Highlander Claimed

I combed the tangles from my hair. I braided and coiled it neatly around my head, gathering it at the back. I fingered a light yellow velvet gown, but before I could remove my robe to dress, I heard Wilkie’s voice behind me.

I hadn’t realized he’d awoken.

“Come to me, lass. Let me bask in your glow.”

He watched me approach him, his blue eyes clear now, with no traces of his earlier haze.

I felt his forehead, and he was cool to the touch. I couldn’t resist letting my hand skim the line of his face and his bristled jaw. The roughness of his texture was so unfathomably fascinating to me. I felt changed by this warrior. That first moment I’d looked into his eyes, something inside me had shifted. As if I could suddenly see color, whereas before him all had been muted and dull. But I was unsure whether his feelings were as intense now as my own, so I tread carefully. “You’re feeling better now, warrior.”

“Aye,” he said, and I was relieved to see that the look in his eyes was one of raw affection and a returned fascination. “Your healing powers are potent indeed.”

“I haven’t healed you enough,” I said. “Let me feed you. Are you hungry?”

“Starved.” He sat up slightly and was able to move without causing himself to wince.

I brought him some food, and I fed it to him. He ate well. I held the tea to his lips as he drank. His eyes never left my face.

“Your face, Roses. Your lips. The color of your hair. Why is your hair so fair?”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to this. “I don’t know. The sun, perhaps. I spend much of my time out-of-doors. More than I should.”

He reached up to finger the bound braid of my hair. “You’ve a halo, angel.”

I fed him another bite of bread. “Yours is a fierce appetite, warrior. ’Tis a good sign. Your health is returning to you.”

“I feel as though I haven’t eaten for days. How many days, I wonder. How long has it been?”

“Since...?” I knew what he meant; I was fumbling over which part to refer to.

“Since we fought, and fell,” he clarified, entirely unperturbed by the recollection.

Now, the very thought of how close he had come to death—and all because I had wounded him—was enough to flood me with an ocean of regret. “I’m sorry I wounded you.”

He watched me for a moment, and I could not read his expression. “’Twas my own fault, for letting my guard down. I was unusually distracted. Practically blinded, in fact.” His mouth quirked at the memory of his own reaction. “’Tis understandable, under the circumstances. Would you not agree?”

He took another bite of bread and waited for my reply, which I did not give. I wasn’t sure what answer he was expecting. Instead, I returned his light smile and offered him some tea, which he drank, watching me all the while.

“So,” he began. “Let’s start at the beginning, and where we left off in the cave, where I believe you made a promise to me, which you have barely begun to uphold.” Again, I was unsure of his meaning, yet I didn’t interrupt him. I was, briefly, mesmerized by the shape of his lips as he sipped his drink, and the memory of the gentle brush of them against my own. “Tell me, then,” he said. “Why did you flee your Ogilvie clan?”

There was never any doubt I would be wholly honest with Wilkie. But I stumbled over my words nonetheless. “I had to. I—I struck the laird with a kitchen knife. I would have been killed, I think, or banished to the dungeons. I’ve never been to the dungeons, but I’ve heard it said that hell itself is preferable.”

“Very likely so,” he agreed. “You make a habit of wielding blades at hapless men?” His question was calm yet chiding, and I found myself mildly hurt by it. I hadn’t set out to injure Laird Ogilvie, or Wilkie; nor had I wanted to.

“Of course not. ’Twas the first time I’d ever struck out at anyone. I only did what I had to do to escape him.”

“I’m sure you had good reason to attack the laird of your keep—certainly a crime punishable by death, or worse. You were wise to run.” I wasn’t entirely pleased with the direction this conversation had taken. And I couldn’t decipher the layers of his emotion. Was there anger there or merely curiosity? He continued, “You knifed him intentionally?”

“Aye,” I confirmed quietly.

“Why is that?”

I paused. I didn’t want him to think badly of me, but he was entitled to the truth. Every truth. I knew it and he knew it. We were bonded already, in a meaningful way. I didn’t understand it, but already it was the surest thing about me. I would answer any and all of his questions. My warrior, I was learning, was protective, possessive and extremely direct.

At my brief silence, his eyes visibly darkened as he watched me. He may have guessed at the answer I hesitated to give.

“He wanted to add me to his collection of mistresses,” I finally said. “As is probably clear enough by my desertion. I had long thought about attempting to flee from him. But I had nowhere to go. In the end, I decided exile was preferable to servitude of that kind. Work is one thing, captivity quite another.”

Wilkie’s fist constricted, and the muscles of his arm grew taut and strained. I wanted to ease his reaction, but I thought at this moment it was better to leave him be. In the end, I didn’t touch him, leaving my own hands clasped in my lap.

It was some time before he asked his question.

“Were you able to fight him off?” His fist remained clenched. He looked so quietly furious that I almost feared him at that moment.

“Aye,” I assured him, but my whispered affirmation was barely audible.

“You succeeded in escaping before he was able to—”

“Aye, warrior. He didn’t know I was armed. I surprised him with my attack, and I fled immediately.”

He lowered his gaze and considered this for a minute or more. Then he raised his eyes to me and I could see there an anxious, tentative question. “So you never...agreed?”

I understood what he was asking. “Nay, warrior. Not once. Not to anyone.”

His relief was palpable, and his tender smile was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen on this earth. It touched my heart and stole my breath. “You...are the only one,” I told him, meaning to continue, but stopping once the words were spoken. They summed up everything I needed to say. And even as I said them, I felt the now-familiar honey-sweet ache low in my stomach. His hand reached for mine, enveloping both of my own, clasped tightly in my lap. He loosened my grip and held one hand, stroking his thumb lightly across my palm, as though sensing my shame and attempting to soothe it all away.

“You did what you had to do,” he said. “It took courage to do what needed doing. I’m not angry with you, lass. How could I be? You’re an angel, after all, ’tis it not so?”

In fact I didn’t know what I was, or even who I was. Or where I had come from. I had a raging urge to show Wilkie my tattoo, to reveal all the dark mystery of my past, to see if this uncommonly intense and sudden bond was stronger than my fear. But I couldn’t do it. I was too afraid he would be repulsed by me, that he would no longer want me, that he would cast me back into the bleak darkness of my former life. “Nay. I’m not an angel.”

“You’re my angel,” he said, insistent. His expression was affectionate, and his dark-lit blue eyes searched mine for signs that I might be reassured. “You’re never to fear me. All right? I just want to learn you.”

“All right.”

“So, hungry, exiled and alone, you raided our orchard for food.”

“Aye,” I said. “I’m sorry about that, too.”

“Not I.” His half smile touched my secret places, warming me yet further. “If you hadn’t stolen from us, I wouldn’t have followed you. I was intrigued, aye. I thought you an easy conquest, or I wouldn’t have chased you alone. And when you spoke, with your voice undisguised, I had a feeling you were not what you first appeared to be. You looked so...”

I waited for him to finish, and when he didn’t immediately reply, my curiosity got the better of me. “So what?”

“So small. So slender. I wasn’t expecting you to be quite so fierce.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, willing myself not to weep at the thought of my ferocity and its outcome.

“Not I,” he repeated. “If you hadn’t struck me, I wouldn’t have struck you, then I wouldn’t have removed your helmet and laid eyes on the most beautiful creature in this life, or any other. At that moment, our fates entwined, Roses. I know not why, but I know it to be true—I am bound to you forevermore. There is nothing to regret.”

My heart fairly sang at his words. My warrior wanted me here. I could stay with him, at least for a time. You will be fed, and you will be under our protection until our brother is fit enough to decide your fate.

“You did surprise me at the loch, aye,” he said softly.

I blushed again, remembering when and how I had surprised him. I’d wanted to look away from him, but he was too alluring, in my memory and even more so here and now.

“Would you like me to change your dressing, warrior? And wash you?” The heat that flushed my cheeks only burned even more fervently as I realized what my offer might have suggested.

“I would like you to do anything to me that you would like to do.”

“I’ll wash your hair for you, if you’d like,” I said.

“My hair isn’t the only thing that’s dirty,” he teased, but I was too shy to indulge him.

“I’ve assisted the Ogilvie healer,” I said. “I’ve tended many wounds.” If the pretence was that I was Effie’s assistant, then I might as well make myself useful. And there was nothing I would rather have been doing in this moment in time—or any other—than tending to Wilkie Mackenzie’s needs.

“You sewed me up like an expert,” he said. “Effie said she couldn’t have done it better herself. And that’s saying something—she doesn’t give praise lightly, especially when it comes to the healing skills of others.”

I began to peel back his bandage, making sure not to open the wound.

“Did you train to be a healer?” he asked.

I told him some of the details of my history and my family, as I had explained to his brothers. He seemed shocked by my admission that not only I but also my mother had been recruited to be Ogilvie’s mistress, and that our status had been lowered because of her refusals.

I looked up at him to find him watching me with an inscrutable expression. “You are surprisingly stoic considering the oppression you’ve endured,” he said. “I’m sure I would be more bitter had my family been treated thusly.”

I considered this. “I harbor bitterness toward only one person. And he is not here, nor do I hope to ever meet with him again. I know that my parents would be pleased that I had avenged my mother’s plight in a small way, and escaped his clutches. I can make peace with that, and do my best to find a life for myself elsewhere.”

Wilkie continued to watch me, and I detected in him, as I had in Kade, a sense that he respected not only my honesty, but also my point of view. It occurred to me that I had surprised these brothers, that they might not have expected me to admit to my bold and traitorous reactions to Ogilvie; I also got the sense that they felt my actions entirely justified. I didn’t feel as though I needed this assurance, but I was grateful for it nonetheless.

Wilkie followed a line of thought, speaking it aloud. “’Tis true that Ogilvie is well known for his fondness for keeping numerous mistresses. So much so that he’s never taken a wife. Not a particularly stout plan for the future of the Ogilvie clan, if he produces no legitimate heirs.”

“Nay,” I agreed, hoping to change the subject away from the man who had been all but my nemesis for several years. “Your wound is healing well, warrior.”

It was. The edges of the cut were already beginning to knit together. I walked over to the basin and filled a bowl with the still-warm water. I used a clean cloth to wash the area around the wound, taking care to be gentle with him.

“Your potent healing paste recipe may have saved my life, according to Effie,” Wilkie said. “That, along with your sewing skills.”

“I could share the recipe with her if she’d like. I’ve made it often for Ismay.”

“Write it down and she can add it to her book.”

“I— Well, I don’t know how to write. But I can dictate it to her.”

“Is that so?” he asked, and there was astonishment in his voice, and maybe a thread of pity. “Were you never taught to write, lass?”

“Nay,” I said quietly.

“Can you read?”

“My mother started teaching me once, but there was too much other work to be done. We never had enough time for the lessons.”

He touched a fingertip to my chin and tipped my face up to him. “Well, that, sweet Roses, is something we could remedy.”

I couldn’t help smiling at him. “You’re going to teach me to read, warrior?”

“Aye,” he said smugly, as though he’d found a new mission in life. “That I am.”

I felt overjoyed at the thought of Wilkie teaching me, making an effort for me, and spending his time with me in any capacity at all. If his intention was to teach me to read: that would require time. My future, at least for the short term, might not be daunting and unknowable; it could be charmed, if Wilkie was near. “I would very much like that.”

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