Page 7 of The Highlander’s Defiant Bride

His gaze lingered on the hills, on land that had drunk too much blood long before their father’s time, and more because of him. “Aye,” Cameron said finally. “Da always did.” Cameron’s throat tightened. “At Alness, we lost good men, Munro men, and he called it a lesson learned, a debt paid. But I never saw the gain in it, Kenzie. Only the cost.” The memory pressed in on him—the Mackenzies’ advantage, the bitter retreat, the shame that had followed them home like a curse.

Kenzie’s features tightened. “Da believed strength kept us safe.”

“He believed war did,” Cameron said quietly. “Against the Mackenzies. Against the Rosses, when tempers flared. Against any clan that stood too close to what he claimed as Munro ground.” Cameron exhaled, a long, weary breath. “Da was not alone in that. The Highlands have been tearing themselves apart for generations. Frasers against Rosses, Campbells against Camerons, MacDonalds against half the north, when old slights are stirred anew. Da simply played the game as it had always been played.”

They walked on, the tension between them a tangible thing. “We swore loyalty to the king for peace,” Cameron went on, his voice roughened by regret. “Not for this endless reckoning. Da said he honoured that vow, and perhaps he believed he did, but every battle only sharpened the same blade meant for our sons.”

Cameron glanced at the covered form between them. “Da wanted to protect the clan. Of that I have no doubt. But I wonder now if he ever understood how tired the land itself has grown of our fighting.”

Kenzie’s jaw tightened. “He’s gone now.”

“Aye,” Cameron said, and the word carried more weight than grief alone. “And that leaves us to choose what comes next.” He looked ahead, where Foulis Castle waited beyond the rise. “I will defend our people when I must. I will never turn my back on Munro blood. But I will not spend their lives to soothe old grudges or honour ghosts.” His grip steadied. “Let Da rest with his wars. I intend to give our people peace, even if it costs me everything.”

Kenzie studied his brother for a long moment before nodding. “I do not like it, but I understand.”

The silence stretched as they continued, until the looming silhouette of Foulis Castle grew closer with every step. When they finally reached the gates, the portcullis opened and those returning from battle entered the courtyard.

“Welcome back, Master Cameron, Master Kenzie,” their steward, Errol Hobbins, said as he rushed forward to greet them. His smile slipped when his gaze moved past them to the cart between the two sons. “Dear lord, who?” he asked, his voice raw as he searched the still-living men for familiar faces.

“Laird Robert is dead, as are six others,” Cameron said, motioning to a cart farther back, trying to keep his voice steady. The words echoed through the courtyard, stopping those who had come to join them from the castle beyond. “We were victorious over our enemy, but at a terrible price.”

“Nay,” Hobbins said, the word heavy with emotion. “’Tis sorry I am, milord,” he said, acknowledging the change in Cameron’s status as the steward accepted the reins of Cameron’s horse, then passed them to a waiting groomsman.

Cameron’s gaze shifted to the figure hidden beneath the thin linen covering in the wagon. He was aware of the activity going on around him as those who had returned to the castle greeted their loved ones and the horses were taken to the stables, but his gaze remained on the once-powerful laird who was now silent.

He had faced the death of loved ones before. His mother and sister had succumbed to consumption. And yet his father’s death weighed heavier on his shoulders. The prosperity of the Munro clan was now in Cameron’s hands.

Forcing his thoughts back to the moment, he straightened. “Kenzie, Tavish, Jamison,” Cameron called to his brother and two other warriors who had dismounted. “Help me carry Da into the dining room. We will lay him out there until we can prepare his grave next to Ma and Lizzie at Kiltearn Parish.” The Munros had been buried there since the early thirteenth century.

The four men easily lifted the fallen warrior and carried him into the dining room, laying him out on the large table at the head of the chamber. More warriors entered the room, their battle armour streaked with blood and mud. They carried the bodies of the other fallen men. They placed the men on tables along the walls of the chamber, then took up positions as though protecting them. Cameron swallowed against the dryness in his throat as two serving women came forward and started whispering prayers near the head of the table on which his father rested.

Cameron drew his father’s sword that he had carried back from the battlefield and placed it atop the shrouded figure. “Da should be buried with his weapon.”

Kenzie nodded in agreement. “Seems fitting for a man who was never far from his blade.” His youngest brother’s gaze shifted from the unmoving figure of their father to Cameron. He drew his own sword and raised it high. “To the new laird of Clan Munro.”

The sound of many swords being drawn filled the chamber, followed by the echo of “To the laird.”

“Should I prepare the men to ride for Clyth Castle to retrieve your bride?” Kenzie asked. “Or send word for her to travel to us?”

“Neither,” Cameron replied more harshly than he had intended. “Bring forth the shrouds. The clan is in mourning. Only when we are through our mourning period will I turn my thoughts to marriage.”

“Cameron,” his brother replied with an arch of his brow. “You know that is not what Da wanted.”

“I know,” he conceded in a resigned tone.

There was nothing he could do about the betrothal. His father’s surprise actions were difficult, if not impossible, to undo. All he could do now was make the best of the situation, but his clan needed him more than a woman who was most likely in a stable, nurturing situation. She was safe for now.

His clan was not. “Perhaps tomorrow I will send for my betrothed.”

Betrothed. The word, whispered by his father as the life ebbed from him, had upended Cameron’s life every bit as much as his father’s death. Tradition demanded that he and his clan endure six months of mourning before such a union could take place. Six months of limbo he was utterly unprepared for.

He should send a messenger, riding hard to the Gunn lands, to inform the woman who was now, against his will and knowledge, his intended, of his father’s passing and the delay. He should contact Destiny Gunn herself and perhaps arrange a meeting, a sort of courtship. But the words withered on his tongue, a bitter ash. He could not. How could he explain this unexpected vulnerability that had settled inside him?

Better she and everyone else think him as ruthless and unfeeling as the tales of his prowess in battle painted him. Better his own clan and all the other clans believed him, the new head of the Munros, to be a man of cold steel and colder resolve, impervious to the chaos that churned within him so they would not take his father’s death as an invitation to attack. Let them think he was precisely what his fearsome reputation promised, rather than the boy who stood on the precipice of a lairdship he felt profoundly, desperately, out of his depth to claim.

Kenzie, his younger brother, leaned against the rough-hewn stone of the hall, his face grim, eyes scanning the shadows as if expecting his father’s ghost. “Should I at least send for Gavan?”

Gavan, always the diplomat, had remained behind on the battlefield, negotiating the surrender of the broken Mackenzie forces. Gavan’s temper could flare, but he knew when to sheathe it. With carefully chosen words and a steady presence, he had a way of guiding conversations until others believed his conclusions were their own.