by Diana Cosby
His uncle stumbled back.
As Cailin moved forward, the earl regained his balance, rounded his sword in a vicious swing toward Cailin’s legs.
He jumped. Forged iron slid a hand’s width beneath his boots. Before he could gain his feet, his uncle slammed against him, his foot jamming into his injured leg. Pain screamed through him as he fell to the ground, his uncle’s body landing hard on top of him, trapping his sword arm.
Nay! Cailin kneed his uncle in the gut, rolled and pinned Gaufrid. In a move honed by his years of fighting with the Templars, he withdrew his blade and pressed a dagger to Gaufrid’s throat.
Eyes frantic with fear widened. “Spare me!”
Fury pouring through him, Cailin ached to shove harder until every last drop of blood was emptied from his worthless carcass. “However much I want to kill you, shame is a fitting penance.” He hauled him to his feet, shoved.
Gasping for breath, his uncle stumbled back.
“From this moment on,” Cailin roared, “as Earl of Dalkirk, I banish you from my lands, and all will know your shame!”
Desperation darkened his uncle’s gaze. “I have naught.”
“You have your life.” Cailin sheathed his sword. “Which is more than I should allow after you killed my parents.”
Hand trembling, his uncle reached for his broadsword on the ground.
Cailin stepped on his weapon. “Keep your dagger, nay more. Go!” Gritting his teeth against the pain in his leg, he picked up the broadsword, then strode past Gaufrid, ignoring his eyes dark with hate. ’Twas done. Now to check on Elspet, then he would—
“Cailin, behind you!” Sir Donnach called.
Cailin whirled as he withdrew his blade.
Dagger clutched between his fingers, a merciless smile creasing his face, Gaufrid angled his hand as he started to throw.
Before the blade could leave his uncle’s hand, Sir Donnach’s dagger whipped past Cailin, sank deep in the earl’s chest. Blood trickled down his garb as he gripped his chest and collapsed.
Silence fell upon those on the wall walk.
“The earl is dead,” a man shouted from above.
“The true Earl of Dalkirk lives!” Sir Donnach walked over to Cailin, bowed in deference, then stood. “Long live the earl!”
Cheers rose from the castle, and the church bell began to ring.
Cailin stared at his uncle, a man whose entire life was devoted to power, to evil. “’Tis over.” He nodded to one of the guards. “Take him away.”
“Aye, my lord.” The guard hurried toward Gaufrid’s body.
Cailin met Donnach’s gaze. “I thank you.”
“’Tis unnecessary,” the knight said. “You won the challenge.”
“You saved my life, an act I willna forget.”
A wry smile touched Sir Donnach’s mouth. “As I remember, you rescued me when I almost drowned in our youth. We are even.” He knelt. “I swear my fealty to you, my lord.”
The other knights dismounted and followed suit.
* * * *
Streaks of dawn broke through the sky before Elspet was settled in his chamber at Tiran Castle. At her moan, Cailin strode over and sat beside the bed, his combat with his uncle but a memory. “I am here.”
A frown wedged upon her sweat-laden brow, then smoothed as she continued to sleep.
“Elspet,” he rasped, the hours of watching her, praying for her fever to break strangling his every thought.
The thick, deep gray blanket seemed to swallow her as she remained still, the dark hues of the weave at odds against her pallor.
Panic rising, he glanced at the healer, wanting to scream his frustration, understanding too well that caught in the throes of fever, her life could be lost in a trice.
Aged eyes dark with concern held his. “You havena left her side all night. The bed in the next chamber awaits you. Try to rest, my lord. If she awakens, I will alert you.”
My lord. A title he’d yet to become used to. And with Elspet’s life in the balance, the legacy he’d fought for meant little. At this moment, he’d give up everything for her life.
He shook his head. “I canna sleep.”
A soft rap sounded on the door.
He glanced up. “Enter.”
Rónán stepped inside, followed by Lord Odhran and Taog.
“How is she?” the Templar asked.
“Still asleep.”
His friends halted near the bed. “Has she woken at all?”
“Nay,” he rasped.
“I willna ask if you have tried to sleep,” Rónán said. “You look like Hades.”
Cailin rubbed the back of his neck, gave a rough exhale. “I closed my eyes a time or two, but all I see is her taking the dagger meant for me. If only I had attacked the castle earlier, she would be—”
“’Tis done,” Taog snapped. “You made the decision you believed best at the time, a choice I supported.”
“As I.” Lord Odhran stepped forward. “Your people await you. They have heard naught but lies fed to them by your uncle and need to know you are a man they can trust, one who will treat them fairly, a leader they can turn to.”
His people.
He glanced at Elspet. Face pale, her breath came in the slow, steady rhythm of sleep.
Aye, ’twas his castle, the people within his responsibility. After all that was sacrificed, never would he fail them. As well, familiarizing himself with his stronghold, getting to know residents, making a list of things that needed to be done would keep his mind busy.
Cailin turned to the healer. “After I meet with my people, I will be going through the castle ledgers with the steward. If Elspet wakens, send for me.”
She nodded. “Aye, my lord.”
* * * *
Late afternoon sunlight spilled through the crenellations, leaving shadows like jagged teeth as Cailin forced his legs to move as he crossed the wall walk. The day’s events had aggravated his injury and every step was painful.
Rónán opened the door to the turret leading to the dungeon. “You are all but stumbling on your feet. Go, sleep. I will check the dungeon and report to you later.”
Caught in the golden rays of sunset, the entry blurred before him. Gritting his teeth, Cailin entered, started up the steps, using the wall for support. “After I am done, I will check on Elspet, then try to rest.”
“With the way you are weaving on your feet, I may have to carry you back.”
Cailin grunted, shoved up another carved stone step.
“Bloody stubborn.”
“Nay, irritated that I havena been here earlier.” Torchlight wavered upon the dank, curved walls as he went. “After I spoke with the people of Tiran Castle, I visited Sir Petrus. God’s blade, after the beating he took, ’tis a miracle he still lives.” He shook his head. “Gaufrid died too quickly, but at least he is dead. To think, I was going to do naught but banish him. I was a fool.”
“You are an honorable man. However horrific your uncle’s actions, you didna want family blood on your hands. When most would have slain him without question, you offered mercy.”
“Which the bastard discarded.” Cailin jerked open the dungeon door. The stench hit him first. Their progress tangled with the moans of men as the scrape of sodden wood reverberated within the dank, cold chambers. “God in heaven, to allow anyone to live in such filth. Rónán, fetch the steward. Tell him to bring me a list of every man within and the charges against them immediately.”
“Aye.” Face grim, his friend hurried out the entry, pulling the door behind him.
Bile rose in his throat as he slowly walked the length of the dungeon, noting the fear in the men’s eyes, those who dared to look at him. He shuddered to think what they had endured beneath his uncle’s cruelty.
Near the end of the walkway, chained in a cell,
an elderly man stood stooped, leaning against the wall.
He remembered briefly seeing the man when they’d slipped in to rescue Sir Petrus. Regardless of his fate, though dressed in rags, his frame thin and his face streaked with bruises, he held himself with pride.
Familiarity crept up Cailin’s spine. He stilled. God’s blade, he knew him. He struggled to remember the names of men he’d known as a child. The few that came to mind he dismissed as they’d be the wrong age.
Legs trembling, Cailin braced his feet and held the man’s gaze, furious that even an elder wasn’t spared his uncle’s torture.
The old man coughed, a deep, rattling sound. Eyes bright with intelligence narrowed.
“Gaufrid is dead,” Cailin said, finding it important that the man should know. “I have come to free you.”
“A bloody lie.” With a snarl, the prisoner glared at the door. “Gaufrid is out there, ’tis yet another of the bastard’s tricks.”
The rough, familiar voice had Cailin’s pulse racing. “Who are you?”
Nostrils flared with fury. “As if you dinna bloody know. What is Gaufrid’s plan this time?” he snarled. “Nay doubt he has invented another punishment to appease his warped mind.”
“Your name,” Cailin demanded, chilled by the sense of urgency.
His gray hair and beard hanging in oily strands, he drew himself to his full height. “The rightful Earl of Dalkirk!”
Chapter 19
Cailin’s knees almost buckled as he stared at the man behind the forged bars, chained to the wall like an animal. A man he’d loved, a man due to his uncle’s treachery he’d believed dead. “Father!” he cried.
The elder’s face wrinkled with suspicion, then he moved as far forward toward the door as his chains would allow. His mouth parted, and tears began to roll down his face. “S–son, can it really be you?”
“Aye.” He struggled to breathe, expecting any minute to awaken and find ’twas all a dream. Ever since his youth, he’d believed him dead. But here, now, he’d been blessed with the most precious gift. “Gaufrid told me you were dead.”
His father wiped the tears from his eyes. “My brother told me you had died at sea. ’Twould seem,” he spat, “the bastard lied to us both.”
Metal scraped as Cailin fumbled the key into the lock, turned it. Hands shaking, he jerked open the door and wrapped his arms around his father, and for the first time since he’d been told of his father’s death years before, he cried.
When his body stilled, Cailin freed him from his chains and stepped back, taking in his gaunt frame, the ragged, filthy garb, the worn holes in his cracked boots. “How long have you been here?”
“Since the day your mother and I and Gaufrid went hunting when you were a lad.”
“Is she alive?” he asked, praying for another miracle.
The joy in father’s eyes faded. “She is dead. While I was out of sight during the hunt, Gaufrid killed her. A fact I didna learn until I woke up in the dungeon. ’Twas then that my brother revealed how he had crept up and hit me while I held her lifeless body.” His mouth curled into a snarl. “Over the years, my brother found perverse pleasure in keeping me alive, trying to break me.”
After the reports of his uncle’s twisted ways, something Cailin could believe.
“For several years, he kept me in a secret location,” he continued. “At times he would beat me, leave me without food or water for days. I will never forget when he strode in, declaring that he had paid to see you murdered. I…” A tremor shook his thin body. “I refused the bastard the satisfaction of knowing how I crumpled inside. A few years ago, after having installed younger guards in the dungeon who wouldna know me, and with them believing I was dead, Gaufrid brought me to this cell through the secret tunnel.”
“I never knew,” Cailin whispered, aching at the misery he’d endured, the ultimate betrayal.
He stilled, glared at the door. “Gaufrid?”
“Dead,” Cailin growled. “Had I but known you were locked here, of how you had suffered over the years, I would have ensured the bastard died a slow and painful death.”
His father’s shoulders sagged as if a weight had been lifted. “When did he die?”
“Yesterday. After his men attacked my camp, trying to kill me, but almost killed Elspet instead…” Even as he yearned for hours with his father, Cailin looked away. He had to get back to her.
“Who?”
“The woman I love.” He shook his head and shifted to relieve the weight on his injured leg. “Father, there is much I need to tell you, to explain, but not here. After a bath and a hot meal, you need to rest. We have plenty of time to talk. Years.”
With care, he led his father to the lord’s chamber, opened the door, pleased to discover all signs of his uncle had been cleared away as he’d requested earlier this day.
Instead of Gaufrid’s rich silks and gaudy statues, a portrait of his father and mother graced the wall above the hearth. A cream handcrafted cover woven in a complex Celtic pattern lay atop the bed, and several wool blankets lay folded at the foot. To its right sat a table laden with a bowl of water, a flask of wine, bread, cheese, and sliced meats. In the far corner stood a tub filled with steaming water.
He’d intended to use this room with Elspet, but thanked God he could hand the chamber to the man to whom it belonged. “I will leave you until we sup.”
After another embrace, he departed. Urgency had him hurrying down the corridor. He couldna discover his father was alive then lose Elspet. ’Twould be fate’s cruelest joke to gift him with a long-lost parent while stealing the woman who’d won his heart.
Please God, let her live!
The potent scent of herbs filled the air as he stepped inside her chamber. Shimmers of golden light spilling from the hearth illuminated her pale face, exposing how her chest barely rose and fell with each breath. Heart in his throat, he glanced toward Rónán, who sat nearby. “Any change?”
Deep lines dug across his friend’s brow. “None since you left.”
He nodded. She hadna died. He’d find solace in that. “I just returned from the dungeon and…” His throat tightened with emotion.
Face taut with concern, his friend shoved to his feet. “What has happened?”
“’Tis my father; he is alive.” Voice rough, Cailin explained the events of a short while before.
Rónán shook his head. “God’s truth, ’tis an incredible blessing.”
“’Tis.” He swallowed hard. “Once he and Elspet awaken, I look forward to introducing them.” Cailin glanced toward the bed. “Go and rest. I will stay beside her.”
Rónán sighed. “I would argue that you need to find your own bed, but from your stubborn look, ’twill achieve naught.”
“It willna.”
“I shall be in my chamber if you need me.” He departed.
The snap and crackle of the fire filled the silence as Cailin walked over to her side, the beads of sweat on her face shimmering in the firelight, as if mocking his fear. Cupping her hand, he knelt before her, made the sign of the cross, and began to pray.
* * * *
Heat seemed to engulf her, to fill her every breath, the inferno a dark companion to the pain lancing her side. Rousing from a groggy haze, Elspet shifted, trying to find a comfortable position, bumped against hewn muscle.
Confused, she forced her lids open. Struggling against the incessant throbbing throughout her body, she turned her head to find Cailin lying beside her, then frowned at the unfamiliar chamber. Where were they?
Memories rolled through her of the attack, of the terror at the assailant hurling his dagger toward Cailin, of how she’d jumped before him, then naught.
By the soreness in her side, ’twas where the knife had sunk in.
She scanned the chamber, noted the flag bearing the crest of Dalkirk hanging near the heart
h. Several large chests lay stacked against one wall, no doubt Cailin’s mail filling the largest, others holding garb and his belongings. Several bottles of wine stood upon a nearby table, a bowl of water lay near the bed, and to its side sat a basket filled with herbs.
Was this Cailin’s room from his childhood? As if it mattered. Wherever they were, he was alive.
Love filled her as she skimmed her gaze over his muscled body, clad in naught but a shirt and trews. From his slow, deep breaths, he was asleep. Needing to touch him, she smoothed her hand over the rough stubble upon his face, a man she would love forever.
Blue eyes opened. Relief flickered in his gaze, then a tender smile curved his mouth. “Your fever has broken.”
“I had a fever?”
“Ever since the attack two days past.”
Her hand trembled as she lowered it to the comforter. “I have been asleep for two days?”
“Aye.”
“Where are we?”
“Tiran Castle.”
Her mind whirling, Elspet listened as he described the events since the attack, gasping at the last. “Your father is alive?”
Fury coiled in her gut as he explained how his uncle had killed Cailin’s mother, allowing everyone to believe the earl had died in the hunting accident as well. But he’d imprisoned his brother and found twisted enjoyment in tormenting him since.
“I am glad the scoundrel is dead!”
“As I. Gaufrid can never hurt anyone again.” Cailin skimmed his thumb along the curve of her jaw, the tension on his face easing. “I canna wait until you meet my father. He will love you.”
“Will he?” Caught up in the mayhem of the past few weeks, until this moment she’d forgotten one simple fact. She shifted, ignoring the radiating pain, then took a steadying breath. “I am a simple lass without a family, much less a dowry.”
“That willna matter to him.”
“How can you be sure?” she whispered, her unease growing. “What if he disapproves? What if he—”
Cailin smothered her words with a tender kiss. A twinkle in his eyes, he cupped her face. “My mother was the daughter of a Viking blacksmith. They met when he was traveling.”