Broken Highlander's Blood Oath Read online

  “And after her maidenhead is yielded you could perchance auction her again for permanence, at a lower price. I for one would be eager to afford the reduction,” Lord Chaffery said.

  “Lower?” Lord Armand eyed him.

  “Of course a man would have to consider the possible bastard,” Lord Chaffery added hastily.

  “And the lady? She agrees to this method ... this auction?” Donan strove to keep the words from choking him. It was difficult, although he knew the answer; he had to hear it from the knave's own mouth.

  “The lady obeys her brother in all matters,” Lord Armand snapped, now watching the back hall with angry anticipation. Then, he turned back to Donan like a hungry hound. “Yourself and this brother of yours, you heard of this little gathering where?”

  Donan treaded lightly, he could only assume the lord of the castle knew of the perverse auction, although Donan was there quite innocently. Shancy and he had been on a journey from visiting his English holdings, left to him from his mother’s father, the first Baron Barnard, and they were returning home.

  Granville Castle had offered a night's dry sanctuary in their journey and it was a mere happenstance they were there.

  “Lord Granville mentioned it and I of course could not let it pass.” Donan watched Lord Armand’s gaze move past his legs, clearly assuming what Donan had implied, that he needed to purchase a lady of permanence, for he could not win one because he was lame.

  Donan considered it was past time to leave Lord Armand’s putrid company, and then determine what to do. Unfortunately, Donan could only see one clear way out of the situation for the gentle lady and that was by using force; however that would leave the necessity of an honorable marriage for the lady afterward.

  Christ, he'd never intended to ever press marriage on his younger brother, however Shancy would be the only one that had enough station and legs to be worthy of Lady Analise. Jesu, could he stand by and watch his brother marry the fair lass? Donan’s fingers tightened into a fist, what a fool he was being. What an utter fool.

  “And your interest, Eagle, what price has it?” Lord Armand asked with sharp intent. “You would not want to be left out of the bidding.”

  “Nay, I would not,” Donan replied through thinned lips. “And I can assure you my bid will be the highest I’ve paid yet.” Donan forced his mouth into a strained smile toward Lord Armand’s raised brows. “And you shall be well compensated, that I can be promising you,” Donan finished in a harsh undertone.

  The uproar began with the bells tolling Sextants, and not many moments afterward Donan had rolled his chair away from Lord Armand and Lord Chaffery with some inane excuse to pee. The lecherous lords had begun to seem angrily perplexed, then alarmed when their prize didn’t return to the front hall of the Keep.

  Donan continued to watch them race toward the back hall at the same time two of his knights lifted him, still sitting in his chair, out of the front entryway of the Keep.

  “Find her,” Donan ordered Shancy as they met on the top stair leading into the Keep. “I’ll be hitching myself to my stallion, but we need to make the gate!”

  Donan grimaced at the jostling of his knights Faye and Dun, who tramped through the muddy Bailey toward the stable. The rain would help them later, but then it stole precious moments while Donan prayed for a bit of luck. Where was she? Shancy had reported seeing Lady Analise stealing out of her chamber after he'd deposited her there. That she was trying to escape her stepbrother's vile plan was obvious, but which direction? The postern or the gate? Time was of the essence and it was moments like that, when he was hungering to run off into the action, which left him feeling the most impotent.

  * * *

  “Darn-darn,” Analise hummed under her breath.

  She'd not thought about the extra men Armand had brought nor where they might be placed, and the mare she was attempting through great fear to abduct, was not a willing victim. Oh, how she disliked horses ... nay, she was terrified of them. She kept trying to think that the mare was gentle and the brown-dappled beast did look as fearful as she felt.

  “Halt!”

  It was Red Kife: Analise saw out of the corner of her eye. Mary mother of God, if it had been anyone other than Red Kife. Nay, he was more akin to Kife the savage brute force!

  “You, slut! I’ve got ye now. Come here, little twat!”

  It was a lurid bellow and Analise dropped the mare's halter, not knowing what to do with the blasted piece anyway. Then, she skittered around to the other side of the mare, eyeing its tall back while hysterically thinking perchance she could leap up on it.

  “Twat!”

  Oh twas Kife, leering down at her over the mare's back with both of his hands stretched outward. Analise ran, slipping in the mud, skidding on her knees when a force of nature, made into the fist of Kife, grabbed her cloak from behind and jerked. She screamed or she tried to, but the cloak tie with Kife’s wrenching force behind it, choked off her terror. Frantically, she grasped the tie and she pulled it free, stumbling up and forward as it loosened.

  “Nay!” Kife bellowed, lunging behind her, but God chose his moments and Analise managed to avoid his lunge, slipping down the hill in the mud toward the gate. She knew the whimpering sounds she heard were her own and hysteria was following close behind, but all she could think of was that gate. If she could just make the gate!

  God, however had given her only that one moment, because as she ran the world in front of her suddenly shifted into a fiery blackness, and she screamed, looking upward at the demon sucking her sight.

  Donan's arms swooped downward from Xavier’s towering girth and he grasped Analise beneath her bosom with a strong arm bent around her delicate ribcage, to lift her before him up onto the stallion’s back. The deed was made easier by the leverage of the thick straps that held his legs to Xavier’s flanks on either side, but also made more taxing because of Lady Analise’s hysteria and the churning approach of the red knight.

  “Glenncannon to me!” Donan bellowed, holding a strong arm indelicately across the large mounds of Analise’s straining bosom. She had yet to understand that he was a friend, and while her struggles did not daunt him, he was afraid she would twist off Xavier’s back, and hinder his defense of the red knight’s imminent attack.

  By the rood, he’d found her now and he’d not let her go.

  Donan grasped the thick oaken shaft of one of the crutches he carried, which were shoved into a pommel hole on the side of his gear. He whipped the crutch free, likened to a solid battle staff and he swung it one-handed at the red knight’s head. He was strong of upper body, stronger than most for the effort he used to carry his useless lower portion. The thud of the impact drove up his arm as a loud thwack sounded in the Bailey.

  Donan was certain he'd broken some skull and it left him feeling immensely satisfied. He'd seen the red knight trying to run Lady Analise down like an animal, and worse he'd heard the man’s lewd taunts. What he wouldn't give to the devil himself, he thought, to take to the ground and finish the brute.

  “Donan to the gate!” Shancy bellowed somewhere off to the right and behind him.

  “Analise ... you bitch!” Lord Armand’s screeching echoed in the Bailey yard as he appeared through the Keep's front way.

  Analise stopped fighting him and she whimpered in fright. “Please do not let him have me. Please!”

  Xavier bunched his withers into a leap forward as Donan called instructions to the warhorse. Xavier was voice trained and Donan gave the great stallion his head, as he spoke in Analise’s ear. “You are safe, my lady. I vow to keep you safe.”

  Analise must have caught some of his words and further believed them or perhaps she was too afraid to care, because she wrapped her arms about his waist and buried her face into his chest as Xavier raced toward the gate.

  Chapter Three

  An hour later, Donan swiped hard at the rain gutting his vision as puffs of steam blew out of his nostrils.

  He heard Shancy shout, “T
hey are right behind us! We must part ways!”

  Donan considered bringing Xavier to a halt, but the men that pursued them were too close for even a moment’s respite. He agreed with Shancy’s assessment. However, there was one glaring fault in the plan. “You must take her, Shancy! A man with no legs—”

  He never got to finish, as Shancy shouted, “There's no time, brother! Go! Go! We will draw them away!”

  Donan blasted the dank air before him with a foul curse, hauling on Xavier’s reins to send the stallion crashing off into the woods on the right side of the rutted road. The curse did not cause him to feel better, however he knew Shancy would watch his back, making certain Armand and his mercenaries followed him and not Lady Analise. It was certainly the best in the downpour, because Lord Armand was sure to miss the fact that one of the men he was chasing had turned off.

  Donan waded Xavier a quarter-league into the woods, and then he pulled the stallion to a halt, waiting to be certain Lord Armand’s forces would pass them by. The rain was lighter underneath the thick coppice of trees and he adjusted his great woolen traveling cloak more firmly around Lady Analise. He'd covered her golden head, but it did no good in keeping her dry in the raining down pour.

  They were both soaked through and she was shivering against his chest. He thought she could be in a faint by the limpness of her arms around him, and it was for the best, because the ride thus far had been hellish, and it looked not to improve for a long while. So as not to disturb her, if she were in oblivion, he refrained from attempting to comfort her with words.

  By the rood, what could he say? Do not fear because you are held safe by a crippled man, who may or may not be able to dismount from his horse. Donan nearly laughed harshly at the lunacy of it ... at the sanity of him. What compelled him? However, he knew—saints, did he know, because it was curved and pressed against him so shocking that even his cock rose a wee bit to the occasion of a woman’s softness he’d not felt in five years. Yet, what good did a hardening cock do a man without knees?

  ***

  Analise understood she was a coward, she’d known it ever since God had chosen to give her and her sister Cheval a stepbrother by the name of Armand and a stepfather named Gaul. It was not that Gaul was truly bad; he simply had no use for daughters and less for two daughters who were not his own. It continued to amaze her, even after the last eight years of proof, that a man such as Gaul, with his obvious but normal faults, could have spawned a devil boy like Armand.

  It could have been possible that she and Cheval, the older by two years, would have survived Armand if not for the untimely death of their parents one year before. She and her older sister had built defenses against Armand. Together they had forestalled the young man who would not go so far as to endanger his accession to the baronage that their mother brought to him. However then, her mother and stepfather had died in a freakish accident last Michaelmas and all had changed as anyone with only one good eye could have seen would happen. It was then she'd truly become a coward.

  So cowardly she would rather linger in semi-consciousness than discover the true identity of her newest captor. He most certainly had to be one of Armand’s prospects that had been set to bid for her. A man so lowly he'd neither the price nor honor to pay Armand. Saints, she'd finally passed into insanity and become as batty as Heldregarth the ancient mage in Comtes village near her demesne, as to use the word honor and Armand in the same thought.

  Nevertheless, whoever her newest tormentor was, he could not be as horrible as Armand and that realization lent Analise some comfort as she let her mind drift away ... gladly.

  Donan knew he must get Analise out of the foul weather. She was as cold as a frugal corpse clinging to him. It had been hours since the gambol to split had worked. He was not being followed, of that he was sure, nor with the pelting rain would there be any hope of tracking them. Nay, it would be a wide search Lord Armand would have to engage in now and one encompassing every direction.

  Donan nearly missed the cotter’s hut or more precisely what was left of a cotter’s hut. If it hadn’t been for Xavier shying away from a length of knotted railing that still standing from some type of pen, he would have missed the place entirely in the darkness and downpour.

  Donan reined in Xavier and carefully reviewed his options, while experiencing a blatant bout of frustration over his lameness. Jesu, at least he’d had the foresight to strap the braces to his legs. The braces were contraptions he'd invented for each leg, to hold them stiff, so he could propel himself short distances with the accompanying crutches.

  He just didn't know if he could carry Analise’s weight while unconscious over his shoulder at the same time as attempting to stay upright with his crutches. However, there was no use for it but to try and if he fell, well then he would simply crawl using his arms. It wasn’t as if he’d not done crawled before.

  It was a good luck that Xavier was so well trained, because Donan was able to guide him nearly within what was left of the hut, with its one side wholly burned away. However, part of the thatched roofing was still intact and that appeared to be enough to keep the rain at bay.

  Donan carefully unwrapped his great cloak from around Analise and found what he’d predicted, she was as soaking wet as he was beneath the cloak's heavy weight. Then he had no choice but to lay her across the saddle, so he was free to get down off Xavier’s back.

  It was the most inept and ungraceful act in a lengthy line of them and Donan tried not to imagine how he would remount Xavier later. Still, he managed with Xavier’s stillness and bracing support to reach the ground upright with a crutch beneath each armpit. It was then he started the arduous struggle of taking Analise over his shoulder without falling flat on his nose. He managed it well enough, until it came time to deposit her somewhere—

  With his luck holding he’d spied clumps of hay in the corner, there was no hope for it, so he merely twitched the lady off his shoulder. He held his breath as she landed on her back in the hay with a mumbled protest that as quickly fell silent.

  It wasn’t much longer and Donan sat on the packed dirt floor of the croft with his braced legs stiffly out in front of him as he fed sticks into a struggling fire. His gaze, however, was more for the woman beside him than it was for the fire while he contemplated removing Analise’s clothing.

  With certainty it had to be done, he thought, just as he acknowledged the anticipation pitching inside him. How many chances did a man get in his lifetime to have to undress a practically unconscious woman? Especially one with such bountiful endowments.

  Donan added a bigger stick of wood to the fire, and then he used his arms to scoot closer to Analise, thinking as he did that he couldn’t remember the last time he'd seen a woman nude. It was wickedness for him to tempt his cravings like he was—those cravings that could never be satisfied.

  He sighed heavily. Jesu, he was well use to longing for that which he couldn’t have in both mind and body. It was nearly second nature to him now to sit in his wheeled chair, uselessly, with a wee hardening pud-cock while pretty serving wenches displayed their charms to men who were able.

  Never to him any longer—never once him anymore.

  Perhaps, if just one of the lasses had shown a bit of interest in the crippled man that he’d become, he could have tried? Nay. He would not do that to himself or the lass, even for coins. He was too afraid it wouldn't work or perchance it wasn’t his nature to desire the flimsiness of such a lass. Before he'd been felled, he'd often dreamed of a wife that would someday be his.

  His dreams, he thought, as he laid his hand to Analise’s fragile rib cage just beneath her bosom. Aye, his dreams had looked nearly like this woman. Fair with blond hair, long and curling on the ends like golden thread caught by the fires light. Deep blue eyes filled with romantic notions and outlined by dark lashes. Baby soft skin that proclaimed it had never been touched by a man’s hands and her bosom and belly, which could only be found in maidenly splendor. Her rounded hips that a man could fill
his hands with while holding them strong to his possession and her legs, which were long and supple enough to clasp a man’s determination to her heart.

  Aye, he would see all of the dreams bared to his sight, enough to prolong his fancy for a lifetime, and then he would always be able to put a face to those dreams of a wife, in the lonely years to come. Fair payment, Donan assured himself, for rescuing Analise, and then handing her over to his brother to wed to save her virtue.

  “But I will be the first to behold you, golden nightingale,” he murmured deeply.

  Donan freed the ties of Analise’s gown down each side, pulling the wet and clinging material away from her womanly body; a body that had to be every man’s dream.

  To touch ... to touch: Donan’s mind was relentless. She would never know—just one touch.

  A breast?

  “Christ blood,” Donan swore, as he hauled one of the furs up and over Analise’s nakedness, holding it with his fists, which pushed the fur into the ground on either side of her shoulders. He actually shook.

  “My lord, is it really you?”

  Donan’s eyelids opened at the softly spoken murmur, just as he felt tender and small fingertips touch his jaw. It was a caress of the finest measure with sleepy blue eyes behind it.

  “Am I dreaming?” Sweet blush colored lips spoke with a wisp of warm breath stroking Donan’s cheek, he was that close.

  So close Donan’s lips found Analise’s before reasonable thought could be entertained, and then it was too late because the mouth beneath his yielded with exquisite softness. She was new to the intimate touch of lips and he wasn’t surprised as he tasted her gently, withholding his lustful tongue.

  Analise felt as if her body and her lips were dipping in golden nectar and she never wanted to be anywhere else but beneath Lord Donan’s firm mouth. Soft sounds escaped her throat while her hands traveled up over muscled shoulders and clasped behind his sturdy neck. Her breasts pressed into his solid muscle while his wide palms stroked her bare back and she tried to wiggle closer.