by Barb Hendee
When his men tried to turn in the narrow space, they were partially blocked by injured horses, and more arrows rained down. I watched Caine. His face was tense. He drew his bow again without effort and fired, striking the leader through the temple.
Logan used his bow with equal skill, but his face was impassive, as if he felt nothing.
I tried not to look at him, but when my gaze shifted back to Caine, he fired again, striking another soldier through the eye. Men below were screaming. They had no defense. One jumped off his horse to try and run on foot.
Logan shot him.
There were only eight men above and twenty below, but this brutal display did not last long, and within a matter of moments, the only things moving in the chute were panicked horses. The soldiers all lay on the ground.
Caine stepped away from the edge and looked around as if lost. At the sight of me, a short ways down the cliff, he froze. Then he started toward me.
My body began to shake, and I couldn’t stop it.
“Did you just see all that?” he cried in anguish.
Yes. I’d watched him kill three men. Or had he killed them? No. I’d killed them.
“It’s my fault,” I said.
His eyes widened. “No.”
“It was not her fault!” Logan closed in on Caine. “It’s your fault! You brought this down on us, and you killed those men. Do think soldiers from the king’s army would be out searching for stolen horses or silver?” He pointed to me. “They were looking for her!”
Caine stared at him, breathing hard, but he had no response.
“You brought royal soldiers hunting us!” Logan shouted.
Aiden and a few of the other archers walked up, watching this exchange in discomfort. Perhaps it was unlike Tristan’s grandsons to shout at each other like this. Logan turned away from Caine and walked back to the edge, looking down.
“We need to clean that up,” Logan said, “to kill anyone still alive and bring the bodies up here to bury them.” But he said this with no emotion at all, as if the men below were merely a mess to be cleared away.
Caine looked to me. “Run to the house and send Tristan. We need him for this next part. You stay at home.”
Yes. This got through to me. Tristan was needed here, and I could hide at home.
Turning, I ran.
Chapter Seventeen
The next few days passed quickly. At first I wondered what the repercussions of the massacre would be, but the only people who seemed affected by the event were Caine and Logan…and me.
Almost everyone else, including Tristan, appeared to view the incident as an unfortunate necessity. To them, soldiers had somehow managed to follow Aiden’s group home and then located the chute, and as a result, they’d had to be killed. Should they have reached us and discovered our existence, the number of stolen goods and horses here would have been grounds for arrest and hanging.
It was a risk these people lived with.
“We have to fight like everyone else,” Doris said to me. “We must defend ourselves.”
But I saw it differently. Though I’d never say it aloud, in essence, Logan was right. Had Caine not stolen me, Royce would not have requested royal assistance in a search, and none of those men would have died. The problem was that Caine understood this too, and it weighed on him. He was a brooder by nature, but he’d been more quiet than usual.
More and more, my thoughts turned to my lady, to how lonely and sad she must be, to how I might get a message out to her, to how I might leave this place and go back to her.
I spent my days with the women here, washing clothes, sewing, baking, and cooking. One day when the women were trying to sew and the children were restless, shouting and running between the tables, I took all the children outside and organized a game of Blind Man’s Bluff. We played through much of the afternoon, and when we’d exhausted the game, I acted out several stories for their entertainment.
Instead of thinking me lazy for not helping with the sewing, several women—even one of the younger ones—thanked me.
“Bless you, girl,” Charlotte said. “We may put you in charge of the children full time.”
I managed a smile, but my mind was on my lady. The problem was that except for Raven’s group and the small parties of raiders, no one ever came to or left this place. How could I possibly get a message out under these conditions?
On the afternoon of the third day following the tragedy at the chute, I was in the common house with the women, working with Doris, Charlotte, and Brida on a quilt. My stitches were tiny and neat, and I normally enjoyed quilting, but today, despair had begun to set in that I would never find a way to get word to my lady.
Excusing myself, I walked out back, near the tree line, needing a few moments of solitude to try and push away the despair.
“You are not happy here,” someone said.
Turning, I saw that Brida had followed me out. Instantly, I was on my guard. She’d made no secret of her dislike for me. But when she walked up, studying my face, her eyes held no hostility. Did she want an answer?
“It’s not that,” I said. “I’ve not been unhappy here. I simply belong someplace else.”
Her brow knitted. “And where is that?”
Except for Tristan, no one here had asked where I’d come from. I didn’t think Caine wanted to know too much. Brida motioned toward a fallen log, and we both sat.
“Tell me,” she said.
I began to speak. I didn’t tell her as much as I’d told Tristan, but she listened carefully as I told her about my life at the de Marco manor, about my lady, and about why I needed to go back.
“But I can’t go back,” I finished. “She doesn’t even know where I am.”
“Have you tried to get a message out?” Brida asked.
This caused me to sit straight. I was cautious, but also desperate. “And how would I do that? Almost no one ever comes or leaves.”
“Do you want to leave?” she asked. “Do you want to go home?”
When I didn’t answer, she spoke again.
“Caine was wrong to bring you here,” she said. “I don’t say this so much out of concern for you as concern for our people. You don’t belong here.”
“And you hate me enough that’d you’d help me?”
“I don’t hate you at all. I just want you gone. If you can trust in anything, you can trust in that.”
My mind raced. Taking a great risk, I asked. “Could you help me get a message to my lady?”
She sat quietly for a while, thinking. “Tristan says you can read and write. If you write a message, I can have one of our men ride out on the excuse of selling some of the recent stolen goods or horses.”
“One of the men would do this, in secret?”
“There are a few here who feel as Logan and I do, that you don’t belong.” She tilted her head. “You say this de Marco estate is about a two-day ride to the west and then north?”
My heart pounded. “Yes. But no one could come up here to the settlement to fetch me.”
“No, but there’s village called Tuloose about a half day’s walk south of here. It’s easy to find. In your message, you could direct your lady to send someone to fetch you in Tuloose. Once the message has been sent, we wait a few days. Then during dinner, when nearly everyone is at the common hall, I’ll help get you to the mouth of the chute. If you stay pressed to the near wall in the darkness, you’ll not be seen from the cliffs by our night watchmen. You can walk to Tuloose and someone from your lady’s guard can collect you.”
I sat in hope. Could this work? I didn’t trust Brida, but I trusted her desire to want me gone.
“Will you help me gather paper, quill, and ink?” I asked.
* * * *
That night, as I helped the women to finish dinner, I tried not to show the shining light of my hop
e. Events over the course of the afternoon had moved swiftly. Brida located writing materials from some of the stores taken in raids.
I’d written a detailed letter to Lady Giselle, explaining what had happened to me. I gave no information regarding the settlement, but Brida helped me to provide clear directions to Tuloose, and I told my lady she could send guards to fetch me there. I knew she would, and by this point, Lord Jean would have seen and begun to regret her sadness. He would allow me to stay with her.
After folding the letter carefully, I’d given it to Brida, and she promised to find a messenger.
After this, we slipped back into the common house and began helping with dinner. I almost couldn’t believe the weight lifted from my shoulders now that a plan had been set into motion, and soon, my lady would have me back.
My only pang of guilt hit when Tristan and Caine came through the common house to join the family for dinner. I cared for Caine’s feelings, and I’d come to love Tristan. But my lady needed me.
“Did you have a good day, Little Bird?” Tristan asked, limping up.
The common hall was so crowded tonight that I had to speak up to answer. “I did.”
Caine put a hand on my back and steered me toward our usual table. Tristan followed. Logan and the boys were already there, but no one had taken a seat yet. I didn’t see Brida at first, and then I saw her coming through the crowd with a determined expression. She carried no bowls or cups.
Instead, she stopped at the table and looked to Tristan. “I have something to say.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”
Reaching into the pocket of her dress, she drew out the letter I’d written to Lady Giselle. My heart slowed.
Holding up the letter, Brida said, “This is a message from Kara to her lady on de Marco lands. Kara asked me to find a messenger to deliver this letter so that de Marco guards might be sent after her.”
“What?” Caine turned to me and then shook his head at Brida. “No, that can’t be.”
I wanted to slip under the floor.
She’d betrayed me.
Brida slapped the letter on the table and pushed it toward Caine. “Read it. She came to me for help, so I knew that I needed to take control. She’d have brought guards to fetch her and bring her home.”
I had not gone to her for help. She had come and offered, but that meant nothing here.
Before Caine could pick up the letter, Tristan reached out and opened it, reading the contents.
“It says here she’s asked to be picked up in Tuloose, and there are clear directions written out.” He looked at Brida. “How could she have known about Tuloose or where to find it?”
“Does that matter?” Brida demanded. “Even if they had picked her up in Tuloose, she knows the way to the entrance to the chute. Once she told them where she’d been, they could send an entire regiment of the king’s army.”
Around us, people had gone quiet and were listening. Caine’s expression shifted to anger and disbelief as he stared at me.
“I don’t blame her,” Brida went on. “She’s an outsider who cares nothing for us. It’s Caine’s judgment I question. He brought her here, and she’s the cause of those royal soldiers coming up the chute. Now, she would place us in danger of discovery yet again! What kind of tórnya would Caine make if his decisions are so poor they put the entire settlement at risk not once, but twice?”
And then I realized what she’d done, and how I’d played right into her hands. Rather than getting rid of me, she’d opted to use my desperation to make Caine appear an irresponsible leader who was still saddled with me as a wife—and now I could not be trusted.
Logan had been listening to all this in surprise, so she must not have told him her plans. But when she finished speaking, he glanced at me in disgust and then looked to Tristan.
“Brida’s right,” he said. “You know she’s right.”
Tristan shook his head sadly. “You do yourself no service by this act,” he said to Brida. “And you do yourself no honor.” Then he said. “Caine and Kara, come with me.”
Still carrying the letter, he started for the door. Caine was so angry with me that his dark eyes seemed to burn. Turning, I hurried after Tristan, and a few moments later, the three of us were outside in the night air.
“No one speak until we get home,” Tristan ordered.
Within a few paces, Caine was out in front, walking swiftly on his long legs. His entire body was like a coiled spring of tension. I came behind with Tristan, who walked more slowly, and when the two of us entered the house, Caine stood in the middle of the sitting room.
As soon as Tristan closed the front door, Caine exploded.
Closing on me, he shouted into my face. “Why?”
I’d seen Caine angry before but never with me, and I couldn’t help shrinking away from him. He didn’t stop.
“Haven’t we tried to make you feel welcome?” he shouted. “To give you a safe home?
The walls shook from the volume of his voice, and everything pressed down on me. Images flashed through my mind…the sad face of Lady Giselle…Royce Capello lifting me onto a horse…Caine locking me in the shack in the darkness…men down in the chute screaming as arrows pierced their eyes…Brida slapping my message on the table.
Caine was still shouting into my face. “And the only thing you care about is returning to your lady? Why?”
“Because she is alone!” I cried back. “Lord Jean is no companion to her, and she has no daughters. She spends her days alone now! I was her only comfort, and I am gone.”
Caine blinked and his anger faded. “You worry for her? This isn’t about yourself?”
The sorrow racking me was so heavy I couldn’t try to answer.
Tristan limped to me. “Kara…” he began gently, speaking to me as if I were a child. “Do you understand what would happen if you did get a message to your lady and she sent guards to bring you home?”
“Yes,” I managed to answer. “I would be with her again.”
“Only for a few days. Your de Marco lord would send word to the man who bought you. He would have no choice.”
I shook my head. “No. Lord Jean will have seen my lady’s sorrow. He’d not take me from her again. He’d let me to stay with her.”
“He could not. For him to keep you would be the same as theft. Surely, you can see this?”
The room began to spin as I absorbed Tristan’s words. “He would give me back to Royce?”
“Yes.”
Wrapping my arms around myself, I could not contain a sob. “Then she is lost to me! And I am lost to her!”
After the first sob, more followed. Stumbling sideways, I grasped the back of a couch to stay on my feet, weeping with loud sounds of pain.
“Kara!” Caine caught me and swept an arm beneath my knees, lifting me off the ground.
In a sea of loss, I clung to his neck and buried my face in his shoulder.
“She’s tired,” he said, “and overwrought. I’m putting her to bed.”
Tristan didn’t answer, and Caine carried me down the hallway to our room. Once there, he laid me on the bed and then rushed to the washbasin, wetting a cloth and hurrying back to me. Sitting on the bed, he wiped the cloth over my eyes and cheeks. I was still weeping.
“It’s all right,” he said. “Try to relax.”
With my lady forever lost to me, I didn’t want to be alone.
“Don’t leave,” I begged, grasping the back of his hand. “Don’t leave me in here.”
“I won’t, but you need to rest. You need to let yourself relax.”
After dropping the cloth on the floor, he pulled off his boots. “Roll over onto your side.”
Without thinking, I did as he asked, and he laid down behind me, wrapping his body around mine, with his chest against my back and his chin over the top of
my head, enveloping me with his right arm.
“Try to close your eyes,” he said.
“You won’t leave?”
“I won’t.”
* * * *
The next morning, when I woke, Caine was still wrapped around me. I’d not woken up with him in the room before, much less in the bed.
“Are you awake?” he whispered.
I sat up and looked down at him. He’d stayed with me all night.
“I didn’t want to leave this morning until I knew you were better,” he said.
Was I better? I was calm now, but the revelations of last night were still raw.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“So am I. We didn’t eat dinner.”
He was right. We hadn’t. But this seemed unimportant, and I wished he would ask me about things that mattered. My actions in trying to send that message had hurt him in more ways than one.
After climbing from the bed, we left the room, walking down the hallway together.
In the kitchen, Tristan was boiling eggs. The message I’d written to Lady Giselle was lying open on the table.
“I should eat and then get to work on the barn,” Caine said.
“No,” Tristan answered. “The barn can wait. Sit down. Both of you.”
Caine frowned, but Tristan’s tone brooked no refusal so we both sat at the table. Soon, Tristan brought mugs of tea and boiled eggs.
“Last night was a night for tears,” he said. “But today we need to speak.”
Shifting in his chair, Caine took a sip of tea. “About what?”
Tristan offered him a measured look. “I understand why Kara did what she did. She was taken twice against her will, once by this nobleman, Royce, and then once by you. Of course she would take action to control her own path. No one could blame her for that.” He turned to me. “I may not give many orders here, but I am the tórnya of this settlement. Fourteenth law or not, if you wish to go back to de Marco lands, I will order Caine to take you back.”
Caine went stiff, but didn’t speak.
Though Tristan’s offer moved me, he must have known it was no offer at all.