that was when she heard a terrible sound—a huge and crushing sound—accompanied by the deep groaning of wood.
“It has begun,” Sir Neil said. “They are battering the first gates on the barbican.”
“Will they break?”
“Eventually,” he said.
Margaret hurried past him, heading for the stairwell that went up to the crenellations. He seized her arm from behind. “You do not need to go up!” he exclaimed.
“Of course I do!” She shook him off and raced upstairs, stepping out into the gray dawn.
Smoke filled the air from the dozen fire pits, as did the stench of burning oil. The sky was rapidly lightening, and Margaret saw men and women at the walls, but no one was moving. “What’s happening?” she asked.
Malcolm stepped forward and said, “They are just moving their ladders to our walls.”
Margaret had to see for herself, and she walked past him.
She stared grimly down. Dozens of men were removing ladders from carts drawn by horses and oxen, pushing them toward her walls. She could not tell what the hundreds of men behind them were doing, and she glanced south, toward the barbican. Several dozen men were pushing a huge battering ram forward. She held her breath as the wheeled wooden machine moved closer and closer to the gates, finally ramming into it.
The crash sounded. Wood groaned.
In dismay, she realized the gates of the barbican would not hold for very long. A slew of arrows flew from her archers upon the entry tower, toward those men attacking her barbican. Two of the Wolf’s soldiers dropped abruptly from their places by the battering ram.
Instantly, other soldiers ran forward, some to drag the injured away, others to replace them.
“It isn’t safe for you to remain up here,” Sir Neil said, and the words weren’t even out of his mouth before she saw more arrows flying—some toward the men below, who were erecting the ladders upon her walls, and others coming up toward her archers and the women on her ramparts. Sir Neil pulled her down to her knees, arrows flying over them and landing on the stone at their backs.
“You are the mistress of this castle,” Sir Neil said, their faces inches apart. “You cannot be up here. If you are hurt, or God forbid, if you die, there will be no one to lead us in this battle.”
“If I am hurt, if I die, you must lead them.” Just then, the arrows had not hit their targets, but she was not a fool. When the Wolf’s archers were better positioned, they would strike some of her soldiers, and perhaps some of the women now preparing to throw oil on the invaders. And as she thought that, she heard a strange and frightening whistling sound approaching them.
Instinctively, Margaret covered her head and Sir Neil covered her body with his. A missile landed near the tower they had come from, exploding into fire as it did. More whistles sounded, screaming by them, rocks raining down upon the ramparts now, some wrapped in explosives, others bare. Two men rushed to douse the flames.
Margaret got onto her hands and knees, meeting Sir Neil’s vivid blue gaze. “You must tell me what is happening—when you can.”
* * *
THE SOUNDS OF the Wolf’s siege became worse, and did not cease. The battering of the front gate, the screams of missiles and explosives, the locustlike whirring of arrows. But other screams accompanied these sounds—the frightened whinnies of horses, the cries of the men who were shot, and worse, the screams of those in agony as boiling oil scorched their heads, shoulders and arms.
Margaret now stood in the south tower, not far from the entry tower and the barbican. From her position at the uppermost window on the third floor, she could watch the battle. Thus far, no MacDonald soldier had made it over her walls, and the gates of the barbican were holding. Her archers were great bowmen, she now knew, and a great many of the Wolf’s men had been shot by them, both as they climbed the ladders and as they wielded the ram.
But his men were not the only casualties. His archers were causing damage, too.
She had seen three of her men struck by their arrows and missiles on the wall adjacent to the south tower. He had hundreds of men in this battle, while she had less than fifty. She could not afford to lose even three of her archers.
And he commanded his army by riding back and forth amongst his men. He was never alone, and he rarely rode out of the column of his knights and foot soldiers. Still, she had espied him the moment she had come to stand at the tower window. He was an unmistakable figure, powerful and commanding, even from a distance.
She had never hated and feared anyone more.
And she refused to admire his courage as her archers were continually firing upon him.
“How can ye watch?” Peg asked.
Margaret did not face her. “I do not have a choice.”
“There is always a choice,” Peg said bitterly.
Margaret turned. “You have been very clear, Peg, and while I have valued your opinions in the past, they are not helpful now.”
“We will all die here,” Peg said, bursting into tears.
Margaret grimaced, finally leaving the window. “We will not die,” she said, taking her into her arms. “Not if my uncle Argyll comes to our rescue.”
Peg sniffed. “You are as brave as your mother, and now, the whole world will know it.”
Margaret knew she wasn’t brave—she was sick with fear, but she would never tell her maid that.
She began to worry that the tides of battle were changing. The cadence of the striking battering ram quickened—more men had been added to its service. Fewer men were being struck by her archers—she did not see wounded soldiers dropping to the ground as she had at the start of the battle, and more were climbing up. Fewer arrows flew from her walls at the Wolf’s army while the hail of arrows and missiles from below had become a constant barrage.
She saw one of her archers fall from her walls, very close by the window where she stood, an arrow protruding from his chest. She could not stand it. She ran from the tower, and as she did she heard a great crash from outside, from the barbican, and the huge sound of splintering wood.
Margaret rushed onto the ramparts and paused, trying to adjust to the chaos around her. MacDonald soldiers were literally atop the crenellations now. Dozens of women stood throwing oil at them. Arrows and stones were a constant hail, raining down upon them. Explosives intermittently landed, detonating.
“They have breached the barbican!” someone shouted.
A woman her own age was heaving a pot of burning oil at a soldier who was now standing on her ramparts. As she threw the cauldron at him, he thrust out his arm, knocking the pot aside. Hot oil spilled, but he only grunted. Then he seized the woman by the hair.
A dagger flashed in his hand.
Margaret did not think twice. From behind, she stabbed him in the back.
He roared, turning, enraged. Before she could strike again—now to
