Heart's Thief (Highland Bodyguards, Book 2) (22 page)

“You’ve answered my question,” she bit out.

“Then out with it,” Fabian snapped. “What did the King’s missive contain?”

Sabine dared a glance at Colin. His gaze was sharp and searching, no longer clouded with the lingering fog of unconsciousness.

Dragging in a deep breath, she opened her mouth to speak.

Colin ground his teeth until his jaw ached to keep from bellowing at Sabine not to speak.

Aye, he didn’t want to see her dead, but the betrayal of his King and cause could never be forgiven—not after all they’d shared.

Yet the last thing he remembered before the blackness had swallowed him in the forest was that she’d silently asked him to trust her. He’d told her he was willing to take the leap of faith with her. If that would be his end, then so be it, but at least he would know that he’d finally let love into his life again.

“The missive was bound for Ireland,” Sabine began.

Colin dropped his head, praying for patience, praying for faith—praying for aught that would end this nightmare.

“The King was most displeased about his recent failure to capture Carlisle,” she went on. “He said he could not rest until he’d secured that particular jewel for his crown.”

Colin’s ears bristled at that. The missive had said no such thing. Slowly, so as not to draw attention to himself, he lifted his head.

Fabian stood behind his desk, watching Sabine intently. A grin twitched at the corners of his mouth at Sabine’s words.

Colin didn’t try to mask the hot hatred that burned in his veins as he stared at Fabian.

“The King sent the missive to his brother, Edward Bruce, who is fighting in Ireland. He ordered Edward to return to Scotland so that his men could join the Bruce’s forces. He wrote that with their combined armies, Carlisle would most certainly fall,” Sabine said evenly.

Fabian’s brows lifted and his eyes widened as pleasure stole over his face.

“Oh, that is a very valuable piece of information, indeed.”

His hands flew into the piles of missives heaping atop the desk, sifting frantically through them.

“Those on the Irish front will want to know this, of course. The lords can begin drawing down their troops.” He seemed to find a scrap of parchment he was looking for. He set it aside, then dove into the stacks once more. “And I’m sure Andrew Harclay will pay dearly to hear that Carlisle will be attacked again.”

As Fabian dug frantically through the parchment on his desk, Sabine’s gaze met Colin’s. Her eyes slid to one of the candles flickering on the desk, then back to Colin.

He shook his head ever so slightly, unsure of what she was trying to communicate.

Her gaze darted to the candle again, then shifted almost imperceptibly to the parchment-strewn desk. Then she returned her eyes to his, twitching her eyebrows. Her gaze flicked quickly to the two men who still held his arms.

Understanding struck him like a bolt of lightning. He jerked his head at her in refutation. It was far too dangerous. Neither of them had a weapon, and he was weak from fighting Fabian’s men earlier. His head still throbbed, and both his upper arm and his thigh burned dully where they’d been slashed in the attack.

She held his gaze, then nodded slowly and solemnly.

“…will be pleased to hear of this as well,” Fabian was saying, still eagerly searching his missives. He lifted his head as if he suddenly remembered that they were all still there. “Oh, and Miles, you can take care of these two now. I have what I need.”

Miles stepped forward from where he’d stood behind Sabine and gripped her arm.

“You are breaking your word?” Sabine demanded.

“Stupid, stupid girl,” Fabian said with a sad smile. “You still prove far too trusting. You honestly believed I would let you live? If it is any consolation, it isn’t personal. It is just business.”

Fabian returned his attention to his stacks of parchment, waving at Miles absently as if to hurry him along.

Miles bent, reaching for the dagger in his boot.

Just then, Sabine’s foot shot out, kicking Miles in the leg he seemed to be favoring. Miles roared with pain and tumbled to the ground.

Sabine darted forward and knocked both of the candles over into the pile of parchment with one sweep of her arm.

In the heartbeat of confusion that froze the room, Colin struck. He ripped his left arm from one man’s grasp and drove his elbow as hard as he could into the man’s neck. The man collapsed, wheezing for breath through his crumpled throat.

He launched a punch at the other man holding him, but the man ducked. Colin sent a knee upward, catching him in the gut. With a hard shove, Colin sent the man careening into the hut’s low plaster wall. The man’s head connected with the wall with a sickening thud, and he fell motionless to the ground.

“Nay!” Fabian’s rage-filled scream snapped Colin’s attention back to the desk.

Both candles had caught on the heaps of parchment piled on the desk. The flames spread quickly, consuming the dry parchment with increasing intensity.

Sabine darted a hand through the flames, retrieving the dagger that lay atop the parchment.

Suddenly the door to the chamber was yanked open and two more warriors spilled in. Colin had to leap out of the way of their swinging swords, which drove him back.

“Colin!” Sabine shouted.

He spared her a glance, only to find her dagger sailing toward him. He caught it, throwing the gilded sheath aside as he bared the blade.

With a quick block and spin, he’d driven the dagger into one of the men’s chests. He yanked the blade free as the man toppled, turning to the other one.

The warrior paused, assessing Colin before launching an attack. After all, three warriors plus Miles lay on the floor, either writhing in pain or motionless in death.

As the warrior circled him slowly, Colin darted a glance at Sabine. She was backing away from the blazing desk, which Fabian still stood behind. Fabian was frantically trying to save the parchment from the flames, but the fire licked across the entire top of the wooden desk.

“Nay!” Fabian screamed again, trying to tamp out the flames with his bare hands.

His fine silk sleeves caught fire, the blaze traveling swiftly up his arms.

Fabian shrieked wordlessly, waving his arms frantically to stop the flames. But in his wild motions, his arms brushed the roof’s dry thatching. Fire immediately spread to the thatch, the flames hungrily consuming more fuel.

“Sabine, get away from there!” Colin bellowed just as the last warrior launched his attack.

Colin darted out of the way of the warrior’s long sword, letting the man’s momentum carry him forward. As the warrior stumbled past him, Colin drove the dagger into his side, twisting it as he pulled it free. The man fell to the floor with a gurgling moan.

Colin swayed on his feet, his head spinning from the exertion. Nausea pulsed in his stomach in time with the throbbing at the base of his skull where Fabian’s man had struck him. He forced his eyes to focus on the back of the chamber, where he could still hazily make out Sabine’s form against the growing blaze.

Fabian must have lunged across the burning desk, for he lay atop it now, seemingly unaware that his entire tunic and vest were catching fire. Sabine struggled away from him, but she couldn’t seem to free herself.

Through the roaring flames and the haze of sickness, Colin realized why Sabine had not fled.

Fabian had somehow managed to grab the necklace around her neck and was dragging her into the fire with him.

“You little bitch!” he screamed. “You will not escape me!”

Sabine clawed wildly at her neck, but the necklace choked her as Fabian pulled back on it.

Miles, who still lay on the floor nearby clutching his leg, began to drag himself toward Fabian.

Colin darted forward, kicking Miles in the temple where he saw the edge of a dark bruise disappearing into his hairline.

Miles silently slumped back to the ground, either unconscious or dead.

Sabine’s scream had Colin lurching toward her. He reached for her, stumbling as his vision blurred from the fire, smoke, and his own dizziness.

“Colin!” She launched herself forward, straining against the necklace in Fabian’s grasp.

Suddenly the chain around her neck snapped and she fell forward into Colin’s arms.

“Nay!” Fabian shrieked. He rolled from the fiery desk onto the ground, but his burning clothes encased him in raging flames.

Taking Sabine by the hand, Colin staggered toward the door. He kicked the door closed once they were through, cutting off Fabian’s blood-curdling screams and sealing him and his men in the burning chamber.

They stumbled through the cottage’s main room and out the door into the night.

“What in—”

A warrior loomed from the small barn near the cottage, his stunned expression illuminated by the blaze racing along the thatched roof behind them.

Colin lurched forward, driving Sabine’s dagger into the dumbfounded warrior. As the man slid to the ground, Colin took Sabine’s hand once more and pulled her toward the barn.

He threw open each of the stall doors within until he found Ruith in the back, pawing at the ground and snorting in distress. With a sharp whistle, he sent all the horses bolting from the barn. They darted into the little clearing, then disappeared into the darkened woods.

Hands trembling with fatigue and dizziness, he helped Sabine onto Ruith’s back, then threw himself into the saddle behind her.

Ruith eagerly dashed out of the barn at Colin’s nudge. Colin spurred the horse into the trees, leaving the flame-consumed cottage behind them.

Sabine smoothed her sunflower-yellow skirts with clammy hands. The dress, though a little long on her, was a blessed change from the battered, stained green wool gown she’d worn before.

In the sennight since she and Colin had ridden, bedraggled and bleeding, into King Robert the Bruce’s camp in Lochmaben, Sabine had known more kindness than in all the years of her life combined.

Sabine had been given a hot bath, and the camp’s healer, a kindly, beautiful golden-haired woman named Jossalyn Sinclair, had seen to both her shoulder and the damage done to her neck.

Jossalyn had nodded approvingly at the set of Sabine’s shoulder. She’d determined that the cut on Sabine’s neck from Miles’s dagger didn’t need stitches, though she’d worn a bandage for the first few days in camp to cover the scratches and abrasions made when Fabian had choked her with the necklace.

Jossalyn had also somehow managed to produce the yellow dress Sabine now wore as well. And though she’d promised Sabine that she would see what she could do with her old gown, Sabine suspected that the bubbly, warm-hearted healer had surreptitiously burned the tattered, mud- and blood-stained garment.

“Are ye ready, lass?”

Sabine’s head snapped up at Colin’s low, soft voice. She stood from the cot she’d been provided and smoothed her dress again, though it didn’t need it.

As she crossed the small space from the cot to where Colin stood in the open flaps of her canvas tent, she drank in the sight of him.

She’d barely seen him at all in the last sennight, and when she had it was usually from a distance. Under the pretense that they both needed to rest after their ordeal, they’d been given separate tents. Though Colin’s injuries had been somewhat more severe than Sabine’s, he was not kept in isolation as Sabine was. Besides Jossalyn, Sabine had hardly spoken to anyone in the camp. But she’d watched from her tent’s flaps as fierce-looking warriors had come and gone from Colin’s tent not far away.

She wasn’t sure if her isolation or his visitations were a good or bad sign, but for a brief moment, the sight of Colin chased away her fears.

His tawny mane was held at the nape of his neck by a leather strip. He, too, wore simple but new clothes. A blue tunic that brought out the brightness of his eyes was belted over clean breeches and boots that covered his calves. His eyes were soft on her, but a muscle twitched in his jaw, belying the tension beneath his calm façade.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she replied.

He extended his arm to her as he held open the tent flaps. Sabine hesitated, looking around at the camp, which buzzed with Scottish warriors as they went about their daily activities.

“Dinnae be afraid, Sabine,” Colin said softly. “I have already told anyone who will listen that ye saved my life. Ye’ve no enemies here—and if ye did, I wouldnae let them harm ye.”

Sabine’s heart rose to her throat at Colin’s protectiveness. “You saved my life as well, you know.”

“Aye, well,” he said, his lips curling with a soft smile. “We saved each other.”

At his smile, it was as if the sun had suddenly broken through thick clouds. Sabine’s breath caught at being the recipient of such warmth and light. But all too quickly, the loving glow faded from his face and he clenched his jaw once more.

“We’d best no’ keep the King waiting.”

Sabine swallowed hard. Though she’d been allowed to rest and recuperate for the last sennight, the time had finally come to face the Bruce. She drew strength from Colin when she looped her arm in his, but she could not help the trembling of her knees as he guided her through the camp.

Colin must have felt her shaking, for he drew her closer and leaned down to her ear.

“The Bruce is a good-hearted, fair man.”

Sabine didn’t doubt it, for Colin would not pledge his life to someone he thought cruel or dishonorable, yet she wouldn’t allow herself to hope for a positive outcome. She’d done wrong in her past, there was no denying it. All she could do now was tell the King the truth and pray that he would have mercy on her.

As Colin led her through the canvas tents, Sabine was struck by how similar Robert the Bruce’s camp was to his brother Edward Bruce’s, though things appeared to be arranged for a longer-term stay here. She would have continued looking around except that Colin came to a halt before a canvas tent that was larger than the others.

Unlike Edward Bruce’s one guard, four enormous warriors stood outside the tent. They must have recognized Colin, though, for with naught more than a nod from him, one of the guards pulled back the tent’s flap.

Sabine’s gaze skittered over the tent’s comparatively dim interior as she stepped inside. Just as she might have guessed, the King’s tent appeared both more permanent and somewhat more opulent than his brother’s. Woven rugs covered the dirt ground, and several upholstered chairs sat scattered around the tent. Whereas Edward Bruce’s tent had contained little more than a wooden table, this one was dominated by an ornately carved, large oak desk.

When Sabine’s gaze landed on the man seated behind the desk, she went rigid and her stomach knotted.

The King of Scotland rose slowly, his dark eyes assessing them. Sabine yanked her arm from Colin’s and threw herself onto her knees, dropping her head in supplication.

She saw Colin step forward out of the corner of her eye, and then to her complete and utter shock, he took the King’s extended arm and shared a firm shake.

“It is good to see ye again, Colin. Ye gave us all quite the fright the way ye rode into camp a sennight past. Forgive me for no’ speaking with ye sooner, but I’ve been kept busy.”

“Thank ye, Robert,” Colin replied.

Sabine couldn’t help the hissing sound as she sucked in a breath. Had Colin truly just called the King of Scotland by his given name?

A large, weathered had suddenly appeared before her lowered gaze. In astonishment, her eyes beheld the hand, which bore a large gold signet ring on the middle finger. Even in the low light, she could see the warrior bearing a sword and shield on horseback etched in the gold.
The King’s seal.

Her gaze lifted to the brocaded arm and the broad chest all the way up to King Robert the Bruce’s face. His russet beard was more liberally streaked with gray than Edward Bruce’s had been, as was his hair. His face bore all the etchings of his struggles over the years, yet his eyes were sharp and inquisitive as they beheld her.

“Colin must no’ have explained how I prefer to conduct my affairs in private company,” the Bruce said. “Ye need no’ supplicate yerself, lass.”

Slowly, Sabine placed her trembling fingers in the Bruce’s extended hand. He helped her to her feet, then tilted his head ever so slightly over her hand before releasing it.

Only then did she notice the other two men in the tent. One, a dark-haired man with nigh black eyes, was stepping toward Colin for a quick forearm grasp. He turned to Sabine and gave her a curt nod.

“Finn Sutherland,” he said, his voice low and clipped.

Sabine dipped into a curtsy, trying to steady her knees under Finn’s cool, wary gaze.

“Colin,” the second of the two men said, stepping forward from the King’s left. “It is good to see ye, man.”

This man was just as tall and broadly muscled as all the others in the tent, though he bore a strangely curved bow over one shoulder. His hair was as dark as Finn’s, but his eyes were a sharp charcoal gray.

Unlike Finn’s staid greeting, this man pulled Colin in for a hug. Colin actually smiled as he returned the embrace, pounding the man on the back.

“I am Garrick Sinclair,” the man said, turning to Sabine.

Sabine had halfway dropped into another curtsy when she faltered. “Sinclair?” she murmured, looking up at Garrick.

“I believe ye’ve already met my wife Jossalyn,” Garrick replied, warmth suddenly entering his gray eyes. “She has already told me of her…fondness for ye.”

Sabine felt her eyes go round. The Bruce’s sweet, gentle healer was this fierce warrior’s wife? And Jossalyn had spoken of her to him?

“P-please pass on my thanks to her once more for her care, and for this dress,” Sabine managed.

Garrick nodded and then stepped back to the King’s side.

“Now,” the Bruce said, taking command of the room. “Why don’t we all sit, as I gather there is much to discuss.”

At the Bruce’s suddenly serious tone, the knot in Sabine’s stomach drew impossibly tighter.

Cold sweat sprung onto her palms as Colin guided her toward one of the upholstered chairs. Colin sat next to her, the two of them facing the Bruce, who was flanked on either side by Finn and Garrick.

“I understand yer name is Sabine, lass,” the Bruce began. “But I havenae been informed of yer family name.”

Sabine opened her mouth, but the words to explain her lack of family and her painful childhood clogged in her throat.

“She was an orphan, a foundling,” Colin said, coming to her aid. “She kens naught of her family, for she was lifted from the streets of London as a child. And as for her family name…”

He looked over at her, his gaze searching.

“It will be MacKay—that is, if she’ll have me, and if ye’ll allow it, Robert.”

Sabine’s heart seized, and hot tears of surprise suddenly clouded her vision. She gave Colin a nod, not trusting her voice in that moment.

When she turned her misted gaze back on the three men before her, she found one of Finn’s dark brows lifted questioningly and the King’s eyes slightly wider than before. A small smile played on Garrick’s lips. Mayhap Sabine had inadvertently let something slip as Jossalyn had seen to her wounds. Or mayhap Garrick had simply been the quickest to discern the invisible threads of love that bound Colin and Sabine together.

The Bruce cleared his throat. “I still need an explanation for what happened on yer mission before I make any decisions, Colin.”

Colin nodded, then turned to Sabine. “Why don’t ye start from the beginning?”

Drawing in a deep breath, Sabine did just that—but not from the moment that she met Colin, or the moment when Fabian had given her the assignment, but from the very beginning.

She spoke of what little she could remember of her childhood—hunger, cold, and uncaring faces looking down on her—and then Fabian’s sudden rescue. She described Fabian’s treatment of her, leaving naught of his mercurial moods out.

When she began describing her training and her early missions intercepting missives, the Bruce stiffened in his chair. Finn narrowed his gaze on her, and she had to fight the instinct to shrink back from the cold hatred in his stare. 

She forged on, explaining the turn her training took as she reached womanhood. The Bruce’s mouth thinned, though for some reason Sabine sensed that his disgust was more directed at Fabian than herself.

By the time she reached the description of Fabian’s assignment to intercept the missive she believed Osborn carried, the air in the tent hung thick with tension.

Blessedly, Colin came to her aid once more. He took over recounting how she’d found the blank missive, then how he’d tracked her down and taken her into his custody. Colin explained how he’d planned to hold her captive until he could deliver the real message to Edward Bruce and then return to Scotland to hand her over to Robert for questioning. The King nodded at this, stroking his beard, but he remained silent.

When Colin described how Miles and the giant twin warriors had attacked, bent on killing Sabine on Fabian’s orders, Sabine’s throat tightened and tears once again sprang to her eyes. Aye, Fabian’s betrayal still hurt, as it likely would for some time yet.

Forcing down the emotion squeezing her throat, she spoke as Colin paused.

“I had never questioned my loyalty before then, sire,” she said to the Bruce. “But I realized that I had misplaced my faith in the man I thought of as my father. Worse, I hadn’t considered how my actions had hurt others. I thought of myself as a simple thief, little more than a pickpocket, though instead of coin I took information. Colin made me realize that my actions had consequences, and that while some fought for freedom, to protect their families and their homeland, I fought for naught but the love of a heartless man.”

“And why do yer eyes brim with tears, lass?” the Bruce asked, his dark gaze examining her. “Are ye still loyal to that man? Do ye mourn having been caught?”

“Nay,” she said, her voice strong and steady. “They are tears of anger—anger at myself. I haven’t forgiven myself for giving my loyalty to such a cruel, manipulative man, nor will I for many years to come, I imagine.”

“I believe her loyalty now lies with our cause, Robert,” Colin said.

“Are ye mad, Colin?” Finn snapped, his black eyes flaring. “Ye expect us to believe that? She’s an English spy, for Christ’s sake.”

Sabine inhaled and pressed her lips together at Finn’s sharp words, but the Bruce held up a hand to silence the scowling warrior. The King’s keen gaze shifted between Sabine and Colin.

“Explain yourself,” he said curtly to Colin at last.

“She delivered yer message to yer brother just in time to save him from moving his men into an ambush,” Colin said evenly. “She saved countless lives, possibly including yer brother’s, Robert.”