Beloved Beast Read Online Free PDF Page B

Wendy Close. Take him. He’s a good lad. Kind hearted. Take him before stench like this get their hands on him.
    “Stench am I?” Cryton snarled.
    “Go now! ” Swift pleaded. “Before…”
    But just then there was a sliver of noise from behind, a momentary warning. Mackay twisted about. A pistol appeared against the moldering window frame. Fire exploded from its muzzle. Pain seared the side of his head. Swift screamed He stumbled backward. Something struck him from behind, and then he fell, dropping into darkness.
     
    “Are you alive?” a voice hissed.
    Mackay opened his eyes, but it did little good. The world was as black as old sins. His head pounded with pain, his body throbbed with feverish heat.
    “Wake up.” The voice again, whispered from deep shadows. But he recognized it as Swift’s. It was still melodious though it had lost the polished sheen he’d first heard from her lips.
    “Where am I?” His own voice was barely human, guttural with pain, rusty with disuse.
    “The cellar.”
    Thoughts swirled murkily in his head. Memories streamed past. “Beneath Cryton’s hovel?”
    “Aye.”
    “And the lads he keeps?”
    “Upstairs.”
    He nodded. She exhaled quietly as if she’d been holding her breath.
    “For such a brawny big bloke, you go down terrible easy, Highlander.” Her words may have been sardonic, but her voice trembled, cranking up a little guilt for the worry he had caused her. “Do you oft let others knock you unconscious?”
    He raised a hand, testing the wound. Pain shot through him, but the bullet seemed to have just grazed his skull. As luck went, that was as good as his was likely to get. “’Tis a poor habit of mine. That I see now.”
    “And little else in this damnable hole. Why the devil-”
    “ This defileth the man.” he quoted numbly. His head rocked with pain.
    She was silent for a moment. “You don’t approve of cursing?”
    “Nay, but this seems the proper place for it if there be such a thing.”
    “Can you sit?”
    He shifted, trying. It took all his effort, but finally he was slumped against the rocky wall. She sat beside him, leaning her head against the damp stone. He saw now for the first time that she was chained again and realized that he was too.
    “Are you well?” he asked.
    “Well?” There may have been humor in her voice, which did not seem quite right considering the circumstances. “They’ve taken my hard-won baubles. I’m chained to a wall, and…oh, Cryton plans to kill me upon his return, but otherwise, aye, I’m fair to middling.”
    “Why would he wish you dead?”
    “You heard him, Highlander,” she said. “I was picking pockets in his territory. And doing a rather handsome job of it.”
    “If you’re good at the task, wouldn’t he be wiser to use your skills than kill you?”
    “Wiser?” she said and laughed a little. “Aye, I’ll mention that to him. He’s sure to see sense.”
    Mackay exhaled wearily. “Me apologies,” he said.
    “Apologies?” Her voice was soft.
    “For this…” He motioned toward the darkness. “I did not mean to cause you trouble.”
    She was silent for a long moment. “What did you mean, Highlander?”
    He remained silent.
    “Why did you come? Truly.”
    A fine question. He glanced to his right, perhaps looking for a way out, but there was little to see. “To make amends, mayhap.”
    “I believe Istruck you.”
    So she had, clever little nymph. Truth to tell, he didn’t oft allow that to happen. He must be getting old. “Amends to God,” he corrected. “Or mayhap…” He shook his head. It hurt. “Mayhap to the world at large if there be no god.”
    She didn’t seem to wish to argue religion. “So you truly do take in lads.”
    “I’ve no wish to see them end up to be the likes of me.”
    She was silent for a moment. “Foolish enough to let themselves be bested twice in one week?”
    He snorted softly. That hurt too. “Without skills,” he said. “Good for naught but