The cottage loomed in the distance, a block of darkness in the already dark sky. At least I was pretty sure it was a cabin. It was box shaped and I could vaguely make out a chimney so I think it was safe to assume that the big shape was a house. However, that didn’t reassure me in the least.
“Look, just let me go now an’ Ah promise not ta press any charges,” I pleaded, a huge sense of dread suddenly overtaking me.
All that Kurt did was laugh at me. I knew that by all rights I should have been scared out of my mind with all that was going on... but that emotion just wasn’t there. If anything, Kurt’s constant laughter was starting to get me really angry. This may have been nothing more than a joke to him, but he wasn’t the one being dragged through the great unknown on my stomach on the back of a smelly horse with an even smellier Scotsman while your hands were tied behind your back.
All the same, the sight of the dark cabin was a very foreboding sight. Vision of ambushes and rapes flashed through my mind before I could stop them. I had just lived through a war and wasn’t exactly an innocent any longer. Even before the war I had hardly been one.
“Who goes there?” a loud, very manly voice called from somewhere deep within the shadows.
To my dismay I heard a quiet squeak escape my lips. I couldn’t let them know that I was the least bit scared. It would give them an advantage over me that I wasn’t ready for them to have. So instead I gritted my teeth and allowed the rough hands to yank me off the back of the horse.
“What do we have here?” the hairy man asked, his eyes raking over my body. “Where on earth did ye manage t’ find a whore all the way out here?”
At that moment I’d had more than enough of being called a whore. Screaming in outrage, I kicked the man as hard as I could in the crotch. He released me instantly and I took off running in the opposite direction. I knew that Kurt would catch up with me almost instantly and the fact that my arms were still tied behind my back didn’t help in the least. Still, if I could get to a road, I could flag down a passing driver and they would save me from this insane band of Scotsmen.
“Nice try, lass,” Kurt hissed as he caught me about the waist.
“Let me go!” I screamed, squirming in his arms, trying desperately to free myself.
A foul, dirt encrusted hand was slapped over my mouth, silencing my shouts. Whoever had grabbed me-- most likely Kurt --began dragging me back towards the cabin and another person came and latched onto my legs, lifting my feet from the ground. The fear I had been trying my best to deny was slowly creeping up on me again. It reached its pinnacle a few moments later when the brute holding my legs pulled them up higher than they wanted to go and my skirt slid down, nearly revealing my white panties to their gaze.
“Seems that the fight’s gone right outta ye, lassie,” the one who was holding my feet commented. “Not even a wiggle from ye anymore.”
“Shut yer hole, Rob! Ye dinna wanna be encouragin’ her now,” Kurt hissed at the other man. “It’s taken me this long just ta get her t’ shut up.”
There was a large part of me that was strongly tempted to say something just to spite them. The only problem was that I couldn’t get myself to voice a single sound. Not even an undignified squeak. I didn’t want to risk pissing them off when I was in this position. Get me standing, however, and it was a completely different story.
“I bet we could make her squeal if we really wanted,” Rob said after a few moments.
Kurt’s answer was cut off by a sudden shaft of bright light illuminating the landscape. I was dropped unceremoniously to the ground, nearly breaking my wrists as I landed painfully on my bound hands. Pushing aside the jarring pain, I used my hands to push myself to my feet.
“Ah demand that someone untie me right this instant!” I hissed, glaring at the man standing in the doorway.
The man just smirked in my direction. “Mouthy wee thing, ain’t she? Bring ‘er in.”
I continued to make token protesting noises as I was more or less shoved into the rickety cottage. Once inside, the dread that I had been putting aside for so long had risen to the surface and taken over. There were at least a dozen Scotsmen holed up in the small building. They looked like a band of cutthroats and I didn’t feel the least bit safe with them. However, as Scott has often told me, fear does nothing to quell my temper.
“Look, Ah’ve been a good sport so far, but would one o’ ya untie me!” I shouted, stomping my foot for emphasis. “Ah don’t know what planet ya’ll are from, but where Ah’m from we don’t tie women up an’ throw them ‘cross the back o’ horses!”
The older man gave me an odd look, his white brows nearly reaching his hairline. “Quite a bit o’ spirit in ye, lass. Might as well untie her now. She canna do no harm in here.”
“That’s what ya think,” I grumbled as a knife sliced through my bonds.
As soon as my hands were free, I brought them forward, wincing at the rawness of my wrists. My arms ached fiercely after being bound for so long. I hadn’t noticed so much before, but now that my arms were free and blood was once again circulating through the limbs the pain became a very fresh and all too vivid presence.
“So ye got a name, lass?” asked the older man who I believed was the leader.
I glared at him, crossing my arms over my chest. “Ah ain’t givin’ ya mah name till Ah know yers.”
The kilted man made a surprisingly courtly bow, a mocking smirk on his face. “The name’s Erik MacKenzie, lass.”
Pursing my lips, I stood as tall and straight as I could, not showing an fraction of the fear that was coursing through me. “Marie Beauchamp.”
“Where’d ye find her, Kurt?” Erik demanded of the little man who was hovering over my shoulder.
“At the foot o’ Craigh na Dun,” Kurt announced, coming to stand beside me. “She was havin’ a wee bit o’ trouble wi’ a certain redcoat captain. I knocked ‘im out and brought her ‘ere.”
Once again I found myself on the receiving end of one of Erik’s disbelieving looks. “An’ just what were ye doin’ there by yerself, lassie?”
“Ah got separated from the rest o’ mah group by a band o’ highwaymen,” I told him, glaring at the older man. “Ah ran off inta the woods an’ Ah have no clue what happened ta them. Fer all Ah know they’re dead. Happy now, Mister High an’ Might?”
“Ye believe her, Kurt?” Erik asked the other man.
Kurt scratched at the corner of his jaw, furrowing his brows. “She didna look much too fond o’ stayin’ in the captain’s presence, but that’s all I know.”
“We’ll let Charles deal with it. Right now we must figure out t’ do with Logan then we’ll be on our way,” the white haired man said, turning away from me as though I were no longer there.
The gathered men parted before this single person like the parting of the red sea. Instead of there being a new world on the other side, there was a single man sitting hunched over on a stool. Even from where I was standing I could see what the problem was. He was rocking back and forth, his left hand clutching at the opposite shoulder. There was an obvious sag in the otherwise broad shoulders which meant only one thing: his shoulder was dislocated.
Without any seeming care or consideration for the other man’s condition, Erik pulled the clutching hand away from Logan’s shoulder then removed the plaid covering the shoulder. The shirt that was revealed was dirty and spotted with blood. That was nothing compared to what I saw when Erik grabbed hold of the collar of the shirt and slit it across the breast and down the sleeve with a dagger drawn from his belt.
I could not contain a gasp when the shirt fell away and his shoulder was revealed. If the disjointure wasn’t bad enough, there was a deep furrow near the top of his shoulder which was still slowly leaking blood. His head hung at an impossible angle, making me wince in sympathy. I may not have ever dislocated my shoulder, but I had set more than my share during my tenure as a nurse.
“Out o’ joint, is it, lad?” Erik murmured, probing the area around Logan’s shoulder.
“Aye, it is,” Logan moaned, his large frame shuddering as Erik hit a particularly painful spot. “Caught a musketball in the’ shoulder and fell wi’ me hand out. Hit it full force then there was a crunch.”
A musketball? How does someone get hit with a musketball in this day and age?
“Crunch is right,” Erik agreed, circling around Logan as he examined his shoulder.
For the first time Logan raised his head and I found myself gazing into the most intense pair of hazel eyes that I had ever seen. There was an unbelievable amount of pain swimming about in them, but that was to be expected considering the state of his shoulder. Even so, Logan had to most beautiful eyes I had ever seen.
“... nothing to be done about it save slammin’ it back in.”
I was snapped back into reality by the site of Rob trying to set Logan’s shoulder using sheer force alone. Logan let out a pained gasp, his already pale face blanching considerably. Sweat had already broken out on his forehead and I could easily tell that he was very close to passing out.
“Stop it!” I shouted, gaining the attention of every man in the room. “Ya keep that up an’ yer gonna end up breakin’ his arm!” Shoving Rob out of the way, I knelt down in front of Logan who I could tell was barely containing a scream. “Ya gotta get the arm at the right angle so that it can slip back inta the socket. Anythin’ else an’ yer liable t’ simply break his arm.”
“And just how do you know this?” Erik asked suspiciously from over Logan’s good shoulder.
“Ah’m a nurse,” I said without looking away from Logan. Picking up his arm at the wrist and elbow, I shifted the limb into the proper position. His arm felt like dead weight, making the task more difficult. Now resetting a dislocated shoulder is hard enough under normal conditions, but to set the same arm on a large man several hours after the shoulder had been dislocated was an entirely different story.
This time it was Kurt who spoke. “An’ just what is a wetnurse doin’ out ‘ere? Ye seem a bit outta place, lass.”
Not having any clue what a wetnurse was, I ignored this comment and instead focused my attention on Logan.
“Now this is gonna hurt quite a bit,” I informed him, preparing myself to swing his arm back into place.
Logan managed a tight smile. “Dinna worry ‘bout it, lass. I’ve been hurt worse by less beautiful people. Best get it overwith.”
Taking a deep breath, I swung his arm as hard as I could. After a moment there was an almost sickening pop! and Logan’s shoulder was back in place. I flopped down on my rear, breathing from the sheer force it had taken to swing Logan’s arm back into place. Logan simply stared at his arm in amazement and began moving it about.
“Don’t do that,” I warned, lighting pushing his right arm back down onto his lap. “Just ‘cause yer shoulder’s back in place doesn’t mean it’s healed.”
“It doesna hurt anymore,” Logan said in amazement, flashing me a brilliant smile. “Thank ye, lass.”
“Well it’ll hurt soon enough. Now if someone’ll get me some bandages Ah can take care o’ yer other wound,” I told him, gesturing to the bleeding gouge on his shoulder.
Erik hauled me to my feet and shoved me in Kurt’s direction. “Dinna worry ‘bout it, lass. We havena time ta worry ‘bout that just now. We have a long way to go before mornin’.”
Exhausted as I was, I felt a sudden burst of energy at the suggestion. “Ah can’t do that! He. Has. Been. Shot. Ah need ta clean an’ disinfect his shoulder ‘fore it gets infected an’ needs ta get cut off.”
“Infected?”
I let out a frustrated scream, whirling around to face the aging Scotsman. “Infected! Ya know, festered! Poisoned! Pussy an’ smelly an’ it’ll fall off!”
That seemed to get through to him and I was presented with a pile of rags. Dirty rags. Not the type of thing that would disinfect a wound. They were incredibly greasy and would only make things worse.
“There’s no possible way Ah can use this on Logan’s shoulder! Ah need somethin’ clean! Somethin’ that won’t make it worse!” I hissed, glaring up at Erik.
“It’s either this or nothin’, the choice is yers,” Erik informed me, crossing his arms over his wide chest.
I glared up at him and grabbed what had once been a scarf from the pile of rags. It was no less dirty than the others, but it would be large enough to bind the wound on Logan’s shoulder. As I passed Rob on my way back over to Logan, I grabbed the flagon of ale he was drinking out of. If I couldn’t properly disinfect the wound, this would have to do. I had been taught that it could be used if nothing else was available and, unfortunately, nothing else was available.
“That’s quite a temper ye’ve got there, lass,” Logan said as I knelt down before him once again.
It was hard to stay angry when he was grinning at me so innocently. “That’s what mah uncle always used ta tell me. Now sit still, this’ll definitely sting.”
“Come, lass, give me your best,” Logan dared me.
Ten minutes later, after much cursing on both my and Logan’s parts, the wound was cleaned as best as could be and bandaged in the dingy scarf. My instincts were screaming at me to do something better for Logan, but at the moment that option wasn’t available to me.
“Thank ye again, lass,” Logan said, gently probing his shoulder as I stepped back to survey my handiwork.
Logan uncurled from the chair then and I realized just how big of a man he really was. He was well over six feet tall, broad through the shoulders and the physique of a rugby player. He had a wonderfully angular, clean shaven face with broad cheekbones and a thin, blade-bridged nose that was just a trifle too long yet fit his face perfectly. Logan’s hair was a dark brown, nearly black, but much shorter than the other men in the small cabin so that it stuck up in all directions.
In other words, a god come to life.