Brelan couldn't have cared less.
"Well, I got into that position and I opened that edict, and when I did, I grew curious." He nodded his head as though agreeing with himself. "I grew damned curious."
Brelan felt the hairs on back of his neck moving. "What did it say?"
Holm looked around, insuring himself no one was overly interested in their conversation. The wench was warming her fanny in front of the massive stone fireplace, her skirts rucked up in back; the barman was nodding beside his taps; one or two patrons were staring off into space, their eyes glazed with heavy drinking. The others were asleep, passed out, or dead. "We were told not to drop all them coffins at the reef near Baybridge." Holm lowered his voice. "We were to drop six there but the seventh we weren't." He watched the puzzled frown forming on Saur's flushed face.
"What are you saying?" Brelan was none the best for the large amount of ale circulating throughout his system.
"That seventh coffin was taken someplace else."
"Where?"
For a long time, Holm regarded him silently. The man was definitely beyond sobriety, much the less for wear, but Holm van de Lar had something on his mind that had been nagging at him and this man was the only source available who might put his worries to rest.
"How sober are you, Lord Brelan?"
"Sober enough!"
"Sober enough to listen carefully?"
Brelan emphatically nodded his head. "You betcha!"
Not really sure he should finish what he started, Holm nevertheless took a chance that Lord Brelan Saur was half the man his brother had been. But he wanted to be sure. "Can you be trusted?"
Brelan glared at the captain. "No one has ever dared to questioned my honor before, sir!"
"I ain't questioning your bloody honor, man! I asked if you could be trusted!"
"Trust me with what?"
Holm put his hand on Brelan's arm as the man was about to take a drink. "Pay attention!" he snarled, gaining Brelan's total attentiveness. "I got real suspicious about that edict, so I opened"—his face turned dark—"I opened that coffin."
Brelan flinched. "Why did you do that?"
Holm made an ugly snort. "Like I told you. I was curious. The seventh coffin was supposed to be left at the lighthouse before we cleared the lock into that narrow tunnel."
"But why did you open it?"
"To make damned sure the corpse was dead!" Holm's grip on Brelan's arm turned fierce. "It made no sense to leave a coffin when the rest of them was going someplace else."
A pained look crossed Brelan's face. "Was he…?"
"Dead, you mean? Aye, Lord Brelan, he was." He waited until his companion focused before he continued. "Here's my question. Seven coffins left Boreas to be dropped at that reef. That's what the Tribunal wants everyone to believe. Now, why do you think that is?"
Brelan yanked his arm from Holm's grip. "How the hell should I know? And why would I care? Why the hell are you telling me this?"
"Maybe you got the answer to my question."
Quaffing down his ale, bored with the man, and now just a little more than afraid for a reason he couldn't name, Brelan pushed back his chair to leave. Holm shot out a vise-like hand, gripped his arm, and dragged him down. He sat with a thud, a stinging pain roaring through his tailbone. "Damn your eyes, man! That hurt!"
The captain glared. Piercing blue eyes regarded Brelan with ill-concealed impatience and something akin to dislike. The hooked nose that made the captain's face seem both reckless and ruthless, bobbed up and down as he nodded.
"I got your attention again, Lord Saur?" he asked, hissing his question like a viper prepared to strike. The callused hand effectively clamped on Brelan's arm pinned the younger, slimmer man to the table and enlisted his full regard. Holm van de Lar gave him a look that would have quelled the fiercest warrior. "Who do you suppose was in that seventh coffin we left at Haelstrom?"
"I don't give a damn!" Brelan whispered savagely. "And if you don't let go of my arm, you'll draw back a stump!" He put his hand on the dagger strapped to his thigh.
Holm jerked Brelan's arm. "Do you know what ships drop anchor at Haelstrom Point? That's where the Borstal and the Barracoon pick up prisoners destined for the prison colony at Ghurn."
"So what?" Brelan bellowed. "Get your hand off my—" He tried to wrest his arm free, pushing at the strong fingers with his free hand. "Damn it, let go, I said!"
"When we got there, there was another prison ship anchored. One that you don't ever see at Haelstrom Point," Holm explained, ignoring Brelan's attempt to get loose.
Brelan slammed down his hand on the encroaching fingers, but the captain didn't bat an eye. His gaze was intent on Brelan's sweaty face. "What the hell do you want me to say?"
"That hell-ship was in the harbor waiting for us, Lord Saur. There were no other prisoners. They were there just to pick up that coffin. Why do you think that was?" Holm let Brelan jerk his arm away.
"I don't give a rat's ass. I care even less why you took the damned seventh one to Haelstrom, or even why you dared to open the bloody thing! And as for that ship picking up the damned bloody coffin, that concerns me even less than the piss I am royally in need of pissing!" He stood on wavering legs and steadied himself by taking a firm grip on the table's edge. He leaned toward Holm. "Why don't you ask Tohre why he sent a dead man to Ghurn colony?"
"The Vortex don't go to Ghurn, Lord Brelan."
"You just said…" Brelan wasn't sure what the man had said, but whatever it had been, he obviously hadn't paid sufficient attention to it, for the big man bounded from his chair, towering, and grasped Saur's shirt in two meaty, ham-like fists. Brelan found himself dangling in midair as the captain shook him like a wet dishrag.
"I told you the Vortex don't ever drop anchor at Haelstrom Point! No one knows where that black piece of shit docks, because the only time you see it is when it runs between Idal and Hydrea to pick up prisoners! If the Vortex picks up a prisoner whose papers read Ghurn colony, you can bet that ain't where the unlucky fellow is going. If he were, he'd have been put on the Barracoon or the Borstal. The Tribunal don't want anyone to know the real destination of its prisoners that sail the Vortex, Lord Brelan, sir; but every sea captain in the Seven Kingdoms knows where that ship winds up!"
The captain swung around the table and slammed Brelan into the wall beside them, cracking the younger man's head on the support beam that ran the width of the ceiling.
"Whatever them papers read, it don't mean nothing, you understand? The only thing for sure is this. The Vortex goes to one place and one place only with its human cargo, be it dead or not!"
Brelan saw a burst of light and would have lost consciousness if he had not been viciously shaken, his head wobbling on his neck. He tried to focus on the captain's snarling face.
"Ain't you the least bit curious, Lord Brelan, sir, to know whose coffin I opened?"
"Huh?" Brelan felt himself slipping over the edge of awareness and, with some difficulty, viewed the swelling, pulsating face hovering under his nose.
"Ain't you the least bit curious to know why the Vortex was at anchor waiting for us? And ain't you the least bit curious to know why its crew put that coffin in the Vortex's hold?"
"Captain, I don't seem to be able to…"
Holm again slammed Brelan into the wall. "What I want to know, Lord Brelan, sir," Holm growled, "is why your brother's coffin was taken to the Labyrinth Prison Colony."
"Labyrinth?" was all Brelan was able to say before tumbling into an ever-increasing darkness with that one word echoing behind him. He knew it meant something. Should mean something, but all he could do was lurch into darkness.
And with the darkness, all memory of the word, and the speaker, vanished.
Chapter 11
* * *
She was in agony.
Her body felt as though it were being ripped apart. Wide bands of intense pain flowed through her abdomen, gripping, pulling. She dug her heels into the mattress and p
ushed, strained hard against the tearing agony. Her upper body glistened with sweat. The top of her gown stuck to her heaving chest, the bottom of it pushed up over the swollen mound of her cramping belly. Her hands had a death-grip on the headboard behind her.
She struggled against the scream that pushed at her throat, bit back the wild sound striving to escape. Her back arched, and she bit into the folded rag they had placed between her teeth to keep her from biting her tongue. Her chin pressed into her chest as she rode out the agony.
She pushed.
And pushed.
And pushed.
A searing pain tore part way from her struggling body, but she could feel the spasm subsiding too soon, before she could heave her burden into the world.
It had been thirty hours already.
"Lie back," Cayn instructed.
Settling among the sweat-soaked bedclothes, she could vaguely hear Cayn's instructions to Gezelle and Sadie. Her mind was trying to free itself from this mortal plane on which she lay. She tried to block out the godawful pain draining the life from her body. It had not been this bad with either of her other two babes, even the miscarriage. She tried to smile at Sadie as the cook eased the rag from her mouth.
"Birthing is a hard thing, Milady; 'tis a woman's curse, I fear." There was a gentle look on the old woman's face. "He put you through hell and is still doing so." She bathed Liza's face with a cool cloth. "Like he did my Joannie."
Liza was too weak to question the woman's enigmatic and cryptic mumblings.
Thirty hours. Had it been only thirty hours? she thought with dismay. It felt far longer. The babe strove to hurl itself from her womb, but time after time, the pains would slacken, and she would lay exhausted, trembling from her effort. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew if the babe was not born soon, neither she, nor he, would survive.
"Cayn?" she called out weakly, turning to the Healer.
"Aye, Highness," he answered, taking hold of her hand.
Her voice was hoarse, dry. "Let nothing happen to this babe…"
The Healer looked down at her with pity. He stroked the damp hair from her forehead. "Just a wee bit longer, Your Grace. You just relax now."
"Don't let my baby die…" she whispered, clutching the man's hand to her bosom. "I care not for myself, but you must not let his babe die."
Cayn pursed his lips, his thoughts written across his aged face. He had never liked Galen McGregor. Not from the moment the mewling, ugly-red little bastard had slipped into the world from his mother's straining womb. There had been something about that babe even then that had turned Cayn against him. And he liked the young Princess' marriage to the man even less. He couldn't have cared any less than he already did if Galen's bratling lived or died.
He did, however, have a care for Conar McGregor's lady, as he would always think of Liza. He shook his head at her request. "It is you I will save if it comes to that, Liza. There can always be other children."
"No!" three women protested in unison, stunning the Healer.
Liza gripped his hand so fiercely, he could feel his arthritic bones grinding together.
"You must save this babe!" Liza pleaded. "You must let nothing happen to his child!"
"Listen to her, old man!" Sadie hissed. "You pay her heed!"
"Aye, you'd better!" Gezelle snarled.
Cayn stared at Liza. A pang of sheer hatred for Galen shot through him. What vile punishment would Liza be forced to endure if the babe did not survive? Would the surly bastard blame her? Of late, Galen had been more irrational than ever. His nightly screams awakened the entire keep.
"Cayn, please!" Liza pleaded. "You must let nothing happen to his child!"
He was about to tell her he would think on the matter, when he saw the green eyes widen in pain once more, the slender body stiffen against the contraction. He didn't have a chance to tell her to push, for her body was already straining, the slender hips arching.
Gezelle looked at Sadie MacCorkingdale and knew the old woman must have realized who the father of the Princess' babe was. Sadie nodded in understanding.
"Gezelle!" Liza whimpered, her hand shooting out to clutch at the servant girl. "Please!"
Gezelle whispered in her ear, making a vow that the babe would not be sacrificed for the mother. If she had to, she would tell Cayn who the babe's father was.
Pain. Sharp, unrelenting, and tearing, surged through her lower body. Liza heaved all her strength into pushing out the burning, ripping form struggling to be born. She felt something tear, felt the warm gush of water and blood and fluid along her thighs and under her buttocks. A scream tore through her parched mouth and soared to the vaulted ceiling.
"Oh, god!" came a loud male voice from outside the room. Something sounded against the door, angry mumbles were heard.
"You ain't going in there, Saur!" Hern's bellow could be heard to Diabolusia and back.
"The head!" Cayn shouted. "Push, Your Grace! Push!"
Another scream bubbled out of her. Liza pushed as hard as she could, her heels nearly covered in the folds of the mattress. She didn't feel Sadie holding her right hand, Gezelle her left as the two women levered her up in the bed.
"Push, sweeting," Sadie told her. "Push the little one out into this old world."
She felt an awful pain, felt something tear free, and her body shook. Her hands, which had feverishly gripped the headboard before, now clutched Sadie's and Gezelle's with equal intensity.
"One more push, Milady!" Gezelle instructed.
She squeezed her eyes and heaved.
"It's coming!" Cayn yelled. "It's…"
Liza felt the babe slip from her in a rush of liquid and pain and she slumped into the arms holding her.
"A boy!" Sadie cried. "Just like you said! 'Tis a baby boy!"
There was no need to swat this child's rear. He came into the world screaming lustily and kicking with tiny red feet that brooked no interference with its arrival. His pinched face was screwed up, raging at the injustice of being so rudely thrust out of the warmth and comfort of his mother's belly. His little chin wobbled as he bellowed his tinny yelp of indignation. The little eyes were scrunched so tightly together it appeared as though he did not wish to see what vile place he had been dropped into.
Utilizing the last of her waning strength, Liza raised her head as Cayn laid her son on her belly. Tears fell down her pale cheeks. "His name is Corbin Alexi McGregor." If the boy could not have his father's name, he'd have his initials.
Gezelle smiled at the body squirming on her mistress' belly as Cayn cut the cord with the ceremonial dagger that had severed the ties between royal Serenian mothers and sons for generations. "He's got a set of lungs on him, don't he?" Gezelle laughed.
Cayn ignored her. He was frowning even more. Why couldn't it have been a girl? Galen had been bragging for months about the son he was going to have. Why had the gods favored the little creep once more? "Sleep, now, Highness," he said a bit too gruffly. "We'll see to the brat."
Liza allowed the women to ease her onto the mattress. She looked at Gezelle and gave silent instructions. No one but Gezelle would care for this babe. No one. Gezelle would see him safe. Gezelle would protect him.
"With my life," Gezelle swore.
She was already deep in slumber before her head settled on the pillow.
* * *
Cayn handed the babe to Gezelle. He gently washed Liza's body as Sadie took away the afterbirth. Cayn tucked a folded piece of material between Liza's open thighs to staunch the blood, then drew the soaked gown from her when Sadie brought a fresh one.
Gezelle finished bathing the child, then wrapped him in a light swath of material. She held him in her arms as she and Sadie looked down at him with wonder. "He's going to break a few hearts." Gezelle sighed as she cooed to the still-bawling infant.
Sadie's mouth turned down. "Just like his father did."
"Get that brat out of here before his mewling wakes her," Cayn told them.
Gezel
le's smile faded. She felt she had to say something, but wasn't sure if she should. She looked at Sadie.
The old cook shrugged. "He needs to know if he's to take good care of this boy."
Gezelle took a tiny fist in her hand and opened the boy's fingers, not at all surprised with what she saw in the little palm. She looked up from the babe's little fist to the physician's stiff back.
"Have you looked closely at him, Healer Cayn?"
Cayn turned from the bed to gather his instruments. "He's alive. What else do I need do for Galen McGregor's ill-begotten spawn?"
Sadie shook her head. "You might need look to him to see that he is well."
"I can hear the little bastard," Cayn shot back. "He's well enough. I won't be touching him again until his circumcision, and even then, I won't touch him long!"
"Did you not make an oath to care for all your people, Healer Cayn?" Gezelle met his hard glower as he turned to stare at her.
"I am aware of my obligations, girl! I do no harm. That is the way of Healers." He sneered at the baby. "I'll do no harm to him, either. But I have no desire to see that man's whelp!" Cayn began to jam his things into his bag. "He looks like every other one I've ever delivered! Mayhap a bit more vile, considering who his father is!"
"I must insist you look to him, sir!" Gezelle told him, her face set in lines of battle. "This child is like no other you have delivered within the last twenty odd years."
Cayn turned, annoyed. How dare she speak to him in such a manner? His grimace was meant to quell the silly little chit, but the girl raised her chin and held the infant out to him. "This child is no different! He's a wee part of his bastard father! I delivered that son-of-a-bitch twenty some odd years ago, too!"
"See if you don't see something different about this babe," Sadie cautioned. "There seems to be something wrong, eh, Gezelle?"
Annoyed that his authority was being usurped, Cayn stalked over to the infant and glanced at it with disdain. "What is it I should see? It looks perfectly normal to me."
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