Highland Strength (Book 3)

Prologue

Highland Strength

Prologue

                Sheena had lived a life on the fringe of everything. Always on the outside looking in at what she would never deserve. Knowing she was different, knowing that she was looked down upon, lower than the dogs at the Laird’s table. She had never told any the truth of her origins. No one would believe her, why should they? They would have deemed her mad, had her locked in a dungeon, or never accepted her into the clan. Sending her out to die in the forests of the Highlands. And she had had the quiet, so quiet baby in her arms to think of. She had always claimed he was her brother. Keeping them together. In truth, their parents had been the best of friends, sending their children together through the veil of time to safety. Away from a death and war that were inevitable. Instead she and Naois had been thrust into a hateful world. Where no one would offer assistance without something in return.

                She had promised to look after him. At the tender age of eight summers, she had been one of the oldest forced from her time. Forced into a cruel world that made no sense to her. With a baby just over a summer and winter old. Thrust into a Highland in winter, snow almost as tall as she was. She had thought she would die that first week. In the second she was sure she would be burying Naois in the cold ground. Only somehow, they had been protected enough by their parents spells, that she had managed to limp and stagger her way through forest, snow filled valleys and over frozen locks. Until she had seen the biggest structure she had ever looked upon in the distance. Trudging forward, she had found a people wary of strangers, hardly willing to help, and only just allowing her and her ‘brother’ to stay due to the skills she had shown in finding and catching food in the depths of winter.

                They had slept in the Main Hall, close to the hearth for the warmth. Treated with disdain and as if they were slaves. Their position being the lowest of the low within the clan. The Laird had accepted them, if she worked for their keep. And so she had. Going out with some of the hardier warriors to try and catch some meat in the harshest of winters. She had a keen eye, and soon the hunting parties were following her lead, even from being ten summers old she led the men. But upon returning to the Keep, she was shunned once more. The other children mocking her and her brother. Giving no quarter and she gave them none in return. Her parents had taught her to use her inner power, and so she still did.

                Eventually the other children stopped trying to push her over, or take the food from her plate, or the clothes from her back. They learned to fear her. But in that fear, she had found they were even crueller. She was not above the whispers that started to abound about her. The accusations as she passed of witchcraft and of dark spells happening in the dead of night. She had tried to appear aloof, above their condemnation. She needed no one but her brother, and she had managed to get a small rundown cottage bestowed upon her when she reached ten and five. The elder male who had lived there had survived only by the food she had dropped off for him. Upon his death he had told the Laird his small hovel was hers. Not that he would offer it her himself. He could not be seen talking to the clan outcast.