nicholas was immeasurably grateful, but Rowan still had not opened her eyes. He could not say how long he sat there, rocking her, talking to her, begging her to awaken, not caring at all that Kenneth and Jeanette were witness to his weakness.

R
OWAN HURT ALL
over, as if fire had licked every part of the inside of her skin. Her head pounded, her joints wept in pain. She dared not move, not so much as an eyelash, for she was certain it would only hurt more.

And yet there was warmth, a gentle rocking, a singsong voice that soothed the pain. “She is mine!” The words rang through her
head and her heart, though she could not recall where she had heard them or even who had said them.

“Rowan, you must wake up. Please, love, open your eyes. Come back to me.”

She heard those words, and the feel of Nicholas pressed against her in the heady kiss they had shared by the loch rushed through her, damping down the pain, making it but an echo of a moment ago. She hung on to that feeling, that pleasure, but she dared not move yet.