The Viking's Highland Lass Read Free Page B

help, chaos. Weeping women cried out when they learned their loved ones had been wounded or killed.
    Brina hurried back down the stairs to find to her da when she saw some of the battle-weary men in the keep. They refused to look her in the eye as if afraid to acknowledge her unpleasant fate or maybe their own. They were dirty, bloodied, and a couple of the men limping.
    She hated the fighting. Forever, she’d feared this day would come. Her da had been a hard man, having lost his wife, her mother, when Brina was younger. She’d always wondered if her mother had lived, would her da have been any less cruel.
    â€œWhere is my da?” she asked several of the men.
    Everyone shook their heads. She rushed outside and searched all over the inner bailey, looking for her da, but other than a handful of wounded men, and two men who died after being brought back to the keep, her da was not among them.
    â€œWhere is my da?” she asked Seamus as he dismounted and a lad led his horse away.
    She didn’t wish to speak to the devil himself, but she had no choice since no one else would enlighten her.
    â€œHe is dead.” Seamus smiled a little as if amused to see her distraught over the matter.
    â€œWhere is his body?” She wouldn’t believe it until she saw him for herself. What if Seamus had ordered his men to leave her da on the field, injured and dying so that he could take over?
    â€œSeveral of our men were left in the glen—all of them dead. A winter snowstorm approaches. We will bury our dead when we can. Prepare yourself to be my wife on the morrow.” Then Seamus headed inside the keep, two of his men joining him.
    She hurried into the room off the kitchen where they’d taken the wounded men, and helped to clean and bind their injuries. And then she slipped away to her chamber and paced across the rush-strewn floor, the fading light disappearing from her narrow window. She couldn’t leave until Seamus was celebrating their victory with the clan.
    She prayed another man would step forward and show the clan he had the courage and skill to fight Seamus and stand up for her people. But everyone seemed so ill at ease after returning from battle that she assumed no one had the mettle to challenge him. She couldn’t say that any man truly made her heart sing. If her cousin, Christophe, returned and became chief, he would take a wife of his own and then she would be without a position. Better that than having to wed Seamus, she reminded herself.
    But Christophe was gone again, not interested in clan politics, maybe even dead. They hadn’t heard from him in two years. She assumed his leaving had to do with the way her da had favored Seamus over him. Mostly because he wasn’t heavy handed like Seamus was. Now, she almost wished her da had wed her to some other clan chief to strengthen ties between the respective clans, rather than leave her to this fate.
    She pulled on her brat and headed back down the stairs, intent on finding her da in the glen and ensuring he had not been left wounded on the field to die alone. She would do what she could for him.
    As soon as she hurried outside and headed for the stables, one of Seamus’s men roughly seized her arm, stopping her. “Where do you intend to go, Lady Brina?”
    She held her chin high, narrowing her eyes at him, not to be cowed by the man who towered over her, mud and blood spattered all over his clothing, face, and hands. He was a frightening figure, but she would not be intimidated. “To the glen where you were fighting to find my da. To say my good-byes.”
    â€œHe is past needing them. Return to the keep as Seamus will wish you to join him at the table. We will take care of your da on the morrow as Seamus has said.”
    She assumed Seamus wished to wed her because he was from one of the other branches, and he thought marrying her would give him more of a say with her people. Her clansmen had decided who