"There's no need to shout," Ninian grumbled, reluctantly moving aside.

"Here, now, Roarke, what the devil is the matter with these clansmen of yours?" demanded Laird MacKillon, his white brows furrowed in agitation. "One minute we're all getting along and enjoying a pleasant bit of pipes, and the next they're shooting arrows at us and trying to scale the wall."

"Perhaps they didn't like Thor's playing," Magnus joked, releasing another arrow. "Did I kill anybody?" he asked Lewis, who was standing beside him.

"No, but with every shot you're getting closer," Lewis a.s.sured him encouragingly.

"Takes me a few minutes to get going," Magnus said, undaunted. "Watch me, lad, and see how I become one with the arrow." He sent another shaft sailing into the air, which landed a good three yards from the nearest MacTier. "That's got them worried!" cackled Magnus cheerfully.

"They're preparing to scale the wall!" Laird MacKillon fretted as a tightly formed line of MacTiers moved forward bearing ladders.

"I'll take care of them!" announced Mungo. He heaved two enormous stones off the h.o.a.rding on which he was perched. The rocks dropped heavily to the ground, cleanly missing any MacTiers.

"Hold back!" Roarke shouted.

Laird MacKillon looked at him in bewilderment. "Your pardon, Roarke, but we're at war here. 'Tis hardly the time for exercising restraint."

Colin raised his sword to Roarke's chest. "Do you really believe we are such fools that we will listen to you?"

"You are wasting precious arrows and rocks by releasing them too early," explained Roarke quickly. "Let the MacTiers advance into the pits, which will reduce their numbers and create confusion. Then shower them with everything you have."

"That's a sensible suggestion," remarked Hagar.

Colin regarded Roarke suspiciously. "Why would you act against the interests of your own clan?" he demanded, his sword still trained upon him.

"I don't want to see any MacKillons harmed."

Colin gave a scornful laugh. "Do you expect me to believe that?"

"I don't give a d.a.m.n what you believe, Colin," Roarke snapped. "But if you let your people exhaust their weaponry before the MacTiers are close enough to be damaged by it, how will you fight them?"

Colin considered this barely an instant before shouting, "Hold back!"

"Look how nice and neat they keep their line as they approach," marveled Hagar, scratching his shiny head with the tip of an arrow. "It looks almost like a dance."

"Each man has been given a position and must maintain it until the ladders are up and the warriors are climbing," Roarke explained, watching as the MacTiers performed their familiar maneuver. "They are trained to approach even in the most heated of battles, because it is vital to get the walls scaled."

"h.e.l.lo, there, lads," called Magnus, waving amiably to them. "Just a few more steps and we'll begin again."

The ladder-bearing MacTiers looked up in confusion as they marched, unaccustomed to approaching a castle without being fired upon.

And then the line disintegrated as over two dozen of them suddenly dropped into the pits.

"Now, that was simply splendid!" burst out Laird MacKillon, watching as the remaining MacTiers froze in their tracks, wondering what other surprises were in store for them. "Why, we must have captured at least thirty men in those pits-maybe more!"

"Shoot at the rest of them!" Roarke commanded. "Now!"

The MacKillons obligingly pelted the remaining MacTiers with stones and arrows.

"Take that, ye great, ugly brute!" shouted Finlay, dropping an enormous stone off his platform.

He peered over the edge and watched as it landed squarely in the arms of a powerfully built MacTier who had managed to ascend much of a ladder. Laughing triumphantly, the mighty warrior hoisted the rock over his head and showed it to Finlay.

"Aye, you're a strong one," Finlay agreed, nodding. "But shouldn't you be holding on to the ladder?"

The warrior's expression dissolved. He waggled back and forth for one desperate moment, then fell backward, taking the rock and the two warriors on the rungs below with him.

"Three MacTiers downed with just one stone!" marveled Magnus, impressed. "Let's see if anyone can top that!"

"Let a few of them get up here so I can chop them into wee bits with my sword," ordered Thor, struggling to raise his weapon. "I want to make those villains pay for ruining my pipes!"

"Keep them down for as long as possible!" Roarke countered firmly. "The whole idea is to stop them from climbing the wall!" He looked down to see a group of MacTiers preparing to ram the gate with a heavy timber. "Get ready to pour boiling oil on those men at the gate!"

The men standing by the enormous black cauldron positioned over the gate obligingly began to ease it onto its side.

"Wait for my order!" commanded Roarke, pausing until the rammers were in the optimum position to be hit by the scalding oil. "Now!!"

A torrent of liquid cascaded over the wall, drenching the startled MacTiers below, who instantly dropped their timber and began to beat wildly at their sodden clothes.

After a moment they stopped their frenzied palpitations and looked at each other in confusion.

"b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l, I'm soaked to the bone!" complained one.

"Lewis, what the h.e.l.l was in that cauldron?" demanded Roarke, watching as the dripping wet MacTiers gamely picked up their battering ram once more.

"We didn't have that much oil to spare, so we had to use plain water," Lewis explained apologetically.

"And just exactly how hot was it?" demanded Roarke.

"Actually, it was cold," Lewis admitted. "We didn't want to waste too much wood keeping it hot, so the fires were only lit a short while ago."

Roarke struggled for patience as the MacTiers began to pound the gate. "Myles, Eric, start dropping stones on the rammers!" he shouted, seeing his men appear on the wall head. "Donald, make sure the archers are actually aiming for MacTiers and not just shooting arrows into the darkness!"

"Who is leading them?" asked Eric, scanning the attacking warriors below as he hoisted up an enormous rock.

"No one we know, otherwise I would have tried to talk to him," Roarke answered. "That big blond warrior off to the right is giving the orders."

Donald regarded him seriously. "What are we going to do?"

"For the moment we have little choice but to try to hold them off," said Roarke. "If I try to talk to them, I'm more likely to get shot than command their polite attention."

"But how long can the MacKillons withstand an attack like this?" wondered Myles, watching with satisfaction as his stone struck one of the rammers below.

"Long enough to let the MacTiers know this is not the same pathetically unprepared holding they attacked last year," Roarke replied. "Their numbers have already been reduced by the pits, and we'll hope that if any make their way into the castle they will be caught in the nets. Once they realize this holding is not going to be easy to capture, they will stop and listen to reason."

Eric hoisted another rock over the battlements. "And then what?"

"And then the MacKillons can tell them that we will be released in exchange for their withdrawal," Roarke answered. "That will give the MacTiers the sense that they have won a victory without having to completely destroy-Colin, get down!!"

Colin dropped to the ground just as the MacTier warrior who had scaled the wall behind him delivered a deadly blow with his sword.

Roarke hurled his dirk at the MacTier, burying the blade deep into the a.s.sailant's shoulder. The man's weapon clattered to the ground as he was grabbed by Myles and Finlay.

"b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l, that was a wee bit close!" swore Magnus.

"Are you all right?" Roarke asked Colin.

Colin nodded, but Roarke could see the muscles of his jaw contract as he rose to his feet.

"Now, that's as fine a cut as any man could hope to have and live to tell about it," said Magnus, admiring Colin's back. "It goes clean from one side of yer ribs to the other. I'd be happy to st.i.tch it for ye later, lad, if ye think ye can wait until I'm finished dealin' with these MacTier rascals."

Hagar's face blanched at the crimson stain quickly spreading on his son's shirt. "Perhaps you should go in and have your mother look at your wound, lad," he suggested, refraining from actually inspecting the injury himself. "She'll know what to do."

"It's nothing," said Colin.

"Of course it's nothing," scoffed Thor, barely glancing at it. "Why, I have scars all over my body that go twice as deep as that, and you don't see me running in to my mother."

"A good thing, since yer poor mother's been buried for well over fifty years," observed Magnus. "And the only scars I've ever seen on ye are the ones ye got the day those bees chased ye into a bramble bush, and ye were cryin' for yer ma so loud I was tempted to stuff a rag in yer mouth-"

"Are you certain you're all right, Colin?" demanded Roarke, ignoring the elders' bickering.

"It's just a scratch," Colin a.s.sured him brusquely. "I'm fine."

Roarke tilted his head in acknowledgment and began to turn away.

"Roarke."

He paused.

"Thank you."

Roarke nodded, knowing full well how much it had cost Colin to say those words.

Melantha appeared on the wall head just in time to see a volley of burning arrows rain down upon her people.

"Great G.o.d in heaven, it's raining fire!" said Laird MacKillon, looking about in awe.

Magnus promptly picked up one of the burning arrows and sent it flying right back at the MacTiers. "Take that, ye foul wretches!" he shouted gleefully. "Ye can't burn good Scottish stone, so all ye're doin' is helpin' us to see ye better in the dark, ye stinkin' clods of cow dung-"

"Magnus, your plaid's afire!" shouted Melantha.

Magnus yelped in surprise and began to dance wildly about, unraveling his plaid as he struggled to stamp out the flames consuming the ragged wool.

Thinking fast, Lewis dipped a wooden bucket into one of the cauldrons and hurled its contents onto Magnus.

"G.o.d's ballocks, that water's freezing!" shouted Magnus, instantly forgetting his previous problem.

"Sorry," Lewis apologized.

"That's all right, lad, ye couldn't have known. Where have ye been, Melantha?" Magnus asked, adjusting his sodden plaid as best he could before picking up his bow once more.

"I was in the castle helping with one of the nets," Melantha replied, moving over to the parapet so she could see what was happening below.

"Was it working well?" asked Lewis hopefully.

"Your design was brilliant, Lewis," Melantha told him. "It comes down with barely a whisper, and can be hoisted again so fast it's ready for the next intruders within minutes. Already we've captured over fifteen men."

"What are ye doin' with the prisoners?" wondered Magnus.

"Gelfrid is locking them up in the storeroom," Melantha replied. "And then he's scaring them with some tale about a big rat."

"A pity we can't just drop a giant net on the lot of them," observed Magnus, firing another arrow into the air. He sighed as his shaft landed several feet to the right of the warrior he had intended to hit. "That would put an end to all of this."

"Magnus, aim to the left of your target," suggested Donald.

"Now, why would I want to do a foolish thing like that?" wondered Magnus. " 'Tis hard enough to hit these MacTier curs in the dark as it is, without purposely aimin' away from them. An'if yer thinkin' to comment on my bein' a wee bit off tonight, well, I'm sure I don't need to remind ye about that time I hit yer fearless leader right square in the-"

"Just try it," interrupted Donald. "Once."

"Most idiotic thing I ever heard," grumbled Magnus, nocking another arrow against the string of his bow. "Fine, then, I'm aimin' to hit that big beast of a MacTier standing by the well, the one who is about to shoot another one of those b.l.o.o.d.y flaming shafts at me."

"Aim to the left of him, Magnus," Donald instructed, moving beside him. "By about one yard."

"Pure idiocy," muttered Magnus, reluctantly adjusting his aim, "as if I can't see clear enough to know which way the b.l.o.o.d.y arrow is going to fly-"

"You got him, Magnus!" burst out Lewis in amazement. "Right in the thigh!"

"That'll teach ye to try to shoot yer elders!" Magnus shouted, shaking his fist in triumph. "Now, drop yer weapon and run on home, before I fix it so that ye're the last of yer line!"

The terrified MacTier instantly threw down his bow and scurried away as fast as his injury would permit.

"Your pardon, Roarke, but are we winning?" asked Laird MacKillon, clearly confused by the progress of the battle. "With all these flaming arrows and rocks flying about, 'tis rather difficult to tell what's what."

Roarke watched in frustration as the MacTier rammers continued to methodically bash at the wooden gate with their timber. Several of them had been knocked out by the falling stones, but these men were simply dragged out of the way and replaced by others. The gate was solid and was reinforced by a heavy bar, and if they broke through they would still have to haul up the iron portcullis. Even so, no castle was impenetrable. If the MacTiers didn't succeed in forcing their way through the entrance, they would eventually find another way in.

He had to orchestrate a bargain with them before that happened.

"All we're doing for the moment is holding our own," he told Laird MacKillon.

"I'd say we're doin a wee bit more than that, laddie," countered Magnus. "Looks to me like these filchers are goin' to pay yer ransom-they're bringin' forth an enormous cart piled high with goods!"

Roarke glanced down to see two horses pulling a heavy wagon that was draped in rough blankets.

Uneasiness seeped through him.

" 'Twould appear these MacTiers are wise enough to accept that they cannot win," declared Laird MacKillon approvingly. "And a good thing, too-we've almost completely exhausted our store of rocks." He clapped his hands to capture his clan's attention. "We will release our prisoners in exchange for this ransom, and that will put an end to any further unpleasantness."

"They had better have another set of pipes in there for me," grumbled Thor, "or else I shall be forced to demand the life of one of them as payment!"