Lamentation of Swans
By
Goldie McBride
© copyright by Goldie McBride, July 2008
Published by New Concepts Publishing
Smashwords Edition
Cover Art by Jenny Dixon, July 2008
ISBN 978-1-60394-329-1
New Concepts Publishing
Lake Park, GA 31636
www.newconceptspublishing.com
This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.
Chapter One
Gwyneth had never seen an elf—no magical beings of any kind. Of course, she’d heard of elves, but she’d never expected to actually see one. They rarely left their magical realms to walk among mortals and she’d never been beyond the castle gates in her life, doubted she ever would. A mixture of curiosity and awe filled her as she studied the one currently testing the chains that bound him, momentarily diverting her from the tempestuous emotions roiling inside of her. The long black hair that hung halfway to his waist was as inky as a starless night. She’d caught a flash of bluish highlights when they’d dragged the would-be assassin through the castle gates and across the bailey, like the glint of sunlight on a raven’s wing, which proved it to be a profound black and not merely a very dark brown. His skin was golden brown.
She wondered if he was one of those referred to as a dark elf, or if it had nothing to do with coloring at all but rather a dark heart. She shouldn’t have been in any doubt, she supposed, since he’d been caught in the very act of committing the most treacherous of deeds, but she was far more filled with awe and admiration than revulsion, and that was before she’d seen him.
Now that she’d seen him—well, she could barely catch her breath. She felt dizzy and hot and completely confused. Her heart was palpitating at a frantic pace, her ears ringing. It almost felt like fear, except she knew it wasn’t. It felt like—desire, but she could hardly credit that, could’ve more easily accepted the fear. Why would she feel want or need for that –with him—when she could think of few things she found more disgusting, frightening, and painful?
It confused her, but she was more certain that it wasn’t fear that was making her feel so strange. She supposed it was wicked of her that she didn’t see his attempt on the king’s life as proof of a dark heart, but she didn’t. The truth was, she was far from alone in despising the king. There would’ve been far more folk of the realm who would’ve considered him a hero if he’d succeeded than a villain and she was one of them.
It was one of the things that had nerved her to approach him, the possibility, however vague, that he was nothing like the men of the castle, nothing like a mortal man, all of whom seemed to be nothing more than slight variations of the king, who was a vile creature as far as she was concerned.
It was almost disappointing to see that, beyond the very distinctive ears, there was not a great deal to set him apart physically from the men she saw every day. He was as near naked as he could possibly be and still retain even a bare modicum of decency. He’d arrived shirtless and barefooted, his breeches shredded until there was almost nothing left to the imagination.
She was a little disturbed that the ‘little’ that had been left to imagination had made her breathless with conjecture.
She couldn’t fathom why.
If there was anything she hated more than men’s quick tempers, quicker fists, and nasty habits, it was their ‘nasty sticks’. She would’ve been a happy woman if she’d thought it possible she would never encounter another.
She couldn’t deny that the elf’s form was pleasing to her senses, but she wasn’t even certain of why she found his form pleasing. He was tall and lean. Maybe it was the fact that he was still muscular for all that when the men she was more familiar with than she’d ever wanted to be were either skinny sticks with virtually no muscle at all, or beefy and hauled around as much fat as muscle?
There was no doubt in her mind that he had plenty of muscle to make him physically powerful, and yet that lean form must also make him swift and nimble.
A wave of nausea abruptly shunted her eager curiosity aside, for almost the moment her imagination supplied her with an image of that handsome face above hers, that pleasing body striving above hers, her mind supplanted them with real memories that were far from pleasant.
Thom had managed to corner her before she could slip out of the great hall only a little earlier when she’d helped to serve the evening meal. She’d become adroit at avoiding the men-at-arms, but she’d been distracted—by him. She’d allowed her mind to stray at the most dangerous of times and she’d paid for it in flesh.
She’d been witless enough to struggle on top of the stupidity of allowing herself to get cornered and now it wasn’t just her woman’s flesh that was battered. She was bruised and battered all over from his roughness. Her face was still throbbing where he’d cuffed her with his fist.
She could thank her stars he wasn’t the brute Bradford was, she supposed. Otherwise he might have killed her instead of merely rattling her brains in her head. Then again, she might’ve been able to elude Bradford. He wasn’t as young as Thom and he was a sight heavier. She’d managed to elude Bradford’s clutches the last time he’d tried for her when she’d accidentally planted her foot in the midst of his genitals.
Of course, she’d had to hide for nigh a month to avoid the lesson he’d promised and poor Meg had ended up having to endure instead, but as badly as she’d felt about it she’d never been able to bring herself to simply endure as the others did.
She didn’t think she could bear it anymore at all—not another moment, not another day.
She hadn’t even had her first menses when the men-at-arms had noticed her budding breasts and commenced to laying in wait for her. The first time had been the absolute worst, but she couldn’t say that any time since had been a great deal better beyond not being as painful in her woman’s place. For the most part, she managed to avoid capture, but she had her duties. Cook would beat her and chase her from the kitchen if she tried to hide to avoid having to help with serving and every meal since that first time she’d been caught had been a living nightmare.
“Do you have a purpose for skulking there in the shadows? Or have you merely come to gape, mortal?” the elf growled, jerking Gwyneth from her thoughts, startling her so badly that she nearly dropped the peace offerings she’d brought to try to help her bribe the assassin.
Gwyneth clutched the wine skin and the bundle of cheese and bread a little more tightly, wrestling with the craven urge to run away. As unnerving as the elf was, though, her desperation won out.
“How did you know I was here?” she asked in a low voice.
He turned his head when she spoke and she could see him focus on the wall she stood behind, almost as if he could see the thin crevice she was peering through.
His lips curled. “I could smell you.”
The insult jolted through her in a shockwave. Anger slowly flickered to life in the wake of it.
Truthfully, she smelled the stench on herself—not hers, but Thom’s. At least, it hadn’t been hers before he’d shoved her to the rushes and coupled with her like a dog. She’d been trying to close her mind to it because it reminded her too strongly of what had happened and made her feel sick to her stomach.
It was hard to ignore the fact that he hadn’t actually looked toward her until she’d spoken, however.
The anger began to war with the fear and desperation churning inside of her. Beyond the fact that he’d insulted her without provocation, she wondered if it wasn’t a strong indication that he was no better than those she’d hoped he would help her escape from. It seemed unavoidable that he was merely angry and lashing out at the nearest object handy as they so often did.
As tempted as she was to simply turn around and leave the way she’d come, though, there was no hope behind her. It remained to be seen if there was hope before her. “I brought you something to eat,” she said finally, swallowing her anger and her fear with an effort.
He was silent for so long she thought he’d decided to ignore her. “You’ve taken a strange route to bring food.”
There was a question in the comment and she realized much, if not all, of his anger had vanished. It had at least diminished and it made hope rise in her that she’d been mistaken.
“They didn’t send me to bring it to you,” she confessed at length.
She had his full attention and wondered as she stared at his shadowed face if he could pierce the darkness. Surely not? The cell itself was dim, lit only by a meager amount of light from the torch in the sconce on the wall beyond his cell. Where she stood, she could barely see her hand in front of her face. She’d found her way by memory along the passages she’d traversed many times, fearful of taking a candle as much because she thought it might be missed as from the anxiety that the telltale glow might be detected through some crack and give her away. Most of the castle’s inhabitants were dead to the world, true, the men-at-arms having drank themselves to sleep as was their habit and the servants having worked themselves into a stupor, but in Belmor Castle there were always some people stirring.
“I can not reach it from there,” he responded finally.
Gwyneth hesitated, but she’d come this far. If her courage failed her now she might never get another opportunity to escape. “You won’t … you won’t hurt me if I come near enough to give it to you?”
She couldn’t tell anything about his expression in the shadows, but she could tell he was mulling over her question.
“Who are you?”
Nobody. “A serving maid.”
“There would be no benefit in harming you, then, would there?”
Oddly enough, both his tone and the remark reassured her. “Except to vent your ill humor.”
She saw a muscle work in his square jaw.
“There is only one I would care to vent my ill humor on and, as he is not around, I believe I can contain it.”
“A moment,” she responded, moving away from the peep hole through which she’d studied him. Guiding herself with one hand along the wall, she counted her paces until she’d reached the secret door that led into the dungeons. Despite the antiquity of it, the device that worked it had been very cleverly designed. The door swung open soundlessly. After peering around to be sure none of the guards were near enough to spot her, she made her way quickly along the passage until she reached the assassin’s door.
Kneeling on the floor, she very carefully tore off a piece of bread about the size of her fist and a chunk of cheese about half again that big. Her heart was thundering in her chest when she pushed her hand through the small slot at the bottom of the door designed for feeding prisoners when the guards felt like it.
“It’s not very old at all,” she murmured.
“It smells appetizing enough from here,” he responded dryly, “but I am chained to the wall. I still can not reach it.”
Gwyneth sat back on her heels in consternation. She hadn’t counted on them chaining him—he’d been manacled when they’d brought him in. She’d thought they would only toss him into a cell.
She would have to try to lift the guard’s keys, she realized, feeling cold terror wash over her. In the back of her mind, she’d realized that all along, that she would have to open the door to free him and there was no way to do that without the keys. She just hadn’t wanted to think too hard about the obstacles that stood between her and her goal.
Moreover, she’d envisioned pleading her case before she set him free. She’d thought she might wring a promise from him while she had something to bargain with. Once she’d freed him, she wouldn’t have anything at all.
Retrieving the food she’d offered, she licked her dry lips and took the plunge. “By what name are you known?”
He seemed a little disconcerted by the turn in the conversation, and suspicious.
“Caelin. What is your name, little maid?”
She doubted he had any idea of her size or age, but she appreciated his effort to soften her with words. It was a small thing, true, and no doubt an attempt to deceive, and yet, even though it cost little, kind words were as rare as hen’s teeth. “Gwyneth.”
He was silent for several moments. She did not know why, but there was something in his silence that disturbed her. It was almost as if the name was familiar to him—no great surprise, she supposed since it was a common enough name, but still it bothered her, that silence that seemed to indicate that he was thinking. “Only Gwyneth?”
She ignored that. He had to know she was of Belmor. “If I help you escape, will you take me with you?”
Contrary to what she’d more than half expected given the fact that the king had ordered him drawn and quartered at dawn, he greeted her question with a prolonged, thoughtful silence. “I came to kill King Gerald. If you set me free, I am honor bound to try again. I do not think you want to be with me when I do, little maid.”
Gwyneth digested that in shocked silence. She thought what shocked her most was his honesty. She’d been prepared for him to lie, to readily agree regardless of what he planned to do. She hadn’t been prepared for the possibility that he’d so boldly refuse. She didn’t actually understand it if it came to that. He was an elf and she knew, although they weren’t immortal, that they lived many times as long as mortals. Mayhap their lives weren’t as precious to them? Even if that was true, though, it was completely incomprehensible that he’d risk such a horrible death if he had a chance at freedom.
But then, maybe he thought he could free himself? “Couldn’t you … take me someplace safe and then come back?” she asked plaintively.
“Where in all of the realm of Wynsmere is a safe place?” he growled sardonically. “You are an innocent if you believe there is such a place in these lands since Gerald, ‘the impaler’ seized the thrown.”
His sarcasm was biting, particularly since he had to know she was no innocent. There was no such thing for anyone who lived in the shadow of Belmor Castle. Truthfully, she couldn’t recall a time when she had been. Even as a small child she had seen such things at King Gerald’s principle seat, Castle Belmor, that sickened her, gave her horrible nightmares, made her so fearful that many nights she was afraid to close her eyes.
She swallowed with an effort against the knot of fear and frustration that formed a hard, unswallowable knot in her throat. “They will make a place for me on the executioner’s platform if I help you to escape and we are caught.”
“They are likely to if they catch you down here,” he said harshly. “Run back to your corner, little maid, and turn your mind from this business.”
Defeat settled on Gwyneth’s shoulders. She didn’t know why it had even occurred to her to think for a moment that there was any escape for her. She was doomed to live out her days in the shadow of Belmor Castle—however many days that numbered. Death almost seemed preferable—so long as it was a swift one. Few folk had that blessing, though.
The urge to weep washed over her, but she squelched it. Nothing could be more useless. He wasn’t likely to unbend, even a little, because she shed tears. It would only get her caught.
For a time she wallowed in the misery of defeat, too caught up in the death of her hopes to turn her mind elsewhere. As the pain eased, though, her mind turned again to the fate that awaited him. She felt bile rise in her throat at the thought.
She couldn’t simply leave, she realized. She couldn’t turn her back on him and allow so horrible a fate to overtake him when she might prevent it. Rising decisively after a few moments, Gwyneth set her ‘bribery’ down and moved quietly to the corner, peering around to see if she could see any sign of the guard who generally patrolled the dungeons. When she saw no sign of him, she tilted her head to listen. Faintly, she could hear a chorus of snores, but it was hard to say if any belonged to the guard or if all belonged to the other wretched souls rotting within the dungeon. She heard nothing that indicated he might be awake, though, and finally gathered the nerve to creep down the passage for a better look.
He was slumped across the rickety table in his little cubby hole, she saw, a mug of overturned ale near his hand, his cheek in the puddle that had formed on the rough top and was dripping through the cracks and onto the stone floor. After studying his face for a long moment, she scanned him for the keys and discovered without much surprise that the ring of keys was hooked to his belt.
Anywhere but that, she thought, feeling her belly cinch a few knots tighter than before. Again, she hesitated, wondering if she’d lost her mind, but the image of the stranger rose in her mind again, the elfin man who called himself Caelin. She couldn’t bear the thought of what would happen to him come morning if she did nothing. She didn’t know why, but she couldn’t.
Dragging in a sustaining breath, she held it, let it pass slowly between her lips as she began to inch closer to the guard. A thick stream of drool dripped from his thick lower lip to join the puddle of ale on the table. His entire face was slack.
Reaching him, she curled her fingers around the keys to keep them from jingling when she lifted them from the hook on his belt. He uttered a snort as she lifted the ring. She froze for a split second and then completed the action, slipping the top of the ring free from the hook. Before she could release a sigh of relief, he snorted again and lifted his head, staring at her bleary eyed. “Wha’s this?” he slurred.
Gwyneth stared at him wide-eyed, praying he’d settle his head and drop back into his drunken stupor, searching her mind frantically for a reason for her presence. She finally managed to force her lips to curl when she saw, contrary to her hopes, that he was scanning her length speculatively. “I brung you a bit o’food an’ some wine ta wash it down,” she said in a hoarse whisper. “I din like ta wake you, though.”
He made a grab for her abruptly. Fortunately, he was too drunk to move with any coordination. He tripped over his boots and sprawled on the floor. Gwyneth uttered a giggle, dancing out of his reach. Intended to sound flirtatious, hysteria threaded the sound instead, but she doubted he had enough wit about him to realize it or care if he did.
“I see in ain’t food ye’ve got on yer mind,” she muttered in an attempt to sound seductive. “I’ll just git the stuff I left around the corner an’ once ye’ve had a bit of food if yer still interested ….”
He almost caught her as she whirled to dash back down the corridor, but although he succeeded in grabbing her foot, his hold wasn’t firm enough to trip her up. Racing frantically back the way she’d come, she dropped to her knees and pitched the ring of keys through the food slot of Caelin’s cell. Whether he could reach them or not remained to be seen, but she didn’t want the guard grabbing her and discovering she had them and it seemed doubtful, now, that she could elude him long enough to free the elf.
She’d done what she could. It was all that she could do.
A heaviness still settled over her as it flickered through her mind that it might all be for nothing, that he might not be able to reach the keys she’d tossed to him at such risk to herself.
The guard lurched around the corner and grabbed her before she could gather up the wineskin and the cloth wrapped food. Staggering, he pitched them both onto the rough stone floor, landing on top of Gwyneth hard enough to knock the breath from her, stunning her.
“I’ll have a piece of you,” he growled, “and then mayhap another bit and then I’ll think about the wine.”
He wreaked of ale, but his breath was worse. By the time Gwyneth had managed to drag air into her bruised chest again, though, she’d had time to realize it would be better all the way around not to fight him. He was still too drunk for his suspicions to have been aroused. If she didn’t give him any trouble, mayhap he’d finished quickly and pass out, and she could still escape with her hide intact.
Hiking her skirts, he shoved a hand between her legs, fondled her roughly for a moment and began fumbling to get his nasty stick from his pants. Bile rose in Gwyneth’s throat. Between his stench, his foul breath, and the certainty that she had to endure another poking before she had any chance of escape, it was all Gwyneth could do to hold onto the contents of her stomach.
She felt something about the thickness and length of a finger prodding her and relaxed fractionally when she realized his member wasn’t large enough to cause her a great deal of discomfort. The man, himself, was another matter. After stabbing at the tender skin along her cleft ineffectually for several moments while she lifted her hips up and down in an effort to help him ring the right hole, he finally managed to find her opening and plowed inside of her. Her eyes stung, watering at the burning pain. It was always the same, she thought despairingly, although Alyce had assured her she would grow accustomed and that it was far, far better to endure the discomfort of a few moments than to risk whelping the bastard’s brat. She wasn’t certain she completely agreed, not if it meant there was no pain in the other place, but her fear of childbirth weighed heavily against that, and worse yet was the threat of succeeding in producing offspring in the image of their fathers. She did not know if she could stomach allowing such a babe to suckle her without vomiting.
Snuffling and grunting like a pig as he began pumping into her, he grabbed a handful of breast and squeezed it until Gwyneth had to grind her teeth to keep from crying out. He made several attempts to capture her mouth, but Gwyneth managed to elude that, jerking her head away each time so that, although she felt his slobber smear across first one cheek and then the other, she didn’t have to endure the taste of his putrid mouth on hers.
He’d managed no more than a handful of seconds of humping and grunting when he abruptly jerked, uttered a grunt, and went limp on top of her. Gwyneth struggled to push him off, to catch her breath. Abruptly, he rolled off, sprawling limply on the floor beside her.
“Swine!” Caelin growled furiously, bending over the unconscious guard with his fists balled.
Gwyneth struggled upright, shoving her skirts down. “Is he dead?” she asked shakily when she realized the guard hadn’t merely passed out—at least not without help.
Caelin slid a speculative glance at her. “Say the word and he will be,” he said grimly.
Feeling her heart leap, her throat grow dry, Gwyneth gaped at him but finally shook her head. “You should go. They’ll send someone to spell him in a bit.”
He nodded. Kneeling over the man, he relieved the man of his weapons,—a short sword and a dagger—tore a piece of cloth from the guard’s shirt, and used it to form a gag. Grasping the man beneath his arms, he dragged him into the cell. Gwyneth heard the clink of the manacles as she finally gathered her wits and looked around for the bread and cheese she’d stolen. The scuffle with the guard had crushed the bread a bit and the cheese, she saw, had been kicked several yards. Scrambling on her hands and knees, she gathered what was left, brushed the dirt and debris from the food, and carefully tied it in the cloth she’d used to carry it.
Caelin emerged from the cell again just as she finally managed to get to her feet. He locked the cell behind him while she tucked the knotted cloth into the waist of her skirt and slipped the strap on the wine skin over her shoulder to leave her hands free. “I’ll show you the passage,” she said shakily.
Nodding, he looked around and finally pulled the torch from the sconce on the wall. She stared at it, frowning as she struggled to find the words to reason with him. “There are cracks and peep holes all along the passage. If anyone’s about, they’re liable to see the light.”
He divided a glance between her and the torch and finally returned it to the sconce, following her as she moved to the wall and felt around for the catch that would release the secret door. He caught her arm as they stepped inside and the door closed. “Show me the way to the king’s bedchamber.”
She shook her head even though she doubted he could see it. “I don’t know the way.”
He studied her, or perhaps considered whether or not she was lying. “You do.”
Resentment swelled inside of her. “I freed you. Let me go. I am going whether you help me or not! I cannot endure this place longer!”
“Show me the way first,” he growled, fury in his voice and in the tension of his stance.
She tried to pull her arm free. “I risked enough to free you—endured that pig rutting me. Let me go, I say! I am leaving.”
She sensed an internal struggle but finally his grip on her arm eased. “I will take you a short distance from the castle and give you directions to reach the first village beyond here. And then you will tell me the way to his apartments. If I can, I will join you again once I am done here.”
Chapter Two
Reluctance instantly clogged Gwyneth’s throat, but she merely nodded.
It wasn’t that she cared if the king died. In fact, she thought she would cheer with everyone else. The reluctance was entirely from the dismay she felt that he would get himself killed in the attempt. There was no reasoning with men, though, she knew. Once they’d set their mind to do something they would certainly not listen to a woman—mayhap another man, but not a ‘silly female’.
Turning to her right, she placed a hand along the wall. He followed closely, settling one hand near hers on the wall and the other at her waist. She could feel his warmth at her back, could feel his leg brush her skirts from time to time. His hand felt heavy on her waist and it only grew heavier as they progressed, his heat filtering through the threadbare fabric of her skirt and shift and the bustier she wore around her ribs.
She did her best to block her keen awareness of him and focus on keeping her footing as the floor began to be more and more uneven, but she stumbled from time to time. Each time she did, his hand tightened on her waist briefly.
After a time, the wall also grew rougher beneath her hand and she realized they were no longer beneath the castle itself but had reached the caverns that connected to the passage. Almost as if he’d read her mind, he spoke.
“We aren’t beneath the castle any longer.”
The timber of his deep voice sent a quiver through her to join the faint shaking she’d become increasingly aware of at her core. “No,” she responded, hearing the quaver in her voice.
“You are cold?”
Gwyneth swallowed with an effort. The air was cool and damp and the contrast between that and his warmth, she was sure, contributed to the tremors. But just as surely the chill air didn’t account for it entirely. “A little chilled,” she said finally. “Stay here a moment. It’s safe to light a torch now … and not at all safe to traverse the caverns without the aid of a light.”
He released her almost reluctantly as she pulled away and felt around until she found the flint and torch she kept near the entrance to the cave. The oiled rags wrapped round the top of the torch were damp from the humidity and it took several minutes for a spark to catch. When it did, she tucked the flint into the bundle at her waist and lifted the torch, scanning their surroundings.
“How do you know about the caverns?”
Gwyneth sent him a sharp glance at his tone, wondering at the suspicion that threaded his voice. “I am not sure. I suppose I was shown, but I do not remember.”
She felt his assessing gaze on her as she moved toward the passage she knew would lead them into the valley beyond the mountain range where Belmor Castle lay.
“Does the king know of the passages?”
Gwyneth flicked a glance at him over her shoulder. “I do not know.”
He tilted his head at her speculatively, but she turned away. “If you thought they did you’d be more anxious.”
“How do you know how anxious I am?” she asked tartly.
“You tremble from fear then?”
There was disbelief in his voice. It irritated her because she suspected he had a very good idea that it was him that had her trembling. “Should I not be fearful when it means my life if we are captured together?”
“You should. This is why I think it is strange that you are not.”
Gwyneth compressed her lips. “You do not know me, elf. Unless you read minds—and I have never heard it said that elfin folk possessed that ability—do not presume to guess what I feel.”
They traveled in silence for a time. “Why did you risk so much to free me?” he asked after a while.
She supposed it was to be expected that he would be curious, and yet she’d hoped he wouldn’t ask. “I did not want to watch your execution.”
“You need not have.”
“Not looking would not have kept it out of my mind,” she said in a strained voice.
What did he expect her to say? What was he digging for? Everything she’d said was the truth, even if it wasn’t the whole truth. She didn’t actually understand her reasoning herself. It wasn’t something she could explain.
The decision was more a matter of many things coming to a head at once, she decided, than any one thing, many things that had begun to outweigh her fears.
She wasn’t terribly afraid at the moment because she thought they were relatively safe. She was almost positive no one knew about the secret passages or the cavern besides her. She didn’t know why she thought that except that she’d never heard anyone mention them and certainly never come upon anyone.
Not that she spent a great deal of time wandering through the secret passages, but she’d taken refuge in them many times in her memory. She’d explored them as a child and since that time until she’d memorized every twist and turn and new every secret door.
She didn’t know how she knew about them when it seemed no one else did, but she supposed she’d learned before King Gerald’s time. She could remember when he’d taken the castle. She just couldn’t remember the old king, or his queen, and certainly no one had dared to speak of them since King Gerald the Impaler had seized the throne, so named because he was so fond of mounting his enemies, which was anyone who displeased him, on pikes along the roads throughout his kingdom.
“If you are laboring under the belief that I am not guilty of the crime of which I was accused, you are wrong.”
Gwyneth flicked a glance at him over her shoulder. “If you are laboring under the impression that I would hold that against you, you are wrong.”
He pulled her to a stop, forcing her to turn and look at him. “Why would you risk so much for me?”
The barely suppressed violence and suspicion in his tone confused and unnerved her. If was almost as if he sensed a trap of some sort, suspected her motives, but what could he possibly think she had to gain by releasing him and then leading him to his death? She supposed, after a moment, that it was understandable, given his treatment, that he trusted no one within Belmor and she still didn’t understand why it seemed that he felt animosity toward her.
And mayhap she was only imagining it was directed toward her?
Or he was still angry that she’d refused his request?
She allowed her gaze to flicker over his handsome face for a handful of seconds, studying the appealing features she’d only guessed at when she’d watched him from a distance. He stirred her. She didn’t know why, but she wouldn’t have told him if she had understood herself why she had only to look at him to feel her pulse race and her breath grow short, to feel want for him to touch in the all the ways she’d thought she hated when other men touched her.
It defied reason that she had looked at him, a battered prisoner, and felt hope, that she’d felt truly alive for the first time that she could recall.
She looked away when she felt a blush rising to her cheeks. “I do not know,” she murmured. “I thought ….” She lifted her gaze to meet his again. “I felt hope when I saw you. I have not felt that in a very long time.”
He studied her face assessingly and finally lifted his free hand and gently touched her swollen cheek. She winced, more because it brought to her mind how misshapen it was, how ugly, than because she felt any pain. Lifting her own hand when he allowed his to drop, she covered it self-consciously.
“If ever a man needed killing it is Gerald the Impaler. Show me the way.”
She felt her face twist with the anguish that descended upon her. “So that you can throw your life away?”
“If necessary.”
“For nothing?”
His expression hardened. “If I slay Gerald, it would not be for nothing.”
“You would never get near enough!” she said angrily. “He is surrounded by magic. You could not pierce the spell that protects him. If you could, you would not have been in that cell!”
“I did get near enough!” he snarled furiously. “I was within an inch of piercing his black heart! If not for his guard, he would be dead now! It was not his magic that saved him. I was outnumbered. Damn it woman! Someone has to put an end to that monster, whatever the sacrifice! What hope have you felt if you have no confidence that I could end his reign of terror?”
Gwyneth swallowed with an effort. “You could lead ….”
“Whom? The dead? Those willing to fight him have lost heart. The monarchy is dead. It died when the true king and the princes and princess vanished from the ‘loving care’ of their uncle.”
“Some say ….”
He shook his head angrily, cutting her off. “That is nothing but wishful thinking … because their corpses have never been found. In their hearts, everyone knows that the boy king and his siblings were murdered long ago.”
“Go then!” Gwyneth said angrily. “You do not need me to show you the way! The passage is behind you. Follow it! It will lead you to his chambers eventually. I do not know the way.”
Jerking free of his hold, she turned on her heel and stalked away, trying to think what she would do when she left the caverns behind. She knew nothing about the countryside beyond. She’d never dared explore it, fearful every moment that she was gone that it would be noticed and they would begin to search for her, perhaps find the passages themselves.
He caught up to her, grasping her arm and halting her again. “I gave you my word that I would take you a safe distance from the castle,” he said tightly.
“You did not give your word, and I would not hold you to it if you had,” Gwyneth said angrily. “I am far better off without you! They will search for you. They will not miss one maid.”
“This is true,” he said, grim amusement threading his voice now, “but that did not seem to weigh with you before when you asked me to help you escape.”
She sent him a resentful glance. “I had not thought, then, that you would be more of a liability than a help,” she said tartly.
“You are saucy for a lowly maid,” he said, speculation mingling with the amusement that still laced his voice. “And oddly well spoken.”
The comments unnerved her, chilled her. She wasn’t in the habit of unleashing her temper. If she had been she would’ve been dead long since, or feeble minded from having the ‘sauciness’ beat out of her. She couldn’t fathom why she’d given vent to it with him—except that she was frightened out of her mind and she had convinced herself that he wasn’t like the others.
“I beg pardon,” she said shakily.
“So I am the only one privileged to feel the sharp edge of your tongue?”
She was overwrought. There was no other explanation for it. She’d allowed emotionalism to cloud her judgment. She was fortunate that he seemed to view it with amusement … at least at the moment. She was vastly disappointed that he seemed so reluctant to help her when she’d helped him. She was angry that she’d risked so much to set him free only to discover that he was determined to throw his life away needlessly anyway, but neither of those reasons were sound enough to explain her loss of control.
“You need only follow the passage to the stairs and go up them four flights. There are peep holes spaced out along the walls. One will give you a view of the target you seek and there will be a secret panel along the wall in one direction or the other. It is usually in the corner of the room where it is least noticeable. There is a latch on the inside that must be turned. On the other side it requires pressure in the same area to release the latch.” She paused. “I pray you find a swift death Caelin—for your sake and mine—and not the death he planned for you, for that would haunt me forever.”
* * * *
Her words haunted Caelin as he made his way along the passage. It wasn’t fear of death that kept them in his mind, however.
Nothing had transpired as he had expected, planned, anticipated. King Gerald had been waiting for him alright, as Artimus had told him, but not to yield his charge to him as he had been instructed. He had arrived to find himself barred from the castle by the protection spell, had been refused admittance by the guard, and told to go about his business when he had sent word to the king that he had been sent to take the serving girl, Gwyneth, to the Temple of Mannet Rae at Sherbrooke.
He had been forced to retreat a short distance and consider how he was going to fulfill the task he had been given when he’d been presented with what appeared to be an insurmountable obstacle. In truth, he had not planned the attack upon the king so much as he had seized the opportunity. It had certainly occurred to him that it was the surest way to be taken inside—if they did not kill him outright. He had wanted to kill the bastard when he had been barred from the castle—actually, he had long thought the world would be a better place without the bastard but until he had had direct dealings with him he had not wanted to do it himself so badly. He would not have gotten the opportunity even to try, however, if the king had not brought a troop from the castle to hunt him down and kill him.
Being hauled to the dungeon in chains had certainly not been something he had anticipated when he had set out. He had known that it would be no easy task to free himself or to search the castle afterward for the girl, but it had seemed the only possibility for success.
And then the girl had simply presented herself to him, had come to the dungeon to free him almost as if she had been sent. He had wondered if she had been. Mayhap Artimus had manipulated her in some way, but he could not see that it was anything that she was aware of—try though he might to detect it.
She was nothing like he had expected her to be, not the creature he had envisioned when the wizard Artimus had sent him forth to find her and fetch her to the temple for the rites. She should have been as foul as the vile creature that had spawned her! She should have been twisted and pitted and belly churningly ugly!
She should not have pleased his eyes! She should not have made his cock stir with desire. Even if she had not been the spawn of that creature, she should not! She was not elfin. He was not certain what she was, but more mortal than aught else.
There was an aura of magic about her, faint but unmistakable—a legacy of her sire, no doubt. That was how he had known her, suspected even before she had given him her name. It was not her magic, though. He was almost certain of that, but some enchantment, mayhap, that the wizard had placed upon her.
A poor one, by the gods, if it had been intended to preserve that part of her that was precious to the wizard! That which he needed to free himself from his prison, for it had not!
Anger churned in his belly again when he thought of that. Despoiled! Before his very eyes, almost within his grasp, and him helpless to prevent it!
All was lost! Nothing he could do now would give him the chance to free the soul of his beloved mother from that bastard who held her chained in the between realm! Nothing! Because Gerald the Impaler had not guarded the girl as he had been charged! Gerald had balked him at every turn!
Damn him! Damn him to eternal torment! And her, too, the sniveling, useless lump of mortal flesh, he thought with abrupt viciousness. She was useless! Useless! He could not wrap his mind around it, could not think what to do beyond the driving need for vengeance—upon someone.
He would slit the bastard’s throat, pull his black heart from his chest while he lay drowning in his own blood!
He had managed to find the stairway the wench spoke of and ascend no more than two flights, however, when he heard the alarm raised, a clamor within the walls of the castle that could only mean one thing. His escape had been discovered.
He stopped abruptly, listening, at war with the urge to continue and exact his revenge and the certainty that he had lost any chance of catching the bastard unaware and unprotected. Frustration built in him until he wanted to howl his rage. Abruptly his focus shifted to the girl, though.
The useless pawn.
Was she useless? Was there no way he might fool the wizard long enough to draw him forth and, mayhap, slay him? Artimus needed the girl to free him from his prison, but could he use her when she was despoiled, no longer the virgin he had expected?
He didn’t know. Black magic was a force he didn’t fully understand, but he realized abruptly that he couldn’t simply give up. He had to try, somehow, to free his mother from Artimus’ clutches.
He had to have the girl even to attempt anything at all, he realized in sudden panic as he listened to the noises escalate on the other side of the wall of the secret passage. They would find her in their search for him, perhaps slay her outright for her treachery. They would have to know that she had been his accomplice—little though he’d needed her damned interference! The little fool!
He knew he should have killed the guard! His body would have been evidence enough of the escape, but it was his tongue that was a danger to the girl!
Gods damn it!
He launched himself down the stairs at a dead run and raced down the corridor, unmindful of the noise he made. There was enough clamor beyond the passage to mask it and, in any case, he feared if he didn’t make haste he would find his efforts wasted. To his surprise and vast relief, he found her huddled in the caverns. Tears stained her cheeks. It made his belly tighten when he saw them, but he dismissed the flicker of guilt. He had no doubt that she had shed them for herself.
“We have been discovered,” he said grimly. “On your feet! Hurry now, wench, or we will die tonight!”
Gwyneth scrambled to her feet, so relieved to see him alive when she had been certain he had gone to his death that it took her a moment to realize what he had said. “He is dead?”
“Nay,” he growled. “I had not even reached the top of the stairs when I heard the alarm go up. The guard was found, no doubt! I should have slit his throat. They will know I had help.”
Gwyneth thought for several moments that she would faint with fright or throw up. She fought both urges, whirling to lead him as quickly as she could through the labyrinth of tunnels that honeycombed the mountain. She chose the one that led the furthest from the outer curtain wall in the hope that they could reach it before the searchers had spread that far.
She stopped to catch her breath when they reached the opening. The elf, Caelin, pushed past her. She thought for several fearful moments that he meant to abandon her. Even as she pushed herself away from the wall, however, he returned, snatched the torch from her hand and tossed it the ground, stamping the flames out. “They are not convinced, yet, that we have managed to find our way outside the walls. We do not want to remove that doubt.”
He took her hand. “The ground is rocky. Take care where you step.”
Warmth flowed through Gwyneth when she felt his hand close around hers, felt his strength in his firm grip. Nodding, although he hadn’t waited for her acknowledgement, she followed him as carefully as she could, afraid that, if she sent rocks tumbling, the sound might carry far enough to give them away. There was enough light outside, though, for her to see better than she had thought she would be able to. Relief warred with uneasiness at that discovery. Was it nearing dawn already? Would the sun lift the darkness she had hoped would cloak them until they were a safe distance from the castle?
Or was in not dawn approaching at all? Was it merely the lessening of the deep gloom of the caverns that made it seem so light?
Surely, that must be it, she decided. She had only waited until the hall had quieted to leave. It could not be much past midnight if it was even that late.
She stumbled several times in spite of her efforts to be as careful as possible. Caelin was far taller than she. His legs covered the rocky slope as if it was broad daylight, free of treacherous rocks, and as level as the floor of the loft where she slept. Beyond that, she was weary. She had been laboring in the kitchens since well before dawn. She hurt all over from the roughness of the guard when he had rutted her and Thom not many hours before that. And she was more frightened than she had ever been in her life. The fear, she thought, was almost more taxing of her strength than any of the rest.
The third time she stumbled, Caelin stopped abruptly and turned his anger upon her. “Is it your intention to give us away?” he demanded in a low growl.
Gwyneth studied him in dismay. “My legs are not as long as yours,” she whispered.
He seemed to wrestle with himself, but instead of cuffing her for her impudence on top of her clumsiness, he merely turned away and pulled her to a walk again. He moved slower than he had before. It was almost a reproach in and of itself, an unspoken criticism of her failings, for he moved more slowly then even than she needed. She swallowed the bitterness that rose in her throat with an effort.
At least he hadn’t beat her.
But then, she reflected, that would not have been accomplished without making a great deal more noise than she had made stumbling over the rock and no doubt she was slowing him down enough as it was. He didn’t want to spare the time.
When they finally reached more level ground and she thought it safe to do so, she looked behind them, searching for the castle to see how far they’d come.
Not nearly as far as she’d hoped, she discovered with dismay. She could see the torches moving along the ramparts without difficulty.
Caelin paused and lifted his head, uttering a strangely musical warbling sound. He paused, as if he was listening, and then uttered it again. Gwyneth thought at first that the rhythmic pounding in her ears was nothing more than the sound of her heart, for it took on a more rapid cadence when she glanced back at the castle again and thought she saw the gate begin to open. She was certain of it when she caught the first glimpse of a torch in the gaping mouth.
A soft whicker snatched her attention away from that distant threat. She whipped her head around fearfully and saw a dark shadow racing toward them across the field. “They are sending out a search party!” she gasped, gripping Caelin’s arm a little frantically.
“I know. It was a certainty that they would sooner or later. We are fortunate that it was later … and that they did not manage to capture Darkness.”
Gwyneth swallowed convulsively, but she saw that the frightening shadow was no horrible apparition or even a horseman bearing down upon them. It was merely a black stallion. It began to slow even as she recognized it for what it was but was still racing directly toward them at a frightening speed. It skidded to a halt before Caelin, nodding its head so vigorously that it tossed its mane wildly about its head.
“Good boy!” Caelin murmured, his deep voice a soft croon of affection that sent a flicker of envy and resentment through her. If she had had a mane and tail she might have earned more appreciation for her own efforts, she thought bitterly.
She did not have more than a moment to dwell on it. Caelin turned, caught her about the waist, and tossed her onto the back of the prancing beast. It began to sidle and dance harder almost the instant her tailbone settled painfully against its spine. Gwyneth sucked in a sharp breath as she felt her balance shift, felt herself falling.
She hit the ground hard enough to knock the breath from her lungs, too stunned for many moments to get her bearings or attempt to rise.
Caelin grasped the horse’s head, whispering near his ear and the nasty beast settled. Stroking the horse soothingly, he moved around to where she lay. “Did she frighten you, big fellow?” he murmured before he knelt to help her to her feet. “Ignore the stench. She is nothing more than a mortal maid—well, female.”
Hurt and anger welled in her breast at that. Even as she gained her feet, however, Caelin grasped her and tossed her onto the hateful beast’s back again. “Hold on this time until I mount,” he advised her sardonically.
She twisted her hands in the stallion’s mane, more than a little tempted to see if she could wrench it out. Caelin caught the mane above her grip and flung himself across the horse’s back behind her. Settling one arm around her, he pulled her tightly into the cradle of his thighs and nudged the horse. With no more urging than that, Darkness turned and launched himself into a ground eating lope, racing across the broad, open fields that surrounded the castle.
Gwyneth was glad for the hold, despite the fact that it was becoming increasingly clear that she was not welcome, that Caelin considered her a burden he would be better off without. It seemed unfair that he felt no gratitude at all for the risk she had taken to help him, for the mauling she had endured for his sake, but she had not done it to earn his gratitude, she acknowledged, and it was doubtful he entertained any illusions about her motives. She had helped him in the hope that he would help her and he could be in no doubt of that when she had tried to barter with him. Mayhap he considered them even, given the circumstances, and felt no reason for any sense of obligation.
She supposed he was right.
It still stung that he took every opportunity to throw it in her face that she was less than appealing by referring to her stench, but she was obliged to admit that he had reason to be offended. She had not smelt half as bad from the sweat of her labors as she did from the maulings she’d endured from Thom and then that disgusting drunkard, Bard. If it was not bad enough to be ground into the filth on the floors by their rutting, neither man had smelled as if they had been near enough to water or soap to wet more than their fingers since spring—at the least. She could hardly bear the stench herself. She would gladly have scrubbed the smell of them from her skin and clothes if there had been any way to do so!
Under the circumstances, she began to feel more shamed than abused, wished that she could put enough distance between them that she need not worry that he could smell her filth. There was not much hope of it with the king’s men on their heels, but she had not heard a hue and cry. She held out the hope that they would be combing the hills surrounding the castle for some time before they tumbled to the fact that their quarry was long gone.
She had actually begun to relax somewhat as Darkness ate up the miles with his steady lope when the horse began to slow, began to toss his head and whicker a warning that he had scented danger in the shadows that lay before them.
Chapter Three
Drake felt a ripple along his skin that took no more than a fraction of a second to identify. Forcing the sudden tension from his shoulders by rolling them ever so slightly, he narrowed his eyes against the smoke that lay in a low cloud in the tavern and slowly searched the throng of humanity in the establishment for the magic user. A wielder, he wondered, in such a place?
Mayhap. It was a popular place, he thought wryly, being the only one of its kind for many miles. Travelers had little choice but to patronize it, regardless of the rough crowd that he could see gathered under its roof. They were easy enough to pick out—the bullies that strutted around like they owned the place, shoving people out of their way, demanding service without regard to anyone else waiting.
He dismissed them. The magic was powerful. No one with that kind of power worried about throwing his weight around to ward off a confrontation. They had nothing to prove. The travelers perched on the edges of their seats while they waited to be served, looking torn between hopefulness that they might actually get a bite to eat before they were forced to leave and the urge to bolt immediately, he also dismissed.
His gaze settled finally on a man in the shadows at the far end of the room. His keen eyes pierced the gloom wreathing the man. He looked to be somewhere between thirty and five and thirty in human years and yet there was as much white in the hair that hung well past his shoulders as there was black—an odd sort of coloration. It wasn’t mixed. It wasn’t black hair threaded with white. There were wide shocks of white on either side of the front that framed his face. The back was all black.
He scanned the remainder of the tall figure folded into the booth—long legs stretched out beneath the table, broad shoulders.
Not a wizard, he decided. Not human.
He considered for a moment and finally pushed his way through the throng. They gaped at him as he passed, but they were mere humans. They were no threat and therefore of no interest.