“I have been a fool to try to turn away from ye. What we have kinnae be denied. We will find a way. Do ye hear me? I love ye,” he said again and kissed her full on the mouth, tasting her salt, her heat, her tears.
“Ye can kiss the lass later, if we live,” Broch called from the dark beside Callum.
“Maria?” Marsaili asked weakly.
“I’m here, dunnae fash. A bit bruised, but I’ll live. And ye will, as well. I managed to keep my medicine bag.”
“That’s good,” Marsaili said, her voice barely above a whisper.
A tight knot of fear formed in his throat. He’d be damned if he was going to let her die on him after everything they had been through and all that they had left to experience together. He surged toward the shore on his back, with her resting against his front. At first, she kicked with him, but after a few strokes, she went limp in his arms. The knot in his throat seemed to shoot out darts of pain and fear to his head, his heart, and his chest. He could not reach the shore fast enough, and when he did, he laid her down, straining to see her face in the little bit of moonlight. Rain drizzled down, he realized suddenly, as he pushed her hair back from her face and leaned in to see if she still breathed. Her chest rose in shallow breaths, but it was enough.
Maria and Broch came to kneel beside him. Maria placed a hand on Marsaili’s head and hissed. “She burns with fever.” She dug in her bag. She produced a small bottle and motioned to him. “Lift her head.”
He immediately did as commanded, dismayed at the way her head lolled and she did not stir. Maria pressed the bottle to Marsaili’s lips as she opened them and slowly poured in a liquid. Some dribbled out of Marsaili’s mouth, but she seemed to immediately swallow most of it.
“What did ye give her?” he asked.
“A potion of coriander for her fever. We need to bring it down. If it rises any higher, she could have a fit, which can affect the brain.”
He clenched his teeth. “How can we ease the fever?”
Maria looked at him steadily. “There’s nae much we can do. The potion is our best defense. Other than that, we need to keep her warm, though it may sound odd. Soon, the fever will make her cold and miserable,” Maria explained while running her hands about Marsaili’s head, raising Marsaili’s limp arms to check them for broken bones or cuts, and then sliding her hands along Marsaili’s body. “She dunnae appear injured. I believe perhaps exhaustion, and mayhap hunger, made her weak and more susceptible to fever.”
He thought of the rabbit he had cooked, but they’d been captured before being able to eat it. “Aye. I dunnae believe she has eaten much since leaving my home.”
“We have horses tethered just on the other side of the loch,” Broch said. “We’ll ride toward Inverurie, which is a two-days’ journey from here if ridden hard—four if we need to stop often, which we might.”
Callum nodded. “Once we’re safe, I’ll hunt for food and feed her.”
“I’ll hunt the food,” Broch said. “I’m her clansman.”
“And I’ll be her husband,” Callum shot back without thinking.
Both Broch’s and Maria’s eyes widened, and he could feel their gazes still on him as he scooped Marsaili into his arms, wincing at the shooting pain in his shoulder. He set a clipped pace to the other side of the loch. Above him, torches began to flicker on the cliff, and he ran, stopping only when he reached the horses.
Broch was directly behind him. “Take the one on the left,” Broch said, indicating the white destrier. “The other is mine. Maria can ride with me.”
Callum nodded again, and as he shifted Marsaili to swing them both into the saddle, Broch laid a hand on Callum’s arm. “Have ye asked Marsaili to wed ye?”
“Nae yet, but we’ve a son,” he said, the truth still hardly seeming real. “We will be wed, whether she wishes it or nae.” Though he prayed to God that she did wish it. Now that he had come to realize how futile fighting his love for her was, he hoped he did not have to fighther.
Broch chuckled. “I’ve been privy to a fair amount of courting of stubborn lasses by the MacLeod brothers, and I can tell ye, if ye approach Marsaili with directives of what she will do, she will likely do the exact opposite.”
“I’ll take that into consideration,” Callum replied as the sound of shouting grew louder, coming closer. Without another word, he swung onto the horse with Marsaili, situated her in front of him, and took off toward Inverurie, where he prayed they would find the Summer Walkers. He had no notion what they had to do with finding his son, but that is where Marsaili had been heading, so that was where he would go.
