The flames licked the fields first. John MacTavish stood at the edge of the farmland, the wind tossing sparks across the scorched earth. He had ordered the crops destroyed, a blow meant to weaken the enemy’s stores, not the lives of innocents. His men knew the rules—always the rules. The fire was war; the blade was war. But women and children? They were never to be counted among the enemy.
Yet, this village was not like the others.
When his men came back from searching the crumbling huts, their faces were grim. “Only men, Tanist,” one of them muttered. “Strong ones, fighters.”
Only men.
It was unusual. Farming villages were usually filled with families—wives, sisters, daughters, toddlers tugging on their mothers’ skirts. Here, the huts rang hollow, the few surviving men either too broken to resist or too reckless to throw down their weapons. John’s gut twisted at the thought, but then he heard it: a cry. Not the rough shouts of men fighting for their lives, but thin, sharp, and desperate.
A babe’s cry.
He followed the sound, boots crunching over charred straw and scattered tools, until he came upon the scene. An elder of his clan had already found them: a young woman, barely more than a girl herself, clutching a bundle swaddled in threadbare cloth. Her face was pale, streaked with soot, her eyes wide with terror as she held the child to her breast.
“Tanist,” the elder said, bowing his head slightly. “Found her hidden behind the hearth. Just her and the wee bairn.”
John’s brows furrowed. “Only her?”
The elder nodded. “The rest—menfolk. She’s the only woman we’ve seen.”
She flinched when one of his men shifted nearby, clutching the babe tighter, shielding her with a feral protectiveness that only a mother could bear.
“The plague took the lasses here,” one of the other clansmen muttered low, as if to explain the impossible sight. “Near every woman an’ bairn, save her. An’ look at the wee one… she’s only just been born.”
John crouched low, studying the young mother. She couldn’t have been more than twenty summers, and the babe—he guessed no older than two moons, red-faced and squalling. He glanced over his shoulder at the men who lingered nearby, their gazes carefully averted. None dared speak it aloud, but John understood. If sickness had claimed the women and children of this place, then this girl’s fate in a village of desperate men had been a grim one. The babe in her arms was proof enough.
His stomach turned. He thought of his mother, his sisters, of the laws carved into the heart of his clan. They were warriors, aye, but not brutes. Never that. They would never assault a woman for the sake of a babe, as the men of this village had.
He looked back at her, lowering his voice. “It’s been a cruel time for ye, hasn’t it, lass?”
Her grip on the child tightened. She didn’t answer, lips pressed thin, eyes shining but dry. No tears left to give.
“It’s been a cruel hand fate dealt ye,” he said quietly. “Ah cannae change what’s past. But ah can promise ye this — you’ll nae be treated as a spoil o’ war. Not by me, nor by any man wearin’ my clan’s tartan.”
The babe fussed, letting out a soft wail. For a moment, John’s stern features softened as he looked upon her tiny face, flushed with the simple need of comfort.
Innocent. Entirely innocent.
He straightened, turning to his men. “See to it she has food, water, an’ clean blankets. She’ll ride back wi’ us, safe.“
When the prisoners were bound and herded together, John kept her apart from the rest. One of the younger clansmen, barely more than a lad himself, offered a hunk of their best bread — soft inside, still warm from the day’s baking — holding it out at arm’s length so she could take it without fear. Another brought a skin of fresh water, drawn before the wells had been fouled in the raid.
John watched the exchange in silence, his expression unreadable, though inside a quiet relief stirred. His men understood — warriors they might be, but no honour was to be found in frightening a mother and her babe.