KEIRFIELD, SCOTLAND
NOVEMBER 1542
Alisoune Hay's heart pounded painfully. They were coming after her. She wheezed through her burning lungs, cursing her tight stomacher, and squinted in the bright morning sunlight as she floundered through the thick fallen snow. Her satchel flopped against her thigh as she hoisted her sodden skirts up with one hand and held her spectacles onto her nose with the other.
She could hear the irate shouts of the townsfolk as they pursued her. Some of them were calling her witch. Some were calling her blasphemer. And some of them were calling her things she pretended not to hear.
'Twasn't the first time she'd earned the disapproval of an entire town. As her parents had oft remarked, Alisoune's mouth was even bigger than her brain. And that was saying something.
Usually the people in the towns she passed through dismissed her opinions as the brash ravings of an impertinent young lass. But this time they'd taken her more seriously. This time, according to the awful red-haired priest who'd instigated the hasty proceedings against her, she'd spoken against common wisdom, God's will, and the very nature of the known world.
But that had been precisely her point. The world was not known. In fact, science had barely scratched the surface of the vast realm of knowledge. How could man possibly pretend to know everything about the universe?
She suddenly stumbled over her dark green skirts and fell face-down in the snow. She heard a shout behind her and felt an instant of panic as the ground blurred in her vision. Patting feverishly about with her hand, she finally located her fallen spectacles and perched them again on her nose. They were wet and covered with snowflakes, but at least she could see.
Scrambling to her feet, she surged forward. She hadn't expected the crowd to follow her so far. And by their growing rage, it seemed they intended to do something more dire than merely run her out of town.
Now that her parents had gone to France and left the business to Alisoune, she had no one to placate the townsfolk and assuage their anger. She'd already tried to explain herself in a reasonable fashion and even resorted to offering the priest money to withdraw his claim. But that had only gotten her into more trouble.
"Burn the witch!" she heard in the distance.
Her breath caught, and she tried to slog faster through the snow, despite the cold, throbbing ache in her chest. They couldn't be serious. Burn her?
What could she do? Where could she go? She quickly cataloged her options.
She had no horse, no cart. There was no church nearby for sanctuary. There wasn't even a troupe of players or a group of pilgrims to vanish into, which was her usual mode of safe transportation from town to town.
If only she owned a pair of those wooden planks the Danish soldiers attached to their feet, she thought, she might be able to glide across the snow and lose her pursuers.
Or even better...one of those man-carrying kites invented by the ancient Chinese that could allow a person to fly over the treetops.
But she had neither. And no matter how diligently she tried to employ that big brain of hers, she could think of no plausible escape.
She certainly didn't want to be burned at the stake as a witch. 'Twas an unpleasant way to die, especially if the wood didn't create enough smoke to asphyxiate her first and she was forced to endure the flesh-scorching heat of the flames.
She let out an involuntary squeak of remorse. Why did she always have to think in such exquisite detail? Sometimes she wished her brain wasn't quite so big and that she could wool-gather her way through life like more simpleminded lasses, without a care.
The shouting grew louder, and she increased her pace, wincing at the stitch in her side. But she'd already done the calculations. Despite her long legs, the weight of her skirts gave the men following her at least a fifty percent advantage when it came to speed. They'd catch up to her in a matter of moments.
Then she saw something she hadn't figured into the equation—a seemingly abandoned cottage nestled at the edge of the forest.
Maybe she could hide there.
Her instincts for survival renewed, she bolted toward the place.
Before she'd gone two yards, the door of the cottage opened wide, and out charged a great gray beast. As if propelled by rockets, it began running straight toward her.
She gasped. When it leaped at her, all she saw was a scruffy face full of gray fur and a huge gaping maw full of sharp teeth. The animal knocked her down with its paws. Once she'd fallen softly onto the snow, it began to mercilessly lick her face.
It never hurt her. In fact, when the hound—which was the biggest dog she'd ever seen—heard the men yelling in the distance, it growled deep in its throat and nudged her as if telling her to get up and move before they arrived.
She grabbed her spectacles and satchel and staggered forward. The hound enthusiastically bounded around her, guiding her toward the cottage.
At the threshold, she glanced back once to see that the mob of a dozen or so men had spotted her. They bolted forward, their snapping cloaks and foul mood a dark contrast to the bright snow.
Then she swept into the cottage with the dog, slamming the door behind her.
Lachlan, still half-asleep, winced and groaned as the cottage shook from the impact of the door slamming. He opened one eye. The other felt like it was sealed shut. His mouth was as dry as plaster. And his head throbbed from the aftereffects of too much whisky.
"Campbell," he moaned. Over the past few weeks, the hound had somehow learned how to open the latch on the cottage door and tended to come and go as he pleased.
But the scuffling didn't quite sound like his hound. And when Lachlan managed to pry open his other eye, both eyes went suddenly wide at the sight before him.
Instinctively, he rose up on his elbows. "Who are ye?"
The tall young woman in the green gown blinked in surprise, as if she didn't expect to see anyone actually inhabiting the cottage. At least he thought she blinked. 'Twas hard to tell, because her eyes were shielded by two round pieces of glass perched atop her nose.
Before she could answer him, there was a loud pounding at the door. She dove for the bed, sailing over him to wriggle beneath the bed linens and pull the sheepskin coverlet over her head.
He was still reeling in shock at her boldness when the pounding came again, accompanied by irate shouts.
She started at the sound, and he felt her cold, naked leg brush against his as her small icy fist burrowed beneath his hip.
He glanced down at the shivering mound of sheepskin beside him. The woman was clearly hiding from whoever was outside. And whoever was outside clearly knew she was here. The last thing Lachlan needed was to get caught in the crossfire.
The pounding resumed, louder this time, and the woman peeked out long enough to plead with him in an urgent whisper. "I beg ye, sir, hide me. I fear they mean to burn me at the stake." She was pale from the cold, but her cheeks were rosy from exertion, and she was quivering like a cornered mouse. Indeed, with her longish nose and those big spectacles, she looked a bit like a mouse. "Please, sir, please. Keep me safe."
Then he frowned. Keep her safe. He was the last person to be trusted to keep someone safe. His brothers had depended on him to keep them safe. Four gravestones were proof of how that had ended.
But Campbell was staring expectantly at the door. And Lachlan knew he had to answer it. If whoever was outside intended to burn the woman at the stake, they might be carrying torches even now. And they might decide to make quick work of it by setting his whole cottage on fire.
With as little fuss as possible, Lachlan eased his right leg over the edge of the bed, tucked his crutch under his left arm, and pushed up. As usual, he staggered, and his head started throbbing, but he managed to regain his balance and limp over to the doorway.
He snatched open the door. "What do ye want?" he demanded harshly.
At least a dozen townsmen crowded together, trying to peer past him into the one-room cottage. He knew the men, though in the last three months since he'd moved back to Keirfield, he'd kept mostly to himself. Now—whether 'twas due to his rough and ragged appearance, his stern scowl, or his growling hound—nobody answered his question.
"Ye hauled me out o' bed with your infernal racket," he bit out. "So what do ye want?"
Finally, Father Ninian, the red-haired parish priest, gathered up enough courage to raise his quivering double-chin, demanding, "Hand over the lass, and we'll leave ye to your affairs."
Lachlan wondered what on earth a wee lass could have done to incur the wrath of this mob. Two of the villagers had their daggers drawn, four more wielded spades, and all of them had feverish fire in their eyes. He didn't care if the woman had butchered their livestock and set their fields on fire. 'Twas an unfair fight, and he didn't like unfair fights.
"Lass?" he dared them. "What lass?"
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