by Impostress
Balancing a heavy tray, Rhynn bustled into the chamber—though not so much out of duty as to hear the gossip, Kiera thought angrily as Rhynn, with a smile for Joseph, laid the tray on a small table. There was a mazer of ale, a brick of cheese, and a bowl of eggs set near a trencher of wastel bread.
“Thank you,” Kiera whispered to the serving maid, who lingered, casting a smile in the stableboy’s direction. Kiera sighed as she battled tears. “I—I cannot believe this.” Kiera’s throat burned painfully and distant memories of her older sister and their childhood flashed through her mind. Elyn with her adventures, crossing a stream on exposed rocks in summer, riding bareback through the autumn leaves, hunting with their father or aiming her deadly arrow at Kiera’s attacker, and, most recently, pressing Kiera into this insane plan and then abandoning her to Kelan… Dear God, please, please, bless her soul. Redeem her. “How … how is Father? Penelope?” she asked, then shook her head and buried her face in her hands. Tears of grief and remorse spilled from her eyes. “Oh, this is so wrong.”
“I’m sorry,” Morwenna said, and Kiera felt a gentle hand upon her shoulders. Through a sheen of tears, Kiera looked up at Kelan’s sister. Morwenna’s face, so often suspicious, had softened with concern. “If there’s anything I can do …”
Kiera sniffed. “There is nothing,” she said, anger, regret, and grief tearing at her soul. “Nothing anyone can do.”
Breathless, her body aching from the punishing ride, Wynnifrydd saw the castle looming in the moonlight.
Penbrooke.
Home of Baron Kelan and … no doubt, Elyn of Lawenydd.
The bane of Wynnifrydd’s existence.
Surely Brock was within the tall stone battlements, even now searching for his beloved. Wynnifrydd’s betrayed heart twisted so hard she shook. Brock wouldn’t have rested thinking that Elyn might have survived, that his eyes had played tricks upon him the night on the bridge, that she may have returned to her rightful place, that she might even now be married to the baron.
Lying, miserable bastard.
Digging her heels into the mare’s sides, Wynnifrydd urged her horse along the rutted dark road leading to Penbrooke. The moon and stars offered small illumination and the night air was raw and chill. Wynnifrydd hardly noticed. Though she was tired, she felt a Stygian tingle of anticipation.
Tonight belonged to her. Wynnifrydd would extact her revenge from Brock and Elyn and anyone else who had been a part of the mortification she’d suffered when her groom had left her standing alone at the altar. Even now, she felt the humiliation of it all, the ghastly embarrassment to her, her father, and all of Fenn. She set her jaw and lowered her head, riding even faster, feeling the wind rush by, whispering in her ears, telling her that finally she would be able to even the score and exact her revenge.
Soon Brock and Elyn and whoever else had been a part of the scheme to demean her would pay. No matter what it cost.
Kiera pushed open the door of the chamber and stepped inside. Another day was drawing to an end, and Kelan had yet to return.
In the bed, Joseph opened an eye and struggled to a sitting position.
“Nay, don’t,” she said, walking into the darkened room. “I was just checking to see if you’re being cared for.”
One side of his mouth lifted, though there was no spark in his eyes. “Bothered more like. Nell, she’s brought me mead and food,” he said, motioning to a table bearing a jug and empty trencher. “Some other girl carried up hot, wet rags for me to clean myself, the priest was here wanting to pray with me, and the physician cleaned and bound my leg.”
Kiera smiled. “Welcome to Penbrooke.”
He managed a humorless laugh.
“Rest now. I won’t bother you.”
“You don‘t, m’lady,” he said, and sighed. “I think I’ve had enough sleep. ’Tis all I’ve done since I arrived.”
“You need it.”
Joseph didn’t seem convinced and glanced at his clothes, still tattered but clean as they warmed atop a stool by the fire. Near his boots were his knives, the larger one that he’d had strapped to his waist, a smaller one that had lain hidden in the scruffy boots that now rested on the hearth. “I only wish that I could have saved the lady,” he said, his voice husky.
“As do I,” Kiera said. Her heart felt as if it were made of stone. Her eyes burned from the tears that she’d shed, and her head pounded with guilt. ’Twas time to bare her soul again and make Kelan believe the truth this time, even if it meant losing him. She’d waited all day for Kelan, but he hadn’t returned.
Darkness had fallen hours before and she’d spent the evening in anxious anticipation with her ears straining as she hoped to hear his voice rising up from the lower floors or the sound of his boots on the stairs. She’d been disappointed and she understood forlornly how much she’d come to love him. Her heartbeat always kicked up a bit at the sight of him, her pulse leaped when he looked at her, and she grew warm inside at his touch. She looked forward to spending days with him, learning the routine of the castle, and she anticipated each night of making love.
Foolish, foolish woman.
And now you must unburden your heart and confide in him. For there may be a child. You are already a day late; your ever regular cycle has been disturbed. The thought that she could very well be with child was comforting, but only a little. Until she told Kelan the truth, she could find no solace.
“Lord Brock is to blame,” Joseph muttered.
“ ’Twas Elyn’s choice to meet him.”
“But he should have saved her.” Joseph’s lip curled in disgust. “I’ll cut out his black heart,” he vowed, then closed his eyes and sighed. “I should have stopped her; I should never have let her take the horse.”
“You couldn’t.” Kiera placed a hand upon the stableboy’s shoulder. “No one could talk her out of meeting Brock, nor could you have denied her requests.”
“Because she is a lady and I am a servant,” he sneered, and for the first time Kiera witnessed Joseph’s loathing of his position in life. His eyes held hers and she noticed the flare of defiance in their depths, recognized the rebellious thrust of his jaw. “And so she is dead.”
“You must not blame yourself.”
“Nor should you, m’lady. But Sir Brock, he is guilty as Satan himself, and he’ll pay.”
“Shh. We’ll talk of this another day; now you must rest,” she said. She saw him glance to his clothes as if he intended to get out of bed the instant she left the room. Not that she blamed him. Wasn’t she, too, restless, in need of distraction?
With thoughts of her sister and Kelan heavy on her mind, Kiera hurried to her room and gazed out the window. The moon rose high over the battlements of Penbrooke, silvering the ground and stone walls of the keep. Sadly she accepted the fact that Kelan wouldn’t return until the morning. Or later. She would have to live her lie through one more night. Yes, she had told Kelan the truth, but she hadn’t fought hard enough to make him believe her words, that she was Kiera, not Elyn. Tomorrow, she swore to herself, she would be forceful, making Kelan believe that his true wife had died, that she, the impostress, had lied over and over to him. Then she would suffer the consequences.
Her punishment when Kelan accepted the truth would be severe, she knew, but whatever penalty Kelan meted out, it would be less painful than seeing the hatred and loathing that were certain to be evident in his gaze. No sentence could be worse than having him detest the sight of her.
“God help me,” she whispered, making the sign of the cross over her bosom. “Help us all.”
She could stand the waiting in this room no longer. Slipping her mantle over her head, she hurried downstairs to the great hall, where only a few servants moved through the darkened corridors. The dogs slept near the dying fire. The lazy hounds raised their heads as she passed to the main door, where a guard was posted, but seeing nothing seriously amiss, they let out soft grunts, yawned, and settled back to sleep. “Are you going out, m’lady?” the gu
ard inquired.
“Aye, Jeffrey, for a while.”
“But ’tis dark.”
“I know. I won’t be long.” She pushed past the guard and threw him a quick smile.
Outside, the night was cold and crisp, a bit of a breeze tossing dry leaves along the path. Through the slatted windows of some of the huts, a few strips of firelight seeped into the night and she heard whispers of hushed conversation and the cackle of muted laughter. Overhead the sails of the windmill creaked in the brittle night, and in the distance she heard the lonely cry of a wolf.
She didn’t know where she was going, just that she needed to walk, to think, to grieve for her sister, and to plan what she would say to the man who still thought she was his wife. Her boots crunched on the frozen ground, and her breath fogged in the night air. Her cheeks were chilled and she thought of Elyn, fun-loving, daring Elyn, being dragged beneath the surface of the icy river. “God be with you, sister,” she whispered as she made her way to the eel pond, where moonlight rippled across the water. She wondered if when Kelan arrived home she should reemphasize the truth as soon as he returned, or delay and spend a few more moments in sexual surrender, making love to him.
She thought she heard a footstep behind her and turned, squinting into the night, but no one appeared. The keep was nearly deserted and yet she felt a presence, as if someone was watching her. Goose bumps pebbled her arms. ’Twas foolish. No one was about. And yet …
Was it her imagination or did she hear her name whispered over the breeze?
“Kiera.”
Kiera’s blood turned to ice. No one knew her by her given name.
“Over here.” The voice was weak, as if in pain.
Kiera whirled, her eyes searching the darkness.
“Kiera!” Louder this time. More distinct. And clearly from someone who knew who she really was.
Elyn’s voice.
But that was impossible. Elyn was dead. Lost in the icy current of the river …
Heart thudding, she scanned the night-shadowed bailey. Past a hayrick and the well, beyond the garden, she scoured the shadows.
Had she imagined it? Was her mind playing cruel jokes upon her, conjuring up the haunted, frail voice of her sister?
Squinting, she saw a figure hiding behind the ferret kennels. Kiera’s heart beat crazily as the woman stumbled forward. Wearing a fur-lined cloak that didn’t disguise the tattered, bloodied tunic beneath, the ethereal figure slipped out of the shadows. She made a faltering step forward.
Elyn! The woman was Elyn! Oh, God, she was alive and here or … or … Kiera stopped short. Was this really her sister, or was it Elyn’s ghost?
Chapter Twenty-six
Her heart wedged in her throat, Kiera flung herself toward her sister or the damned apparition, whatever it was.
Tears of relief filled her eyes and she wrapped her arms around the stiff form of her sister. Not a ghost. Not an apparition. Not a cruel image of her mind, but her real, flesh-and-blood sister. “I thought … oh, thank God you’re alive! I thought you’d drowned! Where have you been? I’ve been waiting so long … oh, God, look at you. What happened?”
Kiera held her sister at arm’s length and saw the dark accusations in Elyn’s eyes, the haunted expression that aged her face a dozen years.
“You knew not what had happened to me and yet you stepped willingly into my shoes,” Elyn said, her voice condemning, her face pale as death in the moonlight. “I’m certain you never thought you’d have to give them back to me.”
“But you wanted me to do this! You left.” What was Elyn thinking? Why was she making such bizarre accusations? Did she now want to claim Kelan as her husband? How? ’Twas too late.
From one of the towers there was a cough—one of the sentries. Kiera dragged her sister down a path toward the stables. “I never considered myself Kelan’s wife.”
Elyn snorted and held her middle as if it ached. “Do not lie.”
“I’m not. You didn’t return to Lawenydd as you promised, nor were you here when we arrived. I didn’t want to do this deed, Elyn. It was your idea. Your plan. You left me without a word, to face—what did you call him?—the Beast of Penbrooke and marry him.” Anger tore through Kiera’s soul. How could her sister blame her? “You abandoned me. To be with Brock, remember?”
Elyn’s features twisted, making her appear grotesque in the moonlight. “Brock,” she said as if the man were dead.
“Oh, please …” Kiera lowered her voice when she witnessed her sister’s bald pain. “Let’s not fight. I am so glad that you’re alive. Joseph came with the news that you’d lost your life in a river and I … I thought I’d never see you again.”
“I’ve heard the rumors, sister,” Elyn whispered, undeterred by Kiera’s plea. “I hid in a closet by the kitchen where the wenches gossip. They are half in love with the lord themselves and made jokes about bedding him, but they seem to think it impossible now because the baron appears quite taken with his wife, meaning you. And they say that the two of you are in love and that he’s never been happier in his life.”
Elyn’s voice raised an octave with each new charge, and Kiera was torn between elation that her sister was alive and dismal regret at her sister’s hostility.
With difficulty, Elyn pushed a wayward strand of hair from her eyes. “So is it true? Do you love him?”
Kiera’s heart wrenched. She swallowed hard and felt the weight of the barony upon her shoulders. Yet she could not lie. There had been enough lies as it was. A harsh wind cut across the bailey and scraped her face. She loved Kelan of Penbrooke with all of her heart. The truth was impossible to hide. “Aye,” she admitted, nodding. “ ’Twas not expected, but oh, none of this was.” She reached out to touch her sister’s arm, but Elyn recoiled swiftly, as if the thought of her sister’s touch was repulsive.
“And he loves you?”
“So he has said.”
“Then you’ve slept with him? Made love to him?”
“Aye,” she whispered.
“I knew it!”
“How could I not?” Kiera demanded, suddenly angry. She was vaguely aware of a noise in the bailey, but she was so incensed at Elyn’s ridiculous accusations and recriminations that she ignored it. “You didn’t return when you said you would. When you first told me of this plan of yours, you were to return that night, and when I didn’t want to go through with it, you left me anyway. I thought you would be as good as your word, but nay, I waited and waited. Me, Penelope, and Hildy, and you sent no word. Not one,” she reminded her sister. Her fists were clenched, pride stiffening her spine. “Even if you had returned, Elyn, it was too late. Your plan was flawed, so horridly flawed. Kelan’s no fool and he’d already seen me far too often to be deceived by my switching places with you.”
“I was detained.”
“It matters not,” Kiera declared. “I drugged him, but he caught me the next day. I skulked about the keep trying to find you, I lied to Father, and I worried … never knowing what had happened to you. I did everything you asked, it didn’t work, and ’tis not my fault. The only blame I will accept is that aye, I fell in love with him. Despite everything, and my promises to myself, I love him.”
Elyn’s jaw tightened. “So now you want to remain his wife?”
“Nay … I want not to be his wife if he is to think I am you,” she admitted, though the admission hurt. “And there is no other way. You cannot return now and pretend that you have been his wife all along. Too much time has passed. Everyone here recognizes me as his wife. Kelan considers me his wife. And that is what you wanted, isn’t it? You had no intention of returning,” Kiera said, speaking the suspicion that had gnawed at her soul.
Elyn’s lips compressed. She didn’t answer. Probably couldn’t face the truth. “Tell me of Lawenydd.”
“ ’Tis no different. Hildy and Penelope kept the secret and I pretended that I left Lawenydd to spend some time with you. I lied and said that you wanted me to accompany you to Penbrooke, so that Fa
ther wouldn’t miss me. But now the truth is known, and no doubt Father is furious with all of us. I know all this because Joseph came here to Penbrooke.” Stung by Elyn’s unfair accusations, she turned away from her sister.
The sound of a horse whinnying within its stall echoed through the night. Not able to face Elyn, she asked, “Why did you not return as you’d said you would? What detained you?”
There was silence and when Kiera looked over her shoulder, she found Elyn bracing herself against the wall of the stable, both her arms wrapped around her torso. “‘Twas foolish,” she admitted, a tear tracking down her cheek. “I thought Brock …” Her voice broke and she shuddered, then cleared her throat. “ ’Tis true. I wasn’t coming back, Kiera. Brock and I had planned to run off.” Her eyes seemed to flatten with a dark rage. “Then he changed his mind. Claimed that he had to marry Wynnifrydd, as she was with child.” Elyn’s lips twisted at the irony. “Fortunately he never knew of ours. And now ’tis gone.”
“Of yours? Gone? What are you saying?” Her heart nearly stopped, and though she was barely listening, she heard the sound of the portcullis opening, of hoofbeats thudding against the cold ground.
“Aye, Kiera. I was carrying Brock’s babe; that’s why I could not return, why I couldn’t marry Penbrooke. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with …” She choked and sobbed, then, as if mentally slapping herself, took in a deep breath. “But when he told me of Wynnifrydd and her babe, I rode off angrily. I just … I just had to get away from him. From the thought of another woman … from everything. The horse shied. I ended up in the river. I nearly drowned, only I was saved and survived. The child did not.”
Kiera’s heart wrenched painfully. What if it were her? What if she’d lost her child before it was born? Would anything be worse? More tragic? “I’m so sorry … Elyn … dear God.” She turned to embrace her sister, but Elyn held up a hand, stopping her again. Clearing her throat, Elyn looked away, and her sadness seemed even greater than before.