The ground beneath her vibrated as the swarm of horses closed in on her, Cædda at the front with Garrick and Selwyn, as always, immediately behind him. Every man had his sword drawn, the bows they had brought for the wolves slung across their backs. Her own bow lay at her feet, not wanting to risk any misunderstandings if the men were to see her armed. With every footfall, she could see Cædda more clearly, and she watched as his face morphed from confusion at seeing her standing in the middle of the road, wet and bloody, to the recognition there was a body at her feet. The lord of Shaftesbury held his sword over his head and bellowed, “Hold!” prompting a cacophony of horse screams and snorts as their bits were jerked back and faces ran into hindquarters.
The midnight-colored warhorse Cædda rode skidded to a stop in front of her, and Isabella tilted her head up to him, but she could not force her eyes to meet his. Clearly winded from his long ride into the city, Cædda looked down at her, from her head all the way down to her feet, and then to Einar’s carcass in the mud. To her horror and grief, she watched a proud grin break across his face.
“Father Sigbert has gone to Redwald’s to seek you out. Saoirse did not say you intended to hunt the prisoner yourself,” he beamed down at her.
Behind him, Garrick looked so pleased, she thought he might burst into song at any moment. But what will you think when you go into the jail? How will you feel when you see I killed him too late?
“It was not my intent, My Lord,” she whispered, unable to keep the trembling from her voice. A low murmur spread through the crowd of men as those who had a clear view of the body and the dark slave passed the word back to those at the rear of the formation. She had to stop this.
“My Lord—”
He held up a hand to silence her, his attention seemingly enraptured by something on Einar’s body. In one swift motion, he swung his leg over the rear of his horse, jumping down into a squat next to the body. Cædda looked from Einar’s corpse and back up to her, twice, three times. What was he looking at? The fact that she was covered in blood, while the dead prisoner was nearly clean? The only drops of blood were from where the dagger had rubbed him. The dagger, that’s what he’s looking at.
“This is the weapon that laid Thorstein low?” He squinted up at her, curious, but with a flash of fury in his eyes, one much sharper than the night he had threatened to hobble her.
“Yes.”
With a furious jerk, he ripped it off Einar’s body and stood up, whirling around and holding the dagger out to Garrick.
After a beat of dangerous silence, Cædda growled out, “Am I mistaken?”
Garrick blanched, holding his eyes steadily on the weapon being presented to him. “You are not, My Lord.”
Oh my God.It was Garrick’s dagger. The one Isabella stole from him the night she escaped. The one Cædda took back from her the night she came back with Wyrtgeorn.
“And where is Lady Annis?” Cædda’s voice had a hard, icy edge.
“She is in the jail, My Lord,” she croaked out. “I- I shackled her.”
A muscle flexed in his jaw and he looked sideways at Garrick. “I will tend to her myself.”
“Please!” Unbidden, her hand shot out, snapping closed around his leather-covered wrist. “Please, My Lord. It – it is not only Lady Annis in the jail.” How could she tell him? What would he do?
Cædda stared at her, concern and confusion darting his brow. “What do you mean? Who else would be with her?”
“My Lord!” The distant cry came accompanied by the patter of hooves, turning the heads of every man in their group toward the sound.
Sigbert’s body tilted forward in the saddle of the galloping horse, his arm outstretched in a halting motion and his face stricken white as he rode toward the group.
He knows.In his trip to Redwald’s, Sigbert had of course been apprised of where Isabella had gone, and more importantly, why. She could only wonder if Thorstein remained alive to relay the information himself.
“What now?” Cædda muttered as he stuffed Garrick’s dagger into his belt, adjacent to his own. “Is it Thorstein?” He called out to Sigbert as the priest yanked his horse to a stop and jumped off.
As his feet hit the ground, Isabella’s heart sank as Sigbert gave her an inquiring look—a look that begged she had already told the terrible news. But as always, he knew. Without asking. Of course she hadn’t told him. And the realization in his eyes stabbed an indictment in her heart. You coward! You should have already told him.
“Thorstein lives, My Lord.” Sigbert did not even look at Cædda as he proffered his clipped response. Instead, he bore his eyes into Isabella, dread shining out of them. “Did you find Master Wyrtgeorn?”
Overcome with the desire to run, Isabella forced herself to look at Cædda, his bewilderment turning into panic.
“My son? He should be at the Hall with Hilde.”
“He is not there, My Lord,” her words slurred against her quivering chin and were it not for the soft touch of Sigbert’s hand on her back, she may well have fled from him, from what she had to tell him. “I found your son as the Dane was making his escape.”
Understanding lit Cædda’s eyes—the eyes he had given his son—and Isabella could look nowhere else as his breathing became shallow and his hands tightened into fists.
He took two cautious steps, bringing himself directly in front of her. “Where is he?”
She watched Selwyn and Garrick crane their necks, trying to hear the lord’s pleading whisper, an identical look of alarm spreading across their faces in tandem.
Her throat clamped shut, she could only flick her eyes at the jail as her sobs exploded out of her. “I was too late. I’m so sorry, I was too late.”
Before her last wheezing syllable left Isabella’s mouth, Cædda took off running straight at the jail, his sword clenched in his hand, chopping the air with every step.
With a quick squeeze of her arm, an apology for leaving her, Sigbert bolted after Cædda. The herd of men, perhaps on instinct, moved forward to follow their lord as well. Midstride, Garrick whirled around, ripping his sword from his scabbard and screaming, “Stay!” at the men, spraying those closest to him with spittle, before turning back around and following fast behind Cædda.
Selwyn did not pursue. The sound of his sword being sheathed sent a shiver down her back as she allowed her legs to collapse, helplessly sobbing in the mud.
“Isabella?” Selwyn squatted down, resting on his heels and peering into her face as she cried, his perennially passive expression marred by barely concealed sorrow. “Is any of this blood yours?”
She shook her head, as much to answer his question as to try and rid herself of all that happened.
“Then you need to come with me.”
Selwyn put his hands under her armpits to lift her up, but he yanked them back as a horrible, ear-piercing scream ripped through the city.
“I’ll kill you! I. Will. Kill. You! You traitorous devil. Release me, Sigbert! I command you!”
The echoes of Cædda’s rage rippled through the crowd of men, followed by a mournful howl with no recognizable words. Resting her hands on Selwyn’s arms, Isabella pulled herself up off the ground. Had that been Annis? Had Cædda killed her?
“Selwyn?” she looked at him with desperation in her eyes. “Would he?”
He cut off her sentence by jerking his head at the jail. There, coming out of the door, was Garrick, walking at a quicktime pace, dragging Annis behind him by her wrist shackles.
“What is he doing?” Isabella sniffed.
Garrick dragged Annis directly toward them, his eyes set past Isabella, likely on the Great Hall. There was really nowhere else the main road would take him.
“Garrick is giving our lord some time to remember himself,” Selwyn muttered, his usual dry tone tinged with an acidic pain. “The Magistrate will need be present for whatever judgment falls upon Annis. It is not for Cædda to decide himself.”
Straining her eyes to see over the distanc
e, Garrick’s face grew more clear as he leaned into the hill, coming closer to them. It was red, contorted in grief. She knew he was not crying, doubting at this point in his life Garrick even possessed the ability to shed tears. But the pain cutting across his eyes and the fury lining his mouth reached out and burned Isabella’s throat across the distance. He wanted to kill Annis. Just as badly as Cædda had. But he was preserving the rule of law instead. Cædda’s laws.
“Garrick is a good friend,” she whispered.
“The best you could ever have,” Selwyn replied. “And very defensive of his lord.”
Defensive indeed. As Garrick strode ever more rapidly toward them, Isabella saw he could easily divert around the crowd of men, the angry, confused men who only knew their lord was in agony and their lady was in shackles. But he did not divert. He intended to pull Annis directly through the lot of them so she could face their rage.
Looking at the horrible blank stare that permeated her ruddy face, Isabella felt sick at the thought of being near Annis again.
“I don’t want to look at her,” she hissed at Selwyn, who was still holding her by her arms.
“Nor I,” he spat, leading her by the hand up the hill, toward the Great Hall. Not a single man turned his attention to watch them go. Every head stayed turned toward Garrick and the traitor he dragged down the road.
***
The fleck of spittle lobbed at Annis from Kenrik Lach as she passed him on the street dropped from her face onto the wool of her cloak, finally clearing the fog of despair that had so sinfully compelled her to seek her own death—at that monster Deorca’s hands no less. She had closed her eyes in the jail, in the time between Deorca’s departure and Cædda’s arrival. She had closed them to pray and blot out the sight of Wyrtgeorn’s too-still body. But when she had tried to open them again, her lashes had stuck to the congealed layers of blood on her face and she’d had to use her fingers to wrench her lids free.
Her eyes were open now, wide open as she sat on the floor of the empty Great Hall, Garrick standing over her silently. Her mind had been so hazy as Garrick dragged her through the street, through that sea of revolting men who had the nerve to shout at her, to spiton her. She had half expected the spit to evaporate under the heat of the shame searing her face.
But now in the silence, she felt nothing but gratitude for Garrick’s act of cruelty, even for Kenrick’s vile disrespect. For that glob of mucus and spit forced her to remember herself. She was the Lady of Shaftesbury and as such, she would face what was coming, the unjust wrath of a husband she had so lovingly served. It had been almost twenty years she had served him unfailingly. Wise and even-tempered, her husband was worthy of her service. He would not fail her now.
His rage in the jail had not been his fault. She could not fault him for striking out at her, for his cruel words. His heart, though strong, was full of love, and the sight of his child… of course she would not, could not, judge him for what he had said to her. If Deorca had done as she asked and left her the knife, it would not have been so. If her husband had come into the jail to find her dead next to Wyrtgeorn, she knew he would have understood. That she loved him. That she was sorry for her failures. He would have clutched her to him and wept for her as she watched him from Heaven. But seeing her alive… seeing the blood completely covering her face, obscuring the sorrow in her eyes, he had lashed out in grief for their child. It was not his fault. He was not to blame. No, it had been Deorca from the very start. Her evil had permeated every heart and hearth of Shaftesbury. Even the previously steadfast Garrick had been corrupted by her.
He had not looked at her—Garrick—not once as he intentionally dragged her through that cloud of men, those filthy wretches who had mocked her in her own Hall night after night. He kept his silence even as they stepped into the Great Hall, horribly empty and cold. The look of disgust, that same look every kitchen trolluphad given her every day of her life, had radiated from Garrick’s face as he finally turned his eyes on her. But still, he had said nothing, only dropped the heavy chains of her shackles, the weight of them dragging her down to the ground into a heap before the lord’s table. Before her table.
She had sighed with relief when Garrick had dropped her there. Seeing the empty Hall assured her it would be only her husband here to judge her, to hear what had happened. It would be just the two of them. But then she had seen movement out of the corner of her eye, dragging her head around to see what it was. Her stomach burned and she heard herself gasp in fury as she recognized Deorca standing in the far doorway, the one that led, quite appropriately, to the whipping post.
While Annis scraped her knees on the ground, bent in supplication for the judgment to come, Deorca stood leaning against the doorframe, her back facing Annis as if she had not a care in the world. Even looking at her disheveled braid and the soiled, too-short cloak she wore drew bile into Annis’ throat. The Silent One stood near Deorca, just inside the doorway, arms crossed, his eyes studiously focused on Garrick instead of on her. Annis had never liked him. Seeing him now, standing sentry over that succubus, only verified her instincts of him had been correct.
Why is she here?
“Because the Magistrate will want an account of what you have done.”
Garrick’s sneering reply jolted Annis out of her reverie. Had she spoken aloud? She hadn’t meant to. Her teeth pierced her bottom lip, gone dry and cracked, as she fought to calm the hammering of her heart against her ribs. You hate her too! She longed to scream at him, to claw at his face. You know what she is and you take her side over mine?
“I am quite capable of giving an account of my actions, Garrick,” she spat through bared teeth, tilting her head to look at him standing over her. “I will submit to my husband’s righteous judgment, but I will not bear her presence!”
The vaulted ceiling of the Great Hall had such a way of magnifying voices, and Annis’ edict seemed to roll around the room, twice over, prompting Deorca to turn around. Her eyes, unlike the Silent One, instantly fell upon Annis. Aside from the insolence of this slave holding her gaze, Deorca had also shorn up her face into something resembling righteous incredulity. As if Annis had just said something outrageous. The fear she had shown in the jail as she feigned concern for Wyrtgeorn, the sadness she had mimicked when refusing Annis’ order to leave the knife—those were gone now. Yes, she thinks she’s won. She thinks there is no further need to pretend.
Deorca leaned over and whispered something to Selwyn who, instead of the silent noncommittal shrug Annis had always gotten from him, he actually whispered back, his eyes drawing into a slit as they flicked in Annis’ direction.
Anger roiled in her ears as the whispers echoed around her, punctuated by Garrick’s heavy sigh. The sounds pushed down on her chest, squeezing her head from all sides.
“You think because you killed that demon, you have a right to be here?” she exploded, leaping to her feet, the heavy chains forgotten as she flailed her arms in front of her. “I would have done it! I would have killed him. With my last breath I would have killed him, and you stand there as if your selfish act of self-preservation entitles you to anything other than Hell?” Hot tears coursing down her cheeks, the tightness in her chest was only made worse by Deorca’s non-response to her screams, by Selwyn’s cold stare. “You think that absolves you of your sin? Of your harlotry? Of your disobedience? Of your wanton wrath?”
On the last word, Annis ripped at the laces on her dress, refusing to tear her eyes away from Deorca’s. She refused to allow that beast to stare at her so passively, as if she were somehow above them all. Above the lady of Shaftesbury. She would remind her of who she was dealing with.
As her fingers finally worked her dress loose, pulling both it and her shift off her shoulders, Deorca finally broke out of her stoic charade and pulled herself away from the doorway, her hand outstretched as if to cast a spell.
“Stop it! What are you doing?”
“Do you imagine I forgot what you have done to me?�
�� Annis screamed back, oddly gratified that Garrick and Selwyn remained in the room to witness her wounds. They had been absent when Annis first showed them to Deorca, showed her the lengths to which she would go to protect her family. She wanted them all to see.
“You did this! These wounds are the wages of your sin! Of your deceit!” she wheeled around to ensure Deorca could see her marks once more, bringing her face to face with a gape-mouthed Garrick, whose eyes lay firmly on her breasts. “The blood of my child that covers my face is likewise your doing. You did all of this!”
She pivoted once again, wheeling around to face her enemy. She saw the heifer-like calm drain from Deorca’s face, a raging light of fury replacing it. That’s right, you harpy. Show them what you really are.
Deorca opened her mouth only a little, her teeth gritted as she prepared her unholy rebuttal, but was silenced—by Selwyn.
“It’s odd all of the whip marks are centered on your shoulders and upper back.” The man’s voice, flat and quiet, stabbed into her ears as if it were an infant’s wail. “It’s strange the Pretender wouldn’t have gotten at least one lick on the center of your back or at the bottom, since you said you were in bed when he came upon you. As a matter of fact…” Annis felt her stomach sink as Selwyn shifted his gaze to just behind her. “They look very much like the self-inflicted whip marks of a priest doing Penance. Isn’t that right, Father?”
Silence descended on the room as all three of her tormentors shifted their eyes to the entryway behind her. Her breathing shallow and her palms sticky, Annis prayed it was only Sigbert behind her in the doorway. Please God let Cædda not have heard.
It had been such a short while since Garrick had removed her from the jail and her husband’s anger. Surely it was too soon for him to have fetched the Magistrate. Clutching the tattered bodice of her dress to her bosom, she turned slowly, swinging her head first so she might see who was behind her before turning fully around.
Sigbert had his massive arm stretched across the entryway, blocking her vision of Cædda, who stood immediately behind the priest. But she did not need to see his face to feel the radiating anger, to understand Sigbert’s arm position was designed to hold her beloved back from striking her.
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