The Forgiven Duke (A Forgotten Castles Novel)

by Carie, Jamie

  God, they will kill me now and what good will I be to Alexandria then? Give her a good life, Lord. With or without her parents, keep her safe within Your love . . . like she claims You have for us. Give her a joyous, happy life, I pray Thee.

  The dark man leaned over him and peered into Gabriel’s eyes, an evil smile curving his lips. “You will tell the king . . . tomorrow . . . where she is.”

  Gabriel nodded, willing to promise anything to buy more time.

  He was hauled back to his cell, given another flask of water and broth with a few floating chunks of meat in it and a lone carrot, which he slurped down too fast, making his stomach churn in rebellion. He drank the water slower. Savoring it, saving it in case it was the last they ever gave him. After his meal he knelt on the cold stone and cradled his head in his hands.

  Silent sobs racked his shoulders, increasing the agony with each movement, but he couldn’t help it. He thought of his sisters, Jane, his mother, Meade, his friend Albert. How would their lives be if he never came home?

  Alexandria.

  He saw her face, saw it break into a glorious smile, the sun lighting her dark hair and the life within her lighting her blue eyes. If he told them she was in Iceland, they would go after her. The thought of them bringing her here and doing this to her was more than he could stand to dwell on. He turned his thoughts back toward King Ferdinand and the meeting on the morrow. If he didn’t tell them where Alexandria was, they would kill him. He saw it clearly in the Spaniard’s eyes today. Only the meeting with the king was staying his hand.

  What Gabriel needed was to convince the king that they needed him. That even in knowing Iceland as the place she was last headed for, that she was extremely difficult to track, as his men could attest to. His mind spun with the thoughts, grasping any plan he could come up with. Yes, if he could convince Ferdinand that the only way to find Alexandria was through him, then he just might have a chance.

  He felt for her last letter, took a shaking breath to find it still in the inner pocket of his waistcoat. It was the only thing he still had after he’d been ambushed and taken. They’d taken everything else down to his boots, but somehow they hadn’t found this.

  It was still there.

  It was his only chance.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Alex took shallow puffs of the damp air as they followed a narrow path down, down into the mine, deep into the earth’s depths. The single light from Valdi’s lantern swung back and forth in a reckless way. What if it should go out? She shivered at the thought of complete darkness in this place. They could be lost forever and no one would ever know what had happened to them.

  She paused, clinging to the rough rock wall with one hand. What if her parents were down here, decaying in some hidden crack or hole? What if Valdi had killed them and was leading her and John to that same demise? She looked over her shoulder at Valdi. He scowled at her and motioned her to keep moving. Oh, dear. What had she gotten them into?

  A little farther and she heard the dripping of water.

  “Here now,” Valdi stayed her with his arm, “watch your step. We’ve come to the veins of crystal, but there’s a pool of water under them and mud so thick you would never get out if you had the misfortune to step in it.”

  Alex shrank back against the cave wall, points of jagged rock piercing into her back and shoulders. She suppressed a small squeak, pressing her lips together in stubborn determination instead. “If only it weren’t so dark. I fear I can’t see well enough to see the crystal veins.”

  She pressed harder against the cave wall as Valdi passed her on the narrow path. He fumbled around with something and then a flash of light came from his hand. He held it up and lit a rush that had been bored into the wall. He circled the pool, lighting three more. Light flooded the area as it caught fire, a thin trail of smoke drifting toward the cave’s tall ceiling.

  Alex looked around and gasped.

  A muffled word of exclamation came from John.

  All around them the walls sparkled and flashed as the flickering light made the crystal veins come to life. Against the dark, wet cave walls, veins of crystal weaved like roots of a plant, some thick and some thin, twisting and twining together and running the length and breadth of the space around them and up and over their heads. In the middle of the cave lie a dark pool, silent, still and deadly with its thick muddy bottom. They clung to the narrow path that hugged the wall, looking up and around, avoiding that pool with every step.

  “It’s so beautiful.”

  “Many have thought so,” Valdi said to Alex with a note of pride in his voice. “It is mined with small pickaxes and chisels that take much concentration and time. This crystal comes off in cleavages, lines so straight and pure that when you find them, it is easy to separate. We take the crystal out in blocks, like ice, that way.”

  “I wonder what Augusto wanted it for?” Alex asked aloud, not thinking what she was saying.

  John gave her a sharp look, but Valdi flashed a glance over at her, eyebrows drawn down over his eyes. “The legend speaks of a machine. A very great invention he was building.”

  “What sort of machine? Do you know anything else?” All fear fell away in her curiosity.

  “No.” His tone was harsh. “We should return now.”

  Alex took a deep breath, knowing she wasn’t going to get any more answers from him. She turned rather quickly, too quickly. The rock beneath her foot slipped out from under her. “Ahhh!” She reached for the wall but it was too late. Her arms windmilled as she teetered on the edge of the pool.

  “Help!” She reached out into thin air as her other foot slipped. Moments later her back hit the pool with a great splash. Her heart pounded with the flailing of her arms.

  “Alex!” John screamed, going down on his stomach on the path and reaching out his hand toward her.

  He was too far. Alex’s head went under the dark water.

  “Don’t touch the bottom!” She heard Valdi roar.

  All thought left her except the command not to let her feet touch the bottom, not to do everything her instincts wanted her to do—use the bottom of the pool to push herself to the surface.

  She kept her knees tucked up and pushed her arms up and down until her head popped up from the surface, treading water with hand circles and the small movements of peddling legs.

  Taking a giant breath, she paddled in the smallest space she could make, her skirts heavy and working against her.

  “Grasp this!” Valdi held a long, gnarled stick out to her. She swam toward it, keeping her feet high, and grasped hold with one hand. John joined Valdi as they pulled her toward them. As soon as she was close enough, John reached down for her, clasped her wrist, and dragged her up onto the rock floor.

  He held her there, both of them breathing heavy, his arms around her dripping form, his head pressed against her wet head. “Thank God,” he kept saying, over and over. “You silly fool, thank God.”

  “I warned you,” Valdi barked in a rough voice. “You’re as foolish as your parents. Let’s go.”

  With slow and careful movements, Alex stood. She was soaked, cold and dripping . . . afraid, shaking from head to toe, her teeth chattering. “I–I–I’m s–s–sorry.” So her parents had been here and had asked to see the mine too. But now didn’t seem a good time to question Valdi about that.

  “Keep hold of her until we get out of this area,” Valdi ordered John and gestured with an angry sweep of his arm that they go before him.

  John clung to her hand as they crept by Valdi, leading her out of the inner circle where the pool lay and up the steep incline toward the top and outside. Once outside the cold, stiff winds hit Alex like a bucket of icy water thrown into her face.

  “Hurry to the house.” John took her hand again and ran with her toward Valdi’s house.

  They
burst through the door together. Johannes jerked awake, sat up, and rubbed his eyes. He took one look at them and grumbled, “Now what? What has happened?”

  “Alexandria fell into the pool. We have to get her out of these wet clothes and warm and dry.”

  Valdi came up from behind them. His voice shook as he called out, “Ashanti, take her to your room and help her find something to change into that is warm. One of your mother’s robes perhaps.”

  The girl paled, eyes widening, but nodded at her father and waved Alex to follow her.

  Her room was small and crowded with furniture. Alex took off her sodden coat and let it drop to the floor where it lay in a wrinkled heap, the fur collar looking like a wet dog. With shaking hands she worked the buttons of her dress free and pushed it down to the floor also.

  The girl held out a blanket, eyes wide. “You can dry off with this. I will go and fetch my mother’s robe.”

  “My thanks.” Alex tilted her head. “Is your mother here?”

  The girl shook her head, a gaunt look of grief filling her deep brown eyes. “She died in the mine many months ago . . . Father hasn’t moved her things yet.”

  She died in the mine? No wonder he hadn’t wanted to take them there. And the fact that Valdi would allow her to touch her clothing, something they held so sacred, made Alex’s eyes prick with tears. He wasn’t a monster; he was a complicated man plagued by the grief of his wife’s passing. She mustn’t let her imagination run away with her so and misjudge people.

  “I’m so sorry to hear that,” Alex said to Ashanti.

  When the girl left, Alex stripped off the rest of her clothing and rubbed life back into her cold skin with the woolen blanket. She was drying her hair and turned away as Ashanti entered with the robe. She felt the soft folds on her shoulders and grasped it, wrapping it around her and tying it with the long ribboned belt. It was a lovely robe of dark blue with a high collar and reaching almost to her ankles. Her hair hung long and wavy down her back as she turned a gentle smile on the girl. “Thank you. I’m feeling better already.”

  “You look pretty in it.”

  Alex smiled. “Shall we go in by the fire? I find myself in dire need of something warm to drink.”

  “I’ll bring you a mug of warm goat’s milk.”

  “That sounds perfect.”

  Alex took her hand and followed the thin frame of the girl back to the sitting room.

  “Thank God. How do you feel?” John rushed to her side as if she were on the brink of death and guided her to a chair by the fire.

  “I’ll be fine, thank you, John.” She looked over at Valdi, who was staring at her in the robe with an ashen face. Sorrow and sympathy filled her chest until it ached. Lord, help me say something gracious and kind, something with Your love in it for him.

  “You saved my life. I thank you.”

  He looked down and frowned at his feet. “I shouldn’t have taken you there. I knew better. My wife . . . when your parents were here . . . she took them to the mine and fell into that pool. She didn’t know how to swim and they were not able to save her as I saved you today.”

  Alex inhaled with shock. “You must hate them, my parents. Why would you let me see the mine?”

  He shook his head, his eyes full of pain. “It was an accident, a terrible accident, and they were devastated to be the cause. But their mission must have been important and that’s why I showed it to you. After the funeral, they purchased some crystal to take with them, paid a great deal for it, but I don’t know where they were going. They didn’t answer questions, just asked them.”

  Alex took a long breath and closed her eyes, suddenly bone weary. They must have been horrified by such an accident. And she was at another dead end. Had they left Iceland after buying the crystals? If so, where would they go? It could be anywhere in the world but one place. The one place she longed to be.

  Home on Holy Island.

  THE NEXT DAY, ALEX AND John rode along the southern shoreline going west, the fjords of blue water and sailing ships to the south and the hills and valleys of farmland to the north. They passed fishing villages, little hamlets with their churches, markets, and townsfolk’s cottages, mostly thatched-roofed huts in various sizes.

  They rode slowly back toward Reykjavik, where Alex would have to decide once and for all if she would marry John Lemon. Montague, unless something dire had happened, would certainly be there waiting for them. She had run out of excuses. She had nearly run out of time, and so she rode at a snail’s pace, saying it was to rest the horses so they wouldn’t have to change them out. She’d grown rather fond of Baen and was loathe to return her to her owner.

  Rubbing the soft spot between the mare’s ears, she sighed. A sad weight filled her chest and bowed her shoulders. She’d failed. She didn’t know what to do. She had no idea where her parents might have gone next.

  Dear Lord, I was so sure I was the one. The only one who would find them. Can’t You give me some clue?

  Nothing but the wind, softer and warmer here on the southern shores, answered her.

  “You’ve done your best, Alexandria.” John reached over and clasped her hand, giving it a tight squeeze. “You’ve done everything possible. You can’t blame yourself.”

  Alex stared into his blue eyes, blue like the crater pools, like the sea that held this island in its palm. He would make a good husband. So why didn’t she love him?

  “I can’t let them go.”

  John’s mouth turned down, his eyes sincere in their regret. “You don’t have to.”

  “But I do,” Alex said so soft she felt the words more than heard them. “I can’t go forward without letting them go.”

  John just squeezed her hand again and together they looked down the road ahead.

  HOURS LATER, THEY CAME TO a lonely looking farmstead and dismounted. It was growing late, the day ending in winter twilight. John tied the horses to a rail and led the way to the door. “Perhaps we can beg a bed for the night.”

  “And some food.” Alex patted her stomach. “I’m ravenous.”

  “Yes, and some food. Take out some shillings in case.”

  Alex dug into her pocket and pulled out the ready coins. John knocked twice and then a third time. “I don’t think anyone is home.”

  They backed up and noticed there wasn’t any smoke coming from the fireplace, nor any animals in the pens. The fences were broken down and the place had a dilapidated look about it.

  “I wonder if anyone even lives here.” John tried the door. It was not locked and easily swung open.

  Cobwebs and dust greeted them, but there was still a table and chairs and a fireplace ready with wood.

  They worked together to feed the horses with some old hay and water them with a well that still had a half-broken pump handle. After lighting a fire, they cleaned off the table as best they could and took account of their supplies. They had a loaf of bread and some smoked salmon wrapped in a cloth. Alex had three little potatoes she washed and shoved into the coals. John had a round of goat cheese and a tin of crackers. When it was ready, they spread it out and gazed across the table at each other. “We’ll not starve this night,” John said with a wink.

  “No, indeed.” Alex grinned and took a bite of fish.

  “I must say, Lady Alex, you are looking fine this evening. Are those new jewels around your neck, or is it your skin that is so luminous?”

  Alex hooted a laugh. “Ha, my lord. If your tongue was any glibber, there would be notices out for your capture. Have you broken many hearts with such talent?”

  John lifted his brows. “None that can shine a candle on the present company, my lady.” He leaned toward her and traced his fingertips along the side of her jaw. “I’ve never met anyone like you.”

  His voice was suddenly serious and intent. Alex held her breath, trapp
ed beneath his gentle exploring fingers on her face. She closed her eyes and drifted on the feeling, drifting and floating and . . . seeing another’s face.

  The Duke of St. Easton.

  Tears struck from beneath the cloak of her closed lids. She saw his raven’s hair, short and close to his head. She saw his startling green eyes, penetrating, looking deep into her through his black demimask at the masquerade ball. She felt his strong hands clasping hers in the dance, moving her body around the crowded ballroom in an arc of grace that made her float, and yet at the same time feel safely moored to something stronger than herself. She felt John’s breath as he leaned closer. She felt John’s lips touch hers and imagined they were his.

  She reared back, breathing hard. “I can’t marry you.”

  John’s face turned dark and thunderous. “What? Why not?”

  “I’m so sorry . . . but I . . . can’t go through with it. I just can’t marry you.”

  She rose, knocking over her chair in her haste, turned from the pain in his eyes, and fled into the night.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Blessed Father, holy God, I implore You to act on our behalf. I will do anything You want if You will only save her. Even unto my death. I will keep my silence and die if it will protect her. Anything. Please. Save Alexandria from evil, save her from harm in whatever form it comes. And if it be Your will that she marry John . . . ah, even that, all knowing and merciful God, let it be done according to Your will.

  Gabriel stood outside the king’s throne room praying while he waited to be called inside for his audience with the king. He balanced on one foot and then the other, trying to ignore the aching and bruised body that spasmed and bled and hardly seemed his anymore. He’d never been so thin and weak and could hardly recognize the broken man he’d become. He prayed he would remain upright for this audience, this test with the king of Spain. King Ferdinand VII had a volatile reputation, and Gabriel could only hope he was having one of his better days.