by Kris Kennedy
She tightened her hands around his face. “Vow it.”
“I vow it,” he said, and even as he kissed her, he was lifting her to her feet, taking her to their room.
Only later did she realize she had not asked the far more important question, Given a choice between Rardove and me, which would you choose?
CHAPTER Thirty-Eight
AODH WAS UP on the walls before dawn. The weather was gloomy to say the least. Large, smoky-black clouds patrolled the horizon like sullen sentinels. Down on the ground, the army assembled in the valley. A somber mood prevailed in-castle, a far cry from the festivities and enthusiasm of the past days.
“I think they will try a feint to the west side,” Ré was saying, pointing.
Aodh nodded. As they talked, he counted. He had almost two hundred men in-castle, likely another a hundred or so Irish allies inhabiting the woods around the castle. More Irish were coming, but it would take time to amass them. For now, Rardove was on its own.
The English army had at least five hundred.
Still, even from this distance, unease could be detected in the invaders camp: the army never settled, sentries walked the perimeter constantly, and a low hum hovered over the land.
“I set up villagers to listen for attempts to undermine the castle…”
Ré voice drifted off as he stared over Aodh’s shoulder. Aodh turned to see what had rendered his captain speechless.
Katarina was striding up to them…in armor. She had a handful of arrows clutched in her hand and a bow slung over her shoulder. Guns were strapped to her hips.
“Feeling barbaric?” he inquired as she drew up, and nodded to the weapons. And the armor. And the guns.
She smiled and tucked a few loose sprays of hair back behind her ear. “I am.”
“Katy, you should not be up here.”
“Certes I should,” she exclaimed.
He blew out a breath. “I should send you back down.”
She smiled at him and Ré, then turned to include Cormac in her mad happiness. “But you will not.”
He eyed her grimly. “I might.”
She gave her sword belt a little tug, settling it around her hips. “What if I ask very nicely?”
Ré looked to Aodh, his eyebrows high on his forehead. Cormac grinned.
“Please?” she said.
Silence extended, then Ré said quietly, “If she wants to fight…”
Aodh cursed and reached for her. “If you are here for battle, this is the first thing that must go.” He tugged the coif from her head.
Her hair billowed out like streamers of silk. “Do I look more barbaric this way?” she asked brightly.
“Aye,” he said, less brightly, then gestured to Bran, who came up and handed over his helm. “Go get an extra for yourself, lad,” he said.
Bran threw a grin at Katarina, then bounded off to do as bid, while Aodh tugged the linked hood of her hauberk up over her head, smashing her hair down as well as he could, then dropped the helm atop with a gentle pat.
“Your head. Let’s keep it safe.”
She pushed up on her toes to kiss his chin.
“Truthfully, Katy, for all that you’ve called me mad a thousand times, it’s you who’s the mad one,” he muttered, but inside, his heart was beating hot.
This woman was made for him.
“It’s in the blood,” she agreed, her eyes bright.
He looked up to see another armored figure come up the walls, then another. And on the stairwells around the rounded interior of the battlement walls, were lines of armored figures coming up to man the walls, two or three on each stair. From under the helms of several helms spilled long, feminine hair.
“Katarina,” he said, but she smiled and stepped away from hm.
“You did not think I could hold Rardove with only ten men, did you?” she asked in a teasing tone.
“The women,” he said in amazement as they took to the walls. His men were staring, but Katarina’s garrison simply stepped to the side and made room.
“This is how no one knew you had only ten men,” he understood in quiet, impressed amazement. “Because you had dozens of women.”
She leaned close and said in an almost gleeful whisper, “We quite line the walls at need.”
He watched them take positions, scattered among his men. “They may get hurt.”
“They may indeed. As may you. I hope not. I hope none of us do.” She reached out and put her slim hand atop his gauntleted one. “Aodh, I swear to you, I have no point to make here. If my women were not trained, they would not be up here. But we will win this thing, or we will not, together. What use are they down below? And could not two dozen more well-trained hands help?”
“Aye, they will help,” he said, looking over the new members of his regiment. “And you are sure they can use weapons?”
Great pity touched her features. “Aodh, my love, what use would a soldier be if she could not use a weapon?”
He dropped a kiss on her nose.
There was a small commotion near the front of the English army camp, then a mounted contingent rode out from its depths, flying the flag of Elizabeth and a flag of truce.
“Parley,” Ré declared quietly as the rider cantered up the pebbled path. “He wants to talk.”
Aodh nodded. He’d served under Ludthorpe; the man was both competent and decisive. The chance that Elizabeth had sent such an experienced commander to parley, rather than engage, was slim, but it must be explored.
They met on the field between the castle and the army, within bowshot of everyone.
“Aodh, good God man, what are you about here?” called Sir Charles Ludthorpe, the queen’s lieutenant commander and once Aodh’s captain, from across the field.
“You called this meeting,” Aodh called back, and Ludthorpe’s laugh replied.
They dismounted as they drew to the center. Behind him, Ré did the same; he and Ludthorpe had brought one man each to this midfield conference, within bowshot of the Rardove soldiers who lined the castle walls, and the English army encamped behind the meadow. The two commanders were open targets for everyone, which was entirely the point.
Ludthorpe vaulted from his horse before it fully stopped and strode to Aodh. “I’d never have predicted our reunion would take place here,” he announced boisterously, then reached for Aodh’s hand and pumped it. “As I recall, Con, you never much cared for Ireland.”
Aodh said nothing. What was there to say? That now that he stood again on its green earth, he felt his blood flowing as it never had before? That he knew now he could thrive nowhere but Ireland?
None of that mattered to Ludthorpe. Only surrender mattered. And that could never be.
The buckles on Ludthorpe’s vest winked in the sun as he put his hands on his hips and examined the castle defenses. Then he looked back at Aodh. “Well, what are you doing here?”
“I should think that would be obvious.”
“Then why are you doing it?”
“I should think that would be equally obvious.”
Ludthorpe blew out a gust of air. “The queen is not pleased. Not pleased at all.”
“Nor am I. She made me a vow she did not keep.”
“That is her privilege, Aodh. She is the queen.” Ludthorpe appraised him for a long moment. “Will you surrender, now, before this descends into further madness?”
“Will the queen honor her promise?”
“It was never a promise. You think we have not all had vague vows snatched away, at inopportune times, given to less worthy men, for reasons of politics or passion or whim? What if we all went about taking castles that did not belong to us?”
Aodh nodded thoughtfully, then said, “But Rardove is mine.”
Ludthorpe stared at Aodh, then gave a short bark of laughter. “No talking to you, is there?”
“I will talk. Moreover, I will listen, if the queen has something new to say. But if she says what she has ever said, ‘Yes, no, never,’ then there is no
need. I’ve heard it a hundred times. She was in error. I am rectifying it. Furthermore, I have offered to hold Rardove for her. Rardove can be loyal. Or it can be rebel. ’Tis up to her.”
A begrudging smile touched the captain’s face. “I was not sent with the authority to discuss terms other than complete and unconditional surrender.”
Aodh shook his head. Ludthorpe nodded slowly. “And what does the lady say? Lady Katarina?”
Aodh regarded him coldly. “Why?”
The commander shrugged. “Ever has she been loyal to the Crown. Now you arrive, and I receive a letter praising you to the heavens and begging for mercy on your behalf.”
“She should not have sent that.”
“But she did. Which makes her neatly into a traitor too.”
They stared at each other.
“Why do you not at least send her out to me?” Ludthorpe proposed. “Let her step aside, away from this madness, while we handle the matter. She need not be implicated, nor have any blood on her hands. In fact…” He eyed Aodh. “If you send her to me, I will protect her, destroy her note. The queen need never know she turned, not even a quarter turn. She will be blameless. And in that wise, however this matter turns out, whosoever prevails, she will be protected.”
His chest felt tight. It was an unforeseen offer of kindness, one that would, indeed, protect Katarina no matter what transpired. Aodh had no vision for the future but success, and yet…and yet, Katarina should be protected at all costs, by whatever means.
And yet….
He took a slow breath, then turned and pointed at the castle walls.
“Do you see the soldier in the front of the northwest tower?” he said quietly.
Ludthorpe nodded.
“See the hair?”
Ludthorpe stared, then made a sound of surprise. “Methinks I see hair on a goodly number of them.”
“You do. They are hers. That is she. The lady of Rardove.”
“Armed?”
He nodded.
“Good God,” Ludthorpe exclaimed in a low breath. “On your behalf?”
Pride and fear moved through him in equal measure. “Aye.”
Ludthorpe turned, squinting against the rising sun, his teeth bared in a grin. “You are not to be believed, Aodh,” he said. “Send her to me, and I swear, she will not be harmed.”
“It is not my choice to make, my lord.” Aodh turned for St. George. Ré did as well, a silent shadow.
“It will not be pretty,” the commander said as they swung up.
“No, it will not.” Aodh gathered his reins and nodded toward the tree-lined hills that surrounded them. “There are a lot of Irishmen out there.”
“My scouts estimated a hundred,” Ludthorpe revealed. “Not so many.”
“More are coming.”
“That is good to know. I do not intend to be here long.” The commander pointed to the bright green meadow that stretched in front the castle. “That thing ate one of my cannons.” The top half of the long gray barrel of a cannon could be seen, pointing up at an odd angle out of the vibrant green. Its back end and lower portion had been sucked under.
Aodh smiled faintly. “It’ll eat everything: armament, horses, men…’tis a hungry meadow.”
Ludthorpe laid his hand flat over his brow and peered at the keep. “So the path is the only way,” he muttered. “The cliffs behind are far too treacherous.”
“The path back to England remains open to you.”
Ludthorpe lowered his hand and clapped it against his thigh. “Well, that’s that, then. I am sorry it has to end this way, Aodh.”
“As am I. Would your men want some whisky?”
The commander’s eyes lit up. “Jesus God, man, yes.”
Aodh smiled. “I’ll have some sent out.”
“Anything to lift their spirits. These winds, this wet…”
“God-awful.”
“How does one do it?” Ludthorpe asked with a burst of impatience. “Live out here, in all this?”
“Ireland isn’t for everyone, my lord.”
Ludthorpe met his eye. “But it is for you, eh? At all costs?”
“All of them.” Aodh and Ré reined about.
“She always favored you, Aodh,” Ludthorpe called. “She would be lenient.”
“The queen was always lenient if I did her bidding. Under all other conditions, she is perilous. If you think otherwise, Charles, you do not know her.”
*
BERTRAND, LORD OF BRIDGE, stared at Ludthorpe when he rode back into camp. “You mean to say you simply let him go?”
“I did,” Ludthorpe replied curtly, sliding off his horse and striding purposefully into his tent.
Bertrand followed, scowling. “Why?”
“I was within arrowshot of a hundred bowmen.”
Ludthorpe bent over his small camp desk and scribbled out a few words on a piece of paper, then handed it to a young soldier who stood waiting.
Outside the tent, the campfires were burning. Soldiers stood around them, eating cold food and drinking warm ale and glancing up into the darkening hillsides and forests that surrounded the valley. Unease flowed through the camp like a fog. All around, the trees seemed to move and whisper as evening winds kicked up. But it wasn’t the winds rustling amid the trees; it was the Irish.
No one had expected him to amass allies so swiftly. And if Aodh spoke true, more were coming. Ludthorpe saw no reason to doubt it. Indeed, he’d just received intelligence reporting the O’Fail tribe was mustering, and that was trouble. They would be here in a few days. All the more reason to get the hell out of Ireland.
Aodh had always been exceptionally persuasive, Ludthorpe thought with grim admiration. In only this one matter, of Rardove, had the man failed to get his way.
And it was upon this one that his life would hang.
A pity, the arrogance, and stubbornness, the foolish commitment to a cause that did not translate directly into money or comfort. For Ludthorpe, causes were a waste of time and manpower. Food and featherbeds mattered far more, particularly as he got older. If he handled this matter of Aodh and Rardove to the queen’s satisfaction, he would get precisely that, via a grant of the monopoly on the pepper. A rich retirement awaited.
Still, Ludthorpe had to admit, he admired Aodh. And he certes liked him far better than the noble idiot now crowing in his ear, Bertrand of Bridge.
“You should have lured him closer to our side of things, and we’d have had a clear shot at his head,” Bertrand complained.
“Had I lured him into my tent, Bridge, we were still in parley. Those are the rules of parley: you do not kill each other.” He pushed away from the desk and stared out of the tent. Through the flap, which was tied open, twilight grayed the sky. The campfires shone as bright red dots across the plain.
Bertrand hurried out of the tent after him. “Rules?” At the high-pitched angry word, soldiers turned to stare. “Rules? What is a rule?” Bertrand demanded. “Against the Irish, the only rule is burn them out. Stamp them flat. You are a fool, Ludthorpe, if you think—”
“Have a care, Bridge. Rules are the only thing that keeps me from taking a broadsword to you right now.”
The commander called for one of his men, then swung back suddenly and said, “I know not what the queen sees in you, Bridge, but heed me: do not gainsay me in front of my men again. If you do, I will push you outside our lines myself, and let the Irish have their way with you.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
WALTER APPROACHED KATARINA in the gardens the next afternoon, while she was laying down a new row of onions.
She could stare at the army only so long. Nothing seemed to be happening—Aodh was correct, no army could lay an effective assault on Rardove. So it seemed they were in for a long siege. Rationing had begun, but again, even there, Rardove provided: men had tromped down to the seas by the treacherous cliff pathway just this morning and netted a large catch of fish.
Being in the garden not only gave her somethi
ng to do, it was soothing to be kneeling in soft piles of dirt, concerned with nothing but how to make something small, grow. Beside her, Susanna crouched, her happy, undemanding chatter as soothing as the sun and earth.
Walter’s shadow fell over her and he said in an urgent voice, “My lady, come swiftly.”
Startled, she yanked her hands out of the dirt and stared in shock. Walter’s face was sooty, and he smelled of smoke, as if he’d been standing over a fire. “What happened?”
“There was a small fire—”
She shot to her feet. “Where?”
He waved his hand. “All is contained now, my lady. But you must come. Hurry.” He glanced around nervously as he said it.
She wiped the dirt from her hands and swiped her arm across her forehead. “Walter, I—”
“Come my lady, ’tis most urgent.”
She let him hurry her to the northern side of the bailey, which backed up to the cliffs below. This portion of the castle was generally deserted, used mostly for storage: old barrels were stacked by the wall and two or three broken-down carts stood ready to have someone finish the job and turn them into something useful again. The old bakehouse listed sideways and now housed small scurrying creatures instead of bake fires.
“Walter, what is it…?” she asked in a faintly complaining tone.
“Someone to see you,” he said, drawing up at the little postern gate that opened just over the cliffs.
“See me?” she said in surprise.
“From the village.”
Originally built to allow small parties of occupants to leave without being detected during sieges, the gate led to an extremely narrow pathway, rocky and slick with sea spray, that scaled down the hillside toward the village. Occasionally, at great need, villagers still used it, when they wished to reach the castle quickly, as it was a much more direct route. It was also much more treacherous. Villagers used it only at times of great need.
With a chill of fear, she hurried to it. Walter swung the door open and hurried her through.
As he shut the gate behind them, two English soldiers stepped in from each side.
She stared for an uncomprehending second. Then they grabbed her, wrapped her up, gagged her, and carried her off to the army camp. Walter hurried behind.