Read Online Redeemed (Heroes of the Highlands) (The MacKays #2) by Kerrigan Byrne - Free Book Online Page B

back from a face so disfigured by scars Rory could barely stand to look at it. Soft green eyes flooded with tears that rolled down ribbed, mangled cheeks. “I couldn’t make myself go back in that room.” She clutched at his robes as she fell to her knees, burying her face in them and sobbing. “And I hate myself for leaving her there!”
    “Oh, mama.” The young Banshee drifted into the entry, hovering helplessly.
    Daroch bled for the woman. He could not condemn her weakness. Not after what she’d suffered. He leaned his staff on the cottage and scooped the lady up, carrying her inside. The house was small but comfortable. A fire lay prepared, but not lit, in the large stone hearth. No lanterns glowed. The only light provided by the blue glow of the youngest MacKay sister.
    “Kamdyn, is it?” he asked.
    “Aye, ye can put her here.” She gestured to the large bed, likely brought down from the castle.
    Daroch bent and set the frail woman down gently and covered her with a mountain of furs.
    “I thank ye, Druid, for putting my wee one to rest.” the old woman touched the silt on his face, then brought a hand to her own face.
    Daroch didn’t trust his voice, so he only nodded. Straightening, he looked around. “She’s really not here,” he noted with disappointment.
    “Hasn’t been for days.” Worry glimmered in Kamdyn’s eyes. A familiar green turned aquamarine by her blue glow.
    “She’s been with me,” he informed her.
    The freckled nose wrinkled. “On purpose?”
    A wry laugh wrung from his heavy chest. “No one’s more mystified by it than I. I made it abundantly clear her presence wasna wanted.”
    Kamdyn smirked, wisdom beyond her years shone behind her pretty features. “Perhaps ‘tis why she sought you out. Everyone wants Kylah.” Her face fell. “ Wanted , that is. Also, she may have been drawn to the pain and loneliness in your heart. For I think ‘tis what she needed to feel.”
    Daroch found himself in front of the door, ready to flee from a harmless wee ghost. “What do ye know of my heart?” he thundered.
    “Not a thing,” she admitted gently. “But we are Banshees. We’re drawn to sadness, anger, and loss. Thus is our nature.”
    Daroch couldn’t think of a thing to say, so he turned from the young girl who saw too much and shut the door quietly behind him.
    “Thank you, Druid, for what you did,” the wee Banshee called after him.
    He didn’t turn to acknowledge her, but melted into the moonless highland night.

Chapter Nine
    It took Kylah until the next evening to gather the courage to see him. She stood for untold hours staring at her grave, at her name so meticulously carved into a marker with strange and lovely runes surrounding it.
    Daroch had found her remains. He’d laid her bones to rest. He’d visited her home and comforted her mother. He’d fascinated and excited Kamdyn, who’d vigorously regaled her with every detail of their short interaction.
    “You must go to him, Kylah.” After a hearty and warm welcome home, Kamdyn had rushed her out the door so fast it left Kylah slightly dazed. “He needs you.”
    Needed her? Her youngest sister obviously knew nothing about the man. But even so, the pull to see him again was almost magnetic in its inevitability.
    Kylah lurked in the small crevice that opened into his cave, masking herself from his notice. He wore a vest-like leather tunic that bared his arms to the shoulders and fell to his feet. It split at the waist in many different places, allowing for movement and showing the stag skin trews he wore beneath as he purposefully strode from one place to another. His skin was free of silt and glowed in the firelight like honey poured over iron beneath the ancient markings. His long hair fell clean to the middle of his back in a thick, ebony braid.
    Kylah gawked as he carefully poured what appeared to be liquid metal into a clear bowl of water and marked the change in water level.
    “I can see ye, Banshee,” he