Page 138 of Claimed by a Highlander
“When I came to the house, she rode off in that terrible storm,” he said. “She was standing here when I caught up with her.”
“Ye wouldn’t leave, ye selfish bastard,” Sybil said. “Ye gave her no choice.”
“I begged her not to step back, not to go over the edge,” Hector said.
“Rory was only fifteen,” Sybil said. “Agnes knew he would try to kill you if he learned what you’d done to her, and Rory was bound to find out if it happened again and again, as it would have.”
“It was his fault.” Hector pointed at Rory. “Her precious boy. She would have come away with me if it weren’t for him!”
While Hector held her with only one arm, Rory had to take his chance. He would dive for Sybil’s legs as he threw his blade into the middle of Hector’s forehead. Though Sybil was several inches shorter than Hector, it would be close.
“If ye throw that blade,” Hector shouted, “I swear I’ll take her over the falls.”
To prove his intention, Hector started to take a step backward. Rory threw his blade just as Hector stepped down and his feet went out from under him on the slippery rock. Sybil’s scream filled Rory’s ears as he dove to catch her.
He caught her by the legs, but all three of them spun and slid sideways in a tangle across the flat, slippery rock. Rory kicked Hector off him and tried desperately to gain traction with his boots as Sybil slid dangerously close to the edge of the rock ledge.
Sybil went over the edge, pulling him with her. Rory let go of her with one arm to grasp a tree branch that hung over the top of the falls. With all his might, he swung his legs up and locked them around the thick branch. Sybil was hanging upside down and sliding through his arm.
His heart beat frantically as he worked his way along the branch as fast as he could with his legs and one hand toward the tree’s trunk on the riverbank. As they neared it, Sybil flailed her arms, trying to catch hold of a tree or shrub. The movement caused her to suddenly slip through his arm.
His heart stopped in his chest as he caught her ankle and swung her hard toward the safety of the bank before she slipped through his wet hand. She landed in the thick brush along the falls several feet below him and the ledge.Praise God.
He was climbing down from the tree limb when she shouted.
“Watch out! He’s coming!”
Rory landed on his feet and reached for the dirk at his belt. But it was gone, lost in the river, like the blade from his boot. Through the pouring rain, he saw Hector coming slowly toward him across the rock ledge with his dirk in his hand and murder in his eyes.
“Ye can’t protect her now,” Hector taunted him over the wind and rain. “I want ye to know as I drive my blade into your heart that I’ll have your wife begging for death before I finish with her.”
Rory did not wait for his enemy to strike first. He grabbed a heavy stick from the ground and ran straight at Hector. As he crashed into him, Rory blocked Hector’s blade with the stick. They fell to the ground and rolled across the flat rock. Hector tried to stab Rory in the throat, but Rory caught Hector’s wrist and fought to take the blade from him.
From the corner of his eye, Rory saw Sybil crawling toward them. Her face was bloody with scratches, but she had a blade in her hand and that determined look in her eyes.Jesu, she was going to get herself killed trying to save him if he didn’t kill Hector first.
Rory was distracted for barely a moment. It would not have been enough time for any other warrior to gain an advantage on him, but it was long enough for Hector. Rory was slammed onto his back. At the last second, he caught Hector’s arm with the dirk just inches above his chest.
“I should have been chieftain! I should have had Agnes! I should have had that Grant lass!” Hector said, putting his weight behind the blade as he tried to drive it into Rory’s heart. “First your father took everything I wanted, and then you did.”
Rory’s arms shook with the effort of keeping the blade from piercing his chest. He could not hold Hector off him much longer. But this was a fight he could not lose. His clan needed him.
Sybil needed him.
As he and Hector struggled against each other, Rory felt the edge of the rock ledge beneath his shoulder.
“You’ve been a curse on this clan since the day ye were born,” Rory said through clenched teeth. “Today it ends.”
Rory gritted his teeth and with one final surge of strength, he turned and pushed, sending Hector over the falls.
Hector’s scream was swallowed by the wind.
When Sybil collapsed beside him, Rory rolled away from the edge and enfolded his beloved in his arms. They lay together, not caring that the rain was beating down on them.
“When I realized Hector had taken you,” he said cupping her lovely, dirt-smudged face with his hand, “I was so afraid I’d lost you.”
“I knew you’d come. Ye always do,” she said. “And it would take more than Hector MacKenzie to pry me away from you.”
Rory smiled at his brave and clever wife. With Sybil at his side, he knew he could protect his people and become the chieftain his clan needed him to be. They were both free of the past now.
