Chapter 18

CHAPTER 18

A s night began to draw her cloak around the mountain, Rory grew restless. Though his heart swelled with pride whenever he thought of how his wonderfully odd little wife had a thriving business of her own, he still hated that she was always off somewhere, unprotected. He had expressly forbidden her to travel to or from town at night without his or one of his brothers’ protection after All Hallow’s Eve, and the few times she’d been called away after hours to soothe Mrs. Whomever’s sore throat or Mr. Such-and-such’s angry wound, she had accepted his presence, or Rabbie’s or Cailean’s, without protest. Now, night was here in earnest, and neither she nor Amity had returned.

He felt the familiar pricks of dread rise in his chest as he finished the stew that the women had left for them in the hearth earlier that day. Rabbie was reading a book on his pallet, and Cailean was hanging his clothes to dry by the fire, as he was meticulous about cleaning them after a sweaty day’s work. Rory stood again to peer out the window at the mouth of the carriage road.

“Have they still not returned?” Cailean asked.

“Nae,” Rory answered gruffly. Where in the hell is she?

“I’m sure they just stayed at the Clintocks’ longer than they’d meant to,” Rabbie said calmly, his eyes not leaving the page.

“Aye,” Rory grunted. His insides were in a fiery twist of pain. This is why no sane man would ever choose to fall in love, Rory thought angrily, for he had now accepted that he was, in fact, desperately, madly, wholly and soul-shatteringly in love with Mercy Barnett Macleod Miller.

He sighed and moved back to the chair by the hearth. He often wondered when his undeniable attraction to the woman had evolved into something more, and more often than not he would point to the day she saved Cailean. It wasn’t that she saved his beloved brother with a level head and surprising skill, though that had certainly nudged his heart in the right direction. Nae, it was that she’d come back with that honey, stung all to hell and her eye swollen shut, and had the wherewithal to jut her chin out and forbid him from using her tobacco to heal her stings. That, and the fact that she finally had allowed him to help her. He didn’t know it then, but that was when his heart had grown three sizes, when he had become hers, body and soul.

“I think I hear them,” Cailean said, and as soon as he did, Rory jumped up and commanded them to stay in the cabin.

“Oh, Rory, don’t be too hard on them,” he heard Cailean mutter, but he was already out the door, stalking through the clearing, the sea of goats parting in alarm. He was heading straight for them when Mercy left Amity’s side and quickly herded the goats into the barn, then rushed inside after them, slamming the door behind her. Rory stopped, surprised, then caught Amity’s eye.

“Rory,” she said, her eyes swollen from tears she’d already shed. Rory was at her side in two strides.

“What is it, little sister,” he asked fiercely, holding her by her thin arms. “What has happened?” Tears streamed down her cheeks and Rory began to panic in earnest. “What happened?” he repeated, his voice cracking. When Amity still didn’t answer, he sent her to the cabin and practically ran into the barn, nearly flinging the door from its hinges.

He found Mercy sitting on an overturned bucket by her favorite goat, Lady. She’d lit a few candles and Rory stood still, transfixed, as Mercy drew her hand over the star on the nanny’s head in the flickering light. She didn’t turn to face him, merely kept rubbing the furry forehead, quiet as a mouse. She was still wearing the heavy cloak and her hair was still twisted up under a bonnet. Her appearance was still tidy—it didn’t look as though she’d been attacked.

“I’ve told ye before,” he started out gruffly, “that should ye travel the carriage road at night, ye need to be accompanied.” Rory’s hands clenched into fists when she didn’t acknowledge him. “It’s dangerous out there, and I won’t have ye getting hurt or worse,” he added, his voice cracking. A long silence followed. Rory was at wit’s end. Mercy was always prepared to fight back, to argue with him until one of them capitulated. Never, in all the time he’d known her, had she sat silently by while he berated her, for good reason or no. “Mercy,” he said, and he barely recognized his own voice, it sounded so strangled.

“You have to go,” she said quietly, still staring at Lady instead of him.

“What did ye say?” he asked incredulously, quite certain that he had misheard her.

“You have to go,” she said again, this time a little louder. He hadn’t misheard.

“Explain yerself,” he said, and as he walked towards her, she stood suddenly and stalked past him, pushing a crumpled piece of paper into his hand. He watched her disappear into the back of the barn where she kept her potions and herbs, then straightened out the paper.

Ice filled his veins. For the past two months, Rory had been able to forget the blood and screams of Culloden Field, the smell of Clachan burning to the ground, the bone chill of the HMS Furnace and the sight of dead men, hanging from their chains in the brig of the ship that brought them to this land. With this one advertisement in the Gazette, it all came flooding back, filling his lungs, making it hard for him to breathe. A tall Scot called Rory, with two brothers in tow? Surely anyone in town would recognize at once that this bounty was for the Macleods. The Millers. Rory drew in a deep breath. George Crawley had described him too well, all except for one bit.

“I’m no cheat,” he growled, scanning over the words once more. He heard Mercy loose a breath and he turned to her. She was plucking dried mint leaves from their stems and storing them in a jar.

She had known he was a convict, hadn’t she? She’d called him such before. Though he had never told her about his past, she knew that he had changed his name, that he had come upon her with no clothes, no money. Mercy had never pressed him to explain, and so he hadn’t. No, they had never talked about the past, nor the future.

“You have to go,” she said, her blue eyes finally meeting his.

“Mercy,” he said in a half-whisper. “I would have told ye, but…”

“There’s no need to explain,” she said quickly, turning back to the herbs.

“Aye, it seems there is a need, as ye can barely look at me. I am so sorry, lass. So, so sorry.” Mercy continued fiddling with the mint. “Ye knew, did ye no’? I thought ye…”

“I did,” she said, twisting the lid tightly on one jar before opening another.

“Ye did,” he repeated slowly. “Then why are ye so angry with me?” he asked, exasperated. At that, she cried out and threw the empty jar against the wall of the barn, where it shattered into a cloud of broken glass.

“Why am I so angry?” she sputtered, her face coloring. She strode towards him and for a moment he thought she was going to strike him. “Why am I so angry?” She roughly pulled his sleeve up and examined the scar on his wrist. He had many scars. He was sure she’d never thought much about any of them—but because of the advertisement, this particular one branded him as a criminal.

“If ye knew,” he said carefully, snatching her hands from his sleeve and pulling them to his chest, “then why…”

“Because,” she spat, and he lifted his brows, desperate to know. “Because I thought that I would get to keep you until spring.” The words beat against Rory’s heart. “Perhaps I could have faced your leaving, if only I’d had just a little more time with you.” Her face fell, and the stony exterior she had so solidly built up fell with it. Her body seemed to grow as limp as a doll’s, and he scooped her up by the waist to steady her. She wanted me to stay.

“Mercy,” he whispered into her hair as sobs escaped her lips. “Oh, my love.” He cupped her face in his hand and pressed kisses to her wet eyes. “My heart,” he said softly. “Ye are my heart, Mercy. Ye have been for a long time now, and ye will be for the rest of my days—my heart. I could have left ye in the spring no easier than I could have stopped breathing.” Mercy let out a moan and crushed her mouth to his, and he tasted the bitter salt of her tears. He lifted her and wrapped her legs around his waist to be closer to her, to feel her weight, for she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the ground.

Mercy felt his hot breath on her neck, his hands pressing tenderly into her back and hips. They’d had a relatively smooth marriage once they’d ironed the basics out, but marriage was, she’d thought, often devoid of love. No, she hadn’t dared hope that he felt for her what she did for him. But he did. She’d been certain since All Hallow’s Eve. The memory was met with another flurry of tears as her mouth grew hungrier for him. She hugged her arms around his neck and found his lips, licking and parting them. His tongue met hers and she whimpered, feeling adoration vibrate through her very bones.

God, how she loved him, every part of him, every bleak part of his past and every challenge he would face in the future. Every happy memory, every laugh, every breath. Every freckle, every muscle, every blink, every frown. She felt as though he had filled her, and without him she would be an empty shell.

“I love you,” she whispered.

With those three words, Rory’s eyes sparked with a clear loss of control. Most of their “rutting,” as he liked to call it to her eternal annoyance, was careful. Slow. Gentle. As he took one step back and ran his eyes over her, she saw the beast she’d thought he was when he’d arrived. She knew that he would not be able to stay gentle with her tonight. She didn’t want him to.

His countenance was serious, inscrutable, and he was more handsome than she ever remembered when they were apart. The candlelight in the barn flickered across his features and Mercy closed her eyes, trying desperately to commit his features to memory.

When she opened her eyes again, he hauled her up and kissed her roughly, undoing her stays as he searched her mouth. Mercy thought she heard the sound of cloth ripping, and suddenly she was free of her stays, of her skirts, of her shift. Her hair had come undone and was unfurling over her breasts. She stood there, naked but for her boots and stockings, which tied at her thighs, when he pulled back to shrug off his waistcoat.

Her fingers flew to his cravat and she ripped it from his neck, needing desperately to feel the pulse in his throat. He pushed his breeches down to his knees and lifted her, placing her roughly on her worktable before threading his hand between her thighs and grasping his cock to fit at her entrance.

Mercy moaned as he slammed into her with one stroke, using his hands on her backside to pull their hips as close as possible. She let her knees fall to the side to let him enter her more fully, and Rory growled in appreciation, drawing them together violently again and again. One hand drew up her back before coming around to cup a breast, his thumb sliding over her peaked nipple as she held onto his shoulders, her head tilted back with the sheer ecstasy of him.

Then his mouth was on that nipple, and his thumb snaked down to circle that small bud between her legs, and he was everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, and that ecstasy she was climbing peaked and she cried out, writhing and clamping and digging her nails so hard into his skin that she was sure she’d leave marks. Good. As he kept driving into her, sweat beading on his brow, she realized she wanted to. She wanted to leave him as scarred as she was with their love.

The second time was slower. Rory had laid her down on a blanket in the hay and stood over her, pulling off his boots, then breeches and stockings, and finally his shirt. His eyes never left hers. Mercy was sure that if eyes could start a fire, his would have already. He lay down next to Mercy’s hip and set about rolling her stockings down slowly, kissing her thighs as he did. She closed her eyes and moaned in pleasure as the combination of cold air and the warmth of his mouth made her color with desire. Once her boots were gone, Rory crawled back up and held himself over her body, searching her face.

“I am yours,” he said slowly, positioning himself above her and thrusting slowly, inch by inch. “You are mine,” he breathed, pulling back before filling her again. Mercy drew his face down to hers and bit his lip as he took her, both of them needing to be closer and closer. “Mercy,” he moaned, and rolled so that she was on top of him. “My Mercy,” he said softly as she ground her hips into him, her fingers grasping at the hair falling around his neck. Her pleasure began to mount again, but she was desperate to make this last. Forever, if she had her way.

As he stroked her, she rocked back and forth harder. Pleasure and pain had ceased to be two different sensations, and Mercy chased them both. Rory drew her closer and pressed their lips together, yet his eyes were open, staring into hers. “My darling, my life,” he rasped, letting his head fall back. “Come for me.”

With those words, Mercy felt her insides shatter and expand, collide and fall apart and come back together again. She bucked as the last waves of desire washed over her, and fell down against his chest as her muscles gripped him rhythmically.

“I love you,” he whispered. “How much I love you. Do ye know?” he asked, thrusting again and again. She gazed up at him through half-lidded eyes. “Would kill for ye,” he said as he pulled out. “Die for ye.” He slid back in and she moaned. “Learn to harvest foxglove for ye.” She could feel the pressure mounting again. “Wipe yer tears and breathe in yer laughs.” He filled her and groaned as he found his release inside her. Mercy sighed, pressing her lips to his neck when he fell back, seemingly exhausted.

“It would be easier if you didn’t,” Mercy whispered into his ear. He cupped her cheek and brought her face to his. Her eyes, the most beautiful he had ever seen, met his. The world around them had ceased to exist, and if Rory could have kept it that way, he would have fought an entire army to do so. He would have sailed to the colonies a hundred times, would have suffered through a thousand explanations on how to treat dropsy. As it was, a goat bleated loudly and when he saw the corners of her eyes crinkle, they both laughed.

Mercy laid her head back down on his chest and sighed.

“It would be easier, aye, but I’ve no’ ever done anything the easy way.” He kissed her temple.

“But you have to go.” Rory stiffened when he heard the words. She lifted her head and settled her body on top of his. “You know you must.”

“Then ye’ll come with us,” he said, the idea unfolding as he said it.

“You know we can’t do that,” Mercy whispered.

“And why not?” he asked. We’ll need winter clothes, dried foods, a musket or a bow for hunting…

“I can’t leave,” she said softly, and tears filled her eyes. Rory’s heart stopped as she said it. He knew why she thought that. Her healing was vital to her sense of self, and her land was proof of her pride and hard work. But more importantly and probably furthest from her mind, Rory knew that he wouldn’t be able to protect her and Amity if they came with them. They were convicts, on the run from the crown’s law. If she stayed at Black Knob, if George Crawley came sniffing about, as he surely would once someone from town tried to cash in on those seventy shillings, she could feign ignorance. If she were found with them, fleeing to New France, she could be put in jail or worse.

“I could no’ have left ye in the spring,” he whispered, needing her to know once again, and his eyes stung. Suddenly, his cheeks were wet, and he lifted his fingers to touch them. He was crying, as he never had before, and the realization sent him reeling.

“Tell me,” she said, nestling her face into the crook of his neck.

“Tell ye what?” he asked, blinking back the last of the tears.

“Everything,” she whispered. And so he did.

He told her about Prince Charlie, and how Clan Macleod of Raasay had agreed to support him in the war against the British crown.

“Even though they’re Protestant,” she interjected.

“Aye.”

He told her about Laird Malcolm Macleod, his uncle, and how he had left House Clachan to his eldest son, so that the island would not be lost if they did not return. His father had done the same, leaving Rabbie and Cailean behind.

“But somehow Rabbie is Catholic,” she said, and he grinned and nipped at her finger.

“Are ye going to let me tell this story or no’, woman?”

He avoided the worst details about the Battle of Culloden before describing his homecoming to Raasay, how everyone knew that the British army wasn’t far behind. He told her of the choking smoke he smelled after every structure on the island had been burned to the ground, and how he and Rabbie and Cailean had been hauled off and sent to the prison ship called Furnace. It was a strange name for such a cold ship.

He told her about George Crawley, about how he believed that somehow the sacrifice of Rory’s life would put right his own father’s death. And then he told her about the ship that carried him and his brothers to the colonies.

“It was dark, always dark,” he said, looking away from her lovely face. “Rabbie, he isn’t good with small spaces, with being confined.”

“Why?” she asked softly.

“If ye don’t mind, love mine, I’ll let ye ask him that yerself. And the bit about his being Catholic, which I can see has piqued yer interest.” He ran a finger gently down her nose and Mercy nodded, as he knew she would. She may not understand other people very well, but God be damned if she didn’t feel for them deeply.

“Go on,” she said, nestling closer to him.

“Our wrists were chained night and day to beams above us,” he continued, plucking hay from her hair. “Most men couldn’t stand the dizzying motion of the seas, and the smell of sick stung our noses constantly. Every day or so we were given stale biscuits, but I could barely keep mine down.” He paused to see if Mercy would say anything, but she merely held him tighter. “Perhaps a week in, some of the men grew sick—truly sick, the kind of sick that I imagine yer healing could cure, but none of the sailors paid them any mind. After a few nights, their cries grew silent, and it was soon clear that we were trapped below deck with corpses.” Rory stopped then and swallowed. “I may never forget how their bodies swayed with the movement of the ship, their eyes open, staring.”

“Oh, Rory,” Mercy murmured, pressing her lips to his collarbone gently.

“It was no’ easy then, to keep their spirits up,” he said, referring to Rabbie and Cailean.

“I imagine not,” she returned, and he wrapped his arms more tightly around her. They were still lying in the hay, but the heat from their bodies, and perhaps the dozen goats nearby, kept them warm.

“But then the ship threw anchor near Belhaven. I heard the sailors say we weren’t far from the coast at all. Now, having been raised in the Isles, we knew how to swim, so I figured this was our last chance before the auctioning block.”

“How did you do it?” she asked, lifting his left hand and fingering the scar on his wrist.

“I pretended to be dead,” he said, and she looked up at him. “I saw the sailors unchain the corpses and drag them up the stairs that night, surely wanting to throw them overboard before they rowed to shore. So I told Rabbie and Cailean to wait for me, and I hung limply from my chains, which were still hooked to the beam above us. One of the sailors had quite a time unlocking my right wrist, then had his friend help him drag me above. Before they could get their heads above deck, I knocked the one at my feet into the wall and drew my chains, which were still attached to my left wrist, around the other one’s neck and choked him until he went limp.”

“Did he die?” Mercy asked, but he could tell she wasn’t horrified.

“I don’t think so,” he said thoughtfully. “I’ve killed before,” he said finally, knowing that Mercy of all people would not judge him for it. “I don’t think he died.”

“How did you free Rabbie and Cailean?” she asked.

“I took the keys from the sailor I’d knocked into the wall. I was able to unlock their chains, and the one on my left wrist, but there was a bleeding gash there from the cuff. I saw that the sailor had my blood all over his shirt. It’s why I don’t think he died. He must have told Crawley I’d been injured,” he said, motioning to the advertisement on the ground nearby.

“And then you jumped,” she said.

“Then we jumped,” he agreed. “We swam to shore, and kept to the shadows during the day. By night, we traveled westward, always keeping to the woods. I stole a knife from a farmhouse,” he confessed, “and a waistcoat and cravat. But otherwise we stayed away from any sign of civilization.”

Mercy sighed and a tear escaped her eye. She had known, of course, that his story would be harrowing, but thinking of the Rory she had grown to love being chained in the dark next to swaying corpses was more than she could bear. And now, knowing that she must send him away, her heart broke into jagged pieces, as if they might cut the lungs that worked so hard to bring shallow breaths to her body.

But send him away she must. She was in love with him, and she loved his brothers as if they were her own. They were no longer safe in their haven on Black Knob, and she’d prefer to know they were safe than have them close. A million times over, she would prefer that.

Once, when Mercy was much younger and Amity was just a baby, she had found a baby robin. She had waited around all day to see if his mother would return, but she never did, so Mercy took the robin and placed him in her apron pocket. She fed the robin every few hours, waking in the middle of the night to do so. She realized, with surprise, that she loved him. Young Mercy had never known love, had never felt it before in her life. She had admired yet feared Granny, and had hated and avoided her father, and her mother had been withdrawn if not withholding before dying in childbirth when Mercy was eight. Amity was too loud and squirmy for her to feel anything but resentment towards her. And so the robin was her first love. So when she watched him fly away one day, she thought she would never recover. Really, she never had.

She wouldn’t recover from watching Rory fly away, either. She knew that, but she also knew that she could live with it. What she couldn’t live with was his being captured or killed. Though she loved the work she did, and the land underneath her was her life, they weren’t stopping her from going west with the Macleods. No, it was the knowledge that she and Amity would slow them down, and if they were found, Rory could be charged with kidnapping, too. She’d heard of that very scenario, a white woman who’d willingly fled with a group of escaped slaves.

“The memory of you will keep me warm for the rest of my life,” Mercy said, looking up and meeting his black eyes. “I will never stop loving you, not for one minute. You have broken through and found me, Rory,” she said, and another tear slipped down her cheek. “But we both know you have to go.” She didn’t know where the strength in her voice came from, but she was thankful all the same. Rory’s lip quivered and he turned away. She sat up and looked down upon him. “One day, you’ll settle down and learn French. You’ll build yourself a mill there in New France, and maybe the border will be less treacherous.” He turned back and stared at her. “You’ll send word to me,” she said softly, “and I will run to you. Nothing will stop me.”

“My heart,” he said, and pulled her back down to his chest. “As soon as I reach French land, as soon as I find a home for us, I will come back for ye.”

“I know,” she whispered. She believed his intentions were true, but she had no hope that he would find her again. The lands west of them were every day more dangerous, due to the rapid unraveling of the relationship between the British and French, not to mention the fracturing of the tribes’ loyalties. If anyone could get through it all, though, Rory could.

“Kiss me,” Rory whispered, and she did so willingly. “Sleep here in my arms. As you said, perhaps I need more time, and in the morning I can face leaving you.”