Claiming Her (Renegades & Outlaws) (43 page)

She wiped the dirt from her hands and swiped her arm across her forehead. “Walter, I—”

“Come my lady, ’tis most urgent.”

She let him hurry her to the northern side of the bailey, which backed up to the cliffs below. This portion of the castle was generally deserted, used mostly for storage: old barrels were stacked by the wall and two or three broken-down carts stood ready to have someone finish the job and turn them into something useful again. The old bakehouse listed sideways and now housed small scurrying creatures instead of bake fires.

“Walter, what is it…?” she asked in a faintly complaining tone.
 

“Someone to see you,” he said, drawing up at the little postern gate that opened just over the cliffs.
 

“See me?” she said in surprise.

“From the village.”
 

Originally built to allow small parties of occupants to leave without being detected during sieges, the gate led to an extremely narrow pathway, rocky and slick with sea spray, that scaled down the hillside toward the village. Occasionally, at great need, villagers still used it, when they wished to reach the castle quickly, as it was a much more direct route. It was also much more treacherous. Villagers used it only at times of great need.

With a chill of fear, she hurried to it. Walter swung the door open and hurried her through.
 

As he shut the gate behind them, two English soldiers stepped in from each side.

She stared for an uncomprehending second. Then they grabbed her, wrapped her up, gagged her, and carried her off to the army camp. Walter hurried behind.

*

 
“I AM SORRY to have been so underhanded in my methods of inviting you up to visit me, my lady,” said Captain Ludthorpe as Katarina was escorted into his tent. “But it was imperative that I speak with you.”

Still reeling from the capture and Walter’s duplicity, Katarina took the cushioned seat Captain Ludthorpe offered. “Some men send messages,” she told him weakly.

He laughed.

The soldiers had taken her almost all the way to the village to avoid being spotted by the Rardove garrison lining the walls. They were met by a few Irish spies who, it turned out, Walter had enlisted, men who had either no interest in joining a rebellion, or great interest in the coin the soldiers poured into their hands. In any event, the deed was done, and under the disguising cover they provided, Katarina was taken to the army camp.
 

“The captain merely wishes to
speak
with you, my lady,” Walter kept assuring her as he hurried along behind. “Hear your petition, and put his to you.”

That, and the gag in her mouth, kept her from calling out. For if this was true, and this captain was indeed intent on negotiation, perhaps she
could
speak to him.

In any event, she was utterly unable to resist.

Captain Ludthorpe stepped toward a small table. “Yes, well, your clerk indicated it might be difficult to ascertain your true feelings on the matter while inside the castle. He offered to assist me.”
 

“I can see that. When did he make this offer?”

“Whisky delivery,” Ludthorpe told her with appallingly large smile, and lifted a glass in her direction. “Aodh had it sent out. May I offer you some?”

“No,” she said as he held up the glass. ”But I would very much like a moment alone with my steward. And a pistol.” She had indeed underestimated Walter: his capacity for trickery and subterfuge.

He shook his head. “In truth, my lady, Walter has only your best interests at heart.”

“I very much doubt that. Where is he?”

“We…have him now.” There was something vaguely satisfying about the pause before he said that. Perhaps Ludthorpe did not like Walter much either. “In any event, your clerk felt your head has been turned. And I could not be sure Aodh spoke true, when he said you were fully his.”

She held her tongue as the commander sat opposite her in another of his little camp chairs, cup in hand. For a moment, they regarded each other, then he dropped his elbows to his knees, leaning forward, and stared hard at her.
 

“It would be a most odd development, my lady, for you to have turned. You’ve always been exceptionally loyal to the Crown. Her Highness was quite taken aback by the news. I counseled that we wait, and speak to you directly, that the news we’d been hearing might not be true.”

“News?”

“From Bermingham, for one.”

“That snake,” she snapped. “He bears only ill news.”

“Yes, well, if that is all the news there is to bear, one is rather at a loss, is one not?” He peered at her, perhaps waiting for her to indicate she was bearing good news.

She folded her arms over her chest. “What do you want me to say, Captain?”

“The truth.”

“Aodh Mac Con is precisely what the queen needs out here on the Irish marches. That is the truth.”

Ludthorpe straightened off his elbows. “Aodh has a way of making people think those sorts of things.”

“You know him?” she said in surprise.

He nodded. “We have fought together.”

“Then you know he is stalwart, a natural leader of men.”

“I know he is in open rebellion.”

“And already forming alliances that have eluded me for years, sir. With both the Irish and the English. And he…”
 

The commander was shaking his head slowly. “Open. Rebellion.”

She cleared her throat. “I do think he can be persuaded to come to terms…”

He laughed and set down his cup. “I do not know if Aodh told you, I offered sanctuary. To you.”

“Sanctuary?”

“Let us say pardon, then. The queen is willing to be forgiving to you.”

“How forgiving?”

He shrugged. “Your decision here was not so surprising a thing. Your castle was overrun, you were under duress, trapped, perhaps even…forced to do things.” Their eyes met. “Mayhap to send messages with your name affixed to them. Perhaps to ride with the rebels, and broker alliances with other rebels.”
 

So, they knew of The O’Fail. Curse Walter.
 

Ludthorpe’s voice became more persuasive. “In such circumstances, the queen would be strongly inclined to be forgiving, lady. I give you my deepest assurances.” He lifted his eyebrows, giving her the chance to simply confirm his guesses, and settle the matter, once and for all.
 

She leaned down as the captain had done, elbows on her thighs, and lowered her voice as he had done. “I am under no duress, Captain, and Aodh Mac Con is England’s last, best chance out here beyond the Pale.”
 

He snapped back in his chair and his gaze traveled down her gown. “I saw you on the walls.”

“Did you?”

“Yes. You, one of the most loyal nobles of the realm, in open rebellion
with an Irishman
. At Aodh’s urging.”

She sat forward. “Then I offer that as my proof, Captain: Aodh is precisely what the Crown needs. As you point out, he has fomented a rebellion that stretches across the entire northern portion of Ireland in a fortnight. From whence do such powers come?”

“The devil?” suggested the commander drily.

“From within.” She tapped her chest. “If a single man turned, so be it, such things can be dismissed as little more than self-interest, or foolishness, a man too easily overawed, some such.”

“And if one woman does…?”
 

She pressed on. “But that is not the case. Aodh has persuaded all manner of men to turn to his cause. Both the small and the powerful, English and Irish.”

“Yes, the English concern me greatly.”

“As well they should. It is a testament to the need for a change, do you not think, that even the English are willing to join this rebellion? He has roused them, but only because they wished to be roused. Matters cannot go on as they are. Aodh has indeed fomented open rebellion. He can just as easily dispel it. I tell you, sir, these men did not join a revolution. They joined
him
. If Aodh is here, in command, and loyal to the Crown, they too will be loyal.”

“I do not think it is so simple a matter, my lady.”

“But it can be. If you wish it to be, sir, you could avoid much bloodshed here. You could carry my entreaty, present it to the queen, explain the matter.”

He drank slowly, watching her, and a faint hope rose in her chest. “I was not sent to avoid bloodshed, my lady.”

Coldness stabbed through the bubble of hope that had started rising. “No, indeed,” she agreed. “For if you were, you would not have burned my lands.”

“I would not have had to burn your lands if you had not rebelled against your queen.”

 
“They did not rebel.” She pointed out the tent at the rest of Ireland. “You have made new enemies here, Commander, which I am fairly certain is
also
something you were not sent here to do.”

She forced her breath to calm, for it had accelerated as the certainty grew that Ludthorpe was not here to listen at all but to command. Certainly his eyes had narrowed at her scathing assessment of his tactics and her veiled warning.

“It is your actions that have brought them to this state, lady. Nevertheless, remedies exist for one who has been so loyal for so many years. If you were willing to show sense, we could find a compromise.”

“And how would I show sense?”

“I have instructions that you may stay in residence, should you prove yourself to me, and re-pledge any…honor that may have been lost to the rebel.” Innuendo curled his words into something dark.

“Prove myself how?”

“Turn over the Irishman. The queen wishes only for Aodh Mac Con.”
 

“Only him, is it? And then?”

“Then, you will be…left here.”

“I meant what then for Aodh Mac Con?”

His battle-gnarled hands lifted the glass. “Do not concern yourself with rebels, my lady. I am here to manage them.”
 

“You cannot manage this one, sir. In any event, I am already intimately concerned. I have wed him. Did Walter not mention that?”

A ripple of impatience tightened his square jaw. “He did not.”
 

“Do you not wonder what else he may not have told you?”

“Wedding the outlaw was reckless indeed, lady.”

“Yes, yes, I am well aware of that,” she said impatiently. “A lifetime on the Irish marches has seen that deed done.”

“You were reckless long before the marches, Katarina,” drawled a voice from the shadows.

She turned sharply. Bertrand of Bridge stepped into the light.

Even years later, the sight of him was powerful. Throat-tightening, hand-clenching powerful. As he came closer, she suddenly recalled the way he’d smelled that night all those years ago, of sour ale and garlic, exhaled wetly across her face.

She forced herself to remain sitting and said calmly, “Slicing your face open with a blade was not reckless, my Lord Bridge. It was self-protection.”

The commander looked between them, his eyebrows high in surprise. Then he surveyed the faint ladderlike row of stitched scars that bumped down Bertrand’s left cheek. “You know each other,” he intuited.

Bertrand stepped forward. “Come, my lady, I have made a case for you to the commander.” Ludthorpe’s eyebrows went higher yet. “I assure you, they will be merciful to you.”

She laughed. “As they were to the peasants en route to here?” He seemed startled by the mention of peasants. “As they will be to Aodh?”

“Aodh? You call the Irish rebel
Aodh
? Oh, you have gone to the devil out here on the marches, lady. In England, we call him traitor and dead man. He has gainsaid the queen, fomented rebellion, stolen a castle, and countermanded orders. That is your ‘Aodh.’”

She folded her hands over her belly. “I see you have heard of him.”’

The commander smiled. Bertrand fabricated a stiff smile and stretched it across his thin mouth, so level it did not even bend the thin, trimmed moustaches that topped his upper lip. “His Irish wit has infected you too, I see.”

“I believe it comes down in the rain, my lord. Perhaps if you spent some time here, it would infect you too. Yet you have never spent any time here, and nevertheless think you can rule it well.”

He stared in amazement, glanced at the commander, then back at Katarina. “You…you cannot expect the
Irish
to rule Ireland, can you?” He laughed in astonishment. “Why, even a woman is better than one of them.”

She cast a derisive glance over Bertrand. “The marches would gnash you in their teeth before a week was out, Bridge.”

A flush of anger and embarrassment showed on Bertrand’s face. “I am a nobleman, lady, born to lead.”

She waved her hand dismissively, and from the corner of her eye, she saw the commander smile. “Aodh Mac Con is twice the leader you shall ever be, Bertrand.” Now the flush of red was bright, like a stain. “Know you how many English souls have cleaved to him out here, amid peril and uncertainty?”