Highlander's Destiny, page 15
Once they reached the top and started descending the other side, it was easier. When he heard the soft neighing of his horse, a flame of hope lit in his chest. He helped Danielle up, then swung himself into the saddle, as well. As he lifted the reins, he saw the first torches reach the top of the hill.
With Danielle safely between his thighs, he spurred the horse, knowing it would probably alert their pursuers, but they were on foot. The horse set off in a gallop, and he spurred it harder. Even in the darkness, it moved as fast as it could between the trees and the bushes.
Only at dawn, when he knew the English had been left far behind, could they rest. They stopped in the deep woods near a brook, and once they both dismounted, he led the horse down to the water to drink.
He and Danielle drank, too, standing over the softly burbling water, their eyes locked.
“You’re safe…” she whispered. “You did what you came to do…almost. I got you out. We did it.”
Something tightened in his chest. She meant it. She cared about him. She cared that he was safe.
“I got us out, lass,” he said. “I picked up those shitty braies.”
The tension of the previous hours…nae, the previous few days…burst within him in an explosion of laughter. She giggled. Then their shared laughter turned into full-blown hysterics. And they laughed and laughed and laughed.
He didn’t think he’d laughed like that since he was a lad.
Then the laughter died down. He felt a lightness in his stomach when he looked at her. This woman, not of his clan, not of his time, not anyone to him…had come to his rescue. Had come with him to face his worst enemy. And risked everything for him.
This woman, who knew intimately what his pain was like.
He didn’t laugh anymore. Neither did she. Her eyes glistened hotly in the semidarkness. The gurgling of the brook was deafening in his ears. He was barely aware when the horse moved a few feet away and grazed on the grasses growing in abundance between the trees.
All he could concentrate on was Danielle’s eyes. Those gorgeous eyes were as dark as sapphires.
And they were on him, asking, glowing, wanting.
They came together like two animals. She wrapped her arms around his neck. Her lips were soft against his. His tongue swept and danced with hers, stroking, plunging, worshipping. She tasted like a feast made just for him, and he had been hungry for a hundred years.
His cock throbbed for her, at the silky, warm feel of her. His senses were heightened, the aching, sweet, insatiable desire for her stronger. And then, maybe because of the danger they’d been in for the past days, or because he’d gone to what should have been his death but come back alive, he couldn’t contain the words.
“I love ye, lass. I love ye.”
Because that was what his goddamn, stupid, silly heart was telling him.
“I love ye,” he kept saying through the kisses, through the brushes of hands and the smell of her hair that was in his face.
“I love you,” she echoed, and his heart welded together in his chest, melting from the heat of her body, healed by the warmth of her words. “I love you.”
He undressed her and laid her down on the sleeping roll. There were her soft lips and her delicate breasts that he adored, so sweet, the nipples tasting like butter and strawberries. She wriggled and writhed under him, so sensual he could come just from hearing her moan.
“Danielle…” He whispered her name like it was his undoing, finally feeling like he had permission to be himself.
“Colum…” she echoed, as though saying his name was a spell that could break her into a new realm.
A realm where they both were free to love and be loved.
He watched her face as he caressed her bonnie breasts. She gasped out and arched her torso into his hands. God’s bones, he loved it. He took one nipple into his mouth, and when it puckered and hardened, he clung to her breasts, alternating between sucking them and caressing them with his fingers.
“Oh God,” she whispered. “Oh, Colum…”
He looked at her, continuing to caress her nipples. “Och, lass. I could come just by hearing ye say my name like that.”
She pulled his tunic higher, and he dragged it off over his head. She brushed his chest with her fingers, tracing the battle scars, making the blood simmer in his veins. As her fingers moved down his stomach and stopped at the line of his braies, he was throbbing for her so hard that he ached. The need to dive deep inside her wet heat was a constant pull in his blood.
“Lass…” he groaned.
“You like that?” she asked, breathless. Her eyes were wide and dark staring at his stomach. “You’re magnificent, Colum. I could get lost in the valleys between your six-pack.”
“I have nae idea what a six-pack is, lass, but I wish ye’d get lost a wee bit lower than that.” He chuckled.
She grinned and bit her full lower lip, the color of wine from his kisses. She undid the girdle holding his braies and pulled them down. His erection sprang free, and she gave a wee appreciative whimper watching it.
“You’re so big, Colum…”
She was ready. He knew she was. He was still careful with her, even after days of sleeping together, knowing she hadn’t enjoyed coupling as much as she could have before. But with him, she was a wildcat. A lustful siren, calling him, inviting him for pleasure until he forgot himself and crashed on the rocks.
“Yeah,” she whispered and pushed him so that he lay on his back.
She undid the odd opening of her blue braies. As he helped her pull them down her gorgeous, long legs, he felt he was burning. His fingers shook as he watched her remove the small undergarment she’d called “knickers,” and then she was completely and gloriously naked sitting over him. His erection jerked and twitched nestled against the apex of her thighs, the wee soft hairs of her sex tickling him.
“Ride me, lass,” he croaked. “Use me for yer pleasure. Use my cock and my body to make yerself come.”
She nodded, flushed. Did she have any idea how magnificent she looked, being aroused like that? How her long, willowy body was worthy of a minstrel’s song, and every red-blooded man’s dream?
As she rose slightly over him and took his cock in her soft palm, he stifled a groan of pleasure. She palmed him in her tight fist and moved her fingers up and down his length, making pleasure burst through him. He swallowed hard, his heart racing, watching her, afraid to miss a moment.
When she took his tip and rose and placed it against her folds, he couldn’t stop a groan. “Like that, lass.”
She used him to circle the wee bud of her clitoris between the lips of her pussy. She arched her back, closed her eyes, and her head dropped back as she gave a long moan of pleasure. He took her hips into his palms but didn’t move them. He just wanted to feel her everywhere. When she started to move her hips in circles, unapologetically chasing her pleasure, he loved it.
He wanted more of her doing that. He loved that she was so free with him. That she was herself.
Because he was himself with her, too.
Soon, his cock was harder than it had ever been and was dripping with her arousal.
“I want you inside, Colum,” she said.
“Aye, lass. Use me.”
She put her arms on his chest and put her weight on him. When she lowered herself onto his cock, he thought he would burst. Her tight, hot, sleek core took him in like a fist. She arched her torso, and her fingers dug into the muscles of his chest. He had to restrain himself from thrusting inside her, from plundering her and fucking her until she forgot where she was and who she was.
But it was all about her. He wanted to know more about what she liked and how she liked it, because he wanted to bring her to her climax many, many times.
Only, he probably wouldn’t get many, many times.
But he couldn’t allow himself to think about that now. And when she started to move up and down his erection, all those thoughts evaporated.
All thoughts disappeared, period. He watched her beautiful breasts bounce as she moved, saw her nipples harden and darken. Her eyes were closed, and whimpers of pleasure kept escaping her mouth. Those sounds… God’s blood, she was driving him mad with those sounds.
Very soon, he was delirious with lust himself, and he couldn’t stop from thrusting back at her, meeting her movements. He placed his thumb on her clit and rubbed her there.
“Oh, yes, Colum,” she gasped, opening her eyes to meet his gaze.
He watched her heavy-lidded eyes haze up with pleasure, and as a red blush covered her neck and her upper chest, and her whimpers became urgent and fast, he knew she was close…so close…
So was he.
“Come for me, lass,” he growled out. “Come for me.”
Still looking into his eyes, she fell apart. Her inner muscles tightened around him, and she froze, her mouth open, the most beautiful expression of tortured pleasure on her face. Then her eyes rolled back, and a whole-body shudder shook her. She cried out, and that was his undoing.
He pulled out of her, and the world shrank and expanded as he came and came and came on her stomach, still holding her hips in his palms.
He held her in his arms for a long time, and they talked and laughed lazily, both pushing away the thoughts of the chase and of the war and of the future. Then they ate and slept.
He woke to the rumble of many hooves against the ground. He jerked up and his hand found his claymore. Danielle was still sleeping on the bedroll.
He couldn’t see anyone and couldn’t hear anything. But when he pressed his ear against the ground, he could hear it and feel it. A deep rumble, like a distant earthquake.
That meant one thing. The English army was on the move. Their diversion hadn’t worked…or not fully, at least.
He cursed and gently stroked Danielle’s head. She turned and looked at him sleepily. “Everything all right?” she asked.
God he loved her in the mornings. Sweet and vulnerable and delicious.
His.
But not for long. Their wee bit of heaven was over.
“We must leave now, lass, and we must hurry. The English are on the move. We must warn the Bruce before they get to him.”
Chapter 26
They arrived at Bruce’s camp three days later. Without hiding in the woods, being chased, or stopping to save anyone, they’d saved a lot of time. They’d gone straight down the Falkirk road and ridden like hell, barely giving the horse time to rest.
Danielle’s knees were wobbly and weak from exhaustion. Her thighs and her bottom ached from riding so long.
As they rode towards the camp, she took in the landscape, which was so different from how it would look by 2022. The forest hiding the Scottish camp was ahead of them as they crossed the stream called Bannock Burn. To her right, she saw a field, which was circled in a large U shape by the Burn. She remembered Jamie telling her something about the Bruce’s men digging several pits on both sides of the road and covering them with branches. That was the key to the Bruce’s victory on the first day of the battle, because the English couldn’t flank Bruce’s forces when they tried to attack them from the sides. The cavalry kept sinking into those pits. The horses fell and broke their legs. So Edward’s army had been forced to attack them head-on.
And they couldn’t break through Bruce’s military formations. What was the name that Jamie had mentioned? Danielle didn’t remember, but it was something about tight squares of men with pikes. Like hedgehogs, Jamie had said.
Danielle couldn’t see any branches around the road, just grass and a marshy sort of area. Maybe Bruce was still planning to dig them. Or maybe they already had been dug and were so well hidden Danielle couldn’t see them.
That was none of her business. She looked at the hill where the ruins lay. The way back home. Heavy stones weighed on her chest. She needed to return to her time, but how could she leave Colum? How could she ever imagine a life without him?
What had she expected? She’d known she’d get hurt if she fell in love with him. She’d known there wouldn’t be a future for them. And now the day had come when she could finally return home.
Colum followed her gaze, and his eyes darkened. “When are ye leaving?”
She couldn’t stand the ache in his voice that echoed the pain in her own chest. “I’m not certain. But I need to go as soon as possible.”
He nodded. “Please stay a wee bit longer, lass, if ye can spare the time.”
She smiled. “Just a little longer.”
When they entered the camp, the king was on his horse, barking orders at ten square formations of Highlanders holding pikes. From far away, they looked like a strange, magnificent beast with huge quills, the men moving and breathing as one.
They rode closer to the king and dismounted. Colum brought the horse to the enclosed area where the rest of the cavalry horses grazed, drank, and rested. Then he and Danielle approached the Bruce. He sat with his back straight and his face dark and tense and cut the air with his arm, yelling, “Schiltrons, back, back, back!”
Schiltrons. That was what those formations were called. Like loyal, disciplined dogs, the schiltrons moved back, the shoulders of the men never separating from each other.
“Yer Grace,” Colum said as they drew closer to the king.
Bruce threw a glare in his direction, then momentarily, his face relaxed. “Colum. Ye’re alive.”
He turned to the man on the horse next to his. “James, keep this up. I need to have a word with MacDonald.”
“Aye, Yer Grace,” said the man whom Danielle recognized was James “Black” Douglas.
Bruce dismounted, and when he stood on the firm ground, he hugged Colum. “Ye gave me such a fright, lad. Did ye go to the English camp?”
Then the Bruce’s eyes fell on Danielle, and all friendliness left his face. He stepped back, unsheathed his sword, and pressed the point against her ribs.
“Yer Grace!” Colum said as he stepped between the king and Danielle and put his hand on the sword. “She’s on our side.”
Bruce’s eyes bulged as he looked her over. “She?!”
“Aye. Danielle. She’s a woman.”
“Nae. She or he, or whoever this is, isna on our side. ’Tis a spy!”
“Nae, Yer Grace. She saved my life. She helped me create a diversion in the English camp. She isna a spy…well, nae like ye think.”
Danielle’s back grew damp with sweat. Now she’d angered two kings in this time, the English one and the Scottish one.
“I’m on your side, Your Grace,” she said, raising her hands in submission.
“There’s a bigger worry, Yer Grace,” Colum said. “We rode as fast we could. We went to the English camp, to sabotage them and postpone their march, but it didn’t work, and now they’re marching. They’re on their way.”
Bruce lowered his sword a little and studied Colum. “They are? Well, ’tis to be expected. They need to be here in three days at the very least if they want to honor the agreement and reclaim Stirling.”
“Aye,” Colum said. “But ye need to ken that they are an enormous army. Six thousand cavalry, including famous knights from Germany, France, and Eastern Europe. Men-at-arms. Thirteen thousand infantry and Welsh archers with their longbows. There are about three times more of them than of us.”
Bruce’s face grew paler and paler. He still held Danielle at a swordpoint as he listened. “Dinna ye dare say this to anyone else. Morale is good so far, and this information might break the men’s spirits. They dinna deserve this.”
“Aye, Yer Grace, of course.”
“And what did ye do there? What sort of sabotage did ye do?”
While Colum told him, Bruce’s eyes flicked between Danielle and Colum. When he finished, Bruce shook his head and his face showed rage. He looked at Danielle. “I am appalled that ye are so deceptive. Ye seduced Colum into betraying his people and going to the English camp. He could have died.”
“Nae, ’tis I who dragged her from her imprisonment, thinking she may ken her way around the English camp. Well, back then I had thought she was a man. But she helped me, and she can be trusted. She truly saved my life.”
Danielle was in turmoil. There was no way she could prove that she wasn’t the enemy.
Bruce shook his head. “Ye’re a fool to trust a woman who would sneak into the camp like that. She should be locked up. Who kens if she will set a diversion among us. Edward could use her to attack and destroy us.”
Colum opened his mouth to contradict his king again, but Danielle spoke first. “Look, Your Grace, your mistrust is very understandable. If you’ll allow me to leave, I’ll be on my way home, and you’ll never see me again. I can go right now…”
The look of heartbreak on Colum’s face almost killed her. She’d just told him she would stay a bit longer, and now she was saying she would leave right away. But she couldn’t bear to be locked up again, and she also didn’t want to get Colum in worse trouble.
“Ye dinna mean it, lass, surely…” he said in a low voice.
Someone was coming towards them—three men and a woman. One of them was young, maybe early twenties, with dark blond hair. The woman was Black, which, Danielle thought, must have been unusual for these times in Scotland. She was dressed in Scottish armor—léine-chròich—and had a sword at her back. She was tall and absolutely stunning. At her side walked a tall, blond man with chin-length hair and a short beard. Next to him strode a man whose dark hair was short-cropped, also strange for the Middle Ages.
He reminded her of a modern man.
“What is going on, Yer Grace?” asked the blond warrior.
“Owen Cambel, we have ourselves an English spy,” said the king. “She wrapped her wee bonnie charm around Colum’s head, and he canna see clearly.”
The four people looked her over from head to toe with frowns. When their eyes fell on her jeans and shoes, their expressions changed to astonishment. They exchanged a look with one another.
“Your Grace,” said the woman, her accent oddly familiar. It couldn’t be American! “I believe Colum. She’s not a spy. Trust me. She’s not working for Edward.”
