Midnight Falls: A Thrilling Retelling of Cinderella (40 page)

“What do you mean you are trying to save me?” Thurlow spat, taking her chin in one hand and her arm in the other and yanking her violently from the ground so that they were both standing.

“He is going to kill you,” Ella said, her might slowly rising through her veins, “and I came to stop him.”

“Oh, did you? Is that supposed to soften my heart?”

“On the contrary. I could care less if your black heart is carved from your body and your lifeless, impotent body dragged through the streets until it disintegrates. I was doing it for
him
. Once he exposes you as the murderous conspirator you are, you will be condemned to die. I want only for him to have the satisfaction of watching your death with me at his side, his hand in mine, our spirits and bodies having merged in ways you could only dream. I came to stop Gabriel from killing you because it is too good a fate for you.”

“Gabriel? You mean your uncle: the Duke of Ebersol?”

Ella was not certain how Thurlow had learned the truth about Gabriel’s true identity or how long he’d known. The solutions to those problems seemed so pointless in her current predicament. Even the gratification of goading the bastard would have to be put aside. Her goal was clear. Ella had always recalled the memories of her mother and father and their advice from beyond the grave as two distinct forces in her life. In her moment of desperation, their voices became one.

Don’t give in. He is coming for you.

“You know, it amazes me how long you two were able to play me,” Thurlow said, taking her aching face in his hands and kneading at her lips with his thumb. “My hat is off to you. But seeing how it will cost you your life, and his as well, such accolade hardly seems worth it, wouldn’t you say?”

“What makes you think you will ever find him?” Ella probed, struggling to free her face from his clutches. “He did elude you for fifteen years, didn’t he?”

“Yes, and once again my hat is off. It took some cajoling to finally get that old man at the lair to admit to me that his own people staged Gabriel Solange’s death six years ago. But there is nothing a few burning embers can’t coax out of people.”

“You are sick. And what’s more, you are a fool. There is no way you will get away with this. And you know it, don’t you? Why else would you be here with me when your entire life’s mission may or may not be taking place somewhere in this insane labyrinth? You know that even if you and your rugged band of misfits are successful in murdering Leopold, you will not be able to hide your complicity forever.”

“Or maybe they will,” said Gabriel from the entrance way of the chamber, “since there will be no one dares contest their story. Isn’t that right,
Your Highness
?”

Chapter Thirty-Four

“Aislinn?” Leopold repeated.

“Yes, Your Highness,” the woman said. “Ella Delaquix is my cousin.”

“If she is your cousin, tell me why she didn’t come here herself.”

“Because, Your Highness, she is afraid. Captain Thurlow has been harassing her for years now and she fears he will hurt her or those she loves.”

“Like you?”

“I suppose.”

Leopold scrutinized Aislinn carefully. Could it be possible that she was more beautiful in pink than in the radiance of sun-touched yellow? How irresponsible of him to obsess about her handsomeness when there were so many more pressing matters that required his full state of mind. But Leopold couldn’t shake the uncanny sense that he was safer with her there. Her eyes gleamed in a way he’d never seen in another woman, ever. It was not just timidity and excitement. He’d observed that countless times. She was still timid yes, but in place of giddy exuberance from just being in his presence there was intrigue and childlike curiosity. Was it just he or was Aislinn completely unfamiliar with those of the male sex?

“Tell me more about Thurlow,” Leopold instructed, “for that is the reason why I bid Ella’s presence tonight. She was telling me some very fascinating things about the commander of my army; the man who once saved my father’s life.”

“I do not presume to know, even for a second, all that my cousin has been forced to endure at the hands of Captain Thurlow,” she said, mustering her own courage, which she had prematurely, and foolishly, assumed was already present by just entering that castle. “Nor am I privy to anything—er, I mean
everything
, that Ella knows. But I will tell you that Thurlow is—he is—”

“He is…?”

She sighed and dropped her head into her hands. “I know nothing,” she assented, her head still down. “And I stand here under false pretenses. Ella did not send me. I don’t even know where she is.”

“You don’t? Is she not even your cousin?”

Her head shot up. “She is my cousin!” she pronounced, her once eyes relieved of their timidity and infused with her own variety of recklessness. “And she is the best person I have ever known. Whatever she told you, or was
telling
you, Your Highness, is the gospel truth. I would stake my life on it.”

Prince Leopold took two large steps and stood before her so closely that she could feel the warmth emanating from his body. He peered into her eyes. She shivered. No fear; only invigoration and breathlessness.

Well, there was some fear. Was that what invigorated her so?

“You would stake your life on it?” Leopold said, hinting a most unexpected grin across his face.

“Yes.”

“It’s funny,” he said, his grin no longer slight, “I already have.”

She had not a chance to be stunned by his statement. A thunderous crash invaded the sensuous silence that haloed around them. She screamed.

Where is everyone?
Isolda wondered as she wandered the almost haunting corridors and winding pathways of the castle. Shouldn’t there have been a hailstorm of trumpets and jubilation? It was midnight. Isolda knew by the church bells bellowing from outside the walls.

King
Leopold was born.

Thurlow brusquely turned Ella around and pulled her into his torso. His left arm wrapped around her chest, the other bound her neck. She immediately felt her airways being compromised. She felt something cold and sharp graze her skin. Ella had no clue where he’d been concealing it, but suddenly Thurlow was pointing a knife at her throat.

He has no intention of strangling me. He wants me to bleed out right here, quickly and effortlessly.

Gabriel was motionless. He stood in front of the gaping open doorway, a statue of control and reason. But Ella saw beyond that. His eyes were glazed over almost diabolically; his black hair was streaked with sweat and his chest rose and fell like each breath he took was refueling his body and his rage.

“Welcome, Gabriel,” Thurlow said gaily, poking gently at Ella’s neck with the point of his blade. “I knew I would be seeing you tonight. Better sooner rather than later, I say!”

“Sooner? I have been waiting fifteen years for this moment, Captain Thurlow,” Gabriel said, his eyes fixed on the knife at Ella’s throat. “I had always imagined it would just be you and me, but if you insist on hiding behind a woman that is your prerogative.”

“Nicely put,” Thurlow laughed. “But I am hardly hiding behind her. I am simply controlling her. If I let her go now, she will be yet another foe that I must take on. I know this girl, Gabriel. A lot longer than you have. She has claws that go with her feistiness.”

Gabriel spotted the deep laceration above Thurlow’s eye. “I see that,” he said. “Well done, Ella. But for a king, Thurlow, this certainly looks bad.”

Ella felt Thurlow’s grasp constrict. A snippet of pain in her neck sent chills down her spine. Had he cut her?

“So you have everything figured out, then,” Thurlow asserted, “just like Benjamin.”

“Yes, yes,” Gabriel said, like he was suddenly in a hurry. “But before I continue, I must stress upon you how crucial it is that you release Ella right now. You see, Captain, in your impetuousness, you don’t even realize that she is suffocating and her throat has already been punctured. At this rate, she will be dead in a minute. I think we both know that if anything happens to her, I will come at you like lightening and rip your skull from your spine before you can even lift that dagger. To hell with Benjamin or my vendetta. And if you are dead—well, you will never get a chance to divulge your many secrets like I know you are just dying to do.”

Thurlow smiled. “You still know how to talk, Gabriel,” he taunted. “Even under torture, you had such dignity about you. It is ironic really. Benjamin was nothing like that.”

He threw Ella to the ground and, as she clawed at the floor to pull away, Thurlow’s foot stomped cruelly on the back of her knee. She wailed.

“There,” Thurlow said, proudly, “a compromise.”

“As you see it, Captain,” Gabriel replied. “So tell me all the ways that my brother lacked dignity. Maybe I can assist you. Of course we both know my brother was an orphaned child with nobody to love him. That is quite undignified; although he still had roof over his head and food in his stomach, something even the most loved children of this land often go without. He was a petulant teenager; we all know that. He’d carry on like a spoiled brat who only ever saw everything in life that he wanted but did not possess. For someone poor, he could rival even the most presumptuous of aristocrats in his entitlement. And then his reputation as a soldier—well that was one for the ages. Arrogant, lack luster, unteachable, disobedient … untrustworthy. Why, it is no wonder why he reached out to a fellow comrade who likewise had axes to grind with God for life’s unfairness. And perhaps the most
undignified
thing of all: he described his innermost thoughts and his horrific ambitious with such a friend only to murder him when his infinitesimal rebellion crumbled before it had even begun and declared himself a hero. My goodness, you are right, Captain. Benjamin was quite the indigent.”

Ella, who had laboriously scooted as far from Thurlow as she could though it was no great distance, knew exactly where Gabriel was going. She watched as the volcanic emotion that pulsed beneath Thurlow’s façade began to tremor.

“Wait a moment,” Gabriel went on, feigning puzzlement. “That is not my brother I am describing but
you
, sir.”

Thurlow inhaled a massive breath of oxygen. “It must have felt quite satisfying to get that off of your chest,” he said, coolly, “but I am afraid you missed something.”

“What is that?”

“You already know, don’t you? You burst in here like a lemur all but shouting it out from the top of your lungs. Say it, Gabriel. Tell Ella, the woman that you love, what you’ve kept from her; what you have known for fifteen years. For if Benjamin confided in you just
what
I am, he most surely explained to you
why
.”

Ella’s head was pounding; her cheeks still stinging and her leg throbbing. But the pain was nothing to the weight on her heart that very second. Gabriel was unmoving and intolerably silent.

“Explain to Ella,” Thurlow continued, taking pleasure in his perceived upper hand, “why it is that I will have nothing to fear by way of repercussions for my actions here tonight. I will, as she so naively put it, ‘get away with it’. For I will control everything. The army, the castle guard, the entire kingdom. Go on and tell her.”

Gabriel could not stall any longer. He prayed Ella would forgive him for catapulting her into this nightmare, for not being there soon enough to have spared her pain.

“Ella,” he said, his eyes still fixed on Thurlow, “meet the man who would be king. Captain Thurlow is King William’s son.”

Chapter Thirty-Five

Mario made his rounds through the castle interior. He never expected to see a woman poking about the antechamber like she was a lost child.

“Your Ladyship,” Mario said, “you cannot be here. You must leave immediately or I will have no choice but to detain you.”

“Oh, thank God in heaven!” Isolda bawled, almost falling into the guard’s arms like she was about to faint. “I thought I might be lost forever in these dark hallways. Thank you so much sir. I need your help.”

“What is it, Milady?” Mario inquired politely.

“I am looking for my daughter. The prince summoned her here. It is past midnight and I cannot find her. I worry for her. I must know that she is all right.”