Black Falcon's Lady

by Kimberly Cates

  The tiny choked sob she gave twisted inside Tade as she tried to wrest herself away from him, but he tightened his arms about her, pulling her with him as he rolled back on the bed. One thigh curved over her leg as his lips sought hers. "Nay, Maura, don't. Don't cry, love."

  His mouth opened over her taut lips, crushing the sobs that tore from her throat. He needed desperately to love her one more time, show her his forgiveness with his body, since the swirl of exhaustion, the bite in the ale, had addled his wits, robbed him of the power to put his love into words. She struggled like a trapped linnet beneath him, driving the heels of her hands against his chest, twisting and shoving at him with legs tangled beneath layers of petticoats.

  In some small but still rational part of his mind he knew she was fighting to be released, but that knowledge hadn't the strength to pierce through the dizziness besetting him. "Please, Maura," he said into her mouth. "Don't . . . don't fight. I need to love you. Let me."

  His hand insinuated itself into the split that drew back her outer petticoats, his fingers clumsy as he groped for the ties that held the gown closed. Pulsing with need, he grasped at the soft tapes, but they eluded him. Frustration and hurt raked through him at Maryssa's struggles, and his hands knotted on cloth, almost tearing the narrow waistband and the pocket affixed to the inside. He paused, puzzled, as his fingertips collided not with bare skin, but with something hard and cylindrical within the thin cloth pouch.

  With a cry, Maryssa shoved him away, as though suddenly possessed of extraordinary strength, but in an effort to hold her, Tade's fingers closed tight over the object he had touched a heartbeat before. There was a sound of fabric tearing, then a clatter as glass struck wood.

  He heard Maryssa scream, saw her lunge toward the object that lay upon the floor and snatch it up. A flash of pain streaked across her features, driving back the odd dizziness that seemed to be clasping Tade even tighter. A scent assailed his nostrils, sickly sweet, familiar. The scent of the potion he had used in past months to put jail guards into a drugged sleep.

  Holy Mary… It was—

  With a savage curse he grasped Maryssa's wrist and peeled open her clenched fingers. Blood dripped, warm and crimson, over jagged edges of shattered glass, and the smell of the poppy's narcotic juices filled his nostrils.

  Disbelief and betrayal ripped through him, coupled with stark despair. He forced his eyes up to Maryssa's face, a cry of rage rising in his throat, but it was as though the drug had already robbed his lungs of their breath. "Bitch!" he croaked. "Lying bitch. You . . . you seduced me so . . . so you could drug me!"

  The candlelight streaked her tears with scarlet, as though even her sorrow bled . . . as Devin would bleed. For one hideous instant reality snapped into Tade's drug-hazed mind, slashing him with crystal-clear images of Devin's chest being split wide beneath the executioner's knife. “Tade, it was hopeless," that siren's voice whispered from the face of the devil's own angel. "Devin begged me to keep you from throwing your life away.”

  "Witch!" The cry was almost a sob. Tade's hand flashed out, knocking the broken vials from her grip. Hate tore through him as savagely as a hoodsman's blade, shattering love, trust, all hope of preventing his brother's murder. "You—you drugged me. Drugged..." Her face was rippling before his eyes, doubling, swirling. The delicate features he had loved were agonizingly beautiful even now, tormented as they were.

  "Tade, I had to—to stop you from being killed. The soldiers are waiting. It's a trap."

  "Doesn't . . . doesn't matter . . . have to help Dev.” He tried to force his feet to carry him to the door, wanting to get to the loyal men he knew were beyond it. But the floor of the tiny chamber stretched out around him as endless as the sea, and the room spun him about until he could scarcely see, let alone move.

  He staggered to his feet, feeling the room close in around him, bury him beneath a thousand crushing stones. "Maura," he croaked. "Please help me . . . if you have any mercy . . . Help . . ."

  "I'm trying to, Tade. I love you."

  Something dug into his shoulder, holding him, binding him as he struggled toward the doorway. He felt his knees buckle, his arms too weak to break his fall. The hard floor crashed into his jaw, and he could feel something warm and wet trickle over his skin. Desperately he tried to shove himself up, crawl the last few feet to the iron latch. He could hear sobbing—Maryssa's sobbing and his own—could see among the mists of his mind the lusting faces of a crowd thirsting for blood, Devin's blood. It was as though they were closing in around him, smothering him, driving him down onto the rough wood floor.

  He cried Devin's name as he collapsed, the tiny chamber shifting, wheeling, his limbs useless, leaden. Hands—cool, soft, and wet with tears—cradled his face, the silken hair brushed across his face, and a broken, tortured voice, murmured against his skin. A sob racked him, helpless, hopeless, the light from the single candle shifting into the hideous gleam of bloodied steel as the hoodsman raised his knife, plunging Tade into oblivion.

  Maryssa stared down at the dark head pillowed in her lap, the bronzed jaw twisted with pain even the opium could not dull, the lips moving in pleas Tade could no longer utter. Even through the veil of tears that poured from her eyes, the sobs that shook her whole body, she could tell that he was struggling to speak, begging her to help him save the brother he so loved. Begging her . . . the woman he had trusted, showered with his tenderness and passion. The woman who had made love to him, taken the sweetness of his body, then betrayed him.

  "I didn't want to, Tade . . . but there was no other way . . ." She pressed her lips to the clammy paleness of his brow, kissing him, hushing him as though he were a babe, whispering love-words, broken through with her own tearing loss, pleading for the forgiveness she knew would never come.

  She lifted one large bronzed hand and pressed it to her stomach, feeling its warmth against the womb that held their child. “This is your son, Tade, or the daughter you used to spin dreams about," she whispered to the man who was still thrashing restlessly on her lap. "But you—you won't be with us when she begins to kick within me, won't be with us when she takes her first steps or smiles her first smile. I would have—have loved to lay her in your arms the first time, Tade, and to see the joy in your eyes."

  She buried her face against his tear-dampened cheek. "Oh, God, Tade, I'll miss you so much. But there was nothing . . . nothing I could do." Her fist clenched in his shirt, the cuts slashed into her palm from the broken vials burning as the fine lawn dug into them.

  Both vials had been shattered, the one emptied into Tade's ale and the other, the pain-numbing potion that had been intended for Devin, now pooled upon the floor. And with old Mab halfway to Kerry, Maryssa knew there was no hope of obtaining more of the sickly sweet mixture.

  She clutched Tade even the tighter, her eyes straying to the abandoned map, then to the table where Tade's pistol lay primed and at the ready.

  Nothing I could do . . . Her own choked words drifted back to her. Nay, Maryssa thought, swallowing hard, there was one thing she could still do for Tade, and for gentle, loving Devin, if she had the courage. She shuddered, fighting the nausea and the horror that welled up inside her at the thought that had reared its hideous head. Could she . . .? God, had she the strength to . . .?

  It would be murder. Murder. And yet . . . She pressed her fingertips to her eyes, trying to drive away the images that tormented her, the images of Devin being tortured, his body broken, torn. Could she abandon the gentle priest to the cruelty that awaited him? Could she let him die screaming in agony, food for the blood lust of such a loathsome beast as Ascot Dallywoulde? She looked down into Tade's face, the beloved features anguished even beneath the haze of opium- induced sleep. His lips still pleading . . . silent.

  Dawn bled crimson across the horizon when she eased a pillow beneath Tade's tossing head and brushed his chill mouth with her own one last time. Forcing her numb legs beneath her, she dragged herself to her feet, her shaking fingers closing about
the butt of the loaded pistol.

  Chapter 20

  The Donegal sky pitched and rolled as though Saint Peter stood wrestling the devil, huge storm clouds driving in from Lough Foyle in massive waves. Maryssa turned her face into the fearsome wind, wishing that the tempest unleashed overhead could obliterate the sinister walls of Rookescommon and sweep away the masses who had gathered to see Devin Kilcannon die.

  Some five hundred of them there were, nearly bursting the high barrier of stone ringing the prison yard, crushing one another toward the base of the new-hewn gallows. It had taken half of an hour for Maryssa to weave her way through the close-packed crowd to gain the place where she now stood, a coach's length from the wood platform. Yet aside from a sprinkling of the blood-lusting beasts she'd seen at Tyburn Tree, the people who pressed close to the tools of English justice were as dark and menacing as the clouds overhead, their eyes seething with resentment as they fastened upon the soldiers surrounding the gallows.

  Maryssa shuddered as her eyes caught the flash of gold rope ripping at its anchoring high upon the wooden post, the neatly worked noose seeming to jeer at death. A sharp metal knife with a hooked blade gleamed on a small table. She swallowed hard, Devin's description of the hideous death awaiting him filling her mind.

  Desperate to quell her sick panic, Maryssa turned her eyes to those around her. Nearby a woman knelt upon the ground, murmuring prayers in Latin, while scattered among the sea of people Maryssa could see rosary beads in chilled hands, lips moving in silent pleas to the God who seemed to have deserted his gentle servant.

  Rare within this crowd was the thirst for torture Maryssa had witnessed among Sir Ascot's cronies. Most of those who waited eagerly for the spectacle to begin wore either the pointed, hungry faces of those twisted in their minds or the fanatical gleam of those whose religion allowed no tolerance of any outside of its circle.

  Even the soldiers who stood guard at the raised platform seemed solemn and silent beneath the buffeting of the wind, as though they knew there was something ignoble about the duty of tending to a holy man's death.

  And yet... Maryssa's gaze flicked again to the gleaming blades, the soldiers' task would be finished long before the executioner lowered the noose over Devin's pale blond head.

  She slipped one shaking hand beneath the secreting folds of her cloak, her fingers brushing the butt of the gun hidden within, her stomach churning with fear and horror at what she was about to do. She was about to murder Tade's brother, fire a pistol ball deep into Devin Kilcannon's chest.

  But she was glad of it. Glad... if in so doing she could spare the loving Devin even an instant of agony at the hands of Sir Ascot's charges. She closed her eyes, dredging up the hideous memory of the girl child Dallywoulde had forced her to witness being burned at an English stake, making herself remember the child's agonized screams, the flames eating at her tender flesh. The winds had made the innocent's execution brutal but swift. For a man who faced the traitor's death the agony could stretch on for six hours.

  Maryssa swallowed, forcing back a wave of nausea, forcing back the terror as her gaze flicked to the soldiers who stood at the gallows. Even though she would be damned by her father's vengeful God, she could not let good, gentle Devin meet his death that way.

  The buzzing of the crowd nearest the prison's huge barred doors drew Maryssa's gaze to where a cluster of men were passing under the archway that led out of the huge stone edifice. Crowded as she was, nearly at the foot of the gallows, she could see little except the powdered wigs and resplendent uniforms of those escorting the tall form of Devin to his death.

  Maryssa's eyes strained to pierce through the maze of faces and shoulders that blocked her view, only moments later catching the tousled white-gold gleam of his hair. A robe of coarse brown wool fell about his narrow shoulders, the wind seeming to breathe color into cheeks bruised and grayed with prison pallor. But as he placed his foot on the steps leading up to where the hoodsman now stood, it was his eyes that stole her breath.

  Crystal blue, within battered circles of flesh, they shone, not with peace or with fear, but rather with a strength that seemed to reach invisible hands into the crowd, steeling their courage, their beliefs, their resolve to battle the crushing blows England was attempting to deal the faith the Irish still clung to.

  The solemn, gentle planes of the face that had always been so unlike his brother's was now filled with the Kilcannon pride, the courage of embattled ancestors two hundred years dead who had also lost their lives and their land, but never their honor. And yet, beneath the mouth, set firm in determination, beneath the courage that squared Devin's shoulders and steeled his spine as he saw the implements that were to end his life in indescribable agony, Maryssa could see the simple, devout man who should still be bringing comfort to the dying, linking lovers in marriage, christening infants beside a burbling stream.

  Aye, Maryssa thought, her eyes burning, christening her own babe when she laid it in Tade's arms. She bit her lip, trying to stem the rising anguish that threatened to steal from her the determination and alertness so necessary to releasing Devin from his tormentors.

  The crowd surged, snarling and angry, as the stocky Protestant rector began intoning prayers for Devin's "fallen" soul. Then Captain Langworth puffed out his chest and read aloud the charges that had brought Devin to this pass: "Willfully returning from exile, poisoning the minds of the Irish with papist lies, celebrating the outlawed mass in a glen..." The enumerating of Devin's "sins and crimes" tore a hysterical laugh from Maryssa.

  She gripped the cold metal of the pistol butt in numb fingers, drew the weapon from the waist band of her petticoats, and held it beneath her cloak as Devin stepped toward the man who was to deal him such a hideous death. Desperately she tried to remember those few times she had watched a man fire such a gun, her eyes straying to the soldiers with their swords drawn, weapons ready. A sudden sharp fear assailed her as her mind darted to the distinct possibility that the guards might open fire randomly into the crowd after her pistol discharged. Or perhaps they would level their weapons at the woman who had cheated them of their chance to witness Devin Kilcannon's pain.

  If that happened, she would have no time to hold her English heritage before her like a shield, or to announce that she was Bainbridge Wylder's daughter and, as such, was protected from the law that crushed the poor cotters.

  A hush fell over the crowd as Devin stepped to the edge of the gallows platform, his eyes sweeping over the faces turned up to him. Maryssa had seen those gentle features warm with concern, sweet with love, troubled as they bore another's inner anguish. She had seen him smile gently into the eyes of little Katie, watched his eyes snap with anger when the sanctity of mass was disrupted by men's shallow prejudices, and seen that beloved face contorted in hopeless misery as he had pleaded with her to spare Tade the death that Devin himself now faced.

  His battered, rope-bound hands rose slowly, forming for the last time the sign of the cross.

  "Kill the papist scum!" a voice deep in the crowd roared.

  "Aye, cast him to the devil that spawned him," another cried in answer.

  Maryssa gritted her teeth, expecting more cruel barbs to be flung at the gentle man standing so still upon the platform, but it was as though the seething resentment and simmering anger that lurked beneath the surface of the crowd had stopped the tongues of all but the most reckless.

  The hooded executioner stepped toward Devin, grasping his arm to drag him to the noose, but in a gesture achingly like one of Tade's, Devin pulled away from the man's grasp and stepped beneath the dangling rope of his own free will.

  Maryssa fumbled with the pistol lock, the metal slick beneath fingers that were trembling and damp with sweat despite the chill. Tears blurred her vision as Devin's eyes met those of the man who was to be his tormentor. Devin's voice drifted like a benediction over those who had gathered. "May God forgive you for this day's work as freely as I do."

  Maryssa sank her teeth into her
lower lip, tasting blood and grief. "Tade," she choked, "forgive me.” She started to raise the pistol, but her hands froze as she suddenly caught the full light of Devin's gentle eyes upon her. There was recognition in that soft blue gaze, sorrow, love, and a faith so deep it crushed the hopelessness gripping Maryssa's heart.

  She breathed Devin’s name, tears streaming down her cheeks, her whole body shaking and drained. The pistol seemed to weigh more than the earth itself as she dragged it from beneath her cloak.

  She pointed the barrel toward the platform, leveling it at Devin's brown-robed chest, battling to snap back the stiff lock, then curving her finger about the trigger. Her teeth clenched as she heard the lock snap to the ready. "Forgive me, Tade. Oh, God forgive—"

  Something hard cracked into her arm, driving it skyward with a force that nearly tore it from its socket. She screamed as the pistol exploded, then flew from her hand, the report ripping shrieks from the crowd. The roar of gunpowder from Maryssa's weapon was followed by the crack of another gun on the far side of the gallows. In that one hideous instant, she glimpsed Ascot Dallywoulde's malevolent face, felt his hands crush her arm, but her terror was eclipsed by relief as a cry of shock and pain burst from Devin and his chest blossomed red. Maryssa's eyes snapped, stunned, to where Revelin Neylan's dark head was visible among the masses. She saw his fist flash skyward and heard his cry ring clear, "For God and Ireland!" A hundred guns seemed to explode. Revelin's big body jerked as countless musket balls tore into his flesh.

  Hideous sounds of terror and pain erupted from the crowd, piercing the wind's roar as the prison yard swarmed with soldiers. The men of Langworth's command poured from Rookescommon's huge doors, blocking the gate, spilling from beneath the gallows platform.