Page 1 of Highlander’s Hope

Prologue

Dunollie Castle, Scotland, 1296

“Cruachan!”

Marjorie groaned. She must be dreaming. Why else would she hear her clan’s war cry?

The straw mattress scratched her skin. The room was quiet and smelled like dust from the drapery that hung from the canopy. Was she alone? She tried to lift her heavy eyelids, but then she remembered…

If she opened her eyes, she might see him. And he’d want to strike her again.

Or take her again.

No more pain, please. No more humiliation.

She wanted dark, numb oblivion. She allowed it to take her away from the aches in her whole body. Something odd caught her ear, and she clung to the sound like to the edge of a cliff. The noise came from outside and below. Cries of pain. Metal ringing against metal.

And then…

“Cruachan!” The sound was louder now, coming closer. It was a chorus of many men.

Was she imagining it? Was she so desperate and broken that she was dreaming of home?

The air smelled faintly of smoke. Footsteps pounded against the stone floor outside the room she was being kept in. The door opened with a screech, the iron handle grating. Then it closed.

This sound, of this door, meant one thing.

He’s back.

And if he was here, there would be pain.

Quick, heavy steps approached. He breathed heavily and paced around the room. His chainmail clanked softly. He hadn’t touched her yet. Maybe he hadn’t come for her.

But then why is he here?

Outside, the cries intensified. Something heavy battered against wood.

“Cruachan!”

They have come.

Hope blossomed in her chest, giving her strength. She opened one eye—the other was swollen shut—and turned her head to the light of the slit window.

Alasdair MacDougall paced along the wall of rough, dark rock. His nostrils flared, his eyes wild, his curly, dark hair unruly under the chainmail covering his head and shoulders. He tapped the flat side of his sword against his hand.

He glanced at her and froze for a moment, his face blank.

“Ye awake, wee bitch?” He covered the space between them in three steps.

Even without any strength left in her body, Marjorie pushed against the bed to try to drag herself as far away as possible from him. The blanket fell off, and her bare thighs with dry, caked blood flashed white and reddish brown. She wanted to cover herself, but she was too weak. His scent, one she was all too familiar with by now, reached her. He reeked of sweat and his male musk. He dropped his sword, and it fell with a loud clank. Grasping a handful of her hair at the top of her head, he lifted his other arm and slapped her.

Blinding white pain shot through her head. Then another hit came on the other side. Her eyes must have burst inside her skull. She didn’t even cry. He brought her face close to his, and she smelled his bad breath—a mixture of ale, alcohol, meat with onion. “Ye happy now, precious princess? Ye thought you were too good for my proposal, but now everyone will see what a worthless slut ye truly are.”

She sucked air into her lungs. “What are ye talking about?” she managed to say.

“Yer clan of Cambels are knocking at our doors. But as long as I have ye, I have the power.”

Him saying her family had come for her was different from her thinking it, or imagining it. It was real.