Chapter 28

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

" N ay!" Eloise could see the clifftops as she was dragged down from the horse. They cut through the ropes that had bound her to the saddle in their haste to be rid of her. With her hands now free, she thrust them against each man in turn, trying to be free, but she was too weak to fight two strong men.

One lifted her by the waist as she kicked out, connecting with the other hooded man's gut. He winced, bent forward and rubbed his belly, but soon gathered himself and directed the way up the cliffs.

"We have tae be quick," he ordered his friend. "Before she can call anyone up here with her screams."

"Nae one would hear her scream out here," the man carrying her said easily.

Eloise decided to test it. With the gag long gone, she was completely free to try. She screeched as hard as she possibly could, calling for help repeatedly. The man carrying her plastered his hand over her mouth, trying to block out the sound, but she bit his hand so harshly, she drew blood, forcing him to release her swiftly enough.

"Argh," he cried out in pain and thrust her into the other man's hands.

He took no chances and threw her over her shoulder, so far, that she was in danger of dropping down. She clung to the back of his cloak, terrified she'd fall on her head and be knocked out. He barely caught her in time around the knees near the top of his shoulder, grunting as he trapped her and carried on up the cliff.

"Quickly!" one of the men barked, though she no longer knew which one. She just kept screaming and pounding on the man's back.

I willnae make it easy fer them.

She vowed all sorts of things in her mind, mad promises to enact revenge on these two men and Harper too, if there was such a thing as ghosts and she could walk this earth again.

The higher up the cliff they got, the more she panicked, seeing just how close they were to the cliff edge.

"Throw her off," the man following ordered, trying to bind his hand where she had drawn blood. "Let's be done with this already."

"Remember what Lady Harper said. It has tae look natural."

"Natural?" the other scoffed. "Aye, perfectly natural fer a woman tae go walking off the cliff in the exact same spot another walked off a cliff many years ago."

As the first hooded man tried to look over his shoulder at the other, his hand adjusted on Eloise's legs a little. It was enough of a chance to allow her to lift her knee and drive it down into his sternum.

He grunted in pain and dropped to his knees, so winded by her attack that he was gasping for breath. Toppled over his shoulder by the movements, she landed in the dirt, her hands splayed against the grit and her head mere inches from colliding with a grey stone. She pressed herself back from that rock, scrambling back on her haunches when she felt the rush of the wind behind her, tugging at her hair and at her skirt as if it had large hands.

Looking quickly over her shoulder, she saw the wind came off the sea and up the clifftop. She had inadvertently brought her body so close to that cliff edge that she was in danger of her hand slipping over the precipice. Buffeted by the wind, she scrambled back in the other direction until a firm hand came down upon her shoulder, gripping her tight.

Eloise rolled away from that grip, striking her body into the man's shins in order to dislodge him. He fell forward, his face now so close to that cliff edge that he too froze, unable to move from terror.

Eloise pulled back her foot and kicked him once in the rear, forcing him to stay down as she crawled on her knees, trying to pull herself to stand.

I have tae run. I have tae get away from here. Fast!

She wished she now had that dagger on her hip she had so often carried. No matter what Murdoch had said about how useless it could be, it had saved her more than once, and now, it could have been the very thing that saved her life.

Murdoch. What will he say when he finds out?

She pushed herself to stand as she remembered Murdoch's face the last time they had stood here. It had broken him, to stand where Lillie had died. What would happen to him now if Eloise were to die here too? She so feared his broken heart that she barely noticed one of the hooded men had recovered until he grabbed her ankle.

He pulled harshly, knocking her down to the ground where she inhaled soil, spitting it out repeatedly. He crawled over her, his hand taking hold of her hair, he forced her to her feet then spun her around, so she faced the cliff edge.

The other hooded men rolled away, moving to his feet and rubbing his injured rear.

"Now, ye die," the man behind her hissed in her ear. "Move."

She tried to dig her heels into the earth, but he was too strong. Pushed to the very edge of the clifftop, the toes of Eloise's court shoes hung out over the edge of the grey stone. A distance beneath, the ocean raged, foaming at the mouth like some hungry demon.

"Say goodbye," the man urged in her ear.

Without of options, Eloise closed her eyes and thought of those she loved. She saw Scarlett in her mind, and her nephew too, then she saw Avery and Callie together. Her heart broke when another entered her mind.

She saw Murdoch above her, revealing the smallest of smiles as he moved toward her for a kiss.

I will never see him again.

"Murdoch! Murdoch! Ye have tae stop this."

He didn't listen.

After Murdoch had left a hasty message with one of the menservants to find his friends, he'd set out to the stables and found the first horse he could. Harper had followed all the way, pleading with him to stop this. At one point, she'd tugged on his arm, trying to halt him from getting on the horse and he'd thrown her to the floor. It didn't matter that she was a woman anymore, weaker than him and more likely to injure.

She is a murderer. She killed Lillie and she's trying tae kill Eloise too. That changes everything.

He slowed the horse at the bottom of the cliffs, as Harper continued to bellow behind him. She was falling back now, unable to keep up with his pace.

The horse snorted high into the air as Murdoch brought the two of them to such a sharp halt. The horse could not possibly gallop up such a steep bank covered in rocks, so he was forced to leave the animal with two other horses, whose reins had been dropped on the stones nearby.

"Eloise!" he called, desperate to have some answer form her as he leapt down form the saddle.

The other horses were strangely reassuring, as was Harper's mad chase of him. It made sense – he was searching in the right place.

"Eloise?" he shouted her name repeatedly as he clambered up the rock, taking the steeper section for it would be the fastest, even though he had to practically climb in sections, with his roughened hands pulling at the stones and his fine jerkin from the wedding ceremony catching on the jutting outcrops.

He heard voices beyond. Sounds of pain and grunts, then Eloise screamed too.

Murdoch stumbled to the top of the embankment, not bothering to glance back and see how far Harper had fallen behind.

I'm a fool. I should have seen it before. What did Clyde say about her? All the warning signs were there!

He sprinted toward three figures by the cliffs, their bodies strangely murky in the growing grey light as the day began to fade.

"Eloise!" he shouted, coming closer to her now as their figures came into focus and he saw her position.

She had been pushed out onto the very edge of the clifftop. With her chemise buffeted in the wind and her stays tightly drawn around her body, she was not fully clothed. Her red hair was wild, trapped around her face as she clawed at the man behind her who had a tight hold of some of those tendrils and was using that grasp to force her to the very edge.

"Release her now," Murdoch bellowed, reaching for the sword in his belt. He pulled it out as one of the hooded men who had hold of Eloise turned to face him. He retrieved his own sword and advanced toward Murdoch.

Fine. Then he dies fer what he has done.

Murdoch advanced quickly toward him, lunging without hesitation. The first few blows were muddled in his desperation to get to Eloise faster, and the attacker was well trained, but Murdoch soon got his eye in. Stamping down on the man's foot, he crippled his ability to stand tall, then drove his elbow into the figure's nose. The hood fell back, revealing a face that was bloodied with a broken nose. Murdoch swiped out with his sword next, cutting across the man's hand. The weapon was dropped to the floor as from the force of the blow he rolled away across the ground.

"Murdoch?" Harper was shouting for him, though he didn't bother looking around.

"Release her now if ye wish tae live," Murdoch warned the man that still held Eloise to the edge, lifting the sword.

The man seemed to weigh up his options, looking between Eloise and Murdoch.

Please, Eloise, look at me.

Yet she couldn't. Her face was out toward the ocean, and she couldn't possibly turn around with the man's grasp on her hair. She was so close to the edge that one wrong move could mean she'd die.

I cannae watch her die. I willnae see it happen!

The man's lip began to curl, a sudden smile taking over.

Why is he smiling?

Murdoch was so focused on Eloise that he did not notice the other attacker had recovered until he felt the wind from an attempted blow behind him. Murdoch leapt to his left, narrowly avoiding the first blow, but the second was too fast. The sword cut across his upper arm, drawing blood and making his arm weak.

"M-Murdoch?" Eloise shouted for him, her voice stammering as she clearly recognized his cry of pain. "Murdoch! Ye cannae die fer me," she said in a sudden strained voice. "Ye hear me? Ye are nae dying today."

"Enough, Eloise," he called back to her. "Neither of us are dying today."

Eloise whimpered as the hooded man pushed her head forward. She was now leaning out over the drop and the only thing that kept her from falling was his grip on her hair.

"Stop this. Please, stop this, all of ye," Harper suddenly appeared between Murdoch and the men.

She seemed even wilder than before, a woman possessed, her eyes flashing with unspoken emotion as she looked at Murdoch. The wedding dress she had stolen from Eloise was in tatters from the wild ride, and she reached out with curling hands toward Murdoch.

"This ends now."

"Aye, it does end," Murdoch insisted. "Give me Eloise back, Harper. That is an order."

"I cannae dae that." She shook her head, standing taller. "These men answer tae me."

Why? Why do they answer tae ye?

So many questions filled his head, questions he did not have time nor the patience to ask when Eloise was so close to death. Somehow, Harper, a younger daughter of another laird, had men answering her orders. They couldn't be soldiers from her father's clan, for her father wished for her to marry Clyde too.

She has bought loyalty from elsewhere, but where?

"Give me Eloise, Harper," Murdoch warned, turning his blade toward her. "Nay blood has tae be shed if ye dae what I ask."

Slowly, almost calmly, and in a stark contrast to her maddening shouts from a few seconds before, she shook her head.

"I cannae dae that. I am the one with the bargaining power here. If ye want Eloise alive, if ye dinnae want a hair on her head hurt –" as if in emphasis to Harper's words, the man tightened his grasp on Eloise's hair, making a small squeal escape her lips "– then ye will step back now."

"What?" Murdoch spluttered.

"Ye will step back from this cliff. Ye will stay married tae me." Harper suddenly smiled as she stepped toward him, as if all her prayers had been answered. "Ye will be me husband, Murdoch. We will make a family together." She curled her hand toward him, as if he was not pointing a sword toward her at all. "If ye want her alive, that is the price."

Murdoch looked toward Eloise, feeling trapped.

What dae I dae now?

Every part of him rejected the idea at once, but he could not reject it if it was the only thing that would keep Eloise alive.

A sudden whistle sounded through the air. It was of a bolt that had been loosened from a crossbow. Murdoch knew the sound at once and jumped back into a bent forward position, ready to leap forward into attack, yet the bolt was not aimed at him. It landed in the knee of the second attacker, the one that now stood behind Harper.

A bellow that sounded more like a stag which had been struck erupted across the clifftop. Murdoch looked around, seeing others approaching, scrambling up the cliff.

Ian was out front, sword in hand, and behind him, Avery was running too, but with his injury he could not possibly keep up. He had fired the crossbow instead, and now hastened to reload the weapon as Ian ran forward.

"Murdoch!" Avery bellowed. "Get Eloise."

Murdoch didn't need telling twice. He jumped forward and took Harper's shoulder, thrusting her to the side. She rolled across the ground, screaming for him to come back to her.

The figure with the bolt in his knee tried to stand, dragging his injured limb behind him. Murdoch thrust him away too, all very easily as the man couldn't put weight on both feet. He dropped to his knees and rolled away, just as Ian reached them and thrust the sword toward him. A fight must have followed between the pair as Murdoch heard the clatter of swords thrusting together.

Murdoch reached for the man with his hand as Eloise – taking hold of the back of his cloak, tugged so hard that he jerked. The man fell back, as did Eloise, coming away from the cliff edge and onto land.

She landed on her back, winded and grappling at her hair.

At least she is safe!

Murdoch just had to stop the man reaching for her again. Wrapping an arm around the man's neck, he dragged the him back as far as he possibly could, getting him away from Eloise.

The man squealed like a dying pig, grasping at the thick arm Murdoch had around his throat. He pressed down hard, hardly caring if he squeezed the life out of this man that had been so prepared to throw Eloise off that clifftop.

"Dinnae move," Murdoch warned him.

The man fell still, no longer fighting, but Murdoch didn't trust him. As he dropped the man to the ground, he caught the glimmer of a blade, shining in what was left of the sunlight of the day. Murdoch thrust out with the sword. He struck through the man's stomach and looked away, refusing to watch the life that drained out of his face.

One death tae stop another. Never nice, but necessary.

He withdrew the blade, staggering back as he heard the heavy thud of the man falling to the ground.

"Eloise!" Avery's scream from further back across the clifftop drew Murdoch's attention.

He turned around, ready to reach for Eloise again, only to find she was no longer on the ground. She was at the cliff edge again, tussling with Harper who had hold of a blade. Eloise was repeatedly pushed back toward the edge, the heels of her shoes creating furrows in the earth beneath her.

"Harper? Harper, stop!" Murdoch's voice boomed as Eloise got near the edge, that blade close to her throat. Yet Harper didn't stop. She just kept on pushing forward, ready to murder Eloise. "I'll give ye what ye ask!" The words tore out of Murdoch.

"What?" Harper half turned in her fight with Eloise. She shifted to face Murdoch, her arm wrapped around Eloise, pressing the knife in her grasp to Eloise's throat. Forced still, Eloise strained to look at the blade, trying to see it at her neck as her chest rose and fell with panicked fast breaths.

"I'll give ye what ye want." Murdoch dropped his sword to the earth beneath him and stepped forward, a hand outstretched as if he were calming a wild bull. "All right? I'll stay married tae ye. I'll be the husband ye want me tae be, just please, let Eloise go."

Eloise's eyes shot to him. There was pain there, even agony as the tears pooled in her eyes.

I dinnae want tae marry her, Eloise, but what choice dae I have?

"Ye will?" Harper's voice pitched high, full of hope. "Aye… aye, that is fer the best. But if we are tae be wedded, truly wedded, Murdoch. I cannae have ye thinking of her. I cannae even have her around anymore." That blade tipped dangerously close to Eloise's throat.

"Nay!" Eloise screamed and abruptly bent forward, a hand reaching for that dagger. She thrust her hips back and managed to dislodge Harper from her.

Murdoch jumped forward, catching Eloise as she fell. He grabbed her in his arms, towing her back as Harper slipped on the earth.

The stones were disrupted, some dropping beyond the clifftop, as Harper's arms windmilled in the air, struggling to stay straight. That blade dropped from her hand and her body tipped backward.

Such a bloodcurdling scream erupted into the air that Murdoch froze, his arms fixed tight around Eloise as Harper disappeared from view and dropped from the cliff.