Page 80 of Beguiled By the Highlander
He staggered back, and the icy façade that had sustained him during the last few moments dissolved like snow before a forest fire.
Isolde. He had to find her.
Whatever was left of her.
With a tormented mixture of tenderness and reluctance he picked up her ruined shawl. It wasn’t an omen. She might have escaped. He clung onto that slender thread of hope as he yelled her name until his throat was raw, frantically combing every inch of the undergrowth as the darkness in his heart spread across the land.
But there was no sign of where she had fallen, nor splatters of blood. What had MacGregor done with her?
Despair raked through him. He sank to his knees, his fist clenched around the shawl as he pressed the bloodied wool against his chest. Blindly, he stared at the mighty silhouette of Creagdoun as it loomed against the orange-streaked sky.
How fiercely proud he had been of calling the castle his own. How gratifying it had felt, to install Isolde there as its mistress, and how many grand plans he’d made to ensure Creagdoun, and his Campbell lineage, would prevail.
A dull ache seeped through his chest, corroding all it touched, engulfing him with a despairing inevitability.
What did any of it matter if Isolde wasn’t here to share it with him?
Once, he’d wanted nothing more than to know who he was so his wild MacDonald woman could call him by his God given name.
But now he’d give anything to hear her call him Njord. Because when he had been no more than her stranger from the sea, he’d had everything.
If only he’d been able to see it.
Now she was gone, and he would never hear her voice again, never hear her laughter. Never have the chance to tell her the only reason he’d coaxed her into wedlock was because he couldn’t face the thought of life without her by his side.
Instead, he’d let her believe it was because they were already betrothed, that a contract had been signed. That it was their destiny to unite their clans.
All those reasons were true, but none of them was the truth.
He’d rushed their wedding because he’d fallen for her from the moment he’d first seen her.
And his determination to get his way, no matter the cost, had destroyed her as surely as if he’d plunged her own claymore through her heart.
“William.” The word slashed through the gathering gloom, but he didn’t turn around. He heard the horses, knew the men who had fought by his side in the glen had arrived. But what did it matter?
He had arrived too late to save Isolde, and the men weren’t needed for there was no danger facing Creagdoun.
Alasdair came to his side and gripped his shoulder. “Ye found MacGregor.”
It wasn’t a question.
“William, man, what is it?” There was an urgent note in Hugh’s voice, as though he suspected the worst. “What did MacGregor tell ye before ye put an end to his misbegotten existence?”
He couldn’t speak but instinctively gripped Isolde’s shawl tighter as if, somehow, that possessed the power to bring her back.
“Lady Isolde?” Alasdair sounded uncertain as both he and Hugh stared at the shawl. “No, William. MacGregor was playing with ye. How could he have done anything to her, when she was safe within the castle?”
Aye, she should have been safe within the castle. Reluctantly, he glanced up at the dark shadow of Creagdoun, as doubt stirred deep in his soul. Isolde was stubborn, but she wasn’t ignorant of danger. There was no reason why she would’ve been outside the castle walls. How then, had MacGregor accosted her?
The shawl was proof that he had. But maybe she’d escaped. He’d cling onto that slender hope. And if it turned out to be a false hope, he’d bring the dogs back here and search all night until he found her.
In silence they returned to the horses, and as they approached the gatehouse it was a grim satisfaction to note the portcullis was lowered and that doubtless archers were stationed at every arrow slit. MacGregor wouldn’t have found an easy conquest here, had his plan to ambush them at Glen Clah succeeded.
Once the gate was raised, they rode through into the courtyard, where dozens of torches blazed, and the castle inhabitants gathered, their cheers of victory and relief echoing off the stone walls.
A hollow victory. But that was his own guilt-ridden burden to bear. As he dismounted, the crowd parted, and his heartslammed against his ribs as Isolde walked—no,ran—towards him.
“Ye’re alive.” She stopped short in front of him, not touching, just gazing at him as though he were an apparition. The air lodged in his throat, burning, and he couldn’t move a muscle as his paralyzed mind took in the fact thatshe was here. “William, I thought ye were dead.”
