Read MacCallister: The Eagles Legacy for Free Online

Duff.
    Duff saw Skye sitting at the far end of the bar, with modesty restored, if not composure. She was wiping away her tears.
    “Are you all right, Skye?” Duff asked.
    “Oh, I was so frightened for you!” Skye said.
    “Don’t be frightened for me. ’Tis you I’m worried about. Are you all right?” Duff asked again.
    “They were—they tried to . . .” Skye was unable to finish the sentence. “If you hadn’t come along when you did, I might have been . . .”
    “Wait a minute. What are you saying, girl?” Ian asked. “Did they hurt you? Because if they did.” Ian put the club down and pulled a pistol out from under the bar.
    “No, they did nothing,” Skye said quickly. “Duff came along in time.”
    “It makes no difference whether he came along in time or not,” Ian said. “I’ll be squarin’ things with them.”
    Ian started toward the door, but Duff held up his hand to stop him. “There is no need for you to go,” Duff said. “I’ve already killed Donald.”
    Skye gasped. “You killed him?”
    “I had no choice. They both came toward me with knives. It was a case of kill or be killed.”
    “Aye, before I left I saw that they both had knives,” Skye said.
    “I had better go to the sheriff to report it,” Duff said. “Though I’m sure that Roderick has already made the report.”
    “The sheriff is not going to take too kindly to you killin’ one of his own sons,” Ian said.
    “It was self-defense,” Duff said. “The sheriff will have to know that.”
    “Duff, those boys have been naught but trouble their whole lives, and the sheriff well knows that, but has he ever lifted a hand to stop them?” Ian shook his head. “No, he has not,” Ian said, answering his own question. “Why think you now that the sheriff will believe you?”
    “I am an innocent man, Ian,” Duff said. “I’ll not be running like a common criminal when I know I’ve done nothing wrong. I’ll be going to see the sheriff now.”
    “I will come with you to tell the truth,” Skye said.
    “There’s no need for you to come,” Duff asked.
    “I’ll not see my husband-to-be jailed for something he dinnae do.”
    “You stay here.”
    “Duff MacCallister, you are not yet my husband, so you’ve no right to tell me I can’t come with you.”
    Ian laughed. “Best ye get used to it, lad. She is a girl with her own mind.”
    “All right, I’ll not be fighting with you on the very night before we are to be wed,” Duff said.
    “’Tis a smart husband you will be,” Skye said, and the others laughed.
    Duff and Skye were halfway to the office of the sheriff when they saw the sheriff and three of his deputies coming toward them. Rab Malcolm, who was Somerled’s chief deputy, was one of the men with him.
    “Sheriff,” Duff called. “I was coming to see you.”
    “Shoot him!” Sheriff Somerled shouted.
    “No, Sheriff!” Skye shouted, jumping between Duff and the sheriff.
    The sheriff and all three deputies opened fire. The flame patterns of their pistols lit up the night, and the sound of gunfire roared like thunder.
    “Oh!” Skye said, and as she spun around toward Duff, he saw a growing spread of crimson on her chest. She fell to the road, and even as the sheriff and his deputies continued to shoot, he managed to pull her off the road and through the shrubbery.
    “Skye!” Duff shouted, his voice racked with pain and horror at what he was seeing. “Skye!”
    Skye lifted her hand to his face and put her fingers against his jaw. She smiled. “’Twould have been such a lovely wedding,” she said. She drew another gasping breath, then her arm fell and her head turned to one side. Her eyes, though still open, were already clouded with death.
    “No!” Duff shouted. “No!”
    “He’s down there!” the sheriff called.
    Duff moved into the shrubbery and waited. A moment later, one of the sheriff’s deputies came through the hedgerow. Duff stepped out of the shrubbery and, with his fist, landed a