The Shadow of Albion (48 page)

Her eyes filled with heavy tears, and she clenched her teeth to keep anyone from

hearing her weep. And so, in her turn, she did not hear what approached.

„Who summons me?“ a sweet musical voice asked.

Meriel gasped and looked up. Her astonishment at what she saw was so great that

her tears dried immediately.

A woman stood between the stones. She was a tiny thing – the top of her head

was level with the top of the tallest stone – and her gown was of a silk so fine and

sheer that it shifted like layers of river mist

„I – I– I  do,“ Meriel stammered. „I need – “

„The King is gone from the land,“ the fairy woman observed, „and the Hills are

gone with him. I came from far away to answer your call, Daughter of Earth, but

your cry was loud.“

„He is not dead,“ Meriel gasped, heeding nothing of the woman’s message but

that „Tell me that Louis is not dead – I beg you, Madame!“

„The Young King Hves, but he is dead to us, for he will never pledge to us in the

old way.“ The woman’s voice was cool and remote, as though she did not belong in

the world and suffered none of its concerns.

„He lives!“ Meriel clutched her joy to herself for a moment before remembering

that she had come to ask for help. „Help me, Madame – and I will give you all of

this,“ Meriel said, indicating the bundle at her feet „And – “

And anything else you ask for, she had been about to say, when memories of her

old nurse’s teachings stopped her. Old Janet had been a Scotswoman, and traffic

with the Oldest People was still common enough in the land beyond me Wall for

Janet to have warned her infant charge sternly against such dealings. Most of all, she

had warned little Meriel against the dangers of making vague and open-ended

promises.

 – and I will honor you so long as I live, Meriel finished carefully.

The fairy woman smiled her cool lunar smile and knelt down, poking through the

clutter of gold and jewels.

„It is not enough,“ she said at last.

„But it is all I have!“ Meriel protested, fresh tears in her eyes.

„No,“ the fairy woman said reprovingly, and Meriel remembered the necklace and

earrings she still wore.

Slowly Meriel worked her coral earbobs free and dropped them into the pile. The

fairy woman seized them immediately, and held them up, admiring them.

More slowly, Meriel unclasped the chain around her throat. It held a gold locket; a

cross picked out in diamonds adorned one side, and the engraved Ripon arms the

other; inside was a miniature of her long-dead mother. The locket was Meriel’s

dearest possession.

She only wants to see if I will give it up, Meriel thought rebelliously, but knew her

qualms were foolish. She was risking her immortal soul merely by being here and

lives were at stake. This was no time to quibble over trifles. Meriel dropped the gold

locket among the other jewels.

„It is sufficient,“ the fairy woman said. „What would you ask of me, Daughter of

Eardi?“

Meriel hesitated. Old Janet had told her that the Fair Folk would make a bad

bargain if they could. What should she ask for? That the woman free Louis? That

could mean anything. Send a rescue? The same thing applied.

„I wish you to supply me with the means to rescue Louis, and to send me to his

side,“ Meriel said at last. The moment the words were out of her mouth she wished

she could call them back, seeing a thousand traps set before her.

„That is two things. Which of them shall I grant you?“ the woman asked playfully.

Meriel opened her mourn to speak again, but the form before her had begun to

flow and change, melting like the river mist it so resembled until Meriel had to blink

and look away.

When Meriel looked back, the fairy woman was gone and a grey pony stood in

her place. When it turned its head to look at her, the pony’s eyes flashed red as a

ferret’s. Meriel looked down. The gold, her handkerchief,! and her mother’s locket

had vanished.

Determinedly, Meriel got to her feet and warily advanced upon the grey pony. She

had ridden from earliest girlhood, but the uncanny animal was neither saddled nor

bridled.

She could not allow that to matter.

The pony did not retreat as she advanced upon it.   When she was within range,

Meriel grasped its mane firmly in both hands and threw herself over the pony’s back.

Before she had quite settled herself it began to move, first walking, then trotting, then

stretching itself at a run. Without reins, Meriel could hot control it. All that was left

for her to do was cling to the pony's mane and pray.

Chapter 18

Pawn Takes Rook

(July 19, 1805)

It was exceedingly boring to be imprisoned, Sarah decided. She had been

Monsieur Talleyrand’s guest these past four days, and found the entertainment

decidedly flat.

If she had truly been the woman Talleyrand thought her – the gently-bred English

aristocrat – Sarah might very well have been undone by her harsh treatment: locked

in a cold bare room, her only food a single bowl of gruel each day.

But Sarah had been taught in a much harsher school, and had slept rougher on

scantier provision than this. She had combed out her hair as best she could with her

fingers, braided it into two plaits, and tied them up with strips of rag torn from her

petticoats. She had lost muff, bonnet, and pelisse before she had arrived at Chateau

Roissy, so she made herself a cape from the blanket upon the bed, and occupied her

time pacing her little cell to keep her muscles supple and her body warm. She had

abandoned her corset immediately, hiding the undergarment beneath the wool

mattress in order to keep it with her, and without its constriction, she could move

freely. It was true that her dress had been cut with fashionably narrow shoulders, but

now that she had surrendered her corset the gown was laced only loosely.

Sarah would far rather have had a pair of trousers, such as she had used to wear

when she went hunting, but she supposed she must make do, as her jailers did not

seem to be the kind of whom one could make such odd requests. Except for the

serving girl who came twice a day, Sarah saw no one at all, which was, she

supposed, a thing to be grateful for: Geoffrey Highclere had struck her upon their

brief acquaintance as the sort of pushing fellow who might be inclined to gloat and

take other unpleasant liberties if he thought he might be able to get away with it.

However, Mr. Highclere had blessedly played least in sight, and so Sarah paced

her cell, ate all that was offered to her, and planned her escape.

For escape she must… and soon.

She did not know if Wessex meant to ransom her – though she rather thought his

chilly pride would make it inevitable – but she did know she must not depend upon

his help to escape, for Talleyrand had admitted that he did not know where the Duke

was to be found. Jf a nest of French spies could not discover his whereabouts, it

was unlikely that Sarah Cunningham could, even if she did not happen to be a

prisoner. So she must banish Wessex from her hopes.

And she did have hopes, for both Geoffrey Highclere and Monsieur Talleyrand

had dismissed her as a mere female pawn. They had not even bothered to search

her, but Sarah, when she had been taken, had been dressed in the first style of

elegance, from coif to boots. The tube-shaped buckram corset that Fashion

prescribed was stiffened with supple wire and whalebone stays, and she retained the

silver hairpins that had secured her long brown hair in the upswept fashionable

mode. With these two items, she could pick the lock of her prison. The moon had

been just past full when she had arrived at the chateau; once it waned sufficiently for

night’s darkness to conceal her, Sarah would make her move.

Her circumspection was equally dictated by the fact that the longer she played the

cowed and spiritless prisoner, the less her jailers would look for any resistance from

her. But she did have to admit that the long days empty of companionship or

occupation were very hard to bear. Only the discipline she had learned among the

People in her American homeland kept her from exhausting herself by fretting over

things she could not affect, from Wessex’s whereabouts to Lady Meriel’s fate.

Meriel was not blessed with Sarah’s own resources, and Sarah tried to make herself

accept that she might never know what had happened to her friend.

Sarah was lost in her melancholy thoughts, her feet automatically pacing out the

dimensions of her cell, when suddenly she came alert. She did not know what had

roused her, but as she stood poised, listening, she heard a scrabbling at the lock of

her door. Instandy Sarah fled to the bed and sat on its edge with head bowed, doing

her best to impersonate a spiritless captive.

When the door opened, Sarah looked up. Several chasseurs in red-and-green

uniforms were grouped in the hallway, holding before them a young blond man

dressed in a grimy smock and breeches. The young man’s hands were tied behind

his back, and his face was bruised and bloody, but despite his disadvantages, he

continued to struggle with his captors until they flung him into the room, swinging

the door shut behind him and locking it once more.

Sarah ran over to him, but he was already trying to get to his feet. The cords

about his wrists were tied so tightly that his hands were dark with congested blood.

Vainly Sarah plucked at the knots, realizing that they were too tight to untie.

„Wait here,“ she said. „I’ll have to cut you loose.“

She’d spoken in English; French had been among the accomplishments that her

mother had taught to the young ladies of Baltimore, but Sarah had been an indifferent

student at best and remembered none of her French lessons now. It appeared,

however, that, the stranger knew English, for he stopped struggling and knelt on the

hard stone floor, watching her intently.

At the beginning of her captivity Sarah had stolen the spoon that came with her

gruel. The utensil was tin (ever since that-theft her porridge had come with a wooden

spoon) and she had quickly realized that it would not be of great use to her as either

weapon or tool. But she had sharpened the edge of the bowl to a knife edge anyway,

partly for lack of any other activity to relieve the crushing boredom of her plight.

Now she carefully worked the sharpened spoon free of its hiding place in her

mattress and returned to kneel beside the young prisoner.

„So you are English, men?“ he said in that language. Only the faintest of accents

betrayed the fact that to him this was a foreign tongue.

„American,“ Sarah said automatically, before recollecting that in this bizarre

otherwhere the word had no meaning.

„From the New World!“ the stranger’s face lit up, as though for a moment he had

entirely forgotten his captivity. „You must tell me all about the place, mam’selle.“

„Gladly,“ Sarah said, inspecting his bonds for the likeliest place to cut. „But I

think we had better free your hands, first – if the circulation is not restored I think it

will go badly with you.“

„Those cowardly swine,“ the captive said without heat. „As terrified as old wives

of one lone man – what can I do to harm them, who have been an exile in my own

country since I was but a child? Ah, well. There is no uncertainty about my fate – if I

could only be sure that ma petite is safe. She followed me to the rendezvous where I

was captured; I should have known that she would.“

„And so you should,“ Sarah said absently. She’d chosen her spot and begun

sawing at the cord. The tin was sharp, but it was also soft, and she dared not press

too hard for fear of breaking her feeble weapon.

„Perhaps you have heard something of another prisoner?“ the young man went

on. „Her name is Meriel – she is English, though she could pass as one of my own

countrywomen – “

„Meriel!“ Sarah stopped sawing at the cords and stared at him. „Do you know

where she is? Is she safe?“

„Do you know her?“ the young man said, puzzled. „But you must forgive me,

mam’selle. I have been remiss in making myself known to you. My name is Louis.

Perhaps it is best not to say more, given the singular nature of our means of

introduction.“

„My name is Sarah,“ Sarah answered.

Oddly enough, the simple introduction made Louis laugh, then groan as his

bruised muscles protested. „You must, then, be my Mend’s Sarah – it is good to

see that Monsieur Geoffrey did not make away with you entirely.“