“Nay! Use mine,” Lagan offered, his voice breaking and his eyes suspiciously aglaze. He removed his breacan and tossed it at Dougal. Dou- gal tossed Iain’s back to him. Iain clutched it within his fist, nodding his assent when Dougal looked at him for approval.
Dougal nodded, and averted his face, scarce able to meet Lagan’s eyes—all knew that the two had shared a friendship that bordered on the familial. In truth, Lagan and Ranald were more family than even Iain and Lagan were. Though he didn’t begrudge it, the knowledge aggrieved Iain, for he was alone in so many ways.
He had his clan, aye. And he’d had his father, and he had Malcom, too, but never a sister to tease, nor a brother to spar with. As a boy, he had, in truth, envied their friendship. As a man, he’d held it in high regard. As chieftain, he mourned the death of his kinsman.
Without a word they set to the task of wrapping Ranald’s bloody body within the unsullied red, black, and white folds of the MacKinnon colors.
Page was determined to make the boy realize how much his silence in her father’s house had plagued her. Until now, he’d quietly listened to her rebuke, his brows knit, his little face growing more and more markedly resentful. She didn’t allow it to dissuade her. After all, she’d spent weeks trying to ease his fears and befriend him—and all the while he’d understood every word she’d spoken to him. Somehow, it wounded her still that he would simply distrust her out of hand. She’d tried so hard. “Why did you not speak to make me aware you understood me, Malcom? I wouldn’t have hurt you.”
He merely shrugged, though his expression was one of irritation.
“Did I not stand in defense of you against my father?” Page asked him, making herself more comfortable upon the ground beside him. She lifted her knees, hugging them to her breast, and peered up to see what Angus and the rest were doing. She found them all pacing still, and her brows knit, for she hadn’t as yet discovered what it was that had them so agitated.
She’d half expected they would be off and away as soon as they’d gathered their belongings together this morn, but here they sat still, waiting—though for what, she had no notion.
“Malcom... why did you not trust me?” she persisted, glancing down at the small pile of dirt he had raked into a heap between them. Reaching out, she swept her palm over the ground, helping him to arrange the soil. “I understand why you might have been afeared of my father. Your father explained. But...”
He glanced up at her then, the indignation in his eyes robbing her of words. “Because you said awful things about my da,” he answered grudgingly. “You lied to me and said he was bad!”
Page blinked, too taken aback to reply for an instant.
“You tried to make me not like him!” he accused her. “And my da is guid! Ye dunno my da!”
Jesu, but it hadn’t occurred to her that she might have offended him. It hadn’t occurred to her because she’d been more than prepared to believe the worst of his father.
Her face heated. She didn’t know what to say in her defense. “I... I’m sorry,” she offered. “I suppose that I did, but I—” But she didn’t get the chance to explain, for they returned then, the MacKinnon and his men, like grim specters marching from the woods, their faces leaden and their eyes ablaze.
Page’s gaze focused upon the MacKinnon in their lead. His gaze met hers, and for an instant, for the space of a heartbeat, Page felt the incredible urge to flee. Her heart thudded within her breast, and although she knew instinctively that the anger within the depths of his amber gaze was not meant for her, it made her tremble, nonetheless. She tried to look away, but couldn’t, and in the blink of an eye, his gaze passed to his son. The rigidness in his incredible frame seemed to ease at once.
It was only after she was freed from the MacKinnon’s piercing gaze that she spied the mansized bundle borne upon the shoulders of his men.
Page knew instinctively that it would be one of their own, for she noted, too, that the body was wrapped within the MacKinnon colors. Yet who it might be, she couldn’t begin to conceive. Her gaze raced from man to man as she tried to recall an absent face, but her mind drew a blank. These were not her people, and she knew them not at all.
She stood at once, watching in horror as they bore the body to their mounts. Both she and Malcom stared as they hitched the unwieldy bundle to a horse. Only when they were finished did she find herself able to peer down at Malcom.
His gaze lifted to hers, and in his glistening eyes she saw that he knew without being told.
“Ranald,” he said, blinking away a lone tear.