Wyndmaster 1 - The Wyndmaster's Lady

by Charlotte Boyett-Compo

  "James," Beatrice said. "He hit me."

  "I did not!" Sierran denied.

  "Pervert!" Lord James said. He looked to his sons. "I believe your brother needs to be taught some manners!"

  Sierran did not stand a chance against the six men who fell upon him to drag him from the library. Though he struggled, he could not break free of Dyllon's and Peyton's firm hold on his arms and when he kicked out at Vaughn, found his ankles grabbed as Danica's husband Lord Morris and Madeline's husband Lord Levon hefted him up between them.

  "Sierran!" Celeste yelled but she was held securely in Edward's grip. Twisting and bucking in his hold, she cursed him but that only seemed to strengthen his hold on her.

  The other members of the Morgan clan were hurrying from the room, following those who had hold of Sierran.

  "Let her see what becomes of defying our family!" Madeline suggested. She didn't wait for her brother-in-law to do as she ordered but practically ran from the room.

  Celeste bucked against Edward—especially when he gripped both her wrists behind her with one of his hands while he fumbled at her side with the other.

  "Behave, wench!" Edward said. He drew her out into the main hall and toward a large room where the others were gathered.

  It was not something Sierran would have wanted his lady to see, and had he been aware of her presence in the room set aside for his father's physical workouts, he would no doubt have struggled even harder to get loose. As it was, his back was to Celeste as she was forced into the room to the sounds of the beating his brothers were giving him.

  She knew better than to cry out for fear they would hurt him more. Tears running down her cheeks, Celeste sagged against Edward as fists were slammed into her husband's belly, his face, and his kidneys. Her keening was so low only Edward and Lady Judith heard it but neither paid any attention to her.

  Held securely in Dyllon and Peyton's hands, Sierran's head swiveled beneath the savage hits that bloodied and broke his nose, blackened his eyes, split open his lips and cheekbones. He grunted with each hard shot to his body that doubled him over. He was barely standing when Lord James strode arrogantly forward with a hand held up to stay the punishment.

  "Take him to the coach," Lord James ordered. "I've no desire to have him bleeding on my floor."

  Celeste got a good look at her husband's battered face as he was dragged past her and she cried out, trying her best to break free of Edward's hold to get to Sierran.

  "Be still," Edward insisted, speaking low in her ear. "You are not a fishmonger's daughter. Remember who you are, Anna Celeste!"

  It was at that moment Celeste knew that Lady Beatrice’s husband, this man who was Sierran’s brother-in-law, was aware of her connection to the Justonian throne. She twisted her head around and looked back at him with surprise.

  "Avenge him," was all Edward said as he began walking her behind Sierran's departure.

  Sierran had been dragged down the steps of Eagle Grove and his entire family—a few children included now—stood on the portico and watched as his brothers unceremoniously dumped him on the ground, dusted off their hands, and climbed the steps to stand with the rest of the Morgan clan.

  Celeste broke free of Edward and rushed to her husband, going to her knees in the gravel beside him, her hand trembling as she reached out to touch his bruised and bleeding face. He was barely conscious and every breath he took cost him. With fury lashing her lovely face, Celeste swung her head around.

  "You craven cowards!" she yelled at the Morgan men and their brothers-in-law. "You bloody bastards couldn't take him on man to man. You had to gang up on him." She turned her head and spat on the ground. "Cowards. Each and every one of you is nothing but a coward!"

  Sierran heard the laughter of his family that accompanied his wife's insults. Though he could barely see, he watched as each of them turned their backs on him and left him to lie there on the ground—broken and in nearly unbearable pain—going into the mansion and shutting the door on him as though he was nothing but an afterthought.

  The coachman and the man who had frisked Sierran earlier came over to him and lifted him up to take him to the coach.

  "Be careful!" Celeste cried out, seeing the agony registering on Sierran's face.

  "We are being as careful as we can, milady," one of the men said. He gave her a stern look. "Get in and let us lay his head on your lap."

  Celeste didn't question that order. She hiked up her skirt and climbed into the coach's interior, sliding well over to her husband could be laid on the seat beside her.

  As gently as they could, the two men took Sierran into the coach and gingerly laid his head in his lady's lap. His back was arched against the bench's seat and his knees bent. His arms extended off the edge of the bench but as soon as the men had shut the door and the coach started rolling, he wrapped his arms under his wife's right leg.

  "It'll be all right," Celeste said, smoothing his hair back from his bruised forehead. "We're going home."

  He was barely hanging onto consciousness as the coach bumped over the archway. Every muscle in his body hurt. Every bone felt to be broken. With every breath he took, his ribs grated against one another. One eye was completely swollen shut while the other had only a small slit through which to see. His entire face felt out of proportion and he couldn't seem to get his lips to move so he could tell Celeste not to worry.

  But it wasn't the physical pain that troubled Sierran Morgan the most. It was the emotional agony of hearing his family laugh at his pain, at having them turn their backs on him—again―and to know he meant so little to them that they could do such terrible things to him and not even care.

  Celeste heard the first hitching sob that came from her husband's throat and she looked down, away from the men riding beside the coach as though guarding it. She saw the first tear ease down Sierran's battered face and knew a moment of such wild hatred and unremitting fury, she was almost tempted to tell the coachman to turn the landau around so she could go back and stomp the Morgan family into the dust.

  "Dearling, don't," she said, smoothing her hand on his shoulder. "They're not worth it."

  The one sob became a torrent that had been building up since Sierran Morgan was a child. He let loose the flood that had been bottled up inside him all those years, releasing the hurt that had been festering. His crying was like that of a lost little boy and it tore at his wife's heart, made her all that more determined to make his family pay for having caused him this much grief. Wrapping her arms around him, she held him as best she could as he cried out his sorrow until he fell asleep, his cheeks wet with tears.

  Chapter Sixteen

  By the time the coach rolled to a stop on the dock, Vargas and two of the sailors from Akinos were there to escort Sierran and his lady to the ship. As soon as Vargas saw the condition of his unconscious commander, he threw his head back and bellowed with rage.

  "Get him on the ship!" Brent yelled. "Now!"

  It was Vargas who slipped his arms under Sierran's body and lifted him up, carrying him carefully from the coach.

  "Hurry, Vargas!" Brent shouted. He was staring at a cloud of dust that was boiling toward the seaside town, figuring—and rightly so—that it was Sierran's family coming after him.

  Running behind Vargas as the soldier carried Sierran up the gangplank, Celeste turned to see what had garnered the lawgiver's attention. Her heart turned as hard as iron and when Mac ordered the cannon's primed, she stayed up on deck, even as her battered husband was taken below.

  "You'd best get down to your cabin, milady," Mac warned.

  "I'm not going anywhere," Celeste spat.

  "Get underway, Captain!" Brent ordered.

  The ship began moving backward out of the slip even as a thundering group of horsemen came galloping into Edgeville.

  With muskets leveled on them, the men standing atop the warehouses had no idea whether to fire or not. No order had been given to do so but they tracked in their sights the pilot of the ship an
d the four or so men standing at the railing. One musket was trained on the lone woman though the man wielding the gun would never have dared to shoot a female.

  The Akinos was a good twenty feet back from the dock when Lord James Morgan whipped his horse up onto the wooden dock. "The deed!" he yelled. "I need the deed!"

  "What's he talking about?" Brent asked Celeste.

  "I have no idea," she said. "Sierran signed the gods-be-damned thing."

  "Did he bring it with him?"

  "Of course not," she said. "He left it on the desk. What would he need with the stupid deed? He doesn't want Patterly."

  It was then Celeste remembered Lord Edward drawing her toward the table at which Sierran had signed the deed. She remembered his hand fumbling against her hip and put her hand to her pocket. She heard the crinkle of paper and her eyes widened.

  "The deed!" Lord James screeched, his mount rearing with hooves flashing. "Give me my deed!"

  "See if you can't knock off the end of that dock," Brent told one of the cannoneers.

  "With pleasure, milord," the sailor replied.

  The Akinos was well away from the dock and the cannoneer and his fuse man lowered the mouth of the cannon and aimed it at the dock.

  "You wouldn't dare!" Lord James bellowed but jerked on his horse's reins, pulling the animal back and out of the way. He looked up at the musket men. "Fire, the gods damn you, fire!"

  Before the men on the roofs of the warehouse could do as Lord James ordered, the cannon on the Akinos bucked and a loud explosion rent the air as wood and hemp went flying into the air and the end of the dock disappeared in a cloud of gray smoke.

  A loud cheer went up from the decks of the Akinos and the remaining cannons leveled on the tops of the warehouses where the musket men stood. To a man, they dropped their weapons and began skittering down from the roofs, most sliding down the tin roofs on their backsides.

  The wind and gods were on the side of Sierran Morgan and his men that day for a gust caught the mainsail of the Akinos and she sailed gracefully into the bay. Two cannons were fired from the harbor but both shots fell harmlessly into the sea, the sleek ship standing well away from any threat.

  "They will come after us," Brent warned.

  "Let them," Vargas said. "We'll blow their asses out of the water!"

  "It will take them awhile to arm their ships and we'll be to Zykanthos by then," Mac said.

  "We're not going to Zykanthos," Celeste said.

  "What?" the three men questioned.

  "Captain Kynth," Celeste called out. "Make for Dullwitch, if you will."

  "Milady?" the captain questioned.

  "You heard me," she said. "And pour on the sail. I want to be there as quickly as possible."

  "Aye, aye, milady," the captain said.

  Celeste started for the companionway, but Brent stopped her. "Do you have the deed by any chance?" he asked.

  She fished in her pocket and pulled out the deed to Patterly. "It appears Lord Edward stuffed it into my skirt."

  "Eddie's a good man," Brent said. "Remember that when we get to Dullwitch."

  Celeste nodded then continued on below deck. Her husband was lying on the bunk with his eyes closed but she could tell from his labored breathing that he was conscious. She hunkered down beside him and ran her fingers over his cheek.

  He opened his eyes. "Did we blow something up, wench?" he asked.

  "Just the end of the dock and it needed repairing anyway," she quipped. "I will have Vargas wrap your ribs. If I do it, there's no telling what else I might do to you for putting yourself in harm's way."

  "I have you back, don't I?" he countered, trying to smile although his cracked lips prevented it.

  "Remind me to never trust one of your kin ever again," she said.

  He could barely see her with his one good eye but he fumbled for her hand and when she took his hand in hers, he brought her fingers to his cheek. "Did they hurt you?"

  "Made me madder than snot," she said. She shrugged. "But, no. They didn't hurt me. They didn't dare."

  "Damned straight," he said, closing his one good eye.

  He drifted off and when he awoke, Vargas was gently wrapping strips of linen around his broken ribs.

  "Here," his lady said, holding a cup to his lips as she lifted his head up with her other hand. "Drink this and don't give me any trouble."

  It was tenerse and it was extremely potent—numbing his lips and tongue immediately—but he knew better than to complain. He swallowed the bitter brew, shuddered, and was asleep before his head was lowered to the pillow.

  "I don't know how long we'll be in Dullwitch but I don't want him awake while we're there," Celeste told Vargas. "Dribble a drop or two into his mouth to keep him out."

  "Milady!" Vargas said, his indignation turning his normally placid face hard as flint. "I could not do that!"

  Celeste turned to Brent. "Then you do it," she ordered. "Either way, I want him kept out and away from any trouble."

  "Consider it done," Brent agreed. "By the way, milady…" He leaned over and whispered something into her ear that made Celeste Morgan grin from ear to ear.

  * * *

  Docking just after five in the afternoon, the Akinos was boarded by the harbormaster who demanded to know why the ship was in port.

  "I have business with the King," Celeste stated.

  The harbormaster's walrus mustaches quivered with ill-concealed disdain. "And who might you be, Milady?"

  "Lady Anna Celeste Allen-Morgan of Dragonmoor and Zykanthos Island, Duchess of Northumberton, and niece of King Edmond."

  His rubbery lips parting in shock, the harbormaster managed to get his corpulent bulk into a passable bow, sweeping his hand low to the deck. "Your Grace!" he mumbled.

  "Come along," Celeste said in her most regal voice. "You may accompany us to the palace, Lord Harbormaster." She motioned for Mac and Seth to join her.

  "At your p-pleasure, Your Grace," the man stammered and fell in behind her as Celeste headed for the gangplank.

  Following behind her, the harbormaster kept up a running commentary of what they were passing on their way up the street and toward the royal residence of Dullwitch. He seemed to think she needed a sightseeing guide and pointed out things that were of no interest to anyone save himself. By the time their little group arrived at the doors to the palace, Celeste was ready to throttle the chubby man.

  "Do you think," she asked, turning to him with a sweet smile," you might be quiet now, Lord Harbormaster? You've quite given me a migraine with all your prattling."

  His face infusing with a deep shade of red, the man bobbed up and down like a cork on water and stepped back. He cast a glance at the guards then drew himself up. "Her Grace, the Duchess of Northumberton!" he announced.

  The guards came to immediate attention—their pikes coming down hard on the stone step in salute. One quickly stepped back opened the iron-studded door for her to pass through.

  "If I can be of any further aide to you, Your Grace…" the harbormaster began but Celeste was already through the door with her guards shouldering the corpulent man aside as they strode after her.

  "We'll call you," Mac told the harbormaster and shut the door in the man's puffy face.

  Never having been inside a royal palace before, both Mac and Seth wore identical amazed expressions as they took in the artwork and tapestries, the expensive furnishings and the brilliantly clad individuals moving about the corridors. Gawking like country bumpkins on their first trip to a large city, the two men walked in a daze behind Celeste as she made straight for a scrawny man clad all in black.

  From her father's description of the king's undersecretary—and the number two man in the Justonian palace—Celeste had no doubt of the identity of the rather emaciated man.

  "Lord Wenchell?" Celeste asked, holding her hand. "I am Anna Celeste and I have come to see my uncle."

  The razor-thin man arched on very thin brow but he took her hand and bowed over it, then brough
t it momentarily to his lips for a very brief, chaste kiss. When he straightened up, his face held no expression at all.

  "Might I inquire why you wish to see King Edmond, Your Grace?" he asked.

  "A matter of national security, milord," Celeste replied.

  Lord Wenchell, the King's undersecretary didn't bat an eye. "Is this in regard to your recent Joining, Your Grace?"

  "It is."

  "I see, then if you will follow me…"

  Although she had recognized Wenchell right off, King Edmond was nothing like her father had described him to her. He did not have three heads or the horns her father had sworn grew from the top of his brother's pointed head. He was not the ogre, the buffoon, or the ugly 'drab' her father had insisted. Instead, he was a rather handsome man with a booming, infectious laugh, and sparkling eyes that seemed to miss nothing. Upon being introduced to the niece he'd never met, he promptly hooked his arm through hers and had led her off to a window seat, sitting down with her as though they were co-conspirators.

  "I say, you look nothing like Charles described you," the king said, giving his niece a thorough going over with his keen gaze.

  Celeste smiled. "Spinsterish, ugly and fat as a cow?"

  "Somewhat worse than that, I am sorry to say," the king reported. "You do not bear the slightest resemblance to a scarecrow nor do I see any moles sprouting hair upon your lovely countenance, Niece." He grinned. "Am I as you envisioned?"

  "Nothing at all as I imagined you to be. May I ask how you managed to rid yourself of the horns and the pointed head, Your Majesty?" she countered.

  Kind Edmond slapped a hand on his thigh. "Oh, that one I like!" he guffawed. "Leave it to Charlie to describe me as he, himself, appeared."

  Celeste liked this man more each time he opened his mouth. He had a little boy quality about him that put her at ease but it was his all-seeing eyes that did not escape her notice. She knew he would be as adept at ferreting out liars and thieves as he was at making a long-lost niece feel at ease in his presence.