Page 40 of Highlander’s Claim

Scottish arrows flew through the air and hit the English ship, but a new rush of the arrows was already coming for them. This time, one of Aulay’s archers didn’t manage to hide in time. There was a sound of cloth and flesh ripping and a pained groan and a splash of water… Damnation.

“Shoot!” yelled Aulay the moment there was a break in the assault of arrows.

Kneeling under the shields, with the deck rising and sinking, they approached their enemy. The scent of death was here—in their pungent sweat and the angry thumps of their hearts—but they refused to succumb to fear.

And too soon…or not soon enough…they came alongside the cog. Aulay could hear the roar of the enemy warriors and knights, see the deadly edges of their swords glinting as they shook them in the air, hear the flapping of their sail.

“Chains!” cried Aulay. His warriors threw chains with hooks and pulled the ships tight together. They were so close, they could look their enemy in the eyes, count the links of their chain mail.

“Ye pigs came for what’s ours!” yelled Aulay, and his men roared behind him. “Ye will learn a lesson to never do that again!”

“I will laugh at your grave, you dirty barbarian!” cried a man who must have been the captain. He wore a red surcoat bearing three golden lions.

“Ramparts!” roared Aulay.

His men threw wooden ramparts that hooked on to the other ship and then ran across them. “Clann Domnhnaill! Clann Domnhnaill!” they roared.

Their archers kept shooting at the enemy to cover the first Highlanders boarding the cog. Aulay rushed across with his men, and as soon as his feet touched the enemy deck, he plunged into battle. Swords flashed, strikes came one after another. His men with Lochaber axes were deadly beasts. With powerful strikes, MacDonald axes cut through chain mail.

Metal rang against metal. Wounded men grunted and groaned. Water splashed as they were thrown overboard.

And then the English captain stepped in front of him. He raised his sword and slashed at Aulay, who deflected the thrust and attacked. Steel sang with each hit as they sparred.

The English captain was younger, but Aulay was stronger and had years of battle behind him. He knew the man was trained in the typical English way. Hit after hit, Aulay let him believe he was winning by stepping back, and then when the bastard got cocky, Aulay stepped away from his opponent’s sword and sent a thrust into his shoulder that crushed the chain mail and pierced the flesh, albeit not as much as Aulay needed.

But it gave him an opening to press the moaning Englishman against the gunwale. “Did ye find it?” Aulay demanded through gritted teeth.

“Ah…found…what?” The Englishman was hurt but perhaps not in quite enough pain.

“The goddamn treasure ship.”

The captain’s upper lip curled up in contempt. “Go to hell, you wild animal.”

Aulay grinned and chuckled. “Wild animal? I’ll show ye a wild animal.” He pressed the edge of his sword underneath the man’s chin. “Did ye find the lost treasure?”

The man’s eyes darted quickly behind Aulay, which told him there was someone there. “No.” Then his gaze grew from fearful to triumphant. “And neither will you.”

Aulay grabbed the man by the hauberk and pivoted so that his enemy became his shield.

It worked, but the move came too late to fully protect him, only knocking aside the man’s sword—making it a wounding blow rather than a killing one. White-hot pain flared through his left shoulder, and something wet flowed down his arm.

The captain fell on the deck, and Colum thrust his sword right into the man’s face. Colum looked up at Aulay’s shoulder and his face went blank with fear.

“’Tis nothing,” Aulay said. “I’m fine.”

But it wasn’t nothing. He knew it. He had been in enough battles to know a serious wound. And despite killing the captain, the battle was not in the MacDonalds’ favor. There were simply too many English warriors.

More than a hundred, he estimated.

“Retreat!” yelled Aulay. “Retreat!”

Colum and the others picked up their wounded clansmen and helped whoever could walk. While the English were trying to see if their captain could be saved, Aulay and his best warriors fought, enabling the rest to take the wounded back to their ship.

As soon as the last of the MacDonalds were on Tagradh’s deck, Aulay yelled, “Throw the bridges!”

Even though the English followed them, the MacDonalds lifted the wooden platforms that connected the two ships. English warriors fell into the sea with loud splashes.

“Cut the ropes!” cried Aulay as he hastily made his way to the rudder.