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powerfully built and undeniably a formidable warrior. He was also reputed to be the most handsome of the six brothers and took to his role with relish.
    “I didn’t think they’d look at me,” the squire said, his deep red face matching the color of his hair. “I just wondered if they’d be as fair as they are reputed to be.”
    “Who?” Arthur said.
    “St. Columba’s bones, little brother.” For a moment, Dugald looked as if he wanted to cuff Arthur, too. But Arthur wasn’t a lad anymore. He would fight back. Though he’d been careful to keep his skills hidden—initially as a means of self-preservation, and now to not have those skills used against his compatriots—he wondered if Dugald sensed that the balance of power had shifted between them. He pushed him, but only so far. “Where have you been living? In a cave with King Hood?” Dugald laughed even louder, drawing a few eyes in their direction. “Lorn’s daughters are reputed to be rare beauties—particularly the middle one, the fair Lady Mary.”
    Arthur wasn’t the least bit intrigued. Reports of noblewomen’s beauty were often exaggerated. Besides, he doubted any of them could hold a candle to MacLeod’s wife. He’d seen Christina Fraser only once, but he’d thought her the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.
    Another face flashed before his eyes—this one more sweet than classically beautiful—before he pushed it away with a frown. Strange that he still thought of the lass from the church though more than a year had passed. The king had been furious to lose the silver—especially when they learned it was double the amount they’d originally thought—but had understood why Arthur interfered.
    “They have one fatal flaw,” he pointed out.
    The squire looked confused, but Dugald understood. His brother’s expression fell, his mouth tightening in a hard line. His ambitious brother might have seen the advantage of siding with Ross and King Edward—and by necessity the MacDougalls—but Dugald didn’t like Lorn any better than Arthur did. “Aye, you’re right about that, little brother.”
    “What flaw?” the squire ventured to ask. The lad had courage, Arthur thought, knowing what was to come.
    Dugald clopped the boy again. “You’d better hope it’s blindness, if you want any of the lasses to notice you.”
    Another hour of his brother’s loud conversation passed before it was their turn. At last, Arthur followed his brother forward to pledge his sword to MacDougall. As the head of the family, at least as far as England and the Earl of Ross were concerned (his three older brothers having been declared rebels), Dugald spoke for them all. Alexander MacDougall handled the formalities, but Arthur sensed Lorn’s immediate interest.
    “Sir Dugald of Torsa….” Lorn left off contemplatively. “One of Colin Mor’s sons,” he said, giving him a long, steady look. “Not the eldest, though.”
    His quick-tempered, hotheaded brother replied with surprising equanimity. “Nay, my lord. My eldest three brothers fight with the rebels.” As Lorn well knew. “And your uncle,” Dugald added with just the right tinge of sarcasm.
    Lorn’s mouth thinned; he obviously didn’t appreciate the reminder of his traitorous kinsman. “I remember your brother Neil,” he said, looking his brother straight in the eye. “He fought well at the battle of Red Ford.”
    Red Ford. The battle between the MacDougalls and Campbells over their lands in Loch Awe. The battle where their father had been cut down in cold blood. By Lorn.
    Lorn—the bastard—was baiting them. Dugald knew it. Arthur knew it. But only Arthur wanted to kill him for it. Dugald hadn’t seen what he had. The great Colin Mor Campbell had died like a warrior on the battlefield, but only Arthur had witnessed the treacherous manner in which he had been killed. It would have been his word against Lorn’s. Neil was right to have protected him. He would never have been