Seeking her blood…
“Shawna, Shawna…”
CHAPTER 18
Shawna awoke with a start, bolting to a sitting position and swallowing back a scream of terror as she shook herself free from the horror of the dream.
She stood and walked to the window, looking out on the landscape and shivering. Was David right? Was someone seeking a sacrifice? She couldn’t deny that the man killed in the crypt last night had been very scary indeed, as his words had been. But she had been friends with the witches of Craig Rock all her life. They were not killers.
Someone was.
She hugged her arms to her chest. If a cult needed a virgin sacrifice, Sabrina was not it. But she hoped desperately that Sabrina didn’t tell her kidnappers about her condition. They might simply kill her quickly to get her out of the way.
Shawna shivered. The man had said that they wanted her as well. That she would see Sabrina soon enough. Yet, she would hardly be the proper sacrifice at all herself. She wasn’t an innocent maiden. She had borne and lost a child.
Consequences.
Most of the time, she didn’t even allow herself to remember the consequences of their night in the stables. It was far too painful.
She bit into her lower lip. She should have told David last night about the child she had lost after his death. She had run away from Craig Rock when she had discovered that she was going to have his child. She had desperately wanted the babe—she had believed herself that she had been responsible for David’s death, and having his child would in some way give life back to him. She wasn’t going to have anyone pressuring her to give up her child. They would have expected her to do so. She was Lady MacGinnis. Milkmaids had illegitimate children. Ladies did not.
But running away hadn’t mattered. Because her infant had died at birth. She had felt as if even God were mocking her. And she had come home then because Alistair had come for her, offering her a brotherly love and care she needed very badly at the time.
How did she tell David now that he’d had a child, but that his child had died? When he had just come back from the dead himself.
The dead among the living.
The living among the dead!
She gasped out loud, suddenly realizing that the dying man had given her a clue as to Sabrina’s whereabouts after all.
She tore about her room, digging into her wardrobe for her clothing. She paused, realizing even in her hurry that she didn’t see David’s tartan. She dug beneath her own belongings, certain that it shouldn’t have been buried so deeply. Just when she was truly afraid that someone had come in and found the tartan, she discovered it herself.
She exhaled a sigh of relief. She brought the wool against her cheek, and for a moment, she trembled, just feeling its warmth.
Then she set the tartan aside, dressed quickly in a deep purple riding habit, and slipped quietly from her room, hurrying down the stairs.
Yet when she came to the foot of the stairs, she was startled to find Skylar there. She’d assumed that Skylar would have been out looking for Sabrina with the men.
“Skylar!”
“Aren’t you supposed to be locked in your room?” Skylar queried her.
“What about you? It was your sister who was kidnapped.”
“They wouldn’t let me out of the castle,” she said mournfully.
“Has anything new been discovered?”
“Nothing I know about,” Skylar said. “Gawain and Alaric have ridden south to search through the forests and stop by and speak with some of the forest folk. Lowell and Aidan are still searching the tunnels with the miners. There are so many shafts.”
“Aye—and caverns. The mines are very near the caverns and cliffs at the loch’s edge. They actually all tie in together. The cliffs here give access to so very much going on beneath the earth. It seems that there are more ways than one to get into or out of anyplace on the property,” Shawna said. “Except for…”
“Except for what?”
Shawna shook her head. She came very close to Skylar and whispered, “Where is David? Do you know?”
Skylar shook her head. “I’ve no idea. I was told to stay here—watch you when you came down. But surely, Hawk knows where David is.”