Free Cathy Maxwell - [Chattan Curse 03] by The Devils Heart Page A

“I’m in no danger. I’ve been shot worse before.”
    His announcement did not calm his sisters. Their brows came together in alarm, their mouths opening to ask a million questions, and he held up a hand to beg for quarter. “I was in a war. Remember? Do you think in boarding a ship, men throw thistles at each other?”
    “The world might be a better place if they did,” Anice announced, and the men around her laughed.
    “You may have been shot at by the French,” Laren said, “but we didn’t expect you to be shot right here before our eyes. You could have been mortally wounded.”
    “But she was not aiming for my heart,” he reminded them. His voice was light. He seemed to be enjoying himself.
    A new voice spoke up, one as grating as a crow’s caw, and it belonged to a small, grubby-looking woman. She appeared to have only two teeth in her head and her nose was impossibly big. But it was her tiny, shrewd eyes that put Margaret on guard. “I believe you should rid yourself of the Chattan,” she announced, and then spit on the ground. “No good will come of having her here.”
    “The woman is our guest, Nila. Remember that,” Laird Macnachtan bit out. “And quit spitting.”
    Nila did not take well to the order. Her eyebrows almost disappeared in her hairline. For a second, Margaret anticipated her spitting again, but grumbling several opinions to herself, the crone had the good sense to withdraw.
    Meanwhile, the stable lad returned with a roll of clean wraps used for horse legs. Laren took the cloth from the boy and began wrapping the wound to stop the bleeding without bothering to remove the laird’s coat.
    Margaret had to speak up. “You should remove his clothing if you wish to stop the bleeding.”
    “Well, aren’t you something, my lady. ” Anice spoke with scorn. “First you shoot him and then we are not tending him well enough for your tastes. I fear everything they say about you is true.”
    “Everything they say about me?” Margaret repeated, mystified and, yes, feeling very guilty.
    But Anice and her sister were not up to answering. They, Nila and the few other women in the stable yard gathered around the laird.
    Nila informed them she’d heard of a remedy for healing that called for putting chicken droppings on the wound. Anice shouted, “Someone, fetch a chicken.”
    The women might have been serious in the order, but the men in the stable yard hooted with laughter.
    That was enough for the Macnachtan. “If any of you brings a chicken, I’ll wring its neck, and yours ,” he warned as he pushed his way out from the midst of the women. Laren followed him, her hands holding the bandage she’d wrapped around his arm.
    “And here we thought it would be making you smell better than the pig stink you are wearing, Heath,” one of the men said, and the others laughed.
    A dull red crept up the Macnachtan’s neck.
    He’d taken their earlier comments in stride, but this one had touched a nerve.
    “I haven’t finished tying the bandage, Heath,” Laren complained.
    “It is good enough,” he barked out. “And don’t the rest of you have tasks to be doing? Or are you going to stand around grinning like great apes all day?”
    The men quickly went about their business, a sign that they did respect him when he used a tone of voice that warned heads would roll.
    Laird Macnachtan turned his attention to Margaret.
    The drumming in her head was louder now. She was suddenly very, very tired and she could not afford to be so. She needed her wits about her to find Fenella’s book.
    She meant to say as much to him, but when she opened her mouth, no words came out.
    She swayed. Laird Macnachtan put out his hand as if to steady her.
    It was the wrong thing to do.
    To her horror, Margaret bent over and was frightfully ill.
    All over his boots.
    She looked up, scandalized. This was beyond a lapse in manners. She’d never disgraced herself in such a way before. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered,