by Lisa Jackson
“So be it, criminal. Just remember, you chose your own fate!” Snap! The thin rope of leather slapped hard again. Bjorn convulsed, pulling at the straps that held his hands. Numbing blackness threatened to swallow him and he prayed it would be so. Around him, peasants, servants, and soldiers stared at him, some with faint smiles, others holding hands over their mouths as if they were about to be sick, still others with lifeless eyes, as if they cared not. Work had stopped in the castle and he and Cormick had become the main attraction.
“Speak, damn you!” Holt thundered, and Bjorn felt a small measure of satisfaction at the vexation in his tormentor’s voice. “For the love of Christ, tell me!” Another flick of Holt’s cruel wrist. The whip cracked, then sizzled as it flayed another strip of skin off Bjorn’s shoulders. With all his strength, he held his tongue and didn’t look to his side, where Cormick was already sagging against his restraints, blood oozing from his mouth, eyes closed, his skin split open from more than a dozen brutal bites of the whip.
“Stop!” a woman’s voice—the blond girl Cayley—yelled from a window high in the keep. Bjorn could barely see her. “For the love of God, Holt, stop this!”
“Bloody Christ,” Holt muttered, then turned to face the keep. “If what I do offends you, m’lady, do not watch. I only make an example of those who are disloyal to Dwyrain!”
“By beating them until they die? This man was only a messenger, who wanted to help you find Megan—”
“I barter not with the demon outlaw!” Holt said, his temper snapping. In a softer voice, one she would not be able to hear, he growled to one of his men, “Go up to her chamber and keep her away from the window until I’m finished.”
The fat-necked soldier was quick to run to the keep, but not before Cayley yelled again.
“Stop this torture now! The baron would not approve. This is still his castle, his soldiers, his prisoners, and—”
“I spoke with your father this morning, m’lady. ’Twas his idea to flog the truth from these men in an effort to find Megan. ’Twas he who insisted the traitors not go unpunished.”
“Nay, my father would not … Who are you? Stay away! Nay! Leave me be! Unhand me, you brute!” she cried, and then there was silence in the bailey once again.
Holt, grumbling about hardheaded women, advanced to the brace where Bjorn was bound. With the handle of his whip, Holt bashed the side of Bjorn’s face, rattling his teeth. Pain, in a blinding flash, ripped through Bjorn’s jaw. “I’ll find out the truth, you know. One way or t’other. You’d better talk while you can, you dirty, lying dog.”
Bjorn spit blood and hit Holt square in the face.
“You stupid bastard.” Again, the whip handle crashed against his face. With a sickening pop, his nose broke. Blood spurted. Pain screamed through Bjorn’s brain, but he managed to look Holt square in the eye.
Through rattling teeth, he muttered, “Go to hell, you son of the Devil!”
Several peasants laughed and Holt’s face turned red in rage. White lines edged the corner of his mouth. “You first,” he growled and struck another blow. A flash of blinding agony flared behind Bjorn’s eyes and the blackness that he welcomed came at last to claim him.
Cayley shoved her trencher aside. Ever since Holt had banished her to her chamber, she’d seethed. Treated like a wayward child! Not trusted even to take meals in the great hall! Restrained by a big, burly, stinking knight while the outlaws were being flogged! She glanced at Megan’s bed and felt a deep pang of sorrow for the sister she’d tormented and teased.
Climbing into the window, she stared down at the bailey and felt sorry for herself. Even the girls plucking eggs from nests, milking cows, or herding the geese had more freedom than she.
From her position, she heard the pounding of the carpenter’s hammer and the clank of steel as the armorer forged new weapons. Smoke drifted to the sky and a thin, cool mist shrouded the forest far beyond the castle. The chapel bells rang and she watched Father Timothy and Holt, heads bent against the wind, hurry down the steps and into the bailey. They were arguing, Holt’s face stern, the priest’s worried.
She shivered and felt as if death were near. If only Megan were here or her father were well or her brother hadn’t died. But idle wishes helped no one. For the first time in her life, she had no one to turn to, no one to take care of her. “Please, please help me,” she murmured, hoping God was listening.
Wringing her hands, Cayley tried to think of a way to see the crippled sorcerer again. Though she’d once hated him, she now believed that he was good, that his interests in Dwyrain were pure, that he, if anyone, could help break Holt’s horrid death grip that was clamped firmly over the throat of the keep.
The door opened and a soldier allowed Rue, wearing an apron and carrying a basket of herbs and eggs, into the room. The door closed with a thud. Rue crossed the chamber in surprisingly swift strides. Sighing loudly, she took Cayley’s fingers in her own bony hands.
“Something’s wrong,” Cayley said.
Rue slid a glance at the door. “Aye,” she admitted in a soft whisper.
“Father!”
Rue gripped tighter. “He is not long with us, aye, but he no longer drinks fouled wine. ’Tis you I fear for,” she said. “Holt has sent a messenger to Rolf at Castle Henning, offering you to be the old baron’s bride.”
“What—?” Cayley could hardly breathe and her legs threatened to turn to mush. Rolf was an old man—an enemy of her father—one who had been married many times and whose wives either died or disappeared. “Nay—”
“Aye, ’tis true,” Rue said, finally releasing Cayley’s grip and rubbing her arms as if she were cold from the inside out. Cayley’s strength gave way and she fell against the bed. Marriage to Baron Rolf? Her stomach turned over and she had to fight the urge not to retch.
“It could be worse,” Rue said, avoiding her eyes.
“How?”
“Holt—he’s already promised you to Sir Connor, but he wants not to marry you, because … well … you know …” She fluttered her fingers in the air. “But Holt wants to marry you off and not to Gwayne of Cysgod, though I know you wanted to be his wife.”
“Gwayne is of no matter,” Cayley said quickly, her head spinning. Her love for Gwayne was not deep, she now knew, just a childhood attraction, but Gwayne would be a much better mate than either Rolf or Connor. Her skin pimpled in goose bumps from fear of the dead-eyed knight and the sick old man. “I have to get out of here,” she said. “I—I have to find Megan, to get help from a baron who is friendly to my father … or a priest of—”
“Slow down, child. You be rattled and—”
“But there is no time!” she said, feeling as if a cold, hard hand was slowly squeezing the life from her. “You must help me.”
“Aye,” Rue said, nodding. “I know. I asked Holt to set you free and he laughed at me. Told me ’twas not my place to even make such a suggestion.” Her jaw tightened so hard that the bone showed white against her chin. “He’s loathsome, Cayley, and cannot be allowed to rule Dwyrain.” Then, as if feeling the need to explain herself, Rue glanced down at her hands. “He’s taken a fancy to Dilys,” she said and shook her head. “Poor girl. My only granddaughter. A comely, sweet lass, but sometimes slow.” She swallowed hard and her eyes narrowed with injustice. “ ’Tis difficult for me not to pour the poisoned wine I steal from your father’s chamber into Holt’s mazer. ’Twould please me to see him sputtering and gasping for his life.”
“Aye, and I would slit his throat if I could,” Cayley agreed, surprising herself, for she’d never been a savage woman, had never felt the need for revenge, never wished a man dead except for the sorcerer before she’d met him. When she’d blamed him for the deceit, sickness, and pain at the castle, she’d thought she’d like to see him dead, but now, she knew differently. He was a kind and good man—a strange one with near-magical powers. But not so Holt. He was the very Devil incarnate.
Rue reached into her basket, beneath the
eggs and a soft cloth, to the small dagger she’d hidden there. “For your protection and escape,” she said, handing the knife to Cayley. Its handle was carved from wood, its fat, short blade straight and deadly.
“Escape?” she repeated, gnawing on the inside of her lip as she twirled the tiny weapon in her fingers. “There is no way I can escape.”
“I will help you,” Rue vowed. “Now, I must leave or the guard will become suspicious. We will both think, and when I return, we will have a plan for you to escape Dwyrain, find Megan, and warn her of the horrid beast her husband is.”
“And what then?”
“I know not,” Rue admitted. “Pray your father does not fail.” Adjusting the eggs and herbs over the towel in her basket, she left the room quickly and Cayley heard the bolt being slammed over the door. She could not break down the thick planks with her bit of a knife, nor could she carve her way through the stones of the floor. Her only means of escape was through the hole in the roof for the fire or the window, which was far above the frozen loam of the bailey. Oh, would she were a sorcerer, then she could find a way to escape. At that thought, she rounded her bed and walked to the window, where she could see the north tower. ’Twas there, deep below, where the sorcerer was held. She had only to set him free and he would help her escape and find Megan.
Oh, cursed fates, what could she do against an army the size of Holt’s?
’Tis not the number of men who fight for a cause, but the convictions of those who do, lass. Her father’s words swam in her mind and she knew that there had to be a way to leave these castle walls behind and find Megan.
“Ahh … she awakens …” a gentle female voice, one Megan had heard in her dreams, whispered.
“Praise God,” another, deeper, voice intoned.
“Maybe now we’ll find out who she is.” Another woman, one with a slight lisp.
Those soft, soothing voices surrounded her and Megan blinked several times against the light of a candle being held near her face. “Where am I?” she asked dazedly as the women, several of them, exchanged glances. Only then, when her eyes adjusted to the yellow candlelight, did she realize that they were nuns, dressed in their somber habits and wimples, staring at her as if she were some oddity—a freak of nature. The room was a dark chamber with a single window and cavernous ceiling.
“ ’Tis the Sacred Heart Nunnery where ye be,” one of the women said. She laid a smooth hand to Megan’s forehead. “I’m Sister Leah, and you … ?”
“Megan of Dwyrain,” she said without thinking, and then gave herself a swift mental kick. Kind as these women were, they believed in God and truth and all that was holy. They wouldn’t look kindly on a bride who had been kidnapped from her husband, then refused to return to him after lying with another man. A cold blush stole up her face and she tried to lever herself up from the hard pallet on which she rested. “I … I must not tarry.”
“You’re ill,” one of the sisters said. “A farmer found you on the road not far from here two days ago and you have not once opened your eyes or taken any nourishment.”
“Aye,” she said, her voice scratchy, her throat dry as flour, her mouth tasting foul. Foolishly, she ran her tongue around her teeth and nearly retched.
“Be quiet,” Sister Leah suggested with a patient smile. “We will bring you food and fresh water and you’ll feel better. Then you can tell us why you were traveling alone.”
“My horse?” Megan asked.
“Horse?” The nuns exchanged knowing glances, which Megan read much too easily. They thought she was not fully awake—that her mind was playing tricks on her.
“My destrier.” Wolf’s horse. “A black stallion with three white stockings and a small white patch on his forehead.”
Three heads slowly wagged side to side. “The farmer brought you in his cart, and ’twas pulled only by a brown workhorse with a back that looked near broken.”
“This is a warhorse, a steed that …” She let her voice drift into silence, for what could she say? That she’d stolen the horse off an outlaw who had kidnapped her and then eventually loved her, as a man loved a woman? That the horse was probably stolen from some nobleman the outlaw had robbed? Swallowing any more arguments, she said instead, “I am on my way to Erbyn.”
“Erbyn?” The first nun, Sister Leah, stared at her with puzzled eyes. “Why?”
“ ’Tis the Lady Sorcha I must see.” Her voice was weak and she could hardly remain half sitting. With a sigh, she fell back on the small bed and the chamber spun before her eyes.
“I’m Sorcha’s sister,” Leah said. “Erbyn is close by.”
With what small amount of strength she had, Megan struggled to sit up again. “Then I must go there. I have to find her and talk to her …”
“Shh. ’Twill all come to pass. First, Megan of Dwyrain, you must get your strength back so you’re able to travel.”
Ice surrounded the edges of Hag’s End Lake, a smooth body of water rumored to be haunted by the ghosts of dead Welsh warriors. Wolf drew up on the reins, motioning for Jagger and Robin to remain silent and invisible in the shadowy forest surrounding the banks. Closing his eyes, Wolf tilted his head. From his mouth came the harsh shriek of a hawk’s cry. The scream split the cold forest air. Jagger blew on his hands. Robin bit on his lower lip.
Wolf waited.
Stillness whispered through the dry leaves and steam seeped from the horses’ nostrils as they breathed hard and stamped impatiently.
“ ’Tis no use,” Jagger finally said.
“Shh!”
They were close to Dwyrain, less than a day’s ride away, and Wolf wasn’t turning back. ’Twas time to face his old enemy and end the burn for revenge that fired in his gut. And time to find Megan, his mind tormented him again. There had been but a few minutes when he’d not thought of her and, in truth, it wasn’t revenge that spurred him on so much as the need to see her again. What if you do see her again? What then? Will you steal her away once more? Bed her ruthlessly? Try to hold her close when she wants nothing to do with you?
Bittersweet agony ripped through his soul. How foolish he’d been to let himself care for her, to let his emotions become entangled with her when he’d vowed years ago never to let a woman close to his heart.
Now he had no choice but to follow his convictions. He could offer her nothing, but he could save her from a marriage that was certain to kill her spirit and dull her bright mind.
So now you’re a god—or a priest? his mind taunted, and Wolf ground his teeth together in frustration. Though she had stood before the altar and pledged her troth to Holt, Wolf believed in his heart that she didn’t love the cur and never would.
Since when do you believe in love?
Ignoring the demons in his head, Wolf lifted his hands to his mouth once more, raised his chin to the sky, and gave the hawk’s mournful cry.
Again, nothing.
“Why not howl like a wolf?” Jagger said and was rewarded with a hard glance.
“And announce to everyone within earshot that I be here?”
Jagger chuckled at his joke or Wolf’s consternation, Wolf knew not which. Robin, swallowing a smile, stared at the ground. Around his waist he wore a new leather pouch from the boar that had nearly taken his life.
An answering cry split through the forest, so loud it nearly parted the shroud of fog that clung low to the hills.
“I’ll be damned!”
“No doubt, Jagger. Come.” Wolf leaned forward in the saddle and urged his mount to the edge of the lake where another rider appeared through the icy mist. “Jack.”
“Aye, and how d’ye be, Wolf?” the hunter asked, his eyes dark and worried.
“I’ve been better.”
“Haven’t we all? Haven’t we all?” Jack said. “And the lady? Is she safe?”
“Megan?” Wolf asked, alarm causing the hairs on the back of his neck to rise. “Is she not at the castle?”
“Nay, the messengers came in peace, bringing your letter
of ransom, but Holt turned on them.” Quickly, Jack explained about the capture of Bjorn and Jagger, as well as the return and imprisoning of the sorcerer. According to the hunter, Holt had control of the castle and sent search parties out patrolling for his wife, but his two most diligent men, Sir Connor and Kelvin of Hawarth, had become disinterested.
Holt had reprimanded them and they’d laughed in his face. Furious, he wouldn’t give the men any more chance to snigger at his foolishness. He planned not to pay ransom for his wife and had declared it a sign of weakness to give in to the demands of criminals. His answer was that he intended to flog the truth from Bjorn and Jagger and any other poor soul who might have some knowledge of Megan’s whereabouts and happened to wander through the gates of Dwyrain.
“But Lady Megan, no one has seen her?” Wolf asked again, fear congealing his blood.
Jack scratched the whiskers on one cheek and shook his head. “Yer men claim she is with you.”
“She escaped,” Jagger said with a wide grin. “Think on it, a tiny woman like that, slippin’ away from Wolf.”
Robin’s smile was smug, as if he thought it a great joke that the bit of a woman he adored had tricked Wolf.
“She’s not returned to Dwyrain,” Jack said.
Desperation took a stranglehold on Wolf’s throat. ’Twas possible she was safe with friends somewhere, that she had decided not to return to her father’s castle and her husband’s ire, but ’twas unlikely. She could have been captured by another band of outlaws—there were many in the surrounding woods—but Megan was smart, an accomplished horsewoman, and was riding the best steed in the land. Also, he was certain that she would be more careful than she’d been on her wedding day, when Wolf had abducted her.
“So there has been no sign of the lady, but my men and a strange sorcerer are being held captive?”