The Earl: Order of the Broken Blade: Book 4

by Mecca, Cecelia

  Roysa looked to Cait for the answer, as she had not yet been to Bradon Moor.

  “’Tis a complicated matter,” she admitted. “People outside of our clan don’t understand it. But those who love my mother, and there are many, understand why Terric has joined the fight. The English king”—she frowned—“our king and his father have wronged her in many ways.”

  These women knew her parents’ past, and hers. They knew the English king’s role in her mother’s inheritance being taken away. They knew one of his closest advisors had attempted to rape her. None questioned her clan’s loyalty. “Others, of course, believe Terric’s duty is to Clan Kennaugh. And not to Dromsley. They think he should be back in Scotland.”

  Roysa reached for her sister’s hand. “As for what happens after this is over, I’m not yet sure, but Bradon Moor is just across the border. And you”—she shifted her gaze to Cait, then Sabine—“all of you will only be a few days’ ride away. It does not matter if the land is called by a different name.”

  The bleak hollowness that had filled her at the start of the meal all but gone, Cait smiled at Roysa, Idalia, and Sabine. The sisters she’d always wanted but never had. Her eyes swelled with tears.

  “I am thankful for each of you,” she said. “Grateful to have been brought into your lives.”

  It would be beyond cruel if the extended family she’d only just found was torn away from her so soon. They had to have been welcomed through the city’s gates. They had to be okay.

  She simply could not entertain the alternative.

  Chapter 30

  “Those walls have been scaled but once, and never successfully. Perhaps we should . . .”

  Noreham stopped. He was looking at something over his shoulder.

  Conrad waited for him to continue, their talk of preparations to move on London continuing.

  “Conrad, look.” Lance stood next to Noreham. His expression had been grim for most of the morn. But not now. The blacksmith actually smiled.

  Turning to the open flap of the tent in which they had gathered, Conrad could not believe what he was seeing. It could not be . . .

  They’d given up hope for it.

  “’Tis gone.”

  The Plantagenet banner, the red and gold that had been taunting them all morn, was, indeed, gone.

  He did not hesitate.

  “Now,” he shouted. “We ride now!”

  His words were met with cheers, but they could not celebrate just yet. There was much that could still go wrong. And yet, it felt like a sign the tide had turned, once again, in their favor.

  “The banner is gone,” he said to Guy, almost in wonder.

  Guy clapped him on the back. “’Tis good news, my friend.”

  They shouted orders to their men, getting them mobilized, and then ran to their mounts. Conrad waited impatiently as his squires fixed his arming cap into place, his helm and gloves the only two items he had to put on as they’d all been suited much earlier that morn.

  His men knew their positions.

  They had all prepared for this.

  Mounted, he waited for the others. Lance, Guy, Terric . . . they would ride alongside him in the lead, as agreed. None hesitated. If they were to take the city unawares during mass, they didn’t have much time.

  Charging down the mountain, ahead of all other men, and watching the twin towers of Aldgate loom closer and closer, Conrad said a silent prayer, summoning the strength, if not the impetuousness and temperament, of his father.

  Together, they would seize a different path, a different future for England. Conrad would face worse odds for Cait. For Licheford.

  With only the slightest of pauses, Conrad rode over the drawbridge and into the city whose gates were, indeed, open and unmanned, side by side with his brothers, who’d formed an order that could have gotten each of them killed for being traitors.

  Still could, but it seemed less likely with every passing moment. Not only were the gates unmanned, but it was as if a plague had spread through this section of London. Conrad did not know how their supporters within the city gates had managed it, but they’d not spotted one person yet.

  Nay, that was incorrect.

  There were two, actually. And he knew one of them, though not the companion, well.

  FitzWalter rode toward them.

  That he was not armored told Conrad all he needed to know. Yanking off his gloves and helm, he addressed the southern leader of their rebellion as he rode toward them.

  “’Tis a relief to see you.”

  “Pardon the delay,” FitzWalter shouted back. Shouting was necessary, for the mounted men who entered Aldgate behind them were anything but silent.

  Guy laughed beside him, and Conrad could not blame him. They’d almost attacked the greatest city in England because of that “delay.”

  “A story for another time,” FitzWalter said. “Do the men know their positions?”

  Even as he spoke, the men riding behind them began fanning out in different directions. They all had their part to play, a plan they’d fine-tuned over the last few days. Within minutes, the entirety of London would be occupied. When John’s supporters realized as much, there would be bloodshed that day.

  Their work had only begun, but he felt assured of their success.

  “They do.” He nodded to the others, only Guy without a helm as was his custom. Without another word, all four departed, Conrad raising a fist in parting to FitzWalter. “You’ve done well,” he shouted, riding past him.

  “’Tis your turn,” he heard from behind.

  Indeed it was. More than fifty knights followed him, their destination, Westminster. Soon, church bells would ring, the streets would be flooded with people, noble and common, and they would all learn what he and his supporters knew already.

  London had been seized by rebels. If the king refused to meet their demands, Louis, the son of King Philip, could sail unopposed up the Thames to the very abbey Conrad sat in front of now. The one that hosted the coronation of England’s kings.

  The future of London, of England, was now theirs.

  Chapter 31

  “Riders,” Idalia cried, running into the hall. “Riders have been spotted just outside the gates.”

  “How many?” Cait asked, jumping from her seat so quickly the edge of her sleeve dipped into the bowl of stew in front of her.

  Eight nights they had been gone, each of them worse than the last.

  As Cait hastily attempted to clean her sleeve, the others abandoned her to the task. A maidservant handed her a linen serviette, and Cait took it with shaking hands, too flustered to do much with it. The girl took the serviette back, dipped it in a goblet of water on their table, and completed the task for her.

  With a grateful smile, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She was eager to join the others, but a part of her hesitated to do so. She feared what they might have learned. Even so, she’d learned the steep cost of avoidance. She thanked the girl and slowly made her way outside of the keep and into the courtyard.

  Her heart lurched at the looks on the other women’s faces.

  “What is it?”

  Sabine spoke first. “They say there are only a few riders. Four men.”

  “That . . . that cannot be.” Why so few? What did it mean? Where were the others, the hundreds who had ridden out? “No, that cannot be,” she repeated.

  Cait looked to Roysa, but she did not appear any more inclined to offer an explanation than the others.

  Four men.

  Though darkness had just begun to fall, Cait fixed her gaze on the long pathway leading away from the castle. She watched it, as did they all, for any kind of movement. The courtyard filled with curious onlookers, the steward included. But still, no riders.

  She could not breathe. This was just like waiting in Dromsley Hall during the battle—looking for her brother, searching each face with mingled hope and dread. Only now she also awaited news of Conrad.

  And then he rode into view—a
magnificent figure of a man astride a massive destrier. He loomed large and imposing, just like he had upon her arrival at Licheford weeks before, but there was a difference this time.

  Before, Conrad had seemed shocked, although not altogether pleased, to see her.

  This time, he smiled.

  She quickly scanned the others but did not recognize any of the men.

  “Terric?” she called as the others questioned Conrad at the same time. Although he was riding toward them quickly, his horse kicking up dust in his haste to get to them, he did not wait to speak. Maybe he could see the worry in their faces.

  “All is well,” he shouted. “London is ours. I’m here to bring you to them.”

  The screaming was not just her own. Roysa and Idalia hugged as cheers erupted from all around them. But Cait only had one thing on her mind.

  She ran toward Conrad, and by the time she reached him, he had dismounted. He gathered her in his arms and kissed her, not stopping even when whooping and clapping erupted from the courtyard. Only when she broke away to ensure his words were true did the cheers cease.

  “Terric is well?”

  Conrad nodded, handing the reins of his horse to a stableboy. When a second moved to help the first, Conrad stopped him.

  “Will you take this?” he asked, removing his gloves. “And this?” He removed his light armor with the boy’s help as Cait and the others watched in confusion.

  “A bath, if you please,” he called to the steward, who immediately disappeared into the keep.

  Conrad smiled at her as Cait finally realized what he was doing.

  “I regret I’m unable to give you a full accounting,” he said to the others, looking at Sabine, who smiled back at him as a sister would. “The men will do so for me. I can tell you this, London is ours. The cause has been won.”

  “Won?” Sabine asked, her eyes wide. “Do you mean . . . ?”

  “King John will meet us in six days’ time at Runnymede.”

  Cait was too stunned to respond.

  “Meet you?” Sabine mumbled. Cait could tell her friend fought off tears. This rebellion was as important to her as it was to any member of the order. Her parents had died fighting the king’s unjust policies—her father was one of the original dissenters who had paid the ultimate price.

  “Aye,” Conrad said, taking Cait’s hand. “Within days of learning of our occupation of London, he took all of his provisions to Bramber Castle. Having lost the treasury and Exchequer at Westminster, he had no choice, really. We received letters of safe passage just before I left to come here. We meet with him on the fifteenth of June.”

  Cait’s heart raced.

  “We,” he repeated. “All of us. I’ve come to escort you all there.”

  When Conrad looked to her, Cait knew what this meant. His barely perceptible nod confirmed it. It had been his idea to come for them. To include them.

  To include her.

  “The men will explain in greater detail. But prepare to ride out in the morn.”

  “The men?” Roysa asked. “Why do you keep saying that? Where are you . . .”

  She stopped, realizing Conrad’s intent. At the same moment, Cait’s hand was tugged in the direction of the keep. And then he lifted her into his arms, the women bursting into giggles behind them.

  “Will you join me for a bath?”

  “Is the choice mine?” she asked, pretending not to notice the looks they were getting as they passed through the courtyard.

  “Nay,” he admitted. “’Tis not.”

  All the way to their chamber, Cait pressed her head to his chest, listening to his heartbeat, assuring herself he was alive and all was well. She felt safe for the first time in days, partly because he was safe.

  “Is that smile for me?”

  He put her down just before opening the door.

  Though there were not as many candles as there’d been the night of their wedding, the servants had arranged the large wooden tub just before the fire, in the very spot where they’d first made love.

  Conrad set his sword on the sole table in the room, and Cait’s eyes followed his fingers as he untied the leather belt at his waist. She sighed, actually sighed, when he took off his surcoat and tunic, revealing his sculpted body.

  “Yours,” he said, continuing to undress. “This is yours. I am yours. Everything you see is yours, Cait. It has been, always.”

  Before she could think of a proper response to words that both dried her throat and made her pulse quicken, her husband was in the tub. Grabbing the soap that sat on a wooden stool next to him, he disappeared into the water. Cait took off her gown and then her shift.

  If she had thought Conrad handsome before, he looked even more so as he emerged from the water and slicked back his wet hair. When his eyes found her, Cait’s heartbeat raced even more.

  The way he looked at her . . .

  Shoulders back, as proud as if she wore the most fashionable gown at court, Cait strode to the tub. Under his gaze, Cait felt more powerful than she ever had in her life. There was no mistaking the hunger in his eyes.

  For her.

  She did not wait for him to ask. Instead, Cait stepped up onto the wooden stool beside the tub. Conrad reached up to take her hand and guided her into the tub. Though it was nearly as cramped as the first time, it somehow felt right that their reunion should be here.

  Without a word, he guided her leg to one side, and she straddled him. This conqueror of kings, very much in Cait’s control, both of them consumed by the same need.

  Without a word, Cait leaned down. Conrad’s hand snaked through the hair at the nape of her neck. Grabbing a handful of it, he pulled her down the rest of the way until their lips met. His mouth slanted over hers, covering it completely. Every bit of him demanded. And Cait was happy to meet those demands.

  Reaching beneath the water, she tested her special powers and was rewarded with a moan from Conrad that vibrated against her lips. When his hand covered hers, both of them guiding him into her, Cait cursed herself for having waited so long to come to him.

  Better to treasure what we have now than bemoan what we’ve lost.

  And she did treasure him.

  As he slid in and out, Conrad massaged her buttocks with his hands, every bit of Cait bursting with pleasure. Reveling in the heat of the fire next to them, the heat created between.

  The slow lovemaking became a frenzy of tangled limbs and splashed water. Even more so than the first time, their joining signified the end of a very long journey as two separated people became one.

  “It feels so good,” she said, breaking away reluctantly but needing some sort of temporary reprieve from the sensations that threatened to overwhelm her.

  “I love you, Cait.”

  As if reinforcing the tenderly stated words, Conrad thrust into her, and Cait did not hold back. She met him, hips circling in the rhythm they’d created, thrust for thrust. She wanted to say the words back, but no sound came from her.

  At least, none that formed coherent words.

  When Conrad’s jaw clenched at the same time as the muscles in his shoulders flexed, the sheer power of her husband coupled with the very gentle way he held her hips . . . Cait could not hold on any longer.

  “Conrad . . .”

  With one final thrust, Cait finally let go. The power, regret, love, pleasure . . . all of it mingled between them as she cried out his name.

  Her entire body shuddered as Conrad’s head fell back against the side of the tub. Collapsing atop him, Cait somehow managed to hold her head just above the water.

  With his help.

  “I cannot move,” she said finally. “Nor do I wish to just yet.”

  Conrad pushed a strand of her hair behind her ears.

  “If we stayed in this tub forever, I would die a happy man.”

  Cait smiled. “That may very well be true. But I think you would have a difficult time explaining to Terric why you did not appear at Runnymede.”

  Conr
ad sighed. “I suppose you are correct.”

  She pulled off of him and began to move away when he stopped her.

  “Just one more moment.”

  As he looked at her, a question in his eyes, Cait realized what her husband waited for, and she said the words gladly.

  “I love you too. Always.”

  Chapter 32

  Runnymede, England, 15 June 1215

  “Will you come with us?” Conrad asked.

  Cait had just entered their tent to fetch a mantle for protection against the cold. They’d been in this open meadow between Windsor and Staines for just over a sennight, the negotiations having taken longer than anyone had expected. Last eve, however, just after the sun had set, the men had come back with the happy news.

  It was done.

  They’d finally agreed on all sixty clauses of the Charter of Runnymede, and it was being readied for them to sign. And although the king had returned to Windsor Castle each night rather than stay in this tent city that had been erected, he would be present this morn.

  “I am not needed,” she said to her husband, grateful for the invitation nonetheless.

  When his hands slipped around her waist, Cait leaned into him, enjoying a warmth more profound than any mantle could give her. Would she ever become accustomed to her husband’s closeness? When he was near, she had difficulty thinking of little else besides his touch.

  “I need you.”

  He brushed her hair aside with his chin, his lips finding her neck. Cait tilted her head to the side to give him better access.

  “You do not,” she chided, Cait’s core clenching as he kissed just under her ear. She swallowed.

  What were they discussing?

  His tongue?

  Nay, their meeting with the king.

  “Conrad—”

  He spun her around, his lips capturing hers. As he kissed her, Conrad took the mantle from her hands and slid it over her shoulders. She felt the warmth of the soft fabric enveloping her. Much as Conrad was doing with his arms.