Page 70 of Highland Crown
CHAPTER20
Rouse the lion from his lair.
—Sir Walter Scott,The Talisman
Like a flowing river of humanity, the marchers swept out of the city into the fields beyond. And Isabella finally knew she was no outsider. She was part of this. Part of the thousands moving together, breathing together, marching together. Her heart beat as one with the crowds. She was with the old tanner, his face lit with the possibility of change. With the schoolmaster, his lads at his heels, wide-eyed and expectant. With the mother, holding her babe in her arms. With the dockworker, his hook on his shoulder and the words of liberty on his lips.
As one, they flowed past the lines of glowering magistrates. Past the lines of mounted dragoons, their faces impassive, their sabers at the ready. Disapproving manufactory owners and landowners staring hard-faced from carriages and from horseback. Their privileged lives blinding them to the pain of those who suffered.
Isabella and her people—herpeople—continued onward without regard for their looks of anger. Theircensure meant nothing. The swords and the soldiers and the line of cannon in the distant fields meant nothing. They moved together—one voice, one heart, one goal.
And Isabella marched with them, caught up in the passion of the thousands around her. She marched for the tenants forced from their land and left to wander. She marched for the families torn apart by the violence of their oppressors. She marched for her father, for her husband, for all the generations before them whose noble cause of independence was betrayed. She marched for a lost world where standing up for freedom and justice was now a crime.
And she marched for herself, a woman awakened and willing to fight against the strong-armed tyranny that repressed her people.
A pull on her arm made Isabella blink back the tears. Her immediate surroundings came into focus, and she caught Jean, who’d stumbled. She shielded her from the sea of marchers behind them as the old woman found her footing.
“If ye wish it, I’ll walk into battle with ye,” she said. “But the sawbones been calling ye that way.” Jean motioned to the building they were passing.
Mr. Carmichael. Caught up in the excitement, Isabella had lost track of where she was going.
They’d joined the stream of people on Chapel Street. Soon, however, as they approached Rose Street, their progress slowed. The folk walking from the Maggot and the harbor were merging with those coming from town, and the line stretched back toward the center of the city for as far as she could see.
Isabella counted the tolling bells of church steeples; itwas ten. The crowds jostled them from behind, but she took her instruments bag out of Jean’s hand and, holding her friend by the other, cut across.
Mr. Carmichael held the door open for them, and they stepped through it.
“Much larger crowd than was expected. The word has spread. I hear they’re coming from as far away as Dingwall and Nairn.”
Isabella paused at the open door looking out beyond the ropeworks at the open fields, the destination for the marchers. A large crowd was already filling the space.
“Your husband is the spark, you know. With all he’s doing and his return at this moment, he’s helped awaken the people of Inverness. Folks are ready to tear down the old and build anew.”
Cinaed breathed the smell of pine and horseflesh and looked out from the line of trees where his Highland riders waited, grim-faced and silent, beside him.
He didn’t know how long they’d have to wait for the prison escort to pass, but if their information was correct, the wagon bearing John Gordon and the others, protected by a half-dozen mounted dragoons, should be coming soon. He nudged his horse forward and looked up the coach road. No sign of them yet.
Beyond the flat fields, Moray Firth was grey and choppy, and distant storm clouds closed off the skies to the east. Here, though, the sky was clear, and that served them well. Cinaed ran through the plan in his head again. They’d attack the escort after it passed, keeping the bright morning sun behind them and in the soldiers’ eyes.
Cinaed had never intended for Isabella to find out hewas taking none of Searc’s men. Every available body, every trained fighter, was needed at the gathering in Inverness. He glanced at the riders with him, hoping he’d guessed right and he had enough.
Each man with him was a Mackintosh of Dalmigavie. Over this past week, he’d come to know many of them better. He remembered at least half from his youth. These were tough, committed men, and he had faith in their courage and ability. If the commanders at Fort George decided to send more soldiers, however, the odds would shift. But Cinaed and these men would fight to their very last breath.
His thoughts returned to Isabella, as they had over and over since leaving Inverness. He had no fears for himself. He’d chosen Delnies Wood because it was halfway between Fort George and Nairn. If it came down to a pitched battle to free John Gordon, so be it. At least there would be no reinforcements coming. But Isabella had put herself at the very center of a potentially deadly situation. Cinaed knew how high feelings were running. Highlanders were a hotheaded people to begin with. But for seventy years, the shackles of English rule had been chafing at them. If they saw a way to fight their way free, he worried that Inverness could ignite the powder keg. No matter what precautions Searc and the weavers were taking, if a confrontation arose, no one could predict the outcome.
Blast, he cursed silently. He never should have let her be part of that. She could be hurt. He could lose her. Forever.
Dread soaked him in sweat. He took a deep breath. He couldn’t stop her, and he’d be a fool if he tried. Isabella was smart and strong. He knew that. But knowing it did nothing to lessen his worry.
A puff of smoke rose above a low rise far to the west. The signal.
They were coming.
In this larger room of the warehouse, a dozen mats on the clean-swept floors sat ready for patients. At one end, two higher tables had been positioned in case surgery was needed. Isabella walked between the empty beds, remembering the chaos of another time, another day of strikes, and the lives that were lost.
The martial sound of bagpipes playing in the distance, the shouts of “equality, liberty, and fraternity” drifting in through the windows, only served to sharpen the memories.
Thankfully, there were no patients yet. No guns had been fired. No bugle calls. No clash of sabers. No signs of trouble… that she was aware of.
