Part 56 (1/2)
”I do not answer to the likes of you, Campbell.”
He raised his sword and brought the blade down with a vicious swipe, tearing open the shoulder wound that only days ago had finally mended.
With blood seeping through his tunic Brice stood his ground, exchanging thrust after thrust with Holden Mackay. And although the man was not the swordsman Brice was, he had size on his side, and the wound that was draining Brice of precious strength.
”I warned you that one day you would rue the day you banished me from your castle.” Mackay advanced, again and again, until Brice felt the cold stone wall at his back. ”You should not have tried to keep the woman for yourself. The spoils of war should be shared by all.” He thrust his sword and watched as Brice dodged, and the blade pierced only the fabric of his tunic. He pulled his sword back and advanced again, determined to pin Brice.
”Now,” he said through gritted teeth, ”I will have it all. Your t.i.tles, your lands and your woman.”
In an unexpectedly agile move, Brice leaped aside and turned, pinning Mackay to the wall. With his sword pointed at Mackay's chest he hissed,
”What are you talking about, man? What is this nonsense about t.i.tles and lands?”
Holden Mackay's eyes narrowed.
”I will tell you, if you promise to let me live.”
”I make you no such promise. Now,” Brice said, bringing the point of the sword closer, until it pierced Mackay's tunic and s.h.i.+rt and drew a faint thread of blood, ”tell me what nonsense you speak.”
Mackay began talking quickly, as if hoping to postpone the inevitable.
”Gareth MacKerizie offered to share half your land with me, and give me all your t.i.tles, if I would but penetrate your castle and discover your weaknesses.”
”MacKenzie. So you have been in this with him from the beginning.”
”Aye.” Mackay's eyes glittered.
”I have long coveted the t.i.tle Earl of Kinloch.”
Brice thought of his own disdain for such things.
”The t.i.tle was my father's. He earned it. What good would it do another?”
”It would make me a t.i.tled gentleman. I would be as acceptable at Court as you.”
”All the t.i.tles in the world will not make you what you can never be, Mackay.” He ignored the man's look of hatred and pressed the tip of his sword over his opponent's heart.
”What has any of this to do with Meredith?”
”Nothing,” Mackay snapped.
”The woman was a personal prize that I decided to steal from you the way you stole her from MacKenzie.”
Brice's eyes narrowed.
”You knew all along that I killed the wrong MacKenzie?”
”Aye.” Mackay threw back his head and laughed.
”You killed the puny brother, Desmond, whose only crime was obeying his eldest brother.”
Brice felt a terrible urge to plunge the sword through this monster's heart. But he cautioned himself to hold his famous temper in check. He still did not know the fate of Meredith.