Page 36 of The Best of Brenna Grant

Highland Retribution

Book 3

Braden and Cairstine

Loki helps protect the bairns from the Channel of Dubh.

Chapter Seventeen

The men from the channel bring a group of bairns to be shipped across the water. But The Band of Cousins are there to stop it. Loki’s sling does it again, this time in the Channel of Dubh.

Kenzie has faith that Loki, his adoptive sire, will save him and the others.

It had been terribly difficult for Steenie to mind his tongue with the men who’d come to put them in a cart and carry them through the mountains toward the loch. The one trail had been so treacherous that the wee bairns had cried for their mamas over and over again, and the four men traveling with them had not been kind. They’d cussed at them so much that Steenie had wished to hit each of them with his fist. He wanted his arms to be like tree trunks like Robbie and Braden Grant’s so he could punch them and make them stop being so mean.

He flexed his muscles to check them out, wondering how he could get them to be so big.

“You have to work in the Grant lists, Steenie,” Kenzie whispered.

“Huh?”

“I saw you looking at your muscles. You want them big like the Grants, do you not?”

Steenie nodded, his face lighting up. “Aye, how can I get them that big?”

“You have to work in the lists. They work there every day.”

“Can I when we get out? I’ll get mine to be bigger.” He flexed his one arm to demonstrate to Kenzie how big his was already.

Kenzie said with a grin, “When you’re a wee bit older, mayhap.”

“I’ll practice every day.” He was sure he could get his arms to be bigger.

Before he knew it, they’d made it through and were drawing near the loch.

When they could see the loch ahead, Kenzie leaned over to whisper to Steenie. “If you see any hawks or falcons overhead, especially more than one, ‘tis a good sign.”

“Why?” Steenie whispered.

“Because my cousin married the Wild Falconer and Uncle Alex sent for them, though ‘tis unlikely they’re here yet. But Papa says they do amazing things. Have you not heard about him?”

Steenie shook his head, his eyes widening. “What does he do?”

“He can send his birds down to attack mean people. They’ve done it before and ‘tis spectacular. If you see them, it means my cousins are here.”

“You two lads keep quiet back there. I shoulda split you two up.” The lead man had a long scruffy beard that hit his chest.

“Scruffy…” Steenie whispered. Then he looked at Kenzie and giggled. That was one of the activities that had helped them make it through the night—giving names to all of their captors. Scruffy, Blackteeth, Stubby—because he’d lost two fingers—and Smelly.

He peeked at the two lassies in the cart with them. They were sisters, and one had her head in her sister’s lap while she sucked her thumb. “Why does she suck her thumb still? I don’t.”

“Because she watched her mother die not long ago. She’s sucked it ever since,” the girl named Edith said bluntly. She turned her head away from Steenie, and he wondered if she was mad he’d asked such a direct question.

“What’s her name?” he asked, hoping to get her to talk to him again. He would feel horrible if he lost his mother, especially if something happened to her in front of him and he wasn’t able to stop it.

“Eva.”

“How old is she?”