Highland Warrior by Heather McCollum (rainbow fish read aloud TXT) 📕

Och, but what if leading her people meant she would stay on Orkney to fight? He had never felt such helplessness before.

Pushing the dour thought away, Joshua whistled lightly as they walked. It was a happy tune he remembered his father whistling before their mother died long ago when Joshua was eight years old. They reached the edge of town, and Kára halted.

“Go on back to Hillside,” she said. “I will meet you there.”

Up ahead was the small chapel sitting on a rise above the one-street town. “I would see ye safely to their graves.”

She frowned but didn’t stop him from following her. The streets were barren, adding a haunted feeling to the place, and Joshua could see the scorch marks of the three fires up on the hillside. No one seemed to be about. Except for Asmund, he had not seen anyone living there, as if it were a false village to trick Robert into thinking Kára’s people lived there.

The wind blew fresh off the sea below the village. Approaching the weathered gate, Kára stopped and turned to him. “I wish to talk to them alone, Joshua.” She looked down, shaking her head. “Not that I think they are there. Only their graves.” Her blue eyes turned back up to meet his gaze. “There are hard decisions to be made. It helps me to talk it out.”

Joshua nodded, his mouth relaxing. He certainly understood the need to think alone. “I can wait for ye in the tavern.”

“I may be awhile.”

“Asmund will keep me entertained.”

A smile spread across her lips, and she laughed lightly. “I am fairly sure Asmund has not entertained anyone in two decades.”

“I will help him count his turnips,” he said, making her smile broaden.

The gate squeaked on its rusted hinges as she pushed into the graveyard. He watched her walk along the path of tall grasses that partially hid the older monuments to the Orkney dead. Her hair floated in a swirling gust of wind, and she pulled it to one side, trying to tame it. The blue gown caught on some of the twiggy grasses, making the back of the skirt straighten out behind her as if it were the train trailing a queen at court.

His chest tightened. Aye, if he did not convince her to leave Orkney, she would die here, not of old age but from some violence brought down upon her by Robert Stuart, his son, or his mercenary. She disappeared behind the corner of the chapel. Joshua cupped the back of his head, stretching the muscles of his chest, and glanced about. Without trees, there was no worry that a battalion waited in the forest to emerge with deadly force. He turned and walked back down the hill toward the village.

Maybe if he found out more information about Kára’s people, he would discover a way to ensure they left Orkney Isle. He glanced over his shoulder, but the chapel still hid her, the queen of Orkney, the one he realized he could not leave behind.

…

“What do you think, Papa?” Kára whispered, her eyes tracing the chiseled letters in the stone over her father’s grave. What would Zaire Flett do? Stay and fight or take his people to a new land, a new life with so much potential that she would be a fool not to consider it?

“He says we would be welcome. That there is plentiful food and trees to build houses. No wars right now and the protection of hundreds of trained warriors.” The wind rustled the tall grasses growing all around her. “What should I do?”

She leaned forward, setting the few wildflowers she’d found still growing in the sun onto her mother’s and sister’s graves next to her father. “I would not leave you, but…Brenna just had her first babe. I know Calder wants to take her somewhere safe.”

Her hand went to her abdomen. “And Geir should have a better chance to grow strong, he and any other children I may have.” Could she be pregnant after three nights with Joshua? They had come together at least seven times, and it’d been the middle of her month. And now her flux was late. “I cannot fight when huge with child,” she whispered. But she could not regret any life that may have taken root. Life meant hope, something she was feeling for the first time in nine years.

She sat, letting the ocean breeze wash over her, listening to the rustle of grasses and the caw of seabirds. Placing her hand on the cold stone of her father’s grave, she closed her eyes, hoping she could hear his answers. What do I do, Papa?

“A flower among the weeds,” a voice called, making her eyes fly open, her head snapping around to the side of the chapel.

Stomach tightening along with her fists, Kára’s gaze landed on the tall form of Henry Stuart, his unmarked, smooth face smiling wickedly.

Chapter Fourteen

“Move swift as the Wind and closely formed as the Wood. Attack like the Fire and be

still as the Mountain.”

Sun Tzu – The Art of War

Henry Stuart bowed his head in a mock display of respect, but his leer showed the monster that lived beneath his smooth features.

It was the face of her nightmares, the man who had killed her husband and nearly her son growing within her as he dragged her back to his father’s palace, touching her intimately while he trapped her against his body on horseback. Since then, the sinewy-strong man had stalked her whenever he could. The fact that his father planned to wed him to some highborn lady made no difference to Henry. His father had several mistresses and a handful of bastards, like he had been a bastard of the old Scottish king.

Kára slowly stood, a blade in one of her boots. A short sword against her hip. That was the sum of her weapons—the blades and her seething hatred of the man. Two