Book One of the Wild Thistle Trilogy

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Black Isle, Scottish Highlands, 1703

            The waves swept across the ocean in unrelenting scrolls of terror.  The water of Moray Firth boiled like a witch’s cauldron.   Hope stood watching, afraid their presence would tempt the sea further.  Faith watched from the tower; her chin barely reached past the crenellated barrier between her wee body and the sheer cliff below.  Her sister Honour, their father’s favorite and little love, stood beside her, eyes wide with fright, three-year-old lips trembling.  Hope held onto her hand, crooning a few words of reassurance; her eight-year-old maturity marked her as the bravest of the sisters.

            Their maid Hilda screeched above the roar of the whipping wind as her portly form bustled toward them.   She gathered them into her outstretched arms and herded them toward their mother’s chambers.  “Lasses, come, yer maither has me scouring the castle for yer wee hides!” 

            Weeping breached the broad doors that protected the Laird’s rooms.  At once the girls glanced at each other, nervous and afraid.  With a hearty shove from Hilda, they crossed the threshold.  Faith, a bold and curious lass of six, pulled her sisters forward.

            “We’re doomed,” their mother moaned.  Her body hunched over a figure on the mammoth canopied bed.  “They’ll take it all from us.”

            Hope rushed forward and patted her on the arm.  “Tell me, Maither.   Why are ye crying so?”

            Catriona Tavish lifted her head and wiped the tears that channeled down her face.  Her bright blue eyes had faded with redness, her usually porcelain skin was ruddy.  Strands of golden yellow hair escaped their veil and mussed around her grief-stricken face.   “My angels, ye shouldn’t be here.” 

             Honour gasped and attempted to crawl upon the bed.  With help from Faith, she pulled herself up and began wailing.  Her sisters followed her pointed finger and tears began to thread down their freckled faces. 

            There lay their father, the strength of their lives and Laird of Clan Tavish.  Blood crusted his brow, mangled his auburn hair.  His pallor shone white, corpse-like. 

            At Honour’s cries, his eyes slowly opened.  All wasn’t lost, it appeared, for their great oak of a father still lived, unlike the many clansmen who hadn’t survived the war with Clan Mungo.

            “Ah, here’s me women,” he rasped beneath a grimace of pain. 

            They all came closer, eager to be near him despite his battered state.  His right hand clasped his wife’s face as his left pulled Honour closer.  “Me loves, ye have tae be helping yer maither now, ye ken?”  

            Honour’s wails stopped, yet tears still overflowed her lashes. 

            Hope took her father’s hand from her sisters into her own.  “Aye.  We’ll do our duty to the clan.”

            Faith nodded her head, too frightened to speak.

            “Remember, lasses.  Through Faith, Hope and Honour  ye can rule.”

            His eye lids closed as a stuttering breath eased passed his lips.   His hand went limp as it fell from his wife’s face.  All four women stared as if eager he’d speak again, touch them with his infallible spirit of life.

            Catriona began keening with such heartache the girls could barely stand to stay in the chamber. 

            The great Laird of Clan Tavish was dead.  God help them all.