Mary Reed McCall (27 page)

Heaven remained quiet.

That was it, then. God must understand. Perhaps He even approved. With a sigh of contentment, she opened her eyes and gazed at her brother with a look of determination.

“All right, Ian,” she said firmly. “We’re going to do it. Now let’s get to work.”

G
ray swung his blade, hearing men scream and feeling the familiar resistance of flesh beneath his hacking charge. His mind blurred in the heat of killing, and his heart thumped madly. But ’twas not from bloodlust this day. Nay, this was something entirely different. For the first time since that awful day seventeen years ago, he battled his opponents with a sense of panic and desperation.

He had to get to Catherine.

Eduard’s men fought well and hard, and there were over three hundred of them to Gray’s nine score. Already the imbalance in numbers had taken its toll; many Ravenslock men lay sprawled, dead or wounded, across the grassy field leading to Faegerliegh Keep. It would take a blessing from on high to turn the tides in his favor.

Or perhaps a burst of pure will.

An opening appeared in the thick mass of warriors in front of him. Kneeing his stallion forward, Gray lent his fury to the attack, widening the gap. The path led directly to the gates of the keep, its entrance barred only by an iron portcullis. Whether out of rash complacency or lack of preparation, Eduard had left his defenses weak…and that was going to give Gray the only opportunity he needed.

“To the gates!” he roared over the din, ramming and slashing his way through Eduard’s knights. His men followed close behind, scrambling up the walls and scaling the tower that housed the gears to the mechanism. Several of them began to fight with the guards there, while three others pulled the lever back, raising the metal gate with a groaning screech.

A new flood of Eduard’s men stormed the area as Gray and his troops surged into the massive courtyard, filling the enclosure with the violent tumult of warfare. Gray pressed on. He’d almost reached the curved doorway leading into the main keep itself, when one of Montford’s knights caught him with a lance-blow.

Gray tipped off his stallion, rolling to his side and springing up in time to block the man’s charge and deal a killing strike himself. He watched his opponent fall and then, with one last glance at the battle raging behind him, he ducked through the entry-way and into the cool, dark silence of Faegerliegh Keep’s main corridor.

Yanking off his helm, he moved down the hall, his weight on the balls of his feet, his sword ready. Catherine hadn’t exaggerated; the hallways were intricate, twisting and turning, with several smaller corridors jutting off at odd angles. He kept to the main gallery, hoping to gain his bearings so that he could more swiftly locate Catherine or her children.

His ears thrummed in the silence, still numb from the clamor of battle, but he threw open every door as he passed, his eyes straining, searching, desperate. Some of the chambers revealed naught but empty disarray, while others sheltered huddled masses of servants and children, their faces streaked with tears or eyes wide with terror. He resisted the urge to stop and help them. Catherine and the twins needed him more right now. Continuing on, he darted his gaze to the left and right, alert to any movement, any shifting in the shadows.

Suddenly, the hair prickled at his nape and he stopped mid-stride. Something had moved in the corner of his vision. He was approaching the juncture of another hall; dust motes danced in the stream of sun from the glazed windows, swirling in a pattern that revealed a person hiding in the shadows.

Gray stepped forward, cautious, alert. As he reached the turn in the corridor, he lifted his blade and swung it toward the man who lay waiting for him in the gloom.

Only it wasn’t a man. It was a woman…a battered woman, whose hair hung in wild, tangled
strands to cover half of her face. Her upraised hands clutched a makeshift weapon, a wooden leg she’d obviously broken from a chair or stool somewhere.

Sweet Jesu in heaven
.

“Catherine…?”

She stood there for a mere instant, staring at him, eyes wide with apprehension. Then, with a sobbing cry, she dropped the piece of wood and threw herself into his arms.

Gray embraced her with a groaning cry that echoed her own, his heart contracting with love and relief. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head before pulling back to cup her face very gently in both of his hands.

“How did you know?” she asked, her voice thick with tears. “How did you know to come here so quickly?”

Gray shut his eyes for a moment, wishing that he could spare her the pain of what he was about to tell her. But there was no way around it. “’Twas Heldred, love,” he said quietly. “He intercepted a spy who was fleeing to Eduard. While trying to stop him, he was wounded. But he fought valiantly and managed to drag himself into the open before ’twas too late, to alert us of the breach.”

Gray saw Catherine’s eyes widen, fresh tears spilling over as she suddenly grasped the full meaning of what he was saying.

“Then Heldred is—?”

She couldn’t finish, and so he just nodded stiffly, holding her close as she cried her grief into his
embrace. He wanted to let his love seep into her through his palms, to take away all of the pain she’d already suffered, all the hurt she was suffering now.

“He was a dear and loyal friend,” she murmured finally, pulling back a little. “I will never forget him.”

Gray nodded again and smoothed her hair from her brow, breathing in sharply at the bruises he saw along her temple and cheekbone. He clenched his jaw against the renewed flood of rage that swept through him. Beyond her visible injuries, he knew that she must have been hurt in many places that he couldn’t see just by the careful way she held herself in his arms.
That bastard. That hell-spawned, treacherous bastard
.

“God, Catherine, I’m sorry,” he said, his voice rough with emotions that threatened to swallow him whole. “I’m so sorry I didn’t get here in time to stop him from doing this to you.”

“Nay,” she answered softly, shaking her head. “Don’t blame yourself. There was no way to know. I’m just thankful that you’re safe and that you’re here with me now.” She pulled back again to look at him. “But we must hurry, Gray. We need to get the children. Eduard ordered them locked in the solar. I was going to them when you found me.”

He nodded, still supporting her weight. “Aye. We need to get them out of here.” He looked into the shadows behind her, seeing nothing. “Where’s Alban?”

“Eduard wounded him when he caught us. The last I saw of him he was being carried from my
chamber between two of Eduard’s men. I don’t know where they’ve put him.” She swallowed and added more quietly, “Or if he’s still alive.”

Gray clenched his jaw, keeping his reactions in check. He nodded. “We’ll have to trust him to take care of himself for now. Your children must needs be rescued first. Come.”

Taking her hand, he helped her down the corridor, following her instructions for where to turn. By the time they reached the short jut of hall leading to the solar, he uttered another silent prayer of thanks. He knew now that he’d never have found the chamber on his own. Not through the maze of corridors they’d followed to get here. ’Twas undoubtedly why Eduard had chosen the place as ideal for securing the twins.

Only two men stood posted outside the door. From his position with Catherine down the hall, he could see that they looked very young and very nervous. He’d hazard a guess that these new-bloods were all that Eduard could spare as guards, once he realized that he’d be faced with an all-out battle beyond the boundaries of the keep.

Suddenly, a banging arose from within the solar, followed by shouts and screams. Gray lunged forward just behind the sentries, who’d turned to each other at the noise and scrambled to open the door.

But before Gray and Catherine could reach them, there was a loud clatter, and a cloud of soot billowed out of the now open door. Throwing himself into the chamber, Gray tripped over the prostrate
forms of the guards. He waved his arms and coughed, unable to see anything. Ash filled the air, along with the fearsome shrieking of two very small warriors wielding knobby sticks at him.

They swung their sticks wildly, and one of the blows connected with his shin. He cursed, shifting his weight to grab the miscreants, one in each hand, by the backs of their shirts. He hoisted them into the air, carrying them unceremoniously into the corridor, where he put them down before spinning back to shut and bolt the door on the two sentries still lying, half-senseless, inside.

“Ian! Isabel!” Catherine cried, kneeling to enfold them into an embrace.

“Mummy!” they croaked simultaneously, coughing and sneezing as they wrapped their arms around her neck, both trying to talk at once.

“Oh, Mummy, you’re hurt!” Isabel said, coughing again and blinking back tears from the ash as she cupped her hand gently over her mother’s cheek. She pulled a grubby doll from her waist sash, where she’d obviously secured it to do battle with the guards. “Lily was worried about you too, Mummy. We were trying to get to you, to save you from Uncle Eduard. That’s why we had to trick those bad men. But we didn’t want to kill them, really. We only—”

“It was my idea to hit them with sticks, Mummy!” Ian crowed between coughs. “You’re not mad, are you? I didn’t hit them too hard, I just—”

“Oh sweethearts!” Catherine pulled both of them
tighter in her embrace. “I’m not angry. I just thank heaven that you’re both all right.”

“We must make haste,” Gray said quietly, loathe to end their reunion, but knowing that ’twas dangerous to linger. Catherine nodded, pushing herself to her feet with a grimace.

“We’ll go this way,” he said, taking her hand and directing the twins to walk next to her as he led them all back down the hall toward the courtyard.

“Wait a moment.” Catherine pulled back suddenly and squinted as she looked to get her bearings. “We’re close to the buttery here. If we can reach it, Gray, there’s a hidden door that leads to a tunnel out of the keep. It goes all the way to a field beyond the walls.”

He frowned. “A secret passage in a manor house?”

“It served as an escape route nearly two centuries ago, during the Conquest. Geoffrey once told me that the family who lived here added it in case the Normans breached the walls during an attack.”

“Then Eduard knows about it as well,” he said grimly.

“Aye. But ’tis our only way out, other than taking the children through the battle in the courtyard.”

Gray nodded, leaning out into the corridor she’d indicated, looking for any movement. All seemed quiet. The twins gripped each other’s hands, staring at him, but doing exactly as he bid while he supported Catherine down the hall. Every now and then the shouting sounded nearer, and they were forced to duck into the shadows or behind a door until it seemed safe to continue.

Though she never complained, Gray knew by the way she limped and by the ashen cast of her complexion that Catherine was in a great deal of pain. He cursed silently, love for her mingling again with his rage against Eduard. He itched to get his hands on the bastard, to make him suffer tenfold for what he’d done to her.

At last she pointed to a door ten paces away. “There it is. The buttery. The passageway is hidden behind the shelves on the far wall.”

Gray led the children into the large, cool chamber; Catherine stood with them while Gray worked to remove the heavy shelving that blocked the tunnel. There was no way to do it quietly. Barrels thumped to the floor and pottery jars crashed as he yanked the wooden slats from the wall.

But soon the ancient looking door appeared, its latchstring hanging out. Gray lifted the rotted leather carefully, and the door creaked open. Cobwebs yawned and stretched at the corners of the portal, the odor of decay spilling out of the tunnel to coat them with a chill blanket of vapor.

“Come,” he said, herding the children into the opening. “We must hurry.”

“Nay. ’Tis too dark and small!” Ian cried, pulling back.

“He’s afraid because when we fostered with Master Dumont he used to lock Ian in a little chamber below the kitchen floor for being bad,” Isabel said softly.

“Merciful saints,” Catherine muttered, looking as if she was going to be sick.

“’Tis all right, Ian. There’s naught to fear,” Gray said, hoping to comfort the lad. “Your mother will lead the way into the tunnel. You can go right behind her.”

“I don’t think that I can, Gray,” Catherine said. “Without a torch, I can’t see well enough through this swollen eye. You’ll have to go first and let me follow behind the children.”

Gray considered that for a moment, uncertainty assailing him. Leaving Catherine last made him uneasy, but it didn’t seem that he would have much choice. Leaning in, he brushed her lips with a kiss, murmuring for her to take extra care before he stooped to enter the tunnel, coaxing first Ian, then Isabel in after him.

“You’re doing fine, lad,” he murmured to Ian, who trembled and clutched Gray’s tunic in a death-grip as they crept along.

Gray looked back to ensure that Catherine had ducked into the tunnel as well before he continued to lead them all on through the dark passage.

Suddenly, he heard Isabel gasp.

“Lily!” Isabel cried. “Oh, Mummy, I’ve dropped Lily!”

Gray turned to see Isabel scrambling past her mother, trying to crawl back into the buttery.

“Nay Isabel! We mustn’t return. ’Tis too dangerous,” Catherine said sharply, lurching to catch Isabel at the very portal of the chamber. She was just nudging the weeping little girl ahead of her into the tunnel again, when Gray saw her face stiffen in the
dim light from the chamber. A tingle of warning shot up his spine.

“Ah, Catherine, my dear. How lovely. It seems that we’ll get to finish our little meeting after all.”

Eduard’s voice echoed through the tunnel a mere instant before he reached in to grab Catherine and drag her, kicking and fighting, back into the buttery. With a shout, Gray twisted and threw himself at the door, trying to get to her, but the wooden slab shut on him and the twins, sealing them inside and leaving Catherine trapped with Eduard on the other side.

Thrusting the children behind him, Gray slammed into the door, rattling the scarred planks, then ramming it with his shoulder. Aged as it was, it wouldn’t budge. Eduard must have put something heavy in front of it. The twins huddled in terrified silence, as through the wood the muffled sounds of scraping furniture and banging gave way to the unmistakable echo of a slap and Catherine’s cry.