Free The Saint by Monica Mccarty Page B

usually ignored MacSorley. That he didn’t perhaps more than anything underscored the severity of the situation. “Aye, well, try not to abduct any lasses this time, Hawk.”
    MacSorley smiled at the reference to the “mistake” that had led to his absconding with Lady Elyne de Burgh from her home in Ireland last year. “I don’t know, Raider could use a wife. With his surly disposition it might be the only way he finds one.”
    “Sod off, Hawk,” Robbie Boyd replied. “Maybe I’ll just take yours? The poor lass must be tired of you by now. God knows we are.” Boyd’s exaggerated weary sigh elicited quite a few laughs and murmurs of agreement, succeeding in dissipating some of the tension.
    “Be ready, then,” MacLeod said. “We leave in an hour.”
    Dismissed, Magnus started to break away like the others, but MacLeod stopped him. “Saint. Templar. Hold back a minute.” He waited for the rest of the men to leave before he turned to Magnus and Gordon, the steely gaze that missed nothing flickering back and forth between them. “Is there anything I should be worried about?”
    Magnus straightened, not needing to look at Gordon to know he did the same. “Nay, Chief,” he said, Gordon’s voice echoing his.
    Tor MacLeod was lauded as the fiercest warrior in the Highlands, and right now he looked it. He scrutinized the two men with withering intensity. Few men gave Magnus pause, but the leader of the Highland Guard was one of them. They all had a little bit of Viking in them, but MacLeod had more than most. “Discord is poison in an army. Whatever is going on between you two, put it aside.”
    MacLeod walked away, not waiting for them to respond. He didn’t need to; they understood what was at stake.
    From the moment MacRuairi entered the boathouse with word of Edward Bruce’s crisis in Galloway, the only thing that mattered was the mission. He and Gordon were too experienced as warriors to let personal matters interfere with the job Bruce sent them to do. Their lives, and the lives of their Highland Guard brethren, depended on it.
    But the tension was there, lingering under the surface,waiting but not forgotten. The fact that MacLeod had picked up on it shamed them both.
    Gordon looked as grim as Magnus felt. “Come,” he said. “We’d best get something to eat. I’ve a feeling we’re going to need all our strength for the night ahead.”
    “Not to mention a few miracles,” Magnus said dryly.
    Gordon laughed, and for the first time since Magnus arrived at Dunstaffnage for the wedding, the knot of tension twisting in his gut dissipated. He’d already lost Helen; he’d be damned if he lost his friend, too.
    They walked back to camp to join the others, reviewing the details of the daring plan to rescue the king’s proud, headstrong, and at times reckless brother. Edward Bruce was not a favorite among the Highland Guard, but he was the king’s trusted lieutenant in the troublesome south and, significantly, his sole remaining brother. Edward’s death or capture would be a personal blow to a king who’d already suffered too many since the war began: three brothers executed in less than a year; a wife, two sisters, and a daughter imprisoned in England—one of those sisters in a cage.
    If they had to get through fifteen hundred Englishmen to save Edward Bruce’s damnable hide, they would do so.
Airson an Leòmhann
. For the Lion. The symbol of Scotland’s kingship and the battle cry of the Highland Guard.
    For the past two days, the eleven members of the Highland Guard had worked together with one purpose in mind: reaching Edward in time to avert disaster. They’d sailed as far south as Ayr, then headed east on horseback into the wild and untamed forests and hills of Galloway.
    Although the war in the north had been won, the war in the south waged on. The English controlled the borders, with large garrisons occupying all the major castles, and in Galloway—the ancient Celtic province in the