Page 80 of Wolf Heir
“My bow and quiver of arrows. I suspect someone else is waiting for us in Morag’s solar, no’ her ladies. You see? They are still standing with her while they watch the men battle it out.” Aisling really wished she could watch the fight. But she had another plan in mind.
“And then what?”
“We go to the crofters’ farm, but we’ll go through the back gate.” Aisling motioned to Niven, and he raced to meet up with her. “Tell Coinneach’s family to leave out the back gate and go to their farm. I’ll follow.”
“I will too,” Blair said.
“But dinna tell Morag any of this.”
“Aye, Aisling,” Niven ran to speak to Magnus, who gathered his mate and son to escort them to the back gate.
“I would like to see what they planned to do with us, but I think that would be a foolhardy quest,” Blair said.
“Aye, especially if we had to kill the men to protect ourselves. And who would believe us?”
“Ifwe managed to kill them and they didn’t kill us first,” Blair said.
Coinneach and Aodhanwere about to go down the tower stairs when he saw Aisling heading his way, then thwarted by Morag. He didn’t trust the chief’s mate in the least.
But then Aisling had spoken to Hamish, and he called his brother over, and the next thing he knew, Hamish and Collum were joining them up at the wall walk. Though Coinneach barely heard Hamish’s gruff words, “Take off your shirt,” because he was watching what Aisling was doing—running to the castle, pausing, then waving Niven over to speak to her. Then Niven went to see Coinneach’s parents.
What was going on?
When Aodhan slapped him on the back to remind Coinneach what Hamish had commanded of him and said, “Remove your shirt as his lairdship says.” The command his lord had given finally filled Coinneach’s thoughts.
Had Aisling given him up because it was too dangerous not to? He pulled off his shirt, and both Hamish and Collum looked closer to see the wolf head. Both men were frowning, looking at Coinneach, then at the wolf mark again.
Hamish touched it as if it would disappear if he rubbed it off. Collum did the same after him. But it was not ink or dirt that could be rubbed off.
“You’ve had this since you were born?” Hamish asked.
“Aye, my laird.”
“Your parents are no’ your parents?”
“I always believed they were so, and I will always cherish them as my parents who raised me. Tamhas likewise is my twin.”
Hamish frowned. “Does he also have the mark of the wolf?”
“No, my laird. We didna think there was any significance to it.”
“If the mother of your blood died and you were given to the crofter family, when did you first shift?” Hamish asked.
“When I was five years old.”
Hamish glanced at Collum. Collum said, “If his mother had died, he couldn’t shift into the wolf until he was old enough to handle shifting in front of others.”
“Aye.” Hamish looked over the wall walk to see his men gathered to fight, Morag standing off to the side, watching him. “You are saying that Morag had someone take you away to live with someone else so that she could have her own son with me?”
Coinneach didn’t say anything, afraid to get Blair in trouble.
“You knew you were…uh, kin to me, and that’s why you wanted to work here,” Hamish said.
“No, only that…that someone didna want me to work here for fear you might realize I was uh, related to you.”
“Who?”
“Morag.”
