Read Online The Knight by Monica Mccarty - Free Book Online Page A

the enemy, and she should hate them as James and her father did, but living with them day-to-day it was hard not to make some friends.
    Her father frowned. Like James, he didn’t approve of her friendliness with their “occupiers.” He might be forced to interact with them, but she was not. “Killed, from what your uncle said. Along with most of his men.”
    Her eyes filled with tears, thinking of the handsome commander eager to return to his sweetheart in England.
    “This time there will be nothing left,” her father added. “Not one bloody Englishman left in Douglas.”
    Joanna’s eyes shot to his in horror. The “Douglas Larder” may have happened almost three years ago, but it was still fresh in her mind. He would do it again. James had sworn he would show them mercy. He’d promised her.

CHAPTER FIVE
     
     
    James stood outside the gate of the Douglas stronghold. His stronghold. The castle where he’d been born that had been built by his grandfather in the days of King Alexander III. He would rebuild, he swore, and make it even better than before. But emotion burned in his chest and throat.
    The day had dawned gray and cold—fitting, he supposed, for the distasteful but necessary deed being done here today. Like William Wallace before him, Robert the Bruce had adopted the battle strategy of leaving nothing behind for the English but scorched earth, giving them nothing to eat and nowhere to hide, even if it meant destroying their own homes. The king’s castles had not escaped the swathe of destruction: Lochmaben and Turnberry Castles had both been taken and slighted.
    Now it was James’s turn to watch his castle destroyed.
    The long night of feasting was no longer evident in the sober faces of the men who were gathered behind him, watching the men prepare the fires. Truth be told, after what happened with De Wilton, James hadn’t felt much like celebrating last night, but he went through the motions for his men—and for his castle. It deserved a fitting send-off.
    It was just timber and stone, he told himself. The memories could not be destroyed.
    Boyd, who’d been looking at him all night as if he’d suddenly grown two heads, must have read something in his face. “You don’t have to do this.”
    James tightened his jaw. “Aye, I do.” It was his command, his order that would see it done. The least he could do was stand witness. “Has Seton finished with the prisoners yet?”
    Boyd’s mouth fell in a flat line. “He’s readying them now.” He gave him a hard stare. “Silver and a safe escort to the border? This isn’t like you.”
    James shrugged. It wasn’t. He didn’t know how to explain it other than something had struck a chord in him when he’d read that letter. The thing that De Wilton had been reaching for—the thing that had cost him his life—had been a letter from a woman in England. The lady he’d hoped to marry.
    Joanna had tried to tell him that De Wilton had a sweetheart back home, but James had been too jealous to believe her.
    The lady had written that she would agree to marry the English commander if he could hold “Castle Dangerous” for a year. It was the kind of test the troubadours had sung about, harkening to the great age of chivalry when knights had proved their worthiness on the lists and undertaken other challenges and feats of bravery in the name of love.
    “You didn’t do anything wrong,” Boyd said. “He moved and you acted on instinct. He had no right to ask for mercy in the first place. Were the roles reversed he would have struck you down without hesitation—and become a rich man in the process.”
    They all had high prices on their heads, but the Black Douglas’s was higher than most.
    “I know.” But James couldn’t deny the guilt he’d experienced on reading the note. So instead of taking the castle by force, he’d offered the English soldiers holed up in the keep terms for surrender. Terms that had included a safe escort and enough money