Free Warrior's Last Gift by Melissa Mayhue Page B

light sparkling around him.
    Tossing his covers back, he climbed from his bunk and struggled to stand as the floor heaved under his feet.
    “What the hell?” he muttered, completely awake now.
    Arms outstretched for balance, he attempted to cross to the door as the floor rolled like an angry sea beneath him. Earthquake? They had them up here, but he’d never experienced anything like this.
    He’d barely made it two feet before a gust of wind whipped past him, battering at his bare skin. The lights changed to a brilliant green splattered with a million colored twinkles, sparkling and dancing, shooting around the room like angry shards of rainbow.
    A second heavy gust toppled his chair and knocked him from his feet, battering his ears as if with words shouted from afar. He held up his arms to cushion his landing as he fell, but the floor he expected to hit had disappeared.
    Instead, he felt himself tossed into the air and slammed forward into an endless void, the incessant chant of “Now, now, now!” ringing in his ears as his mind faded to black.

C hapter F our
    Northern Highlands, Scotland
    1294
    Cold gnawed at his skin like a starving animal, and voices buzzed angrily in his ears. Chase struggled to open his eyes but it felt as if his eyelids had been glued shut.
    “Best you keep to your saddles, lads, if you value your heads upon your shoulders, that is,” a deep voice said.
    The words made no sense. From what Chase remembered before he’d blacked out, he must have been right at the epicenter of the biggest earthquake in Montana’s history. Had rescuers arrived? That had to be it! He needed to let them know he was here.
    He struggled to call out to them, but all he could manage was a grunt.
    “What’s happened to that one?” another voice asked.
    “Set upon by thieves, I’d say. His mount, his weapon, even his clothes are gone. They left him with naught but a nasty bump on his head.” It was the first voice again, filled with authority and tinged with an odd accent. “Could even have been the two of you, for all I know.”
    A bump on his head. They were talking about him! They thought him a robbery victim? What was wrong with these guys? There had been an earthquake and—
    “Here, now, we’ll be hearing none of that from the likes of you. We’re about our good laird’s business, seeking men to his employ. We’ve no a need to be robbing strangers along the road.”
    Chase struggled to move, but couldn’t, and realized that he was bound by some rough cloth as if he were a mummy. Bandages, perhaps?
    “And who might this great laird of yours be, this man who seeks to hire strangers to his cause?”
    “Torquil of Katanes,” one man said, his voice hushed. “Laird of the MacDowylt.”
    At last Chase’s eyes cooperated with his brain’s commands and opened. Not bandages but a woolen blanket covered him, wrapped around and under him. With a superhuman effort, he rolled himself from his stomach to his back, lying still when he finished, unable to do more than breathe through the weakness gripping his body.
    “Yer lad over there is moving around.”
    “So he is,” the original voice agreed. “Am I correct in assuming we’d be well paid if we were to choose to throw our lot in with this Katanes of yours?”
    “For yer service, he offers a full belly and a roof over yer head. He offers a home at Tordenet Castle.”
    The original speaker chuckled. “I’m quite capable of finding my own food and shelter, lads. That’s precious little incentive to raise my weapon in battle on your great laird’s behalf.”
    “He also offers silver,” a third voice added. “The amount of which will be dependent upon yer usefulness with that weapon you brandish about.”
    “Done, then,” the first man boomed. “How do we find our way to this Tordenet Castle of yours?”
    “You follow this trail. Two days’ ride to the northeast and you’ll come upon her. You canna miss her, for she gleams in the sunlight like