by Jill Barnett
His stepfather sarcasm was not lost to him, but Lyall’s mistakes were done, so he refused to cower and or labor over what he could not change. He told them of his conversation with Frasyr’s man, then explained that along with Glenna’s brothers and their horses, they could infiltrate Kinnesswood under the pretext of offering the horses for sale to Frasyr’s man. His stepfather listened without comment, then joined the discussion and questioned him about the lay of things inside the gates, and the plans began to grow, take form, and become the single path that made the most sense, except for the matter of trusting him.
“How do we know you will not give us up to Frasyr?” Elgin Gordon asked, eyeing Lyall with contempt.
“You cannot know,” Lyall said. “But without me, neither have you a chance in hell to get inside, so you have little choice.”
25
A group of men-at-arms stood guard outside the tower door. Earlier, when Glenna put her ear to the door, she could hear them talking and dicing. After her third foiled escape attempt, Frasyr stayed true to his promise and sent for the smith. She was leg-shackled to a pin in the wall beneath the shuttered arch with just enough chain for her to reach the edges in the room.
The traitorous grey cat lay curled nearby, contented and purring so loudly it sounded like the recoil of a bowstring. The beast was not part of her plan. She had tried to get rid of it, had pounded on the door when she discovered it was locked in with her again. “Guard! Guard!” she had called out.
“My lady?” came the voice through the door.
“You need to take the cat,” she said. “It wants out.”
“Nay. She will stay with you.”
“But—“
“Good night, my lady.”
“Guard!” He did not respond. “Guard! I had not wanted to hit you with the laver,” she said truthfully.
Still nothing.
“If your sister were held captive, would you not want her to do the same?”
But she found she was talking to dead ears, and was stuck with the cat.
For a while now, she kept busy by cutting the support ropes from bed with one of her three stolen knives. She crawled out from under the bed, dropping some of the ropes next her, before she cut the last two and watched the straw mattress fall to the floor.
Done!
She sat back on her heels, wincing as she rubbed her ankle, which was red from the thick iron shackle. Then, for the third time, she hunched over it with the smallest knife and worked at the lock, but she could not seem to pick it no matter how she turned it.
“What is wrong with this lock?” She looked across the room, where she had picked the shutter lock without a problem. When the manacle lock would still not open, she dropped the knife in frustration and groaned under her breath.
The cat opened one eye, annoyed.
“This is all your fault”.
Unfazed, the cat went back to sleep.
The sun was up and though it was still cool in the tower, ‘twas lighter now in the daylight and with the shutters open. She rose and moved toward the arch, leaning a shoulder against the shutter and looking out while she waited for some renewed patience to test the manacle lock again.
Outside, there was a huge, bright blue sky with a few, fleece-like clouds floating by. The breeze coming in carried the moist scent of morning dew, and spread out before her, the wide forest beyond the lake stood in the great shadow of Ben Nevis.
A movement caught her eye near the edges of the lake, and she leaned forward, searching the shoreline and the trees.
Montrose?
He was not Montrose, really, but Sir Lyall Robertson. To her he would always be Montrose. Again and again she perused the area, but there was no one. Her eyes were playing tricks on her.
After they had pulled her out from under the bed, when they had dragged her away, she’d called out for him, out of instinct, perhaps. For her instinct told her Montrose would never let her be harmed, or hurt, that he would save her if she were in trouble and called out for him. He loved her.
De Hay had laughed at her when she had called his name and said, “Montrose? He is not Montrose, you foolish woman. You think that Robertson will rescue you? That coward? He took the deed to his lands--his thirty pieces of gold for bringing you to me--and he was out the gates moments later without a word or a look back.”
She had bitten de Hay for those words. Montrose loved her. If it were not true, what kind of fool would she be? He loved her. Yet when they closed the door and she was alone again, battered and bruised and feeling trapped, she weakened and asked herself if he would really walk away so easily.
She thought not, but then she remembered her own escape from the abbey, running away because she was trying to ignore what she felt for him, and still stubbornly sticking to her vow to not be a pawn for a father she did not know.
Self preservation.
But Montrose loved her. She believed that more than any single thing, and perhaps, the only thing left for her to have faith in.
But until the oaf realized what he had done and how he felt, she would be forced to save herself.
Below, the lake shimmered silver in the sunlight, and from the tower, it was a straight drop down to the water. She turned, hands on her hips as she studied the room. There had to be something else she could use to pick the lock.
She began rummaging through all of her plunder and lay them out on the table. Five purses lined up in a row on the table, some plumper than others, along with two jeweled rings and the three knives, one with an emerald-encrusted handle that at some point Sir Coll would see was missing from his person, along with his purse—the plumpest-- and a lovely brooch with a huge ruby in its center. Though its pin was narrow, she pulled it from the brooch, held it up and eyed the tip.
Perhaps….
She sat down with her foot on the edge of the chair and tried every way to pick the manacle lock. There was a loud snort, and the cat, asleep on its side, began to run, its paws moving furiously as it slept. She should hate the cat, but she couldn’t, even though the little beast kept her from escaping. The cat was only was acting on instinct, something she understood.
A vision of Montrose came to mind, and she felt a deep pang. De Hay had been wrong about Lyall. He was not a coward, driven by greed. Emotion drove him, and perhaps some misplaced pride.
A loud shout pulled her from the chair to the open arch, then came the creaking of the gate chains and the sound of horses hooves. She could see nothing, even when she tried to lean out. She sagged back against the shutter and closed her eyes.
Come to me, Montrose. Please come.
She opened her eyes and searched the horizon again, but saw no sign of him. Sighing in frustration, she slumped to the floor and stuck the pin back in the cursed lock.
One slight twist and it magically clicked open. She was free! Well…she was free of her chains. Laughing, she rubbed her ankle, so relieved, and then, she pulled the ropes toward her and set to work.
The mattress took a while to tear apart, the straw took some time to spread out in piles about the room and in front of the door. At one point, the cat woke and moved to one of the straw piles, curled up for a nap, refusing to leave even when Glenna scolded it, hissed at it, and tried to shoo it away. Finally, she picked up the cat and fashioned a sling to hold it.
The flint sparked readily, and before long, the oil reed flamed. Fire ready, she looked around her, took one deep breath, and she was ready, aware of the great risk she took if her plan did not go well.
* * *
His plan was not going well.
The first guard went down easily, but the second guard had Lyall pinned on the battlement with his head and shoulders hanging off. Below was a huge outcropping of jagged rocks that would break a man’s back should he be unfortunate enough to fall upon them…and he was close.
From his first few steps across the battlement, he had been in trouble. After fighting with the guard he’d met on the stairs, Lyall opened the woo
d door and ran out on the wall, then made the mistake of looking down. The height threw him off, and when he turned about, he faced an archer the size of a yew tree.
Disarmed too quickly, they struggled man-to-man, his only weapon his strength with his sword out of reach. The man pushed harder, a hand on Lyall’s throat, and from the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of the rocks so far below.
Fear broke out in beads of sweat on his brow, but he kept the heel of his hand pushing the man’s head back so he could not shout any warning. One alert and the castle would arm, then Ramsey and his men would never get inside the gates. And he hoped to God that Elgin Gordon was where they had left him, still manning those gates.
He felt the prick of the man’s dagger at his throat and found another burst of strength, and tried to reach for the man’s arrows, but his arms were not long enough. The knife tip was dangerously close, and his opponent did not budge but his face was red as apple.
With his boot to the man’s gut, Lyall tried to shove him off, but the man gained momentum, then lifted him and started to push. He began slipping over the side and fought to not slide any farther, which took everything he had and his arms began to shake.
The guard gasped suddenly, and made a sick groan of death. There was no more struggle and Lyall was freed, as Alastair Gordon shoved the man off him.
Panting, Lyall pulled himself up and sat there, his breathing labored, cold sweat pouring like water over his face, his worthless life still passing before his eyes. He took a moment, then grasped his sword and looked up. “God’s ears, Gordon. What took you so long?”
Alastair gave him a hand up and boasted proudly, “I had three guards to overtake on the eastern wall.”
“Only three?”
“Aye, but all at once,” Gordon lied.
“I’ll wager they weren’t the size of two men.” Lyall cast an uneasy glance at the man laying next to him, and knowing he owed Alastair Gordon his life.
“I would not have thought you were so worthless in a fight, Robertson.”
“Aye. Merely ask any one of Ramsey’s men. They’ll be all too glad to tell you what a coward I am.” Spoken too many times before, the words came from his lips easily. “’Tis is in my blood,” he said simply. “Now grab that pennant from its mount, and stop your cockcrowing. Someone has to signal Ramsey.”
Just as Gordon began waving the pennant, Lyall looked into the bailey, where a man had crossed and was just entering the gate house where they had left Elgin.
Lyall cursed silently.
There was a shout, loud enough to cause an alert. A moment later the gatehouse door opened with a loud scuffle and Elgin Gordon and the man tumbled out, Gordon clearly outmatched.
Alastair spun around. “El!” He took off through the battlement door, but Lyall looked on as his brother was already sprawled on the ground with a sword poised to kill. Frasyr’s man raised the weapon, ready to skewer Elgin.
In a the time it took a heart to beat, there was a whistling thud, and guard fell forward, an arrow in his back and piercing straight through his heart, his sword falling harmlessly from his hands.
Alastair Gordon came running out from the bottom of the stairs and straight to his brother, who lay there alive and stunned, pale and staring at the dead guard. Alastair turned and looked up as Lyall lowered the bow.
Two groups of Ramsey’s men had crossed the lake and were riding off the barges onto the island, another was already nearing the castle entrance.
“The gates!” Lyall shouted, then ran for the stairs.
The castle was arming.
At the bottom, he ran out, sword raised as Frasyr’s men swarmed out into the bailey. But the Gordons had managed to open the gate, and half his stepfather’s men were already inside and had the advantage of fighting on horseback. The fight struck hard and furiously, with sword clanging against sword and men began falling.
Lyall ran through the melee toward the keep, and inside, running past Frasyr’s men, who were flooding out like ants, strapping on weapons, and did not question his presence.
They must have thought he had never left.
Ahead of everyone else, he took the stairs from the hall two at a time, finding speed he did not know he had. He ran down the corridor and up into the tower, where he threw two guards down the steps and kept going until he faced and fought the other guards posted outside the tower door. His strength felt like a gift from Heaven and he fought as powerfully and unrelenting as did the huge archer on the wall.
The ring of metal against metal was still in his ears when he used the guard’s key to unlock the door, only to be stopped in his tracks by an orange wall of burning flames, and over the top of them, the horrific, haunting sight of Glenna leaping out the tower arch.
26
The lengths of rope Glenna had tied to the manacle chain ended only halfway down the tower, where she was dangling. She looked down. It was a sheer drop to the lake below. Too late now, her great idea to escape down the outside of the tower didn’t look so brilliant from her current vantage point. She felt as if she were hanging off of Ben Nevis. The cat, an added nuisance, was looking at her contentedly from the sling around her shoulder. The little beast had no idea what was coming.
Clinging to the rope, Glenna used her feet to push off from the tower wall, swinging outward, trying to find the courage to let go and fall into the lake. She kept touching the wall with her feet, and shoving off, touching the wall with her feet, and shoving off….
“Glenna! Glennnnn-na!”
“Montrose!” Startled, she looked up and there he was, her beautiful golden knight, half hanging out of the arch, black smoke billowing up above him. Coughing, he tested his weight on the rope, then pulled off his smoldering gambeson and tunic in one swift motion, and crawled out, barechested, then shimmied down toward her.
A breath she hadn’t known she held escaped in relief. Her knuckles grew white she held onto the rope so tightly; it swayed and shook from his motions. Tears burned her eyes.
He had come for her. He had come for her!
Then he was there, so close the warmth of his breath touched her face and ruffled her hair. She felt his strong arm wrap firmly around her. His mouth closed over hers, and she was swept up and carried away as if lost in the waters of Lethe. There in his arms, it mattered not that they were hanging off a burning tower. She felt safe, as if she could fly like the gulls that wheeled over the sea, like the eagles that circled the treetops, or the plovers skimming across fields of heather. She clung to him as if he was her breath and blood, her heart and life.
Longing and relief ran through her veins and felt so joyous and natural and pure she questioned if those emotions came from her or him…perhaps, from them both. Together, they were different than who they were alone; they were solid and strong and one. Loving him was everything, a power to which she could surrender because instead of weakening her, loving him made her stronger.
Montrose. If she fell to her death at that moment, she would have died in complete elation, because he was holding her and kissing her, because he loved her.
The cat mewed…loudly.
He pulled back. “What have you there?”
The cat stuck its mangy head out from under her arm and looked up at them from eyes the color of the island summer sea.
“I couldn’t very well leave it to burn,” Glenna told him.
“Aye. The room is well gone. I almost didn’t make it to the arch. The floor collapsed behind and under me.” He looked down, paused, then said seriously, “You know we must jump. There is no other way.”
“Aye,” she said with mixed emotions. That water looked far, far away.
“And yet, here you are with a cat hanging off of you.”
“I planned to hold onto this cat tightly when we hit the water,” she said brightly, as if fear were the farthest thing from her mind. “And here you are with me hanging off of you.”
“I plan to hold onto you tightly when we hit the water.”
"We would not be in this situation if I'd had--"
"--your bow and arrows," he finished.
"At least you can admit it." She gave a shaky half-laugh, nerves still raw. “Montrose?”
“You need to stop calling me Montrose.”
She looked at him and said, “And you need to start calling me, your highness.”
He smiled. “So you have decided you like being the daughter of the king.”
“Only if being one gets me what I want.”
“You are prolonging this, Glenna. Look up there. Smoke and flames are coming out the arch. We have to leap.”
She nodded, suddenly as serious as he was.
“We have to let go.”
“Are you afraid?” she asked in a rush.
“Frightened witless,” he said calmly, taking a firm hold of her hand. “We’ll push off from the wall three times, then on my command, we’ll let go of the ropes together.”
She nodded and kept her eyes on his, as they planted their feet on the wall side by side, and shoved off, once, twice…thrice…
“Let go, my love,” he said as simply and evenly as if they had been walking in the woods.
Hands threaded together, they fell through the air frighteningly fast, like heavy stones, and echoing out over the water, his scream was as loud as hers.
* * *
The water was cold; it slapped and stung and was endless, swimming through it was truly endless. When Lyall feet’s finally hit the silty bottom, he pulled Glenna into shallow water, while the mewing cat, slung over his shoulder, squirmed and scratched at him. They stumbled together onto grassy land, breathless, spent and soaked.
Lyall dropped the sling between them and lay there, then rolled onto his back, breathing so hard it hurt and staring up at the blue sky, the grass feeling strangely warm beneath him.
“Solid land has never been so welcome,” Glenna muttered, laying face down on the grass next to him, her head buried in her arms. “Do I still have arms and legs? I cannot feel my limbs.”