none by Borjana Rahneva Page B

tenser than he thought he had reason to be, and wondered at the strange woman who'd put him so on edge. Dunking his head underwater, he tugged his fingers through his hair, untan gling the matted mass before he washed.

    MacColla sat up abruptly and whipped his hair from his face. Curse his distraction, but he still hadn't pressed the issue of the woman's clan.
    He'd thought she was a spy. All signs pointed to it. She'd come upon them in Campbell's own lair. A mysterious woman, strong and alone, with no ready explanations or denials on her tongue.

    And, most troubling of all, she had suspected the truth of
    James Graham's fate.

    And yet, in his heart he didn't believe it to be true. S he'd seemed so…   innocent . He'd thought it was merely her injury that made her appear so. But feeling her quake before him as they rode, steadying her with his own hand, he'd sensed her confusion, her vulnerability.
    Some sort of scout for Clan Campbell? He couldn't give the notion much credence.

    She'd trembled like a newborn foal, terrorized by the sight of Fincharn. And then she'd gotten violently ill, and he'd wondered if she weren't actually an enemy of John's clan  Scrymgeour. And yet there had been no   recognition between the two of them.

    He felt mercy for the poor lass. Wary, but merciful.
    And, oh, how he wanted her. The image of those creamy arms and shoulders stayed in his mind, taunting him. And the smooth stretch of her belly. He fantasized about  pulling that strange white shirt up and over her head. He knew her breasts would be even paler and more perfect, if such a thing were possible.
    MacColla shut his eyes, marshalling his body back to
    composure.
    He'd keep her close until he could discover the truth of her origins.

And God help her if she turned out to be something she didn't appear to be.
    * * *

    Haley paced another frantic circle around the room, dragging her hand hard along the cold stone as she went.  The sharp peaks and edges of granite h ad made her palm raw, but she couldn't stop herself. Something had to make this experience real to her. She pressed her hand harder onto the damp rock, foisting her physical self onto this strange world, hoping her mind would follow.
    She was back in time  and didn't know how it had
    happened, just that it had. The evidence was all around  her. But it was more than simply the clothes and the  Gaelic. More than the godforsaken chill of the castle she  now found herself in.

    Haley   knew . She felt it. Felt it in the desolation around her.  An animal knowing, bone- deep and as old as man, that she could travel for miles in any direction before encountering another soul. She felt the absence of technology like a sudden silence. Felt nature around her, ascendant, all-

    powe rful, in a way she'd never sensed it before.
    Most of all, she felt small and vulnerable and terrified out of her wits.

    She stopped. She needed to search again for something, anything that could be used as a weapon. She'd already noted the small candleholder on the table at her bedside.
    The pitcher full of water could do some damage too. And

    pocketing the small knife on the tray of cheese and bread  had been a no-brainer. Her eyes roved the room.   There  must be something else.
    She stormed to the bedside for the hundredth time. Small
    table with candles, pitcher, basin. She peeled the thin  mattress away from the bed. It was packed tightly with  straw and made a light crunching sound. There was a  woven hammock beneath, attached to the wooden cot. She  kicked at the base of it. The thing was too sturdy to remove  a leg, and it'd be too readily noticed anyhow.
    She picked at the hammock that was to be her seventeenth- century version of a box spring. It was actually
    a well-made thing, the rope tied off into strong, even knots  and pulled over and under into a dense basket weave.  Definitely something to keep in mind. Once she severed  that rope, though, that was it for