ZEBRA BOOKS

      Kensington Publishing Corp.

       http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

      Contents

      Prologue

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 14

      Chapter 15

      Chapter 16

      Chapter 17

      About The Author

      Prologue

      Scotland, 1380

      Silently, cautiously, Sine Catriona Brodie led her half brothers, Beldane and Barre, toward the beckoning light of a small fire. She knew it was dangerous to approach a stranger’s camp, but she and the twins were hungry, cold, and afraid. The wood had been their hiding place for far too long, what sustenance they could find all too sparse for a young lass and growing three-year-olds. Sine Catriona could barely recall the last time they had slept with a fire to warm them, peacefully lost in their dreams. For them every shadow was an enemy.

      But they could go no farther now. Driven by desperation, Sine Catriona studied the dark form of the man in front of the fire. His shoulder was to her, so she could see little—except that he was tall. Struggling to be brave, she left her brothers hidden in the shrubbery and stepped forward.

      “We approach to request food and a place by your fire, kind sir,” she said.

      The man turned and stared at her. One of his dark, long fingered hands rested on the hilt of a dagger but she did not immediately construe that as a threat. Whoever the man was he was handsome, gifted with all that was needed to make a woman swoon. Sine Catriona was young, barely twelve, but she knew that much. So too had she learned how much evil beauty could hide. However, he made no threatening move. Her hunger and that of her brothers persuaded her to take a gamble with him.

      “Ye are welcome,” he answered in a deep, rich voice. “I have little but I sense that ’tis more than ye have tasted in many a day.”

      “We are quite hungry, sir.” She motioned to her brothers to move closer to the fire.

      “Twins?” he asked.

      The boys nodded shyly. As they sat and introduced all three of themselves by their first names only, the man handed them some bread and cheese.

      “No family name?”

      “’Twould be best if our family name wasnae given,” Sine Catriona murmured.

      “Child, while ye eat allow me to tell ye of myself. I am Farthing Magnus.”

      “Farthing?” She frowned. “’Tis an odd name, sir.”

      “My mother told me that a farthing was what it cost a mon to make me. My father was weel born. He tried to do weel by me, his bastard son, and trained me to the life of a warrior. ’Twasnae the life for me, I fear, and his legal family was unsettled by my presence. I thanked my father kindly for his generosity and left. Ye see before ye Farthing Magnus—conjurer and thief.”

      “A conjurer,” she whispered, duly impressed.

      “At your command, m’lady. And a thief.”

      “We are no strangers to that sin ourselves.”

      “One must needs survive—as long as ’tisnae from one poorer than oneself.”

      “Aye for ye could leave a mon with naught to eat and that could weel mean that thievery becomes murder.”

      “How old are ye, child?”

      “I am twelve, and the lads are three.”

      “So verra young to be roaming this wood unprotected. Where are your parents?”

      “My beloved father is wrapped in the cold clay, sir. My mother still lives, curse her eyes.”

      “Child, I believe ye have a tale to tell. ’Tis a long night that looms before us. I am but one mon, and one who swears that he would do ye no harm.”

      “Nay? Not even for gold in your pocket?”

      “I admit freely that I am a thief and that my tongue isnae often burdened by the truth, but I do hold dear to a principle or two. I am not a mon to deal in blood money.”

      He did not flinch from her direct, probing look. A self-professed thief