Chapter One

Eight years later– 1478

Inverie, Scotland

St. Benedict’s Abbey

“We have to try again,” Graeme said through clenched teeth, fighting against the pain.

Eppie stopped pressing the wet cloth to the gash on Graeme’s stomach, which he’d gotten by stupidly tripping in the woods, and served him a fierce look that only a woman who’d reared him could give, grown as he was. She sat back on her bench, worry crinkling her forehead and adding lines to those that age had put there long ago, and she snorted. “I should nae have told ye who ye were.”

The words were as familiar as the distraught shake of her silver head. She’d said the same thing every time he’d persuaded her to try to escape the island where the abbey was, which had served as their prison since the day they were captured trying to escape his family’s stronghold eighteen years ago.

“But ye did,” he said, keeping his tone gentle. This woman loved him as her own. He was not her son by blood, yet by a twist of fate and treachery, they were more each other’s family than if she had birthed him. And he loved her as a mama, so he would do all he could not to cause her worry, but staying on this island for fear he might die trying to escape was not something he could do.

“Living here is nae living,” he said, holding her faded gray gaze.

Without a word, she got up with a moan so soft that only one who was alert to her as he was would notice. But that moan was the reason they were not gone from the place yet. She made her way across her small bedchamber to the table in the corner, hobbling more than walking in painfully slow, uneven steps. She’d favored her left leg ever since her right had been broken the first time they’d tried to escape eight years before, when he reached thirteen summers and she thought him finally strong enough for the treacherous journey. Every time she took a step, it appeared as if she might teeter over, and it made him wince.

There were two ways off the island where they were held captive. One way was by birlinn; the other was on foot along a dangerous forty-mile trail. The birlinn had been the only true viable option since Eppie’s crippling injury, and a birlinn had only come to Inverie twice since their first attempted escape. The last time had been two years before.

Until today, that was. He’d seen a birlinn on the horizon early that afternoon, and his head was pounding with the sour knowledge of how long it might be before another chance arose if they did not get off the island today. “Eppie,” he said, his tone desperate to his own ears. Time was slipping away. They needed a plan in place before the birlinn arrived.

Her shoulders bunched up nearly to her ears, but she did not turn around. “We’ve tried the birlinn twice before and failed,” she replied to his unspoken demand.

He inhaled a steadying breath for patience. “We have to try again.”

She swiveled toward him with a silver flagon clutched to her stomach. “Nay. Bernard will kill ye if we are caught. Each time we’ve attempted escape and failed, the punishment he’s inflicted upon ye has gotten worse, and if nae for Gaufrid stepping in last time, Bernard would have lashed ye to death.”

It was true. Gaufrid was the one monk in this godforsaken abbey who had ever shown them kindness, and he had risked his life by intervening with Bernard. Gaufrid had reminded Bernard that if Laird Campbell wanted Graeme and Eppie dead, he would have killed them when he’d captured them eighteen years before instead of banishing them to the isle.

“There’s nae any voice of reason left here, what with Gaufrid’s recent death,” Eppie said, pausing, Graeme was certain, to get a hold on her sadness.

Graeme own chest tightened when thinking of the monk he’d considered a friend, who’d died a fortnight previously from sickness. He’d liked Gaufrid immensely. Over the years, the monk had secretly taught Graeme to use his fists to defend himself, though Gaufrid had warned that doing so would mean a greater infliction of punishment, as there was nowhere to escape to. Gaufrid had also shown him how to wield a sword—or at least as well as he could with only the sticks at their disposal—should he ever get away from Inverie and actually have the chance to pick one up.

“So, nay,” Eppie continued, interrupting Graeme’s thoughts, “I’ll nae attempt to escape with ye again.”

He clenched his teeth once more so he wouldn’t snap at Eppie. She knew he’d never leave without her. “Is this what ye believe my da would have wanted?” he asked, trying another method of persuasion. Eppie had been so loyal to his father, Laird Stewart, the Lord of Lorn, that she’d willingly agreed to risk her life to ferret one of his three children away from their home when it had been under attack by the Campbells and the Lord of the Isles.

She hiked an eyebrow at him in clear exasperation. “Yer da wanted ye, yer brother, and yer sister to remain alive, which is why he sent each of ye with someone he trusted to keep ye that way.”

“He wanted us to remain alive,” Graeme said, forcing himself to keep his tone slow and even, “so that we would one day return to our home and claim what was taken from our family by our supposed allies and friends. I kinnae imagine my da would have wanted me to spend my life rotting in an abbey because I was too afraid of dying to attempt escape.”

Eppie pressed her lips into a thin line and started toward him, one shuffling step at a time. She held the silver flagon to her chest now, and he frowned. “Are ye thinking I need a drink for my pain?” he asked, raising his hand toward the gash on his stomach.

Before he could touch it, Eppie hissed, “Dunnae set yer fingers to that open gash. Ye’ll get an infection from yer dirty hands.”

He lowered his hand to his lap. Eppie knew more than he did about such matters. Though she’d worked in the kitchens at his family’s stronghold, her sister had been the healer and had taught Eppie a thing or two about the arts. Eppie had told him, as she had everything else about his life before the treachery—before the attack on his family’s home, and before they’d been caught and sent to this abbey to live and die where no one would ever think to look for them, if anyone had even been left to do so.

She stopped in front of him and thrust the flagon at him. “Hold it up to yer face and look at yerself.”

“Ye’re daft, old woman,” he said, good-naturedly.

She thumped him on the head. She may be slow with her feet but not her hands.

“What was that for?” he demanded, rubbing at his scalp.

“That,” she said, pushing the flagon and his hand toward his face, “was for the backtalk. Ye may be a man, but I’m still yer elder.”

“I was teasing ye, Eppie.”

“I’m nae in the mood for teasing. Now look at yer face.”

He did as he was bid. He had not looked upon his own face in two years, not since he’d received the lashing that had nearly killed him, so his image came as somewhat of a surprise. He studied first the jagged, light-pink line that started at the top right of his forehead and made a path through his right eyebrow where it stopped, and then it commenced once more below his eye. Had the green of his eyes dulled? He shook off the question. It didn’t matter. He followed the scar the rest of the way to the top edge of his lip.

He’d changed physically and mentally in those two years. His hair had darkened, and Eppie had been right that he looked harsh and fearsome between his close-shorn hair, courtesy of Atholl, who insisted it helped to release the devil. He saw the scar and the muscle he’d gained from the constant physical labor Bernard and the monks had him do. It was funny what lifting mead barrels every day for aged monks did for one’s chest and arms. If he’d had this power in his body when Bernard had taken him by surprise, flicking the switch at his face before beginning the lashing, Graeme might have killed him. Though he assuredly would have been killed for the deed in return, and he wanted to live to escape.

Graeme raised a finger to the scar and traced it over the rough skin. The blood and the pain were gone, but his insides curled as if it had just happened. “Well,” he said, realizing he’d been staring at himself for quite a spell, “ye always told me I was far too fair to look upon.”

“Ye still are,” Eppie replied, her voice soft now. He looked to her and saw tears shimmering in her eyes.

“Ah, Eppie,” he said, overcome with the knowledge that she cared so much for him. She was the one good thing in his life. He stood and drew her into his embrace. “I dunnae mind about my face.”

“I ken ye dunnae,” she said, sniffing and hugging him before pulling away to look at him. Her nose was red from holding back tears, he suspected. “Gaufrid kept ye alive that day. If we fail today, Bernard will kill ye. I just kinnae risk it.”

“I am dying now, Eppie. Day by day. Moment by moment. From when my eyes open until they shut, and I’d rather die quickly and with courage than wither away inside until I draw my last breath, a shell of a man I was nae ever braw enough to become. I want to see the home I kinnae remember. I want to discover if my brother and sister still live. And I want vengeance against the Campbells, and all others who attacked my family and put us here.”

The horn blew two long blasts and one short to announce an approaching birlinn from the watchtower outside. Graeme could have been the string of a drawn bow for how tense he felt. “Eppie—” He glanced out the lone tiny window in her bedchamber. The sky had gone from bright blue to filled with purples and oranges. He’d been in here too long trying to convince her. “Our time is up. We must make an escape plan.”

She bit her lip, showing her indecision. It was better than her muleheaded refusal from before. She was wavering. As she opened her mouth to speak, the door to her bedchamber slammed open, and there stood Bernard, bald head glistening with sweat from undoubtedly rushing to Eppie’s room at the sound of the horn. His beady brown eyes were narrowed, and he had a sword in one hand and a dagger in the other.

“Come on now,” he growled, motioning to them.

“To where?” Graeme asked, blood rushing through his veins.

“To the cage, of course,” Bernard snarled. “I’m nae going to fash myself over ye while the Campbells are here.”

Graeme’s insides went cold, and the icy blood in his veins now roared in his ears. He cast a look at the window, but he could not see the vessel, nor the Campbell banner that must surely be fluttering in the wind. The Campbells were here! The rage he always held just below the surface rushed up, threatening to break through. His hands curled into fists, and as he started to draw one of them back, Eppie grabbed his arm.

“Help me walk, aye?” Her voice wobbled with her fear for him. She worried that he’d do something foolish and get himself killed. And he very nearly had. He exhaled slowly, trying to release some of his rage. “Aye, of course,” he said, even as Eppie’s fingers curled tightly over his bicep.

“The old woman has always been smarter than ye,” Bernard said. “Now come along.” He waved the dagger at them to indicate they should go first. Graeme started forward, but Eppie paused.

“Might I get my cloak? It will be cold in the cage tonight.”

“I dunnae give a damn if ye’re cold, old woman.”

“Mayhap the Campbells will nae like ye treating a woman so poorly,” Graeme tried. “They keep us alive for a reason.”

Bernard’s lips turned down, indicating he’d taken the bait. “Get yer cloak but be quick about it.”

Eppie shuffled over to her bed, grabbed the cloak, and shuffled back, and then they were being prodded along by Bernard’s sword and dagger, the tips pressed against their backs. They made their way out of the abbey and into the inner courtyard and the cool night air. The temperature had dropped, and the sky had darkened even more. The oranges had nearly faded, leaving only purple that would eventually fade to black. The torches flickered brightly along the rampart of the abbey, and he could see the iron cage that hung from the second story swinging back and forth.

The wind had picked up from earlier, when he’d looked outside and the trees had been still. It wafted over his face, and when he looked at Eppie, wisps of her silver hair fluttered around her aged face. Bernard paused, looking skyward and cursing, and Graeme glanced up as well. Cool drops of rain immediately hit his face and slid down his skin. A storm was coming, and with it, the perfect distraction to aid their escape, if only they were not locked in a hanging iron cage. But they were. Rage and hopelessness knotted in Graeme’s chest. Bernard would lock them in, and there would be no escape.

Graeme knew it well because he’d been locked in the cage before, and he’d made his hands bloody trying to get out. It had been futile and foolish. The knot inside him tightened, and he imagined wrapping his hands around Bernard’s thick neck and squeezing the life out of him, except Bernard would gut him with his sword or dagger before Graeme could cut off enough air to kill him. If he ever got away from this abbey and secured a weapon, he’d always keep it on his body within reach, and he’d keep a dagger strapped to him for the times when he needed to be naked for bathing.

Bernard started forward once more, and soon they were mounting the stone steps to the second story. The rain made the going slippery, so Graeme clutched Eppie’s arm to keep her from falling. Once they reached the top, he glanced toward the shoreline, curious if the birlinn had docked yet. It appeared that all the monks had come out to greet the Campbells. There was just enough light left in the sky, combined with the torches four of the monks in line held, that Graeme could easily count ten men, which was the precise number of monks that occupied the evil place.

In the water, the birlinn had docked and people were already starting to disembark. He thought he’d find the first person off to be dressed finely, as he assumed the Campbells would be, but the man who stepped onto the dock first wore no rich cloak, nor did he have any jewels upon his person as far as Graeme could see. When the man stopped immediately after setting foot on Inverie soil and turned back to the birlinn, Graeme thought at first that he must have forgotten something aboard. But no, the man genuflected, as one would to someone higher in station. This man seemed to be a servant, based on the helping hand he offered to the individual behind him. The person set their hand in his proffered one at the same time they pushed back the hood of their cloak. Graeme stared in shock. A woman had come to Inverie.

This was the first woman he’d seen besides Eppie in eighteen summers, and in truth, he did not remember his mother, sister, or the other women from his family’s home, but Eppie had told him enough stories that he knew he had spent the first three years of his life doted upon daily by his mother and the other women of the castle. Though he could not make out the stranger’s features, her dark tresses fell nearly to her waist, a visual feast that would have been lost to the night and the blending of the sky shadows if not for the pale cloak highlighting her hair.

“Get in the cage,” Bernard ordered while pressing the tip of his sword into Graeme’s back. Graeme drew his attention from the woman to the cage where Eppie was already sitting. She pressed her lips together in a frown as he stepped into the cage. It dipped with his weight, and Eppie drew in a sharp breath. She hated heights, and no doubt her insides were in a thousand knots. He did his best to carefully place his other foot down in the cage to keep it from moving, but it was futile, given they were suspended in the air. The cage dipped to the other side with the addition of his weight, and Eppie’s nostrils flared as she grasped his calf. It always surprised him how strong her grip was for such an aged woman. The door creaked shut and the lock slid into place. Then, without a word, Bernard turned and thudded away.

Once Bernard was out of sight, Graeme moved toward the door and shook it, despite knowing full well that Bernard would never forget to lock it. He clenched his teeth against the hopeless rage rising in him once more as the cage began to sway in the wind. He turned his head toward the birlinn. It appeared the party had already disembarked and departed the dock, leaving the birlinn to bob up and down in the rough waters.

“A woman and a storm,” he bit out, as the drizzling rain grew harder, pelting the iron cage with a tink tink tink that threatened to drive him mad. Behind him, Eppie was silent, having decided to let him rage. There was eighteen years’ worth of it. He gripped the cold wet metal, wishing for the strength to pry the bars open, but of course, that was only in tales from bards. “We could not have prayed to the gods for a better set of circumstances to gain our freedom. Why do the gods grant us these two bounties and deny us by locking us in this cage?”

“Quit yer bellyaching and take this,” Eppie said.

The smugness in her tone had him turning toward her immediately. Their eyes locked, and her weathered face stretched into a grin. Lifting her hands, she dug in the right cuff of her gown for a moment and produced the gold hairpin his mother had long ago gifted her for helping with the birth of her children.

“Eppie,” he said, unable to utter more than that for a brief moment. “Eppie, I could kiss ye.” He reached for the thin gold pin and grasped it between his thumb and index finger, his heart beating with excitement and fear. In all the times they’d been locked in this cage, she’d never been able to smuggle the pin with her before.

He brought the thin gold hairpin up to his eye as the rain came down so hard that it blew sideways in a sheet of white to wet the inside of the cage. “Ye’re certain it will work?” he asked.

“It should,” Eppie replied. “Ye ken I’ve only tried it thrice before when yer mama told me how. With the locks on our bedchambers here being bars and nae like the cage lock, I’ve nae had another opportunity to try.”

He nodded, excitement pushing his blood through his veins as he turned to the lock and tried to get in a position to fiddle with it.

“Dunnae drop that pin,” Eppie warned behind him as he stuck the tip in the opening. He felt around, twisting the pin this way and that.

“Woman,” he said through gritted teeth, “dunnae ye think I ken that?”

“If ye were nae holding my pin I’d smack ye upside the head,” she replied.

The pin seemed to move deeper into the lock, and Graeme pushed harder, jiggling it as he did so until he felt the click rather than heard it. His pulse racing, he grinned and pulled the pin out to put it between his teeth. He released the lock and turned to find Eppie there, white as a sheet but grinning and standing.

She reached up, took the pin from between his teeth, and stuck it in her hair. “We best be going. If we’re caught this time, Bernard will kill ye.”

“Aye,” Graeme agreed, “but I’ll have died trying to gain my freedom, and that is an honorable way to die.”