Chapter One

Aberdeenshire, Scotland

27 October The Year of Our Lord 1663

“N o, no, no, no, no…” Abigail Lindsey whispered as she ran through the pelting rain across the road and onto the moor. Was the man in the tavern behind her William? She wasn’t going back inside to find out.

Abigail squinted into the darkness that stretched like a blanket over the hill leading toward the hulking castle ruins at the top.

You are mine, Abigail, to do with as I please.

“No bloody chance,” she whispered, hurrying forward. She had already paid for the entire coach ride to Inverness, but she would end her journey here in the tiny town of Turriff. Her alias, Grace Winfield, would simply disappear. Hopefully, without anyone taking note.

Unless someone inside the tavern said, “Aye, a lass with red hair has been here.”

Who had seen her? The bar maid? The coachman? Her fellow passengers she’d endured all day as she fled from Aberdeen?

The autumn rains had made the peat spongy, and thunder rumbled in the distance as if God argued with her hasty plan to abandon her journey to Inverness. She trudged on toward the castle. “’Tis vacant,” she responded to His almighty question about her sanity. “And sound.” At least she hoped so.

Petticoat in hand, Abigail marched across the moor, her thighs aching as she climbed, hoping the stormy twilight hid her flight. She glanced over her shoulder, her heart thumping so hard, her hand flew to her chest. Holy God! A man stood at the edge of the moor, watching her. Damn the light blue cloak William had given her. It was her warmest, but it stood out in the darkness.

“I am but a phantom roaming the moors,” she said between her rapid breaths, the pains in her legs forgotten as she broke into a run. Lightning splintered across the sky. “Assistance would be appreciated,” she said, raising her gaze to heaven.

Looking back again, she gasped. The man was following her onto the moor. “No.” William or not, he was after her. Abigail charged forward toward the looming shadow of the castle, her satchel banging between her shoulder blades. She ran for long minutes, not looking behind her.

Rain tapped sporadically against the hood pulled over her head. Crack! Lightning shot across the black skyscape again. Its careless light revealed the hairy vines growing like tentacles up the front of the sand-colored stone facade of the three-story tower house before her. With walls thick and solid, if she could get inside, she might survive the night. As she leaped off the moor, her boots crunched the pebbles of the overgrown road before it.

Running up to the front double doors, Abigail grabbed the cold iron latch, working it with desperation. It didn’t release, though she shook it frantically. “Oh God, please open!”

The man must be closing in with his longer strides and trousers instead of skirts. Abigail tilted her face to the dark windows just as another flash of light cut across the sky. A woman stood at the window on the second floor. Her hair long, her face pale, and her eyes turned down toward Abigail.

“Please help me!” Abigail cried. She looked over her shoulder toward the moor. It was dark, but there was movement, the shadow of a monster. Breathing so hard her words were weak, she looked up at the woman again. “He will kill me. Please! Let me in!” A sob came out, born of panic. She pounded on the door, her fists tight. “Please let me in! He is coming!”

In the silence of the receding thunder, Abigail heard the scrape of iron in the lock. Thumbs pressing on top of each other in their haste, she squashed the iron latch, and the door swung inwards. She dashed into darkness, her heels loud on the wooden floor, and spun to slam the door. Fingers desperately seeking, she found the iron key in the lock and used both hands to turn it, snatching it back out. Pivoting, her eyes wide in the inky darkness, she dropped her bag and pressed her back against the door. Little sparks appeared in her periphery like popping embers rising from a bonfire.

Rain pelted the house, and thunder rolled like the deep rumble of a mythical beast. Something wooden banged in the back of the castle, making her jump. “Are there other ways he could get inside?” she whispered into the darkness.

The only answer was a lashing of wind that shrieked around the eves. At the end of a loud clap of thunder, she thought she heard a deep voice yell. Her breath blew out in gusts, and she slapped her hood off her head so she could better listen.

Ye are safe . In the darkness, she could not tell from which direction it had come. A woman’s voice, soft but strong. It felt like truth and not just hope. He cannot hurt you now .

Abigail sank to the floor, her damp and dirty dress belled out around her. She clutched her bent knees, bowing her head as if to curl into a tiny ball. “I am safe,” she whispered. Please God, let it be true.

*

Drip… Drip… Drip…

The sound teased, pressing against Abigail’s bladder, and she shifted, the aches in her limbs making her groan as she stretched. The sourness in her mouth reminded her how thirsty she was. The castle. William. The woman in the window .

She blinked and pushed up slowly from the floor. “Holy God,” she yelped as she saw the woman. She stood in the center of the long room, staring at Abigail. Her eyes were dark in a pale face, her hair striking in contrast. Red and straight, it fell unadorned down to her waist. She wore a green gown without a crinoline to hold it out.

Abigail straightened. “Pardon me, milady.” Her breath caught as she turned to see the lady had moved closer without a sound, and Abigail forced an uneasy smile. “Thank you for letting me take refuge in your home last night. A man from the village was chasing me across the moor.”

The woman’s head tilted to the side, her face blank.

“I am Abigail,” she said. “Well, actually it is Grace, now,” she added quickly. Lord help her. If she was going to live a life of duplicity, she had better improve her lying skills. “Forgive me for intruding, but is there a privy closet? I am in need.”

Abigail bent to pick up her bag and straightened to find the room empty. “Milady?” But she had vanished. Abigail huffed softly. “I will find it myself.”

The great hall was long with wooden beams running the length of the ceiling. Dust-covered tapestries lay bunched on the floor against the walls, as if they’d fallen there and were left to mold. A dusty table sat in the middle of the room, a cold and blackened hearth at the end with a tarnished shield over it. Fuzzy lines of cobweb hung in patterns amongst gutted candles in two chandeliers overhead. Although dry, the castle had fallen into complete disrepair. Was the woman alone?

Abigail found a pot behind a privacy screen in an alcove. “Thank the blessed lord,” she murmured, ducking behind. Her boots clipped on the wooden floor as she returned to the great hall, staring up at the cobwebs that shifted with a draft moving unseen about the ceiling.

“Milady?” she called at the bottom of the turning staircase. More cobwebs ran across the wide expanse of the steps as if no one ever used them. But Abigail had seen the woman staring down at her from the window above.

She found an iron poker, caked with rust, and brandished it like a sword, swiping the cobweb strings out of her way. “Are you here alone?” she called, but there was no answer. The place felt… hollow.

The corridor above was dry, the chilled air smelling heavily of dust. Abigail’s boots clipped softly on the floorboards, her senses alert. She opened each door, poking her head into bedchambers, their scant furniture covered with draped sheets. The only room without dust covers was the one whose windows faced the front of the castle.

“Good morn,” she called. Sheets lay in discarded piles, but no footprints marred the fine coating of dust. A four-poster bed was covered with a silk coverlet and pillows. The wardrobe doors squeaked as she opened them to find a green gown hanging there, identical to the one the red-haired lady wore. Abigail plucked at her own stained petticoat. Maybe she could buy the green gown from the lady if she had others.

The third floor was much the same, with smaller rooms and no furnishings. Abigail returned to the wide, twisting staircase and trailed a hand down the curved wall as she descended. She looked through a broken window, the jagged glass framing the isolated landscape.

Hurrying down and across the great hall, Abigail entered the kitchens in the rear. “Milady?” Light filtered in from several windows high up, two of them broken. The rustle and chirp of a startled bird made her start as a sparrow fluttered up from a cold hearth, shooting out a window.

“Do you have any food and drink I could buy?” Abigail called. Thirst made her tongue stick in her mouth. Walking over, she caught a drop of rainwater from the sill and put her finger in her mouth, turning toward the broken door.

Abigail gasped, nearly choking on her own finger, and shoved backwards until she climbed halfway onto the workbench. An arm, stiff and unmoving, lay on the floor, peeking out from the far table. She leaned out until she could see the rest of the prone body. Blood, black and thick, pooled out under a man’s head. “Holy Lord,” she whispered. His skull was crushed, an iron skillet on the ground beside him.

Pulling her tattered skirts close, Abigail crept toward him and crouched, touching his jacket. “Damp,” she whispered. He’d been in last night’s rain. Abigail’s heart jumped about inside her chest, and she drew in a full breath. She picked open his jacket pocket, pulling forth a few shillings and a folded missive. She held it up to the light.

Abigail Lindsey

5 feet 6 inches

Slight of build

Long, curling red-gold hair

￡100 upon receipt, must be alive

Abigail stared numbly at the paper, her stomach tight. “William,” she breathed out. “He’s hired men to hunt me.”

*

Kerrick Hay took a swig of the honey ale he’d just purchased at the Turriff Tavern. The middle-aged barmaid gave him a coquettish smile, and he dropped a shilling on the table. “I will return when my wagon arrives.”

“If ye get lonely up at Delgatie, just let a lass know,” the woman said, her smile inviting.

“Appreciated,” he said, his gaze already on the door.

“Ye best be careful crossing the moors,” she said. “A man went missing three nights ago.”

He frowned. “At Delgatie?”

“On the moor somewhere between here and there. The coachman said he saw him headed that way, and he never returned for his horse.” She leaned over the bar. “Since I was a wee lass, folks have talked of a lady in red haunting Delgatie Castle. Her name is Rohaise.”

He placed his leather hat back on his head. “’Tis good I don’t believe in spirits, except for the whisky variety.” He picked up the sack of apples he’d purchased and strode from the tavern to retrieve Leum, his large, black horse who waited patiently near the post. Leum’s head tossed as he eyed the sack.

Kerrick pulled out two of the apples, presenting one to his horse. Leum lipped it from his hand, crunching it as Kerrick took a bite of his own and spotted a few golden-colored trees in the distance next to his castle. He imagined a field of barley to the west and a herd of sheep spread out around his property.

One year to make a profit, or ye lose everything. His father’s bitter terms battered against Kerrick’s determination.

And don’t sully the Hay name any more than ye have , his older brother had added.

Dammit . He’d been a hero in Cromwell’s army, but at home he was just a lowly traitor.

Kerrick guided Leum over the spongy moor, made more treacherous after the rains. Careful progress took nearly an hour, bringing him before the three-story fortress. At least all four walls seemed to be standing. The wind blew the limbs of two large oak trees, their yellow leaves flitting down like colored rain as he led Leum around the eastern side where a stone wall enclosed what he remembered was a back garden. There was little hope it had survived decades of neglect. He stopped Leum near the barn.

“Serves you right. Working for William.”

He pivoted at the sound of the voice. A lass?

Rocks clanked together as if she were dropping them. Kerrick walked silently to the closed gate.

“I suppose I must say some words,” the voice floated over the wall. “Dearest God. As a good Christian woman, I must ask for you to forgive this man who no doubt meant to do me harm, and to forgive whoever hit him, because she saved me.”

Saved her? Kerrick pressed the gate where the lock had been smashed. The lass stood alone amongst the weeds. She had the most beautiful fall of golden red hair. Curls cascaded down the back of her green gown.

She stared down at a pile of rocks. “So blessings on your soul, you horrid bastard.” She dropped another rock onto the heap. The wind shifted, and the familiar, tangy smell of death rolled into Kerrick.

“What the hell?” He pushed through the gate. “Who are ye?” The woman gasped, twirling toward him. “And what are ye doing in my castle?” He looked down at the rock pile where two boots stuck out from the end. “With a dead man?”