Page 140 of Bride of Ice
“Wait!” he shouted to the maids before they could leave. “Give the lad the bath he deserves. He’s cold and miserable.” He dug in his pouch of silver and pressed a coin into each of their hands. “Buy him a new set of clothes and send him home to his ma. Tell her she’s never to speak to Sir Geoffrey again.”
Geoffrey was gaping at him like a landed trout.
Colban should have left him like that. But his outrage, combined with the ale he’d consumed, compelled him to pay back the torment Sir Geoffrey had visited upon God knew how many innocent victims.
While the maids pulled Robbie to safety, one of them covering his eyes, Colban fought back for all the lads who couldn’t fight for themselves.
Drawing back his fist, he plowed it into Geoffrey’s aristocratic nose, which bloomed instantly with blood. He followed up with a punch to the man’s scrawny belly, folding him in half. What he did after that, he only saw through a miasma of fury. But soon the fretful sobs of the maids shook Colban from his rage, and he realized the man wheezing on the floor with the ruined face and the battered body was no longer capable of fighting back.
“If ye e’er traffic in innocents again,” Colban bit out, “I’ll finish what I started.”
He dragged the useless coward out of the room and left him gasping in the corridor.
“Take care o’ the lad,” he reminded the maids, taking one last pitying glance at Robbie, who reminded him far too much of Ian.
Then he swept up his satchel of belongings and his claymore, hurried down the stairs, and left the inn by the southbound road.
He wasn’t worried about Hallie. She could handle herself.
What made his stomach knot with fear was the thought of her little brother in the company of such a monster. Sweet, naïve Ian could be so easily tricked. So easily misled. So easily persuaded.
He had to get to Rivenloch. He only hoped he wasn’t too late.
Chapter 36
“I’m going to show Archie the old crannog,” Ian announced as he leaned over the wattle fence enclosing the practice field.
Hallie was currently indisposed, straddling an upstart knight who was flat on his back, a cocky youth who had thought he could best her with a blade. Her palm was on his chest. His blade and shield were halfway across the field. And her dagger was at his throat.
She glanced up through the morning mist. Archie stood beside Ian, staring at her, aghast.
She sighed and let the knight up. Perhaps one day her husband would recognize that she was a real warrior maid with real warrior skills. It was her duty to keep those skills honed. She would have hoped, after three months of marriage, he would be accustomed to seeing her engaging in swordplay.
“The crannog?” she asked. “Why?”
A remnant from ancient times, the crannog had once been a home for her ancestors. A round wooden cottage on stilts, perched over the loch, it was half rotted away now and made a good place for fishing. Trout liked to shelter in the shadowy depths, among the sodden timbers.
“Archie said he wants to do an experiment,” Ian said, an admission that made her husband blush.
“Aye,” Archie rushed to explain, hefting up a fishing pole. “We’re going to find out what kind of bait works best.”
Hallie arched a brow. In winter? It wasn’t the best time of year for fishing. Few trout would rise from the icy depths of the loch to snap at bait.
But she didn’t want to discourage the only friendship Archie had forged within the clan. And Ian was enthused about showing Archie the crannog.
“Be wary in the mist,” she warned, speaking mostly for Archie’s benefit. “You don’t want to fall in. The loch is nigh frozen. And those timbers aren’t going to last forever.” On the other hand, the crannog had been there for hundreds of years. It might well last for hundreds more.
“Don’t worry about us,” Archie said. “We’ll be back by supper.”
As she watched them disappear into the thick fog, hand in hand, she wished she could so easily cultivate the warmth Ian had for Archie. But then Ian was still a child. His affections were easily won by the slightest bit of attention.
The last man who’d given Ian such attention had disappeared without so much as a farewell. At least this one would stay.
Colban, driven by fear, fury, and the need to champion the helpless, traveled for two days without sleep to reach Rivenloch. The weather seemed determined to thwart him. Last night, heavy rains had drenched his wool cloak and caked his boots with mud. Today the world was robed in layers of fog as thick as a burial shroud, with branches of ashes and elms emerging from the mist like charred bones.
His feet were blistered. His shoulders were weary. His lungs ached. But his sore and gritty eyes burned with the fire of valor and vengeance.
His arrival at Rivenloch castle naturally caused a stir. Isabel was the first to see him.
