At Ellis’s direction, they’d forded at a low spot in the rushing river and now faced a sheer cliff face. “Do you propose we walk up the side of that?” Kieran inquired.
The older man grinned, teeth gleaming in his russet beard, laugh lines crinkling the corner of his eyes. “Nay. The entrance to the pass lies just there.” With that, he kneed his horse around a bend in the trail and disappeared into a cleft in the rock.
Kieran’s gut tightened as he eyed the dark aperture.
“Let me go in first,” Rhys offered. A steel helmet obscured the young Welshman’s features, all save the black eyes narrowed with equal parts concern and determination.
“Nay” He’d not send another where he wouldn’t go himself. “You and the others wait here whilst I see what lies within.”
“Kieran, it could be a trap,” Rhys warned.
“Unlikely, but if so, you’ll be free and able to spring me from its jaws.” He scanned the fifty armored men who followed him, capable fighters all and his responsibility. “I’m not a hotheaded youth who charges rashly into danger.” Nay, he’d learned patience and caution the hard way, and they both knew it. “Stay here till I signal ’tis safe to enter.” Swinging his shield from shoulder to forearm, Kieran drew his sword and nudged Rathadack, his warhorse, into the cleft.
Darkness swallowed him up, pressing all around as Kieran moved cautiously forward. His eyes ached from trying to pierce the shroud. A hundred long paces later, his horse turned to the right. Ahead lay a patch of light. Silhouetted in its welcome brilliance, a single mounted man waited. Ellis.
“Takes a body by surprise,” Ellis called out as Kieran approached. Then his glance flicked to the unsheathed sword and his smile dimmed. “Did ye think we meant ye ill?”
Kieran shrugged, not the least bit shamed by his precautions. “I’ve learned to leave little to chance.” His words were lost in the clatter of hooves coming fast through the tunnel. Fearing the worst, he jerked around just as Rhys popped out of the darkness, sword aloft. Hard on his heels rode Martin and Sim. When they spotted Kieran, they ground to a halt in a shower of fine stone and ripe curses.
“I told you to wait,” Kieran shouted over the chaos.
Rhys lifted the visor of his helmet, completely unchastened. “Ye were gone overlong.”
“What if it had been a trap?”
“And ye caught in it. As your second-in-command—”
“Ye know there is no excuse for disobeyin’ my orders,” Kieran snapped, the Scots burr he’d tried to shake thickening.
“I’m sworn to protect ye, even from yerself.” Rhys glared at him as he used to when they were boys growing up at Carmichael Castle. Kieran, older by two years, had been the leader even then, but the Welsh were not easily led.
“You know the rules,” Kieran growled, furious that the rest of his men had followed Rhys and now waited to see if he’d enforce their strict code. Rhys had acted out of concern for his welfare, but discipline was what kept an army such as his in line. He couldn’t relax the rules. “The penalty for disobeying an order is five lashes. You all should feel its sting, but ’twas Rhys who led this revolt. I’ll defer punishment till we arrive at MacLellan’s Tower.”
Rhys nodded. “I will hold myself ready for ye then.”
“Now, now, surely that’s not necessary,” Ellis interjected. “He was only thinking of yer welfare, and there’s no harm done.”
Kieran turned on him with a snarl that made the man shrink back in the saddle. “My orders are law, as you’ll soon discover if your laird hires me to protect his holdings.”
Ellis blanched. “Aye, well, that remains to be seen.” He headed his horse down the trail, apparently uncaring whether Kieran and his men followed. Unfortunately, pressed as he was for funds, Kieran couldn’t afford to cast aside Duncan MacLellan’s offer of work. He needed every coin he could lay his hands on to finance the scheme he’d vowed to undertake.
“Made another friend, I see,” Rhys said cheerfully as they plodded along after Ellis’s reproving back.
“I’m a mercenary, not a courtier.” He found it best if those he commanded feared him. Still he regretted having to punish his only friend. Raising his visor on the pretext of scanning their surroundings, Kieran said stiffly, “I appreciate your concern.”
“I know.” Rhys glanced at the man whose back he’d guarded as they fought their way across the bloody battlefields of France. Tall and heavily muscled, Kieran was a born warrior, like his long-dead sire, the legendary Lion of the Carmichaels. Yet although he’d been gently reared by his aunt and uncle, “hard” and “cold” were two of the kinder things men said about Kieran behind his back. Rhys alone knew of the incident that had turned a happy, engaging lad of five and ten into an embittered man with but one goal... revenge on those who had betrayed him.
And yet, Rhys knew, too, that beneath the thick shell his friend had grown to withstand the pain of betrayal was a caring core. Though he feared that soon the canker eating at Kieran’s insides would devour even that sliver of gentleness.
Today was a perfect example. ‘Twas not his actions that had roused Kieran’s ire; ’twas the damnable situation Kieran found himself in. Back in Scotland after eight years’ exile, yet no closer to realizing his goal. Further from it, if the truth be known, for near every coin Kieran had saved over the years to finance his revenge had been spent to bring his little army hither when they’d been hounded out of France.
“Yon pass is well hidden.” Kieran’s overture of peace.
Rhys lifted his visor and smiled in acceptance. “’Twould be an easy place to defend, hell to try and invade.”
Kieran grunted in agreement and as they fell to discussing Edin’s natural defenses, the knot in his gut eased. He didn’t have so many friends that he could afford to lose one. Truth to tell, Rhys was his only friend... by choice. The fewer people a man let close, the fewer were in a position to wound him. His uncle’s deceit had taught him that those closest to a man could hurt him the most. ’Twas a lesson he’d never forget, a betrayal he intended to avenge...once he had Duncan’s coin.
“I didn’t realize the Borders sported such land.” Kieran scanned the sheer rock walls, crowding in so close it seemed the trail had been hewn straight through the mountain. In places it was narrowed by tumbled boulders. “You said you had patrols out, yet I haven’t seen any sign of them,” he called ahead to Ellis.
“Nay?” Ellis uttered a sharp whistle, and a score of men popped up from the nearby rocks. They wore conical helmets and the Scottish leine croich, a thigh-length quilted coat that offered less protection than the heavy metal armor Kieran’s men wore, but rendered them quicker and more agile. Each MacLellan held a six-foot spear over his shoulder, cocked and ready.
Behind him, Kieran heard his men gasp. Rhys gave a cough of something that was probably laughter. Kieran wasn’t amused, but he was impressed. His spine prickled with the possibility there was a spear trained there, too. “How many men have you?” Years of practice kept his voice steady.
“Thirty, Sir Kieran.” Ellis had turned in the saddle, his grin reflecting those of his men.
Their levity further roused Kieran’s ire. This was no game. “And how many men do you have outside the valley...in the woods by the river?” he snarled on a hunch.
Ellis’s smile faded. “None. After the reivers came and burned the pair of crofts along there, Laird Duncan thought it too dangerous to risk posting men