Highland Fire. Hannah Howell

can?”

      He grimaced as some painful memories of just such reactions passed swiftly though his mind. “There have been a few.”

      “A few? Ye try to hide the truth, but it cannae be ignored. Ye ken that truth as weel as I do. I have suffered the looks that silently cry me a witch or touched by the hand of the devil. I have had folk avoid me because they feared such superstitions were fact. I have e’en had an old woman cluck o’er how thin I was, o’er how little fat there would be for the taking when I died.”

      “Fat? What is so important about your fat or lack of it?”

      “I would have thought a mon with your gift would be weel aware of each and every superstition held by those around him. The fat of a dead redhead is verra useful in potions.”

      “That is utter nonsense.”

      “Of course it is, but the fact that what they believe is utter nonsense has ne’er stopped people from believing it. A part of me says that your claim of foreseeing is utter nonsense, but another part of me believes it and is frightened by it, and I consider myself a verra reasonable person.”

      “It frightens ye?” He frowned as he studied her, regretting his confession. The very last thing he wished her to feel for him was fear. “There is no need for ye to be frightened.”

      “Nay? I would wager that it frightens even ye at times.” She nodded when a light color flooded his dark, high-boned cheeks. She knew better than most how the fear of one’s own gift could grip one from time to time. “No one likes the idea that someone can see what will be. There is a great debate o’er whether such a thing is a gift from God or the work of the devil. It could be considered a curse, and that must mean ’tis the devil’s unholy work. Howbeit, ye claim it has saved your life and it certainly helped ye save mine, so that must mean ’tis a blessing that makes your foresight a gift from God. Sadly, we both ken that many folk will see anything that they cannae understand as the devil’s work.”

      Tavig cursed softly, running his hand through his hair. “I dinnae wish ye to fear me because of it.”

      “Weel, I dinnae verra much. It but makes me uneasy. If I was to fear ye, it wouldnae be for that, but because ye are a condemned murderer.” Even as she said it Moira knew that she no longer believed he was some vicious killer.

      “I didnae kill those men,” he snapped and started to walk again, tugging her after him with a touch of force. “I could hear their screams,” he said softly, his rapid pace easing as his annoyance died beneath the numbing weight of painful memory.

      “Ye were that near to them when they were murdered?”

      “Nay. I could hear the screams in my head. ’Twas part of my foretelling of their death—those pain-filled, horrible screams. I was a day’s ride or more away, too far away to stop their slaughter. They were hung from a tree by their bound wrists and gutted like newly killed deer. God alone kens how long they must have suffered ere they died.”

      Moira felt slightly ill over the thought of such a cruel, savage death. Tavig’s “gift” was far worse than her own. She could at least comfort herself with the knowledge that she had helped people, had eased their pain.

      “And ye found them like that?” she asked.

      “Nay. I was halted not far from them by a friend. He warned me of the trap that had been laid for me. My cousin Iver was trying to use my gift against me, to use it to snare me. He was sure that I would, weel, see the deaths of my dear friends and ride to them. He was waiting there with a few men-at-arms to grab me.”

      “Ah, and claim that ye were caught with bloodied dagger in hand.”

      “Just so. Avoiding the trap didnae save me, though, neither from seeing my friends hung up like rotting game nor from being accused of their foul murder.” He grasped her by the waist, easily lifting her to the top of a stony rise then hopping up after her. “I was caught, dragged before the corpses of my friends to see what I was being accused of, then tossed into the pits of Drumdearg.” He clasped her by the hand again and led her along a slowly rising sheep trail.

      “Drumdearg?”

      “My keep.”

      “The one your cousin Iver now lays claim to.”

      “Aye. If I judge where we are correctly, Drumdearg lies a good week’s ride north-northwest of here.”

      “A little closer than ye might like, I suspect.”

      “Aye—for now. Soon I shall sit in the great hall again—as a free mon.”

      “Tell me, how is it that your gift of foretelling didnae warn ye of the trap ye were riding into?”

      “It did, but I wasnae inclined to heed that part of the vision. I belittled it. Two men were being murdered. I told myself that that was the danger, that it was simply dangerous to go where there was killing being done.”

      “True, although men do seem to be verra fond of doing just that. ’Tis easily seen in how they flock to a battle.”

      “’Tis honor that draws them, lass.”

      “Humph. Honor has put many a mon in his grave. I doubt that it makes his shroud any warmer.”

      “In part, I am tempted to agree. Howbeit, a mon must hold himself to some code and one of honor is as good as any other.”

      Moira considered that for a moment as she struggled over the rutted path. Honor was a fine thing. Unfortunately too many men used the preservation of honor as an excuse for killing other men. Whenever she was told that a man had “died with honor,” she always wondered how the dead man felt about it. Did he wake in heaven, realize that his life was now over, and say, “Oh, weel, I still have my honor”? She heard Tavig chuckle and realized that she had muttered her speculation aloud.

      “Ye dinnae have a high regard for a mon’s ways, do ye, dearling?” Tavig asked, amused and intrigued by her opinions for they revealed a keen wit.

      “I wouldnae say that I have none, but, aye, I do wonder on it all at times. And, at times, I think it is all verra absurd. There are occasions, howsomever, when there can be a great nobility revealed in a mon’s acts. Mayhap ’tis just my woman’s mind, my womanly heart. I simply dinnae understand. I wasnae trained as a mon is, wasnae taught the knightly ways or rules.”

      “Nay. Women are trained to give life, to nurture it. Men are trained to take life away.” He stopped, facing her and holding out the rough waterskin he had taken from the fisherman’s cottage. “Women arenae made to take any life.”

      After quenching her thirst and handing the waterskin back to him, Moira smiled faintly. “I wouldnae say that. Women may not be trained in the ways of war and deeds, but some still have the stomach for killing. Aye, and I suspect that the ones who do kill can do so with some skill. Women just dinnae do it for such things as honor.” She watched him drink, intrigued by the gentle motion in his strong throat as he swallowed.

      “Nay?” Tavig wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “What would make a woman kill?”

      “Tis a verra strange conversation we are having.”

      “True, but now ye have stirred my curiosity. What would make a woman kill someone? Hate?” He dampened a scrap of cloth and gently wiped the dust from her small face.

      Although Moira found it a little difficult to keep her mind on what they were discussing, she struggled to reply. “A woman can hate. Mayhaps e’en more adamantly than a mon.” Still unsettled by his soft bathing of her face, she watched as he briskly wiped the dust from his own. “Jealousy might prompt a woman, too,” she continued, hoping that talk would stop him from noticing how she kept staring at him.

      “And greed.” He slung the waterskin over his shoulder, took her by the hand, and started walking again.

      “Weel—aye—I suppose. And most women would do their utmost to kill anyone who threatened the life