The Game (8 page)

They skirted the walls of the Tower. Katherine was in disbelief. She decided he was mad after all. No man who defied the queen’s authority for his livelihood would dare to come so close to the dreaded place that might well one day become his destiny. No man, no matter how bold, no matter how arrogant.

They galloped over London Bridge and turned east. They had entered a rowdy neighborhood of breweries and brothels. Several well-dressed gentlemen were leaving one such house, and Katherine pretended not to see several half-naked women standing on the street corner. One plump doxy waved at the pirate, even calling out to him, her words both shrill and suggestive. Katherine’s face and ears burned. Liam appeared not to have heard the graphic proposition.

Suddenly they came upon a square building, a depot of some kind, that blocked the street. Liam rode to the left, Katherine automatically following. On the other side was a large two-storied house with a steep, pitched roof of
timber, surrounded by stone walls. Liam abruptly pulled up his mount and slid to the ground. “Wait here,” he ordered Katherine and Macgregor.

He strode not to the front gate but around the side of the wall, disappearing from view. Fifteen minutes later the front gate was opened. Liam stood in the shadows cast by it, his mantle pushed back over his broad shoulders, revealing the fact that he now wore a jerkin over his shirt as well as his breeches and thigh-high black boots. He gestured impatiently. Katherine spurred her mount forward, her heart dancing with sudden, wild elation. And at long last she was to see her father—at long last!

Katherine slid from the horse and hurried to the front door, well ahead of Liam now. She banged upon it. When there was no response, she banged again.

Suddenly a woman demanded from within, “Who goes there at this ungodly hour?”

“Eleanor!” Katherine cried. “’Tis I—Katherine FitzGerald!”

The door was unbolted and pushed open. Eleanor stared at Katherine in disbelief, then glanced at the pirate. “God’s teeth! What do you here?!”

She was a small, slender woman of extraordinary beauty. Light brown hair framed an oval face unblemished by pox or scars. When she spoke, white teeth were revealed, with no gaps between them. She was a Butler, the daughter of Baron Duboyne, and she was exactly three years older than Katherine.

“I have come home,” Katherine whispered, smiling tremulously.

But Eleanor did not smile in return. “This is hardly a home,” she said bitterly. Then she stepped aside. “’Tis a surprise you’ve made for your poor father—and him not well. Come inside.” Her body stiff with reluctance, she gestured for Katherine, Liam, and Macgregor to enter.

But Liam turned and spoke sharply, “Stay outside, Mac. A whistle shall suffice if any visitors appear.”

Macgregor nodded and disappeared, moving with surprising speed and grace for a man so big and brawny.

Eleanor closed the door behind them. “You should have told us you were coming,” she said sharply.

Katherine said, “I wrote many letters. Did Father not receive any of them?”

“I received several of your missives, but did not wish to disturb his peace of mind with the selfish demands of a spoiled daughter. He has enough problems, God knows.”

Katherine was rigid. “’Tis hardly selfish to ask to go home and to be wed.”

“And what will your dowry be, pray tell?” Eleanor said caustically. “Two cows and a piglet?”

Katherine did not believe what the other woman was suggesting. She knew very well that Eleanor disliked her, she always had, from the first day she had arrived with Gerald at Askeaton Castle, a lovely, laughing bride. The memory was still painful for Katherine, not because Eleanor had been so pretty or so happy, but because her own father had also been filled with joy, smiling from ear to ear. Katherine’s mother Joan had been buried less than a month. “Everything cannot be gone,” Katherine said. “Surely there is something left for a dowry.”

“Everything has been taken away or destroyed,” Eleanor cried with rage. “I have had to beg alms from my neighbors! We live on bread and mead!”

Katherine refused to believe what she was hearing. “Where is Father? I must see him now!”

“Gerald sleeps, but I will wake him as O’Neill is with you. Both of you, wait here.” Abruptly Eleanor shoved past Katherine, holding up a glass-domed candle, and began to climb the narrow stairs.

Katherine glanced at Liam, perplexed that Eleanor knew him. Then she recalled that her father, many years ago, had had some dealings with the O’Neill chieftain, Shane. In truth, Ireland was a small world if one were native born. Undoubtedly Eleanor’s father, Baron Duboyne, had trafficked with the O’Neills, too. But what kind of business could Duboyne have possibly had with this man?

But she was distinctly uneasy as she waited restlessly in the dark hall for her father to appear. Was Gerald’s situation even worse than she had feared? The rushes on
the floor smelled foul and overused. It was too dark to see, but Katherine had the unhappy feeling that the hall was quite bare. And now she recalled Eleanor’s well-mended, threadbare nightdress and robe. The stepmother she remembered of five years ago had always been resplendent in furs and velvets and jewels. In fact, Katherine could not recall seeing a single ring upon Eleanor’s fingers, and her heart sank.

Katherine became aware of Liam’s probing regard. She turned her back on him abruptly, beginning to shake. If all Eleanor had said was true, then dear God, what would happen to them all? And what would happen to Katherine herself?

She glanced up, unwillingly meeting Liam’s unflinching gaze. And Katherine was afraid of what lay ahead.

“Wake up!” Eleanor cried, lighting a candle and setting it down on the chamber’s single small chest, which was beside her husband’s narrow bed.

Gerald sat up, rubbing his eyes, nightcap askew. “God’s blood, woman, what is amiss? Is the house afire?”

“No,” Eleanor cried, sitting down beside him and gripping his arms. “Gerald—your daughter is here!”

Gerald blinked, finally awake, a slender man with startlingly fair skin and midnight black hair. “My daughter?” he echoed.

“God has finally heeded my prayers!” Eleanor cried ecstatically. “For he has sent your daughter to us—with none other than the Master of the Seas!”

Gerald started. “What are you babbling about, Eleanor? Have you gone mad?”

“I am hardly mad!” Eleanor was jubilant. “’Tis Liam O’Neill! The infamous pirate, Shane O’Neill’s son, is standing outside this very door just down the hall! Oh, Gerald! At last! At last God has delivered to us a great and wonderful opportunity—do you not see?”

But Gerald had flung his feet to the floor and he lunged upright. Facing the door, his expression was no longer annoyed. And then, he smiled. “Yes, dearheart, I do see. Send for them,” he said.

Liam’s touch upon her shoulder made Katherine jump and then spin to face him. “Come,” he said, not unkindly. “Your stepmother calls.”

Katherine did not want his sympathy or his pity—and that could not be what she saw in his eyes. Her heart beating wildly now, Katherine hurried past Liam up the dimly lit stairs and down the hall to the master chamber. Her father was standing in the center of the small, bare room in his nightclothes. At the sight of his darkly handsome face, Katherine cried out. Gerald smiled and pulled her into his embrace.

And Katherine clung to him. She closed her eyes, leaning her cheek upon his chest. He was thin, but he felt warm and strong. Surely he would solve her terrible plight.

“Katie—are you all right?”

Katherine smiled at him wanly. “Yes. I am…unhurt.”

Gerald’s glance strayed briefly to Liam, but then he gazed at his daughter. “How you have grown up!” Tears suddenly filled his eyes. “How beautiful you’ve become, the image of your dear mother—I would never have known.”

Six years ago Katherine had been tall and skinny and hardly pretty. She flushed with pleasure at being compared to her very beautiful mother. “I am not like her,” she whispered.

But her father was looking at the pirate. “Aye, you are much like her.”

Katherine looked from her father to Liam, watching as they stared at one another in a strange silence now. She could not help but compare them. Gerald was not just thin and gaunt, but so pale, far paler than she’d ever seen him, and she did not think the pallor was due solely to his confinement. There were deep brackets around his mouth and eyes, as well, as if he perpetually scowled. Then he eased her aside with a grimace and moved stiffly to a chair. Katherine understood the heavy facial lines now—she realized that he limped and lived in pain.

Her gaze flickered back to the pirate. Liam O’Neill was powerfully built, strong and young. He was golden in
color, even his skin, from being perpetually out of doors and in the sun. He towered over Gerald and everyone else in the room. He exuded an undeniable presence, at once masterful and indomitable.

“Father—what happened to your leg?” Katherine asked.

He lowered himself awkwardly into the chair. “’Tis my damnable hip. It never healed as it should have after Affane. ’Twas a musket ball. Cold winter nights are the worst. This is not too bad.” He smiled slightly at her.

Katherine dropped to her knees before him. “Father—how can this be? All has been forfeit to the Crown? And you are exiled to such poverty? Is there no hope, no chance of justice?”

His black eyes blazed. He gripped the chair. “There is little hope, Katie, and none from the queen.”

Katherine sucked in her breath. Until this moment, she had hoped, deep inside herself, the way a child might, that it was all a pack of monstrous lies. Or that her powerful, invincible father would have a plan to undo the wrongs done to him. She told herself that she would not cry. Once Gerald FitzGerald, earl of Desmond, had been the most powerful lord in Ireland, like his father and his father’s father before him. He had been born to power, born to wealth, and born to the knowledge that forever he would wield it over Desmond and the other Irish lords. This was the grossest injustice Katherine had ever faced.

“Katie, my exile is no easy fate. I live for my return to Ireland. I think of naught else. But I do not want you to cry, darling. At least I am no prisoner in the Tower. Thanks to Eleanor.” He smiled at his wife. “Last year she came from Desmond and she moved heaven and earth to gain an audience with the queen, and finally convinced Elizabeth to remand me to Sir Warham Leger.” His glanced settled on Liam. “How did you get past my guards, O’Neill?”

Liam smiled. “Easily enough. They were preoccupied with dice and ale. Now they dream of drink and gaming.”

Katherine wiped her eyes with her fist.

“What do you with my girl, O’Neill? The two of you together, ’tis a surprising sight.”

Liam placed his hand on Katherine’s shoulder before she could speak. “Your daughter managed to talk herself out of the convent you had placed her in. I happened to seize the ship she traveled on. As she has no protector, I have taken up that role myself.”

Katherine jumped to her feet. “Father! He has seized
me!
And he keeps me against my will! He wishes me to be…to be his mistress!”

Gerald shoved himself to his feet.

Katherine froze, realizing she should have kept silent a bit longer, glancing from one man to the other. They stared at one another like watchful rivals prepared to duel. Eleanor also watched the men, her eyes bright with interest.

Finally Gerald spoke. “How lucky for you, O’Neill, that my wayward daughter chose to run away from the nunnery in France and that I am exiled like this, in such poverty, unable to take action against you.”

“Yes.”

Katherine cried out. “But Father! Surely you can pay him some small ransom! And talk him out of his intent!”

“Be quiet, girl,” Gerald said.

Katherine backed up a step, finding it hard to breathe. But she could not keep quiet, she could not, not when her entire future was at stake. “Father, I must be freed. I cannot stay with the pirate—I wish to wed—surely my uncle can arrange some reasonable sum, and if not, surely you can come to some agreement with the pirate.”

Gerald’s expression softened slightly and he finally looked at her. “Katie—I have nothing but the clothing on my back and the air that I breathe. I cannot pay the pirate any sum, small or otherwise. And I cannot find a husband for you, not now. No respectable man would have you—none.”

She gasped. “But…”

“You argue with me?”

Katherine flinched slightly, then squared her shoulders, keeping her head high. “No,” she whispered.

Gerald sucked in his breath, trembling now. “I have NOTHING left! All was taken from me. Taken from me
and given over to damned Englishmen. I have nothing, yet you complain that you have no husband!”

Katherine stared at her father through a haze of sudden tears.

“Desmond has been destroyed,” Eleanor added, her voice shrill. “Your father’s ambitious cousin FitzMaurice was quick to leap into the breach after Affane, to rouse the other Irish lords, to chase out the English. But dear God, he burned down all the countryside—and what he left intact, Sir Henry Sidney then burned and pillaged next! Today the Irish hide in the bogs and forests, kern and noble alike, men, women, and children, freezing and starving to death!” Eleanor wiped her eyes. “Desmond is destroyed, your father has lost everything, and you come to us thinking that we can find you a husband? Our problems are far too grave to bother with such nonsense.”

Katherine was stricken. She told herself that she was as selfish as her father and stepmother accused her of being. “I am sorry.”

“If only I knew what FitzMaurice does now,” Gerald cried vehemently. “Damn my cousin.”

“FitzMaurice was chased into Glen Aherlow by the new lord president of Munster,” Liam said. Everyone stared at him, Katherine included. “He lay low for the winter, but I expect him to emerge and renew his battles very soon.”

“Yes, spring is a good season for war,” Gerald spit.

“FitzMaurice claims to be the earl of Desmond in your father’s place,” Eleanor said harshly to Katherine. “And he is far too clever. Even now, he has the support of the Pope and Spain. He will not stop until he has stolen Desmond from its rightful lord!”