Return to Alastair (13 page)

Lionell suddenly laughed. “It is important that we kill him, then, before he finds out!” He turned to the guard. “Lagen, get me Saud here! And Korin!”

“But my lord, sir—Saud and Korin are at your estate at Copen taking care of your business—”

“I don’t care what they’re doing. I want them here! Send word for them to come to me at once.”

Orin Sade was stunned. He’d hoped to be heard but would never have expected such a reaction as this. “You will protect me then?” he dared ask.

“What?” Lionell faced him. “Oh. Yes. Yes, good man, I will. So long as you tell me everything you can of the Dorn and what he knows. And whoever else knows about this. I will not have my wealth nor baronship at risk to that wretched, mercenary dog!”

Lionell dismissed Sade to another room and sat wondering if his mother knew anything of this, or any of his seven aunts. Surely not. Surely they would have said something to him by now. And most of his eleven cousins, all of them girls, were younger than he was. Better that they never know.

Karra Loble had left a son. And Lionell knew very well what that could mean.

10

T
iarra was cooking when she heard Martica’s horrible coughing suddenly cease. She rushed to her side, afraid that she might find the old woman struggling for her last breath, but Martica lay still, staring up at the ceiling.

“Are you all right, ma’am?” Tiarra asked her, and Martica slowly turned her head. She was terribly pale, almost gray.

“I’m glad you got rid of Tahn Dorn and his friend,” she said.

Tiarra nodded, unable to tell her that the blond man was still outside, and her brother would surely be back as well.

“I was out for a while, yesterday, child,” Martica told her.

It hardly seemed possible, by the looks of her. Tiarra knew she was weak again and could not rise now on her own. She took the old woman’s hand. “I’m glad you could do it.”

“I promised you. I meant to keep my word.” She coughed again faintly. “I went to see Mrs. Ovny. I asked her about your mother’s necklace. It’s a beautiful thing. She still has it. She said she’d let you see it, if you’ll not want it in your hands. You should go before she changes her mind. This very afternoon. She does not like a morning caller. That woman can be quite the sort, you know it, child.”

The girl’s heart pounded. She would see a piece of her mother’s own jewelry! “Thank you, Martica! Mother was beautiful with it, wasn’t she?”

“She was beautiful, girl, adorned or not. And as good as any lady could be. God love her memory!”

Tiarra smiled. Martica could be so harsh. But not when she spoke of Karra Loble. Tiarra could like the old woman then, and feel liked for a moment in return. “I’ll go, just as you said. Are you hungry yet?”

Martica scowled. “No. But I should try to eat, I suppose. I’ve hardly been able. I am not long for this world, girl. Whatever will you do?”

Tiarra didn’t know how to answer. Martica had never spoken of such things, and she hadn’t expected that she ever would. “I’ll manage, ma’am,” she told her. “Don’t worry for me.”

“Get yourself a man, girl. But be careful of your brother and his friends. They’re cutthroat thieves, pure and simple.” “Yes, ma’am.” Tears filled her eyes briefly, but Martica wanted nothing of such things.

“Get up and get me my food, child, before it burns over the fire unattended!”

“Yes, ma’am.” She jumped to her feet.

“Do carry yourself well in Mrs. Ovny’s presence when you go,” Martica told her. “You know how she fancies herself. It wouldn’t help you to be brash.”

“Yes, Martica.”

Tiarra fed the ailing old woman and hurried about her other duties, but finally she had done all she could think to do in the house, and Martica slept. They were needing meal again. And other foodstuffs. Surely the blond man would understand that. He and her brother could not keep her restrained to the house. They were not even invited here. But she looked down at the bread on the table. They had helped her. They were still trying to. She didn’t know if the young man outside had eaten. Perhaps it would be proper to do him a good deed.

Lorne was leaning against the neighbor’s cart when she came out. She brought him the bread and the remnant of the stew she’d made. The gesture obviously surprised him.

“Thank you,” he told her. “That is more than kind.”

“Everything deserves to eat,” she said. “Had I a dog, I would surely feed it.”

He smiled. “You have a way of putting things. But thank you again.”

She watched him bow his head for a moment in prayer and then begin to eat. It was hard to imagine that he could be anything but sincere. He looked so innocent. And scarcely older than herself. “How long have you been with my brother?”

“I first met him when I was eight. But I haven’t known his friendship well until the last year, miss. To have Christ makes a difference in everything.”

She didn’t know how to accept his religious talk, so she ignored it. “How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

“And he is about twenty-nine?”

He looked at her with an odd expression. “Twenty-one, so we think, miss.”

“So he says. He looks older than that.”

Lorne shook his head. “When I met him, I thought he was older than twelve. Were it not for his small size, nothing could have convinced me. He acted and talked like a man, an old man even, sometimes. The life he had aged him, miss. I doubt he was ever truly a child.”

“Did you ever see him kill anyone?”

The young man’s sigh was audible. “Better that you give him such a question,” he told her. “He’d not be afraid of it, or any other. He won’t hide his past. But he’s not the same.”

“Why do you take up for him so? What has he done for you?”

Lorne smiled again. “The first thing he did, years ago, was to stop the bigger boys from harassing me when I was new in my training. But in the past year he spared me an execution and got me a job. He shared his Savior with me.”

“Then you owe him.”

“I’m here because I’m his friend.”

“Have
you
killed anyone?”

He met her eyes. “Yes, ma’am. And I am not proud of it. I did it as a slave, but it troubles me still.”

She looked long at him and then sat down. “A slave?”

“My parents sold me. To feed my brothers and sisters. I don’t fault them. They didn’t know how hard it would be for me.”

“You’re not truly a killer, then, if someone made you,” she said with a quiet voice. “You’d have to have the anger in you, the bitter fire that makes you want to. I feel it sometimes. I could kill someone. I’ve wanted to hurt a lot of people. And my brother’s just the same, isn’t he?”

“Not anymore. And I think it was never really him but the pain at work. Perhaps it’s that way with you too, miss.”

She suddenly stood. She should not be talking to him this way. Martica had said to be careful. But he made himself so smooth and easy to like. “I need to go. But don’t worry yourself. I’ll not be long, and I’ll watch carefully.”

He rose to his feet immediately. “They may be watching too. I’ll not risk that, or my word to Tahn.”

“We need provision from the market. You can’t keep me here.”

He met her determined eyes but did not answer. Instead, he turned quickly away and looked over his shoulder. “Do you know that boy?” he asked her.

Tiarra looked but didn’t see anything. “Who’s watching me today?” she called.

The dirty little face of a street boy no older than six or seven appeared from behind a rain barrel. “Just me, Miss Ti,” he answered shyly as two other children peeked out at them.

“Tell them to come,” Lorne told her.

She glanced at him in question.

“It’s all right. I’m not going to hurt them.”

“Jori, Ansley, Rae,” she called. “Come closer.” And then she turned back to Lorne. “I don’t know what you want. But they’re timid. They’re street children, sir, but as good as the next. Don’t you frighten them.”

He smiled. “We need your help,” he told the children, motioning them closer. He pulled several coins from the bag at his belt and knelt on the children’s level. “Miss Tiarra needs certain things from Market Street. Will you fetch them for her?”

One of the children nodded.

“Good,” he said and put his coins in the hand of the assenting child. “Whatever she tells you, get two the same. The second part is for you. That will be your pay for helping me. Is that all right?”

All three of them stared at him with wide eyes and then nodded with excitement.

“I can’t take your money,” Tiarra protested.

“You’re not. But we should help in your inconvenience. Don’t keep the little ones waiting. They might be hungry. You’d better tell your needs.”

Ordinarily, she would have been angry to be told what to do. But it was such a kind thing to do for these children that she couldn’t be angry. The way their faces lit up made her almost want to kiss Lorne for having such a thought. She’d been worried for them. But this young man understood what it was like to be hungry. She knew he must from the story he’d told.

“Thank you,” she whispered, and named the things she wanted. She watched the children speed away happily and then sat down again. “That was very generous.”

He sat a few feet from her. “Well worth it to me. They earn it. And they’re good as the next, as you said.”

He went back to his unfinished food, and she studied him in silence. She hadn’t let herself notice before how very handsome he was. She’d only been seeing her brother’s friend, and not trusting him because of it. But now he’d taken on a different light. His was something like her own heart. She couldn’t name one other person who would be so quick to befriend the street children.

Tahn went to the place Marc Toddin had told him about, but there was only a heap of ashes there in the stead of a house. He stood just looking at it for a moment, asking the Lord for guidance. He obeyed his heart in returning to the home of Magna Sade, hoping to ask her more questions, but there was no one there. She would not be back, he knew it somehow, and he yet wondered what had become of Toddin and his family.

He knelt in the Sades’ abandoned yard and prayed again for guidance. There would be more trouble with the bandits, he was sure of it. How could he keep both his sister and Lorne out of danger without help?

When he rose to his feet again, he had peace despite the precarious spot he was in. Only one companion, now wounded, stood with him against twelve to fifteen bandits or more. In a town where he couldn’t count on the smallest courtesy, let alone any real help.

“We need your help, Lord,” he whispered. “And I know you will supply it.”

Suddenly he thought of Netta and the upcoming Trent wedding. He was glad they weren’t attending. He couldn’t consider it safe, though Lionell had done nothing to continue his father’s deadly assault on Triletts. Yet their absence would surely be an insult to the baron. He shook his head. It was not his part to worry on that. Benn knew such matters. But something about it burdened him anyway, so he stopped again to pray for the people who held his heart in Onath.

Lucas and Marc Toddin were on his mind when he finally turned to mount his horse. “You know I need them, Lord,” he said. “But I don’t know where to look. You will have to bring them to me, and I know you can.”

Suddenly there was a shout behind him. “Dorn!”

He whirled about, not sure what to expect. There were two men, both of them big, headed his way. The one he was sure he’d never seen before. But the other was Marc Toddin.

11

A
s the day grew long, Tiarra was in a quandary, thinking of Mrs. Ovny and her mother’s necklace. She longed to see it, to beg a price as a daughter and begin work to gain it. Martica had said she must go today. And Mrs. Ovny was difficult. There were no guarantees Tiarra would be welcomed if she waited.

But there was this Lorne still here with her. He could not send the children for this. Would he understand her need? She thought he might, and she considered telling him about it, even allowing him to come along, but Martica’s words haunted her. Might Tahn Dorn have an interest in his mother’s jewels, regardless of how he portrayed himself? And no matter how Lorne seemed, he could not be expected to keep this from his friend. It would be a betrayal of Martica’s trust to let the young man know. But how could she manage to go and not have him follow or prevent her?

The Ovnys were several blocks away, nearer to Sade’s tavern than home. There was no way the handsome blond would consider it safe for her to go alone. But he had used the street children. Perhaps she could too.

She waited till the youngsters were back with the food and then took them inside with her, telling Lorne that she would help them cook their share. Martica still slept, and that was a good thing, but it worried her. There was not much time left for her.

Lorne sat on the ground, hoping Tahn was making headway in his absence. It bothered him to think of going back to Onath without him. The Triletts would be dismayed by this turn of events, to say the least. This town was like a bed of thorns to Tahn, even without Burle’s threat. Lorne considered that it would make better sense to stay here himself and have Tahn go, but he knew Tahn would never accept that. He would hold the responsibility too close to him.