Page 8 of Bride of Mist
Her chest ached.
Her eyes filled with tears.
But while everyone else crowded around, exclaiming in awe and relief—murmuring over Hallie, sighing over Colban and the power of love—Feiyan backed away, trembling.
Not with fear now. But with rage.
An intruder had burst into her world.
Threatened the ones she loved.
Rained destruction and mayhem down on her clan.
Nearly stolen her cousin from her.
He must pay.
Shewould make him pay.
As she retreated, separating herself from the crowd, her gaze alit on a great sword abandoned on the field, sharp and bloody and damning. His claymore.
The fiend had left it behind.
Feiyan tucked hersaisaway and quietly picked up the strange blade. She studied the hilt. The crossbar was carved with an insignia. A great oak tree with a single word below it. She traced a finger over the letters. Mac DARRAGH.
She had the savage’s name.
With that, she could hunt him down.
Urramach chewed up the muddy road at neck-breaking speed. Branches whipped at the horse’s sides. Trees passed in a blur. Every impact of hoof on sod sent a shudder through Dougal’s chain mail. And a shiver through his soul.
The wind rushed by his ears, whispering the harsh accusation.
Murderer.
No matter how fast he rode, Dougal couldn’t outrun the truth that pursued him. He couldn’t escape what he’d just done.
Never had he imagined the moment of sweet reckoning would turn so bitter.
Never had he imagined, when he finally reached the mac Giric’s stronghold, three days of pent-up hunger for vengeance would erupt in violence so overwhelming, it would render him blind. With his head swimming in a blood-red miasma of rage, he’d surged forward into the heart of danger like a wild animal. Slashing with his sword again and again. Hacking, breaking, destroying everything in his path.
For one glorious instant on the field of battle, holding his blade aloft, he’d felt like an avenging angel. Felt his ache for justice rewarded. Felt the weight of all the souls he’d lost at Kirkoswald lifted from his shoulders. Doing God’s work, he’d sliced through the ranks of the mac Giric devils. Punishing them with an eye for an eye.
He meant to continue until he cut down every last one of them or died in the attempt. At least then he’d know he’d done everything he could to make things right.
Then he struck the woman.
The pale beauty of her face and the golden spill of her hair as she fell to the ground reminded him of the ones he’d left behind. The fallen lasses. The silenced children. The ones he’d been too late to save.
And when the woman’s innocent lips exhaled their last breath, the red haze had suddenly lifted from his eyes.
Bloody hell. What was he doing?
A shuddering had begun deep inside him then.
Not fear.
Not revulsion.
