“Al, I don’t suppose you’d like an hour or two of shoe shopping? My treat.” I waved my credit tag in the air. Alianna and her husband were comfortably off but I knew her weakness and we both knew my tag could more than take the heat. I had complained bitterly to my friend that my parents had cancelled the year of freedom after college I had been promised now that my handfast date had been so sharply brought forward. I had been taking my anger out on my credit limit. If shopping was to be my only pastime, then my father could deal with the results. “You’d be doing me a favour. I’ll take the boys for a walk and if we swap coats you can show the paps how a real society girl hits the shops.”
“I couldn’t…” Alianna’s protest wasn’t convincing.
“You could.” I grinned.
And she did. I smiled as, moments after Alianna had swung out of the shop with her hair swept up under my broad-brimmed on-trend hat, wrapped in my electric-blue coat, my smaller shadow trailed by the window of the coffee shop.
I headed towards Ranelagh Gardens on the midlevel, pushing the boys and practically humming. It almost didn’t matter if Devyn spotted his chance or not. I felt free. There was an aviary at the gardens and I thought the boys would like the birds.
I hadn’t gone far before a casual arm slipped around my waist making us look for all the world like any other family out for an afternoon stroll.
“Clever girl.”
A shiver thrilled up my spine at the sound of his familiar mocking tone.
I cast him a sidelong look, taking in his face like I hadn’t seen him in years rather than weeks. I had missed him. I always missed him. But since the night of the ball, I had been beyond desperate to see him.
I smiled at the compliment. “I figured it out eventually.”
We walked past an older couple who nodded admiringly at us and I laughed out loud at the joy of the moment. I had escaped my shadows and the bloody paparazzi, and I was away from people I no longer trusted – Marcus, my parents, most of my friends who had unwittingly made me feel even more trapped. I was walking on air. The image we were projecting was so far from reality but I didn’t care. He was here.
“Are you well?” he asked, unknowingly echoing the words I had said to Marcus.
“I’m fine,” I responded. “He didn’t tell them anything. We’re safe, for now. What happened after I left?
“Didn’t Marcus tell you?”
“Not much.” I sighed.
“Fidelma was able to heal Marcus, as you no doubt have been able to see for yourself,” he said unhelpfully.
“He said she also showed him how to help people while protecting himself,” I prompted.
“Yes, she still isn’t sure how he’s able to heal the sick though.”
“They talked about magic? And he’s accepted that part of himself?” I asked.
“Not very happily.” His mocking tone was back but I felt for Marcus. Like me, he would be struggling to overcome his long-held prejudice which regarded Britons and their primitive magics with disdain. “He was curious to know more about his family in the North.”
“But I thought… isn’t he the last of the House of York?”
“Yes, Richard Plantagenet died years ago and he was the last of them. I suppose Marcus was curious about what they were like, especially as Fidelma knew old Richard. The Anglians certainly have a reciprocal interest because when Richard died Anglia became a stewardship, and they can’t crown a new king while an heir still lives.”
“Oh. You mean Marcus.”
He nodded.
I vaguely recalled he’d said something about it before, but that was back when the lives and activities of the indigenous peoples of this island had seemed a lot further away than they did now.
“Do you think I might?” I asked, as the thought occurred to me.
“Might what?”
“Have living family out there beyond the walls?”
“Maybe.” He smiled. “If we can figure out who you really are.”
I grinned back at him as a new world of possibility opened up in front of me.
“The people of Cymru and Kernow are Celts and they tend to be dark, especially with the American and African influences on the coast. Mercians tend to be fairer because that region has had influxes of Northmen over the centuries. Anglia’s a melting pot of Normans, Saxons, Anglians, Franks and so on because it was a refuge for all those fleeing the Empire. With that hair you’re likely either Anglian or Mercian,” he posited. “We’ll start there.”
I, unlike Marcus, was adopted. I had never looked at another human being and recognised a family trait that we shared. And I never would unless I had children. I checked on the boys, who were now happily sitting on the blanket we had laid out so they could admire the brightly coloured birds flapping about in the aviary. Their chubby little hands reached for the birds that were far too distant for them to grasp.
“Speaking of Mercia”—I was suddenly reminded of the end of the ball—“you know the Mercian Prince.”
“I told you I served a house in Mercia.” He was dismissive. “The royal house frequently hosts others in Carlisle during festivals.”
“Did you ever meet the Lady of the Lake?” I persisted.
“Yes.”
“Devyn,” I cried. He had met the most famous woman in all Brittania and all I got was a one-word acknowledgement.
“She,” he said, considering his words, “is a force to be reckoned with. But I’ve been gone ten years.”
“I was afraid you’d left with them,” I confessed.
He shook his head, chuckling softly as he reached across to untangle little Anthony’s solid grip on his brother’s hair.
“I thought we had an agreement,” he said frankly. “I won’t be leaving without you. You did agree, didn’t you?”
I had kissed him. I guess he had taken that as a yes.
I smiled and nodded, feeling stupidly shy. He would be taking me with him. To his home. A home I had spent some considerable time wondering about during my long empty days of domestic captivity. I had gone over and over what little information I knew about him and pondered the life that waited for him beyond the borders.
“You were the boy, weren’t you?” I asked him again. “The one I saw when we were on Richmond Hill, the boy with the man who ran away.”
A terse nod was his only reply.
“The man was your father, the one you don’t speak to.”
Another nod.
Apparently, if I could put the pieces of the jigsaw together, he would let me know if I had put them together correctly. But old habits died hard because he didn’t elaborate further.
“Who were they? Were they your mother and sister?” I asked tentatively, unsure if this was territory he would refuse to let me into.
He shook his head softly, sadly. “No, they were from a great house that mine have served for generations. You remember your vision of the burning of Richmond? Did you see anyone with her?”
I nodded, remembering the two horses, the big man falling, the teenage boy and the girl riding away. “The man that Fidelma said was her father and a teenage boy.”
“The king’s brother, Henry, and Rhys, he was the Griffin then, her personal guard. The Griffin role has come through my house since the time of legend.”
“Your father was the Griffin.” This much I already knew. “And the lady he protected was also a descendent… of Elizabeth Tewdwr?”
I had tried to find out more about her in the quiet, dusty shelves of the forum since returning from Richmond, where nobody could track my activities, but it was impossible to find out what had happened on the Britons’ side of the war because there weren’t any records of that. I was glad to have learned Elizabeth had made it to safety.
“Yes, Elizabeth fled further north and found sanctuary for a time in Dudley. Eventually she married one of the sons of the house. The lady you saw would have been her great-great-something-granddaughter.”
I connected the dots.
“We all did.”
“We? Who’s we?” Who else had mourned that mother and child? He ignored the question but offered me something else in exchange.
“My lady’s death was a great loss to our people. The blood is strong in her line and without her we have suffered greatly; she tended the Belinus ley line in the north.” He looked at me, his eyes dark. “I was surprised when my abilities, those gifted to the Griffin, appeared. I was built to be the perfect bodyguard. Her protector. I took it as a sign that her daughter was still alive. As soon as I was old enough, I came to the city to find her.”
“Why did you think she was in Londinium?”
“My lady was killed near the borders and not many people live there. If there were someone in the populace fitting her description, I would have heard about it.”
“What?” I laughed. “Are orphans so rare in the wilds?”
“No, Cass, unfortunately not. But those with abilities like yours are extremely rare. Which was why when you stopped taking the pills and showed some abilities I was so sure you had to be her.” He smiled ruefully.
“Will I be welcomed by the Britons?”
“Far more welcome than me. I disobeyed them in coming here.” He looked briefly less serious. “In fact, they were pretty sure that I had joined my lady and her daughter – until recently they’d no word from me since I left.”
“They thought you were dead?” I interpreted.
He nodded, a mischievous look on his usually serious face.
“I’m not sure they were all so pleased to discover otherwise when I eventually turned up.”
“Why not? Surely, you being alive is a good thing?”
He turned sombre. “I broke an oath in coming here. What my father did was unspeakable. I was given a chance to atone for his action, to be of service… and I left, on a wild goose chase. I’m not sure what I’ll be returning to. What I’ll have to offer you.”
That explained Bronwyn’s behaviour somewhat. She had demonstrated an odd combination of emotions, which I now recognised as relief, delight, and annoyance – all feelings which Devyn regularly inspired in me. I wondered who Bronwyn was to him. Did she have some claim on him perhaps?
Devyn glanced at the time. “How long do you have?”
“Damn.” I had been so fascinated by his story that I hadn’t thought. I needed to get back to the café. Alianna would be frantic.
I started to gather up the boys and put them in their pushchair. Poor little mites, despite being thoroughly wrapped up their hands were cold in the autumn chill.
“I have to get back.”
“So I gather.” Devyn buckled in one of the boys and pulled a face, making the baby gurgle.
“I don’t know when I’ll be able to get away again,” I told him hurriedly. “When I can, how will I find you?”
“Here.” He handed me a sliver of paper – how incredibly quaint. He must have had it ready to slip to me in case our contact had been more fleeting. “It’s my address. I can’t spend all my days watching in case you give them the slip. I need to make preparations to get us out of the city. You can find me there most evenings.”
I started to push the boys towards the park exit. Noting the address, my eyebrows shot up in surprise; it was only a few blocks away from my home.
Reading my expression accurately, he reminded me that he’d had to have an address in the area in order to attend the same school as me. He’d been nearby the whole time. I paused in dismay.
“There are so many questions I haven’t asked you,” I complained. “How soon do you think we can leave? Where will we go? Have you been able to find out any more about who I might be? Or where I’m from?”
What does me leaving with you mean for us? What did that kiss mean? Why did you try to follow me after that kiss?
These last questions of course I didn’t ask out loud. The very thought of asking made me cringe. Maybe the kiss had meant nothing. Adrenaline had been high. Perhaps it had been nothing more than that.
I didn’t believe that, not for a second, but I was still too chicken to ask him directly.
“I need a little more time.” He pushed me towards the gate and when I resisted he smiled wryly before continuing. “I have the tech but I have to be careful. The Code feels sticky, like a web, and I have to make sure I don’t set off any alarms. So it’s taking more time than I’d like. We’d both need papers to go out the way Oban did and security at the gates seems to be heightened right now.”
“Not too much more time,” I said. “The handfast ceremony has been moved up and it’s soon. The announcement will be this week.”
“But I thought you had a year…”
Traditionally graduates had at least a year of freedom before marrying and that had certainly been my plan.
“Not anymore.” I didn’t need to explain why. “Why don’t we go out the way we took Marina?”
He hesitated, his brows drawing together.
“We could, it’s an option. But I would have to ask for help and that makes it complicated.”
“More or less complicated than trying to mess with the Code?”
He sighed, running a hand through the messy curls that were starting to lengthen in his hair, which was way overdue for a haircut.
“I’ll think about it. One way or another, I’ll have a plan when we next meet,” he said finally.
He pushed me more firmly towards the gate. “Go. You’ll never get away again if you get accused of kidnap.”
I reluctantly started back to my cage.
Chapter Twenty
“We wait until after the handfast.”
I stood there stunned, unable to believe what I was hearing.
“What? Why?” Why would he let the ceremony take place? How could he bear the thought of me being publicly bound to another man? I would break in half if I were in his place and had to watch the bursts that had multiplied over the last couple of weeks since the ball. Marcus and I were the hottest couple in town; all aspects of our impending handfast were wildly speculated on.
With all the preparation for the ceremony it had been impossible to get away but after the bridal tea with my mother and her friends to celebrate my last fitting, I had finally been able to slip out under the pretext of buying a personal handfast gift for Marcus. The public gift had already been purchased and my mother had enjoyed being coy about what it might be with her friends.
All that had sustained me in the last weeks was the sure knowledge that if I made it to Devyn he would have a plan in place and we would be out of the city before I was even missed.
“I don’t understand. You want me to be bound to Marcus?”
Devyn’s mask was stubbornly in place. He’d activated a charm when I arrived, so we could not be overheard, but otherwise his home, which I had never been to before, was as perfectly civilised as any I had ever known.
It was a converted flat in Battersea and it had notes of the past woven amidst its chrome perfection, including a glass exterior wall which looked out onto one of the smallest but most delightful gardens I had ever seen. Even as I stood there immobilised, waiting for him to find the words to explain, I was mesmerised. It was an intimate verdant glen nestled inside the urbanity of his home and somehow seeped through the hard modernity, softening the edges.
“Those are my orders.” He finally broke his silence but remained equally as still as me. He’d asked for help and this was the result.
I felt as though I was made of glass and one wrong move would shatter me from the soul out.
“I don’t understand,” I repeated.
Devyn took a stilted step towards me, entering my space but hovering as if he was aware of how fragile my composure was and afraid of what might happen next. I had never seen him so unsure of himself.
I moved away from him, needing distance
to gather myself. To try and piece together what had happened. I moved around his flat, listlessly touching his possessions, abjectly curious about the place he had called home while he’d lingered on the periphery of my world.
I lifted the small objects that sat on the gleaming surfaces, innocuous and personality-free, as if a designer had created the perfect home and nobody had moved in yet. Nothing really spoke of Devyn. I walked up to the small mezzanine and backed away when I realised I was at the threshold of Devyn’s bedroom. Here at least was some sign of life – clothes strewn on the floor, a couple of shelves robbed of their items, which seemed to have hit the far wall and lay broken on the floor. The tousled bed dominated the room as well as my focus. I wouldn’t have put Devyn down as a restless sleeper; he was usually so self-contained. Maybe not so much at the moment though.
A cough beneath me reminded me that I wasn’t alone and my cheeks heated as I realised I was staring at Devyn’s bed while Devyn was watching.
I made my way downstairs, keeping my eyes carefully averted as he watched me prowl and poke around his home. I corrected myself, his house; this was not his home.
Drawn outside to the garden, I perched on the side of the fountain that bubbled out of the ferns that covered the wall and ran along the ground before disappearing through a drain on the far side. This at least spoke of more than the carefully constructed urbanite. I had never seen such a decadent, untamed garden.
“Cass…” His voice was tentative.
“I need you to explain.”
He took a seat behind me on a couch tucked in an alcove out of any rain. “I made contact to ensure someone will be there to meet us once we exit the city. They will help, but I’ve been given orders to bring Marcus as well. We need him.”
“Marcus. Of course,” I repeated dully. “How?”
My mind turned over the possibilities. How would we persuade Marcus to leave the city? He already resented me, he loathed Devyn, and he bore no love for the Wilders.
The handfast. The pre-wedding ceremony to bind our pending union.
“You think… once the handfast has taken place, he’ll follow me?”
Secrets of the Starcrossed Page 26