Highlander Betrayed (Guardians of the Targe) by Laurin Wittig Read Free Book Online Page A

bide here. And in exchange, we will make you the same pledge. No harm to you while you bide within these walls. Do you accept our hospitality?”
    Hospitality. It was a Highland custom he had counted on and not something most of the king’s spies would understand. Never was such a promise of safety made in the English court and yet here, in the Highlands, where the world was full of dangers from men and nature it was a grant of reprieve from all that, an offer of safety, of comfort, of sustenance, however temporary, and in exchange he must vow the same—to bring no harm to these people. He swallowed, strangely unwilling to enter into an oath he was unlikely to be able to keep.
    But he had no choice. He needed access to this castle. If he did not accept he was sure he would, at best, be sent on his way; at worst, he’d be imprisoned… or dead.
    “I accept.”

CHAPTER THREE
    R OWAN GRIMACED BUT refused to admit how much the cut in her side hurt in spite of the mint poultice her cousin had used to numb it. At least she had been the only one injured. And for all that it hurt, it could have been so much worse if the stranger, Nicholas of Achnamara—she liked the way his name rolled around in her head—hadn’t caught her when she’d tripped, hadn’t pulled her to safety.
    Rowan grunted as Jeanette poked at the cut, making sure all the stone was out. “That is enough, Jeanette. I have work to do.”
    “She is almost done, Rowan, but you will not be seeing to any work the rest of this day,” Elspet said from her bed. Scotia sat next to her with her arms crossed like armor and pique painted all over her face.
    Rowan wanted to argue, but she’d not tax Elspet’s fragile energy by doing so. “You know what a good hand Jeanette has for this work.” Pride twined through Elspet’s quiet praise. “If she says you will barely have a scar when it is healed, you ken that to be true.”
    Rowan didn’t care about a scar. But she did care that she hadn’t done her proper duty with Scotia. If she had kept a closer watch on her wayward cousin, she never would have been meeting Conall on that path and none of them would have been in danger when the wall came down.
    “I’m sorry I didn’t get Scotia away from there before the wall collapsed.”
    Jeanette looked up at Rowan, their faces so close Rowan could feel her cousin’s breath on her cheek. “And what, pray tell, was she doing on that poor excuse for a path that was more important than being here with her mother?” Jeanette looked across to the bed andleveled a stern glance at her sister even though Scotia wouldn’t meet anyone’s eyes.
    Elspet managed to echo Jeanette’s question without ever saying a word. She simply turned her mother’s eye on her youngest daughter—but the girl remained stubbornly mute.
    The image of Scotia and Conall wrapped in each other’s arms flashed through Rowan’s mind, bringing the memory of the warmth and unsettling feelings that had swamped her when Nicholas held her hand in his. Remembering the heat of his touch brought with it the memory of his scent that had washed over her, earthy and fresh, like the forest she loved to wander. An unusual restlessness gripped her. It had taken more self-control than she’d thought it should to leave him to face her uncle and Uilliam.
    “Rowan?” Elspet’s voice wavered slightly, rising on a thin note of concern. Rowan retraced her wandering thoughts to find the question Elspet wanted answered.
    “I do not know what Scotia was doing on the path.” She closed her eyes as Jeanette pressed a pad of linen against her wound, soaking up the still oozing blood, thankful for the excuse not to meet her aunt’s. She hated lying to her but Elspet did not need more worries, especially not where her errant daughter was concerned. “But she did not want to come away and I stood there and argued with her.”
    “Is this true?” Elspet had a hand on Scotia’s arm. “Why would you not do as your