Read Online Conquer the Highland Beast: The Vampire Dylan Macgregor (Hearts of Darkness) by Eliza March - Free Book Online Page A

rang out over the anguished cries, pointed to Dylan’s oldest brother, and the soldier holding him took Liam’s head.
    Dylan’s father screamed impotent oaths. And Kelan, just a few years older than Dylan started shaking.
    “Ye should thank me, brother, for ridding you of the witch’s curse and her filthy spawn.”
    Several men resumed the attack on Dylan. Soon he could no longer see his father or Kelan’s horrified eyes. He hadn’t missed the pain and the hopelessness he’d noticed before they disappeared behind the wall of men taunting him.
    Whoosh! The sound of the blade connecting with flesh drew more cheers and laughter...then his father’s muffled sobs.
    Nay, Dylan would not cry or beg for mercy—not for himself—and it was too late to beg for anyone else. Instead, he allowed the cold darkness to fill him. He memorized each face, the sound of each man’s voice, and vowed vengeance.
    “Enough playing with the lad. Do what you will, just make sure he’s dead,” Haruld said. “Set fire to the village and let’s be done with this bewitched place.”
    ~~~~
    Suddenly, the silence in his head filled with another voice right before one painful blow to the head stopped Dylan’s ongoing nightmare.
    “Dylan, come to me. I’m frightened.”
    His vision failed, but he heard the words of his childhood companion as if she were standing beside him. Blackness filled his sight, the pain stopped, and there was nothing until sometime later, when once again he heard Evie’s familiar voice call his name.
    “Dylan. Do ye hear me?”
    He opened his eyes and blinked. They burned like fire and his head throbbed. The nightmare returned. His father’s body lay sprawled beside his sister’s at the edge of the clearing as if he’d crawled to her with his last dying breath. He didn’t need to look closer to see they were not breathing. Both of his brothers’ heads rested beside their corpses, eyes horror filled, mouths opened in death screams. Moreover, the stake, where his mother had been burned, was nothing but charred wood and ash.
    A warm wet stream trickled down his forehead, dripping into his left eye, interfering with his vision. However, it didn’t stop everything that had happened earlier from replaying in his head.
    “Behind you. Stay still as death...”
    Heavy booted footsteps approached.
    The child in him obeyed the warning and choked back the threatening tears, daring not a sob or a cough as smoke filled the air. The immature berserker in him raged as he forced his body to remain as still as the dead surrounding him. Rigid with fear and anger, daring not a heartbeat nor a breath, young Dylan narrowed his eyes and waited for silence. He regarded the warning still ringing in his head.
    The last of the soldiers rummaged through the debris. One kicked aside an empty basket, and the glint of a dagger drew another man’s attention. When the man picked it up, Dylan saw his father’s seal upon the grip. The head of the clan Macgregor would never willingly part with the family dagger while a heart beat within him.
    He noted the scar on the man’s hand. His uncle’s hand. One day he would cut off that hand and take back the Macgregor dagger for his father, the man’s ballocks for his sister, and his head for his brothers. He would not burn him. For his mother, he would leave his gutted carcass, carrion for the crows. Only then would he have the retribution owed to his family.
    His breathing remained shallow as he feigned death. Aching all over, and dizzy from the blow he’d taken to his head, the pain throbbed, pounding as his heartbeat picked up its pace.
    The other poor souls who bore witness to the attack were left dead or dying. Many were too injured to see what had become of the keep and the village. Fires burned all around.
    W hat he wouldn’t give to be blind to those visions.
    As the raiders straggled off, Dylan considered these memories. They would mold him into the man he would become and when he was