The Rogue's Revenge

by Lucy E. Zahnle

  "The gypsy girl?" Robin's brows snapped together as a dreadful suspicion uncoiled within him.

  Beside them, Concordia grabbed Tracy's arm. "Uncle, Her Grace is struggling with Mountheathe in the back parlor! He's trying to kill her!"

  Robin whirled upon Concordia. "Lucia's here?" he almost shouted, his shocked countenance paling.

  A scream of agonized terror filled the taproom. Robin raced to the back of the inn, the others following, and wrenched open the door to the private room.

  Facing the door, Giles stood amidst broken glass, clutching Lucia before him like a shield, his arm curled around her waist. Blood dripped from the gash above his left eye as he pressed a dagger, its silvery blade glinting in the candlelight, against her white throat. He grinned at Amberley, who froze on the threshold, transfixed with horror. "Ah! So you've finally arrived, Rogue. So glad you could be here to enjoy my little entertainment!"

  Robin's heart pounded in his ears as he stepped charily into the room. Tracy, Peter, and Concordia rushed in behind him. Tulley halted in the doorway, stunned.

  "So you've stooped to hiding behind a lady's skirts, have you, Giles?" Robin said.

  "I must question whether these particular skirts belong to a lady, Rogue, but they are fetching, aren't they?" Giles fisted the fabric of Lucia's skirt in the hand which encircled her waist. "Your doxy's not in my usual style, Cousin, but I've a fancy to lift the little siren's petticoats and sample those charms which glue you so tightly to her side."

  Never taking his eyes off Robin's face, Giles bunched the skirt's cloth beneath his palm until he held the hem in his fingers, revealing Lucia's slim, ivory leg from her ankle to the top of her thigh. With the edge of his dagger, he forced her face upward and to one side, his mouth swooping down brutally on hers. She shuddered with revulsion.

  Norworth and Malkent respectfully turned their backs on Lucia's sudden indecent state of undress. Tulley stared at Giles, astounded to see any member of the gentry behave in such a manner.

  Furious, Robin took a belligerent step toward the tense couple and Giles suddenly lifted his head. "I wouldn't try it, Coz!" His eyes taunting Robin, he forced his blade harder against Lucia's throat. A trickle of blood stained her white skin and Robin halted.

  "Look at her, Rogue!" Giles shoved his hand beneath Lucia's skirt to stroke the satiny softness of her thigh. "Look at your strumpet in her natural state!" His dagger wandered down to cut the ribbon at the neck of her chemise. The garment slid a few inches down her shoulders, revealing the snowy swell of her breasts.

  His hand still curled around his dagger's hilt, Giles straightened two fingers and pushed away the ivory material to caress a coral nipple. "How wantonly she hardens at my touch, Rogue! Such sweet kisses! Such silky skin! Shall I take her for you...here and now? Or perhaps I already have! Perhaps when we were together in the darkness of my coach, I kissed her, stroked her, pleasured her...or perhaps I only pleasured myself to the music of her screams!" Giles scraped his blade across the tip of Lucia's breast. Her eyes widening at the pain, she whimpered and he laughed. "Such exquisite screams, Rogue!"

  "Damn your black heart, Giles!" Robin spat, hatred and fury choking him. "Take your filthy talons off my wife, you coward, and face me, man to man!"

  "You're eaten up with jealousy, aren't you, Coz? Has she lain with me or hasn't she? Perhaps Norworth's had her or even Tracy!" he grinned, then glanced at Malkent's rigid back. "I suppose Tracy's an unlikely candidate. Too husbandly by half. But aren't you dying to know how many lovers she's taken, Rogue?" He pressed the dagger hard against Lucia's throat. "You must tell us, Your Grace! How many men besides the Rogue have you bedded?"

  Giles was obviously waiting for an answer and Lucia rasped out, "None! None, I swear!"

  "She's lying, of course. They all do!" Giles leered. "It hurts, don't it, Rogue, to discover what an adulterous slut you've wed. Well, now you shall know the pain I feel whenever I think of that sanctimonious, self-righteous prig," he nodded at Tracy, "with my Val!"

  The affronted earl whirled around, momentarily forgetting Lucia's unseemly predicament. "My Val!" he echoed in amazement.

  Giles glared at Malkent, then pointedly turned his shoulder. "But my quarrel is with you today, Coz, and I'm ready to end it! Shall I slit your doxy's throat? Rather messy, but then all my options are. Perhaps a dagger through the heart? Very dramatic, that, and damned poetic as well!"

  He idly dragged his sharp blade across the top of Lucia's breast, his tongue caressing his upper lip as he watched blood trickle from the cut. "Crimson and ivory. Such a delightful combination," he sighed . "It must be the heart! Definitely a dagger through the heart! So romantic, don't you think? Someone will write a play or an opera about this. At the very least, there'll be a ballad!" He raised his blade with an unholy laugh and prepared to plunge it into Lucia's body.

  "Giles, no! This is between us! Lucia is an innocent. Let her go!" Fear infused Robin's appeal. "Let her go and I'll give you anything you want! I shall confess to abducting Val! I shall leave England forever! You shall have Grandpapa's fortune...all of it!...and my own as well if if you will only spare Lucia's life." He sank to his knees in supplication. "I'm begging you, Giles!"

  As Robin knelt before him, Giles savored the pleading desperation in Amberley's eyes, thrilled at the knowledge that with a single stroke he could devastate this bitterest of rivals! Drunk with his triumph and thirsting for the final victory, he thrust his dagger downward.

  The clash and clatter of smashing china slashed through the tense air. When Giles glanced up to see Tulley's gaping wife in the doorway, broken crockery littering the floor at her feet, Lucia grabbed his weapon hand and sank her teeth deep into it. Screaming, he dropped his dagger, cursing and cradling his injury as she scrambled out of his embrace.

  At the same moment, Robin lunged at him, the momentum slamming both men to the floor. They battled viciously amidst the broken glass, trading blow for blow with all the fury and resentment that had simmered in their hearts for a decade.

  In a corner of the room, Lucia clasped her loose chemise to her bleeding breasts with one trembling hand, her chest heaving as she leaned against the wall. Nausea overwhelmed her and if her stomach had not been empty, she would have been sick.

  Concordia darted past the writhing combatants to collect Lucia's forgotten cloak and place it around her shoulders. As the duchess pulled the cape closed to hide her nakedness, Concordia helped her to a chair. Lucia gave her a tremulous smile.

  After a brief consultation with Tulley, Tracy and Peter pulled Bridland and Amberley apart. "Have done, gentlemen!" Malkent said. "There are ladies present!"

  Giles snorted derisively at that, using his sleeve to wipe away the blood that still dripped into his eyes from the cut above his brow. Robin stood silently, his eyes hooded as he focused inward, trying to rip away the shrouds of fury that were clouding his judgment. He glanced at Lucia, wrapped in a cloak and sitting with Concordia. His lady was safe, he reminded himself, and relief rushed through him, bringing with it cool sanity.

  "If the pair of you are determined to murder each other, let it be as gentlemen," Tracy said as he and Peter kicked shards of glass to the sides of the room. "Tulley has some rapiers that were abandoned at the inn and he has agreed to let you use them."

  "This time I'll skewer your heart rather than content myself with a shoulder, Rogue," Giles boasted, a mocking glint in his eyes.

  "I am at your service, my lord." Robin bowed stiffly, then walked over to Lucia. He stopped in front of her chair and glared down at her. "I paid Ilya well to keep you in camp. Never say he let you go?"

  "No, I escaped! You cannot keep me prisoner, Robin."

  "Ma chérie..."

  "I had to come! I could not bear to think of...of Concordia all alone..."

  Tulley entered the room and handed the rapiers to Tracy, who looked at them in surprise. "Why, these are the weapons Robin and Giles used the last time we were here! You've kept them all these yea
rs, Tulley?"

  "Yes, milord. Didn't know what else to do with 'em." Tulley bowed and hastened out of the room, shooing his wife before him through the doorway.

  "Gentlemen!" the earl called. "Take your places, please."

  Lucia's anguished eyes slid from the gleaming rapiers to her husband's beloved face. "Robin..." she pleaded.

  "This war must be waged and won, ma chérie, or else Giles's treachéries will plague us for the rest of our lives!" He brought one of her fluttering hands to his lips, then bent and kissed her pink, trembling mouth. "There is no other way, Lucia."

  Banishing all emotion and bending his mind wholly to technique and tactics, Robin accepted a weapon and positioned himself to challenge his cousin. Malkent cried, "En garde!" and the duelists circled, exploring each other's defenses. Suddenly Giles lunged. Amberley parried him easily, countering with a series of rapid attacks which Giles narrowly deflected.

  As he summoned all his skills and swordsman's tricks, Robin's blade was a silver streak, seeming to strike in every quarter at once. Giles began to pant, his blocks growing clumsy. The tense, silent spectators watched as Robin beat Giles back without apparent effort, thrusting here, feinting there, parrying Mountheathe's blade again and again.

  A sudden vision of Mountheathe plunging a knife into Lucia's heart flashed into Robin's mind. His mental discipline vanished. Raw emotion flooded him and he hungered for vengeance, his fury blazing higher as his thrusts and lunges grew careless and his parries slowed.

  Giles's blade darted within an inch of Robin's chest and he thwarted it at the last possible moment. 'Reckless fool!' he chided himself. Forcing down all the bile he felt for his opponent, Robin substituted cool detachment for anger and his blade regained its deadly precision. Giles retreated step by reluctant step beneath his relentless onslaught.

  With a sudden flick of his wrist, Robin sent Giles's rapier clattering across the floor and Giles stumbled backward into the wall, real terror filling his eyes. Robin's smile was predatory as the point of his blade found Giles's throat. "Now, my lord! These good people are waiting to hear the truth about Lady Val's abduction."

  Giles's eyes darted back and forth. He pressed his hands against the wall, stammering, "I-I-I don't know what you're talking about, Rogue!"

  "Tell them, mon cher cousin, about our chase across England and our meeting in this very room ten years ago. Tell them of your deceit, your treachery, and your cowardice."

  Giles remained silent, hatred and fear choking him as he stared into Robin's merciless eyes. Growing impatient, Robin forced the tip of his sword into Giles's throat. Giles swallowed hard as he felt the blade's stinging bite and a warm drop of blood trickled down his neck.

  "Tell them, Giles!" Robin insisted.

  Giles stared wildly around the room, searching for an ally amidst the circle of accusatory faces, but his erstwhile friends were all waiting to hear from his lips the truth they already knew. His pleading eyes shifted back to Robin's grim countenance and he fancied he read murder in Amberley's granite gaze. Robin leaned into his weapon a little, dispassionately watching a second drop of Giles's blood follow the first.

  "Very well, yes!" Giles's frantic eyes focused solely on the length of the long silver blade at his throat. "Yes! I abducted Val, but only because she was mine! It wasn't fair for Tracy to have her! She was mine! I loved her. I still love her...more than Tracy or you or anybody else ever could! What was I supposed to do when you tried to take her away from me, Rogue? Just bow politely and step aside? She was my heart and soul and life! So I fought you and bested you! And a sweet, satisfying victory it was! Then suddenly the others appeared and I knew it was impossible to hold onto my prize. I couldn't lose everything else too! If Grandpapa found out the truth...or Clayton...or Tracy...or anyone, I would be ruined. Why should I be dishonored when I didn't do anything wrong? When I was just trying to get what I needed to live? So I hit upon a plan to blame you, Rogue. The old duke wanted to believe I was the hero and you the villain, anyway. And you, Tracy!" Giles glanced contemptuously at Malkent before turning his attention back to Amberley's rapier. " You've never looked at anything deeper than the surface! Knowing the Rogue was a rake, you were ready enough to believe the worst of him. Poor, noble Robin went like a lamb to the slaughter! For my crimes, you cut him dead and Grandpapa banished him. And you both commended me for my courage! Remember?" Giles laughed, a harsh, hollow, mirthless sound. "But never fear, Rogue! I didn't escape punishment entirely. Instead of kissing my Val's lips in the ecstatic warmth of the marriage bed, I've been doomed to a decade of kissing her hand in a cold, formal drawing room." His mouth twisted bitterly. "And now I've no fortune, no reputation, no Valeria! I have nothing, Rogue! Why don't you kill me? You've taken all else from me!"

  Tormenting memories whipped Robin into a sudden rage; visions of Lucia tortured and terrified beneath Giles's wicked blade, of Lucia crawling, half-dead, from the Brackenwell blaze, of Lucia stabbed and bleeding after her disastrous ride in the park... Then images from all his bleak years of wandering and starvation and shame flooded his mind. Those were shoved aside by earlier, more agonizing memories of the love in his grandfather eyes fading away as, in a voice ragged with anger, contempt, and pain, he cast Robin out of his family. Across the bridge of his blade, he stared at his cringing cousin. His fingers tightened around the hilt of the sword, his muscles tensing to thrust it into his confessed tormentor.

  As his fist clenched on his weapon, Lucia hurried to his side, placing a restraining hand on his arm. "You've cleared your name. It's over. Let it go, Robin!" she said. "If you kill him, you might be forced to flee England again. All you've been through, all you've achieved, will be for naught. Mountheathe will win, after all."

  He looked into her eyes, losing himself in their swirling violet depths. Suddenly, as upon the front steps of Brackenwell Hall all those long months ago, his soul was at peace. His gaze shifted back to Giles and his eyes hardened to granite, but he tossed his sword aside. "très bien! I'll not kill him if it is your wish, ma chérie, but I'll be damned if I can stand the sight of him one more second! Mon Dieu, but I need a drink."

  Robin pointedly turned his back on his kinsman and strode to the door. He wrenched it open, yelling, "Tulley! We need some brandy here!" The others in the room began to move around with a collective sigh of relief.

  Norworth stared at Amberley, feeling somehow cheated of his own vengeance. More than ever, Peter wanted to see Giles Bridland dead. He noticed Mountheathe's rapier lying on the floor and picked it up without any real idea of his own intentions.

  No one looked at Giles. Indeed, his isolation in the crowded room was palpable. Suddenly Lucia's stomach churned its' familiar warning signal and she whirled to discover Mountheathe aiming a pistol at the duke. "Robin! Watch out! He has a gun!" she screamed, flinging herself between Amberley and his cousin. Norworth and Lynkellyn turned as Giles fired.

  Peter lunged at Giles with the rapier, ignoring the ball that whistled past his head. Lucia crumpled to the floor as Peter's blade slid deftly into Giles's chest. "Die, you filthy bastard!" Peter whispered with grim satisfaction as he withdrew. His eyes growing round with shock and surprise, Mountheathe touched the wound and drew his hand away to stare at the blood on his fingers before pitching forward onto the floor.

  Robin was the first to reach Lucia. Slipping off his sash, he rolled it into a pad and knelt beside her, pressing the makeshift bandage against the wound in her chest while her warm blood bathed his hands and bitter tears scalded his cheeks. "Ma chérie! Ma chérie!" he murmured as her face grew ashen, "My wretched hide was never worth such a sacrifice!"

  Chapter 31:

  In Which Lord Norworth Kills a Dragon

  As Dr. Marne entered the private parlor, Robin halted his pacing. "Well, Doctor?"

  "I've finished cutting the ball out, Your Grace. Fortunately, the heavy folds of Her Grace's cloak slowed its' impact and distorted its' path, else it might have lodged in her lung instead of enterin
g above her collarbone. Her other injuries appear to be healing as well as can be expected, considering what you've told me of her history."

  "And the babe?"

  "I felt several strong kicks when I examined Her Grace. If she rests and remains quiet for the next few months, I believe her delivery will be successful. It will be several days, however, before she can be moved."

  "I am in no hurry, doctor. My only desire is for Lucia to be safe and well. When she can travel, she shall go to Lynkellyn Castle where she will get plenty of rest," Robin said.

  "Good!" Dr. Marne nodded. "Now, as to your cousin..."

  "I have no interest in the state of his health."

  "Nevertheless, Your Grace, with a great deal of rest and recuperation, his lordship will survive, although I doubt he will ever be quite whole again."

  Amberley's brows rose. "He will live?"

  "He came within an inch of death, but the blade miraculously missed his vital organs." the doctor said, amazed. "God must have been on his side!"

  "Or mayhap 'twas the devil!"

  "Yes, well, if any charges are to be leveled against Lord Norworth, Your Grace, you will have to press them. Lord Mountheathe will not be able to pursue his case for a long time."

  "This matter will not be food for the courts, sir. Mountheathe should consider himself lucky to be alive and at liberty. He will find himself the accused if he tries to bring Norworth to trial. I daresay nothing more will be said."

  ***

  Concordia rose self-consciously as Peter entered Lucia's sickroom. "How is she? Has she come around yet?" he asked.

  "No, and it has been a long time! The doctor cut the ball out last night! His Grace said it was a blessing that she did not awaken during the surgery, but now... Well, I'm worried."

  "It shouldn't be much longer. May I join you, Miss Lannington?"

  "Oh, yes, of course!" Concordia smiled, waving him to a chair before seating herself. "I would be grateful for some company. I have been thinking the most dreadfully lowering things..."