"Would you like…?" Knoll began.
"I'll eat when we've settled whatever dealings might develop between us," she interrupted. "You're here wanting me to look for one of your other brothers."
"How do you know that?" Knoll asked.
"I make it my business to know," she answered and settled her gaze on the man she considered the leader of the three. "Which brother is it again?"
"Prince Glade," Breck replied. "He's been missing nearly three months now."
"We suspect his Lady-wife is behind his disappearance, but we have been unable to prove it," Vale put in.
"Look to the woman," Lauryl quipped. "What's in it for her?"
"The power of the Faolchúnna," Breck answered. "She wants it, and he has refused to grant it to her."
Lauryl shrugged, putting up a hand to scratch at her cheek. "Means nothing to me, but I suppose it's worth something to her."
"A great deal," Knoll said quietly.
"Would she kill him for it?"
It was Vale who replied. "It is not an easy feat to kill one of our kind, Milady."
"I know a wooden stake or a silver bullet through the heart won't do it and since the three of you are out about in broad daylight, I'm guessing sunlight isn't a problem," she said. "What does it take to put one of you Faolchúnna down?"
The brothers looked at one another, not sure they should answer.
"You might as well tell me for I'll find out anyway," she grumbled.
"Wolfsbane," Breck supplied. "It is a plant that grows on the northern slopes of Faolchúnna. To humankind, it is poisonous if ingested. It is also poisonous to our kind if ingested, but it has a distinctive smell so we will not eat anything laced with it. You get some of it on your flesh and it will leave a scar, but it won't kill you."
"Then how does it kill you?" she asked.
"A dagger coated with the poison, the blade thrust into the gut so it interacts with the stomach acid will kill us, but it takes awhile to do so," Knoll replied.
"An hour or two generally," Breck provided.
"And in the interim it is sheer agony for a Faolchunnan unlucky enough to meet such a fate," Vale added.
"Is that how she will do him in?" Lauryl demanded.
"She won't kill him," Knoll said. "There's no benefit to it."
"True," Breck agreed. "She would simply continue holding him prisoner just for sheer spite."
"But she would make him wish he were dead," Vale stressed.
"How so?" Lauryl asked, intrigued by the statement.
Breck sat forward with his elbows on the table and lowered his voice. "We need Sustenance--blood--to maintain our humanity. Without Sustenance, we will revert to our Kindred, wolf-like creatures, all semblance of civilization gone from our souls."
"The only way Rolanda could hope to destroy Glade would be to starve him, to cause him to Transmute and to keep him that way," Vale declared.
"And that would take many months," Knoll told her.
"He would be deranged long before he took his last breath," Breck put in.
"Deranged?" she queried.
"Perhaps deranged is too gentle a word. Rabid is closer to the way of it," Breck clarified.
"When we go without Sustenance," Vale said, "it does strange things to our metabolisms. Our systems begin to change, our organs dry out, and that causes excruciating agony. We go mad."
Lauryl's brows furrowed. "I take it you've sent men to his keep?"
"And searched every last inch of it as well as the winter fortress in Dubhin," Knoll asserted.
"What of her ancestral home at Bliathmoor?"
The brothers exchanged apprehensive looks. "We didn't think she'd be stupid enough to have him taken there," Breck said.
"That is our mother's ancestral home, as well," Vale told her.
"I don't believe our cousin would countenance such perfidy," Knoll said. "The Marquise is an honorable woman."
"But would she know if her son-in-law was being held captive there?" Lauryl inquired.
Once more the brothers looked at one another. "It is a huge citadel," Breck answered for them. "If he were installed in the dungeon, unless someone tattled, it is doubtful she would know."
"We never considered it," Vale said, shoulders slumping. "Not once did we even mention it amongst ourselves."
"It's been my experience that the last place you look for something is generally where you'll find it," Lauryl stated.
"Will you take the job?" Breck asked.
"I don't come cheap," she answered.
"We'll pay whatever you ask," Knoll assured her.
Lauryl smiled. "I'm sure you will."
Chapter Two
Getting into the des Grieves castle was proving to be harder than Lauryl had anticipated. There were guards everywhere and each visitor to the guardhouse was forced to show an identity chit--which she did not have. Procuring one of the copper chits upon which an imprint of the holder's thumbprint was stamped would take at least a day or two and the counterfeiter was charged an arm and leg for the gods-be-damned thing!
Sitting cross-legged beneath a shady chestnut tree watching the traffic continuously moving over the drawbridge and into the outer bailey, Lauryl had her chin propped in her hand, her gaze missing nothing. She was dressed in long-sleeved homespun wool--the gown cut low in the bodice and rising high to show her trim ankles. She was barefoot, hair straggly, face painted, looking for the world like a classification of working girl upstanding citizens avoided at all costs. The looks sent her way were filled with contempt from the women and speculation from the men, but those who looked like they might be willing to rent her for the night were staying clear for a reason she had yet to understand.
That was until the head guard came strutting toward her, a smirk on his beefy features.
"Slim pickings out here today, eh, wench?" he asked as he stopped in front of her, hands on his wide hips.
Lauryl made a rude sound with her lips. "Aye, gov'ner, that it be," she said and ran the sleeve of her gown under her nose. She eyed him saucily. "Would ye be lookin' for entertainment, then?"
One thick black brow arched upward. "Mayhap." He motioned her to stand up and when she did, he ran an appraising eye over her. "You look none too clean, wench," he observed.
She came toward him with her hips swaying seductively, her shoulders drooping a bit for him to get a better look at her ample cleavage. "Ain't me body ye necessarily need, now, is it, gov'ner?" she inquired with a batting of her blue eyes. She ran her tongue over the rich red color of her painted lips.
"Nay, I suppose not," he said.
She gave him a wide grin. "Ye been scaring off all me customers the live long day, ain't you, gov'ner?"
"Mayhap," he said again. He swept her with another brazen look before he turned to head back to the guardhouse. "Come on with you, then."
She ran to catch up with his long-legged stride. "I ain't got me no chit, gov'ner," she said.
"Don't need one if'n you're with me," he told her, not bothering to look around.
"Blimey, ye be that important?" she asked in a breathless voice.
"I am that important," he said as he squared his shoulders and puffed out his broad chest.
Smiling to herself, Lauryl flicked her eyes to the man by whom she walked and thought he wasn't a bad looking gent. He was taller than her--which was good--and had a face that wasn't too hard on the eye. Moving closer to him, she took a covert sniff and was glad to know he didn't reek. Another stealthy look at his burly hands told her he at least kept them washed and the nails trimmed and cleaned. She liked men with big, rough, calloused hands and a trill of anticipation wiggled through the pit of her belly. Having him screw her if the situation called for it might not be such an ordeal.
"I'm Suzette," she said as she gazed around her when they entered the outer bailey.
"Duggins," he informed her. "Master-at-Arms Cletus Duggins."
"Get outta here!" she said, punching him on his muscular arm with
a balled fist. "Ye ain't!"
"I don't lie," he told her and snaked out a hand to take her by the upper arm. "This way."
He led her to through the barbican, across the fixed bridge, over another drawbridge and into the lower bailey.
"Blimey, ye got all kinds of protection here, don't ye, Gov?" she asked.
"Makes it hard for an enemy to infiltrate us, it does," Duggins replied.
"Infil…" She shrugged. "Whatever that means."
"Creep in," he told her.
"Oh, aye," she said.
He led her across the lower bailey then turned right under a high arch and into the main bailey. She stared up at the tall conical building to which he was taking her, looking around surreptitiously to gauge how many guards, how much foot traffic and what kind of commoner traversed this path.
Once inside the main building, he ushered her to a long corridor.
"Ye ain't taking me to your quarters?" she asked.
"I don't do business in my quarters, wench," he stated.
She spied a set of stairs leading down into darkness and asked him what lay in that direction although she was damned sure of the answer before he gave it.
"The dungeon," he replied.
She pretended to shudder. "Don't like no dungeons," she declared. "Don't like nothin' 'tween me and freedom."
"I feel the same way, wench," he said.
She moved closer to him, wrapped her arm around his since they were the only ones walking the corridor. "You got prisoners down there?" she whispered. "Men you're torturing and the like?"
He laughed. "Prisoners, aye? Torturing?" He glanced down at her. "Well, there be torturing and then there be torturing."
"Poor blokes," she said and feigned another shudder.
"All you need to worry about is pleasuring me with that saucy mouth of yours," he said with a grunt.
Lauryl smiled and leaned harder against him as he led her to a sturdy oaken door and opened it with a key. She glanced around. "Is that one of them shit holes?" she asked, thumbing her finger over her shoulder to what she knew was a garderobe.
He frowned. "You gotta go?" At her eager nod, he sighed. "Then be quick about it."
She hurried over to the narrow door and ducked inside the cold little closet. The smell was as bad as she knew it would be, but she wasn't there to use the facility. After giving the cramped space a quick look, she stood there for a few moments longer then opened the door. "Whewie," she said, fanning the air. "Ye don't want to go in there no time soon, Gov."
Duggins winced and motioned her into the room where he and many of the other guards of the keep took doxies for a quick tumble. He entered the dark room, and the sound of a flint being struck was soon accompanied by a small spill of light cast out into the corridor. "Come on, wench. I ain't got all the live long day," he told her.
The room contained nothing more than a rumpled set of sheets slung over a cornhusk mattress laying atop rope stretchers and a single table holding the oil lantern. The headboard and footboard were rickety looking and the wood scarred with nicks and scratches.
Lauryl let disappointment pucker her lips into a wounded pout the Master-at-Arms could not miss.
"What's the problem?" Duggins demanded.
"Ain't ye gonna give me at least a swig of somethin' potent, Gov?" she asked, licking her lips. She stood there with her hands on her shapely hips. "I needs somethin' to wet me whistle, I do."
Duggins frowned mightily. "You are trying my patience, wench," he grumbled, but he stopped unbuckling his belt and stomped to the door. "I'll be right back. Get undressed and ready for me."
She nodded quickly and began undoing the rows of buttons down the front of her soiled gown. As soon as the door closed behind him, she grinned nastily and hiked up her skirt to remove the sheath strapped to her thigh. The sheath was made of soft, pliant black leather and had been constructed with two pockets. One pocket contained her dagger and the other a small purple glass bottle. Withdrawing the glass bottle from its pocket, she thrust the sheath under the mattress where it wouldn't be seen. With the bottle clutched in the palm of her right hand, she yanked her gown off and tossed it to the foot of the bed. When Duggins returned with a bottle of whiskey and two shot glasses, she was reclining on her side on the lumpy mattress with one knee crooked, her wrist resting atop it--naked as the day she'd been born.
"Mother of Alel," Duggins said as he stood in the doorway. It was doubtful the warrior had ever seen a woman as lovely as the one at whom he was gawking at that moment.
Lauryl patted the bed beside her. "Undress Gov'ner," she said with a wicked gleam in her blue eyes. "I'll pour us that there libation."
Unable to move, Duggins could only swallow hard as his cock leapt like a fish out of water. His face had infused with a dark spread of blood, and sweat glistened on his upper lip.
"You are beautiful, wench," he whispered, moving farther into the room.
She held her hand out for the liquor. "Then it won't be no chore to tup me, then, eh?" she asked, taking the bottle and glasses from his shaking hand.
"Nay," he breathed, his chest heaving with excitement.
Scooting off the bed, she turned her back as he began undressing feverishly. She knew his attention wasn't on what she was doing so it was easy to uncork the bottle in her palm and spill a few drops into one of the glasses. When she turned around, she extended that glass toward him, smiling coyly.
"Drink up, Gov," she said, taking a sip of her own brew. She knew men only too well and knew he'd quickly down the liquor. As he did, her smile widened and her eyes began to sparkle.
Duggins wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and held the glass out to her.
"Another?" she asked.
He hesitated, but she tilted her hips toward him--drawing his eye to the crisp triangle at the juncture of her thighs, and she heard him swallow loudly.
"Aye," he said, his voice gruff. "One more."
She turned, set her own half-finished drink aside, doctored his fresh one a second time with no regret, and then turned to give it to him, coming closer so she could lay her free hand on the hard bulge stabbing at the front of the long johns he still wore. She rubbed him firmly through the coarse flannel material.
"I want me some of this when you're finished with that there swig," she said, her eyes boring into his.
Duggins whimpered, and he grabbed her offering, knocked back the whiskey, and threw the glass across the room. It hit the stone wall and shattered as he shot his arms around her and jerked her to him, his hot mouth covering hers.
Lauryl felt him stumble as his tongue thrust between her lips and began to mentally calculate how long it would take a man his size to succumb to the effects of the drug she'd slipped him. She needed to get him on the bed so he could collapse when the full force of the drug claimed him.
Still massaging him through his long johns, she maneuvered him toward the bed, pushing him down upon it and climbing up to straddle him--their mouths never once breaking contact. He was grunting beneath her assault, and his rough hands were roaming freely down her back and buttocks, the backs of her thighs, and he thrust one between them so he could fondle her breast.
Almost purring at the touch, she ground her lower body against him, knowing it was but a small matter of time before he was rendered unconscious by the strong drug--a drug that would also make it impossible for him to remember anything that happened after it took hold. Pulling her mouth from his, she looked down at him with unadulterated lust and eased up so she could fish through the opening of his underwear to draw him out.
"This is gonna be the best tupping you ever had, Gov," she said, planting the seed in his fevered mind.
The moment her slender fingers closed around his straining cock, Cletus Duggins gave up a hearty roar of pleasure and his eyelids fluttered. His hands slammed down to her hips, and he tried to lift her onto him, but the drug took that moment to claim him, and his eyes rolled back in his head. Within a matter of seconds, he wa
s dead to the world--mouth slightly agape, head tilted to one side.
"Poor baby," she mumbled, caressing what she reckoned would have been a right pleasurable tool. Looking down at it, she sighed then shrugged and slid off him, leaving his still-erect staff poking out of the fly of his long johns.
Slipping her gown back on, she wedged a hand under the mattress, withdrew her sheath, and quickly lashed it back on. After one final look at the Master-of-Arms to make sure he was completely under the influence of the aimnéise, she hurried to the door and cracked it open, listened for a moment, then slipped out, heading for the stairs that led to the dungeons.
Glade Aeolian glared at his Lady-wife, consigning her and her bastard lover to the very deepest greasy pit beneath the farthest rung of the Abyss. As he hung shackled to the slimy stone wall with his bare feet aching from the cold, he longed to be free so he could wrap his hands around Rolanda's neck and snap it like a twig.
"If you would simply agree to do as I ask, Glade, this would all be over before you know it," his lying, deceitful wife told him.
"Aye, so you could leave me down here to go mad from the thirst?" he snarled, yanking feebly on his chains.
"She might well do that any way, old man," Lord Bradford Timmons, Earl of Dorchestraith drawled as he meticulously cleaned his fingernails, not even bothering to look up at his mistress' husband.
"Fuck you, Timmons!" Glade muttered. He was too weak and too ill to put up much of a fight or protest.
"I am sure you would like to do so, Aeolian, but I assure you that won't happen," Timmons quipped with a snide wink.
"You are being unreasonable, Glade," Rolanda said with a stamp of her dainty foot. "Why won't you cooperate?"
"Why don't you go take a flying leap out of the highest window of Blaithmoor, you falsehearted witch?" Glade asked tiredly.
Rolanda hissed at him. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?" she countered.
"I would rejoice to the highest heavens should you decide to splat yourself on the pavers, my love," her husband replied.
"Bastard!" she spat at him and lashed out to slap Glade, putting force behind the hit. She laughed when his head rocked to the side and his lip split to trickle blood.
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