Pride Of Lions

Allisun glared right back at him. “I have no intention of sitting here, waiting on a bunch of McKies.”

“Because of the feud.”

“Of course.”

“So, you are a Murray.”

“I never said—”

“Allisun Murray?”

She gasped. “How can you know that?”

“My uncle said that with your brother gone, you would lead your kinsmen in their raids. I thought him wrong to accuse a woman of such heathenish ways, but I was mistaken.”

“Aye, you were.” Allisun leaped up. “About so much.” She whirled to leave.

He grabbed her ankle, bringing her to the ground with a plop and a grunt of pain. “You are my prisoner, and so you’ll stay.”

“Nay.” She lashed out at him with her free foot. He captured that, too.

Holding both her ankles in one wide hand, he whipped off his belt with the other. “You are my prisoner.”

“I saved your life,” she exclaimed. “I could have left you here, unconscious, for the Bells to find.”

“And I could have let you fall to the stampede.” He hauled her closer, looped one end of the belt around her right wrist, the other around his left. “I would say we are even.”

Fury overcame her fear. “You McKies owe me for the deaths of my father and brothers.” She reached for her knife.

Before the blade cleared the scabbard, he seized her hand and held it fast. My name is Carmichael, not McKie.”

“Carmichael?” Her face turned whiter; her eyes widened.

“Hunter Carmichael,” he said with relish.

“You were there that day.”

“Aye,” he snapped. “I saw your father take my aunt.”

The color rushed back into her cheeks. “You saw, but you know nothing.” Her eyes narrowed. “This feud was your fault. Had you not raised a hue and cry—”

“Your lecherous sire would have gotten away with my aunt and no one would have known whom to blame for the heinous deed.”

She laughed, the sound choked, wild and bitter. “How little you know,” she whispered.

“I know what I saw.”

“Appearances can be deceiving.”

Not to a man who had always dealt in facts. “I was there.”

“So you were.” Her shoulders slumped. She bent her head and repeated the phrase softly, sadly. “And because you were, my family has been hounded—”

“With good reason.”

“So you say.”

Hunter stared at her; trying to pierce the veil of hair that hung before her delicate profile. “What are you saying?”

She turned, tossing the hair from her face, her eyes intent, burning into his. “Nothing, except that you are completely wrong about what happened.”

Hunter glared right back at her. He felt guilty for not having saved his aunt, but he’d not shoulder the blame for starting this feud. Alex Murray had done that when he had kidnapped his aunt. “You’d best try to sleep,” he said tersely. “We must try to leave here before dawn.”

Her head came up at that, like a fighter sensing a challenge. “Oh, I will be ready, sir knight.”

He slept.

Allisun listened to the rhythmic rasp of the knight’s breathing and knew exhaustion had overridden his wariness.

Slowly, cautiously, she bent to slide her hand down the, outside of her left leg. There, in the top of her boot, was the small knife no Borderer went without. One eye on her enemy, she eased the dirk free. If the past twelve years had taught her one thing, it was patience. She applied it now, pressing the sharp blade ever so gently to the leather that bound her to him.

Long minutes passed.

An owl called out from the branches above. Its mate answered, and the pair set out, gliding from the trees on silent wings, hunting in perfect accord.

Her parents had been like that, Allisun reflected as she worked at the bindings. Two bodies, one mind. One heart. Their love had been a thing of beauty, till her mother sickened and her father turned to Brenna for solace. Aye, the Murrays’ miseries, past and present, could be laid at the feet of that sorceress, Brenna. But she was gone, and there was no way to make Hunter understand that without seeming to vilify the dead.

She sliced through the last bit of leather, then held her breath, watching, waiting to see if he’d rouse. He was a handsome man, she thought, staring at his sleep-softened features, the square, stubborn jaw and full, expressive mouth. It was his eyes, though, that had fascinated her. So deep a shade of brown they looked black by moonlight, and so intent they seemed to see clear through her.

When he did not move, Allisun crept from beneath the cloak he’d draped over them for warmth and stole away. It had originally been her plan to climb up to the trailhead and wait in concealment for her men to ride by. But the fate of Hunter’s horse weighed heavily on her mind. What if it was alive but unable to cry out? The thought of so noble a beast in pain sent her toward the base of the gulch.

Keeping low to the ground, moving from tree to tree as Danny had taught her, she reached the base of the mountain. Here the woods were fed by a bubbling burn, the water sweet and cool to her parched throat. As she drank, she thought of Hunter Carmichael, who doubtless hungered and thirsted, too.

Bah. The McKies would find him come morn and carry him back to Luncarty, there to feed him and tend his ankle.

Rising, she turned away from the stream, and nearly fell over the body of the great stallion.

“Poor thing.” She touched its forehead.

“What are you doing?”

Allisun whirled around, the knife clutched in her hand.

Hunter Carmichael stood a few feet away, leaning heavily on a thick tree branch.

“How did you get here without my hearing?”

“Because I am as good at sneaking about as you are.” Limping forward, he knelt on the stallion’s other side and gently stroked the satiny shoulder. “Broken neck.”