My Ruthless Prince (14 page)

"Nonsense," he replied, then he looked at James in question, praying the old man had not heard the man's remark. It was all too true. "Sir?"

"Ah, there you are. I have here your instructions on what we will need to prepare for our many colleagues' arrival."

"Yes, sir." He nodded, taking James's list, glancing at it. "I will see to it at once."

"That's all right. You may begin tomorrow," he replied in a droll tone, glancing in curious amusement from Drake to the Frenchmen. "Getting a bit of advice on the ladies?"

"Oh, yes, sir," Drake muttered wryly.

The men smiled, as did James. Perhaps the old man was bemused to find him acting for once more like a human being than some lethal automaton. Well, he had Emily to thank for it, but Drake still prayed that James had not overheard Jacques's all-too-perceptive observation.

"Good evening, gentlemen. At ease," James dismissed them.

The mercenaries resumed their places, sitting down again. James sent Drake a twinkling look of humor, then bid him good night.

He sketched a bow. "Good evening, sir."

When the old man had exited the hall, the casual atmosphere slowly returned, but Drake remained tense. Scanning the list of practicalities to be dealt with in preparation for the arrival of a hundred more Prometheans and their respective entourages, he was unaware of Jacques watching him.

"Drake?" he murmured.

He looked up from the paper.

Jacques glanced over his shoulder, then leaned closer. "What was that place today?" he whispered uneasily. "The men are asking questions. Who
are
these people?"

Drake shook his head. "It's none of your concern."

"Come, that was a statue of the devil--"

"You accepted the contract. You took the money. No questions. That was our deal. You don't want the answers anyway, trust me. You just do your job, and I'll do mine."

Jacques frowned at him, uncertainty in his dark eyes. He sat back, clearly having heard the warning in Drake's words as well as the threat.

Perhaps Jacques had begun to sense that he and his crew would be lucky to come out of this alive, Drake mused, though he did not allow his grim thoughts to show on his face. The Prometheans rarely left loose threads hanging about for the Order to find.

Drake was fairly sure that after Jacques and his men had served their purpose, he was going to be ordered to poison them or some other such unpleasantness.

He took another swallow of beer, but at the reminder of all the dark business ahead, he could not even taste it anymore. Draining the tankard, he set it aside and strode out of the hall without a word, without a backward glance.

Chapter 10

France

T
he loyal Promethean agent who operated the safe house and listening post in Calais had given Niall a welcome worthy of Malcolm Banks's son and future head of the Council.

At the simple residence on a cobbled street of the quaint seaside town, the true believer had provided him with a meal and the best bed in his house, along with the use of the man's wife for the night, of which Niall had taken full advantage.

As dawn's light crept over the horizon, he was almost ready to leave. He'd been given some fresh clothes, plenty of food and water, weapons, a pair of horses, maps, and a compass, anything he might need for his trek into the Alps.

After a meal the previous night, he had finished encrypting the message for his father and handed it off to the safe-house chief, who in turn had sent off one of his most reliable couriers to hand it personally to Malcolm.

Father,

N

The message was well on its way south, to Malcolm's chateau in the Loire Valley. But Niall did not intend to go there himself. There was no time. Besides, that was exactly where the Order agents would expect him to go. He had not seen them yet, but he was sure they were already on his trail.

Pulling on his coat, he thanked the agent for his assistance, ignored his groveling, and nodded slyly to the man's wife. She lowered her head, rather shamefaced after some of what he'd made her do last night.

He turned away with a smirk. Then he marched out to the horses he'd been given and made sure the fine pair were securely tethered. The journey was long and arduous, so he would alternate between them, riding one while the other served as pack animal. He checked the bedroll and saddlebags, neatly tied.

He was satisfied, as well, that his weapons would be in easy reach: a large knife at his side, two pistols in shoulder holsters, and a loaded rifle across his back.

He had to keep moving to hold on to his few hours' lead. He did not intend to take Virgil's boys on alone if he could avoid it. He'd deal with them once he reached Waldfort Castle and joined his father, who should be bringing along a force of Promethean fighters, as Niall had advised in his note.

They could pick off the bastards following him, as well as quelling Falkirk's little insurgency. Niall was not above letting someone else do his fighting, never having been plagued with a need to be a hero.

With that, he swung up onto the horse and rode out of Calais at a gallop, heading eastward across France.

Bavaria

Emily did not know where Drake had slept. He had not returned to the room the night before, and clearly, she had lost her bet. She didn't like to lose.

By morning, she was itching with restlessness, pacing and perturbed.
Where the devil is he?

God, I have got to get out of this room.

Determined to find out where he was hiding from her, she needed some excuse to wander round the castle, so she went to the servants' area down by the kitchens and asked if there was anything she could do to help.

Her tasks for her so-called master were already completed, she told the old housekeeper, and she couldn't just sit around staring at the walls.

The old German woman, stout, formidable, and devoted to keeping her domain in tip-top shape, was impressed with Emily's willingness and allowed her to go around tending to the candles.

So Emily went from room to room on the main floor, carrying a small folding step stool and a basket of supplies for the simple task.

She trimmed a wick here, replaced the sideboard candelabras there, and threw the spent taper stubs and clumps of wax that she collected in her basket. They would be melted down and added to the new batches of wax and tallow to be poured into candle molds and used again.

Pulling her step stool over to the wall, she tended the sconces, too, replacing the candles as needed and cleaning the soot off the glass with a rag doused in vinegar.

Back at Westwood Manor, this was work that made the housemaids groan, but Emily found the drudgery of her assignment oddly soothing. Besides, it gave the perfect opportunity to look for Drake.

She really was surprised that he hadn't come back to her. Perhaps he was embarrassed.
Perhaps he's furious at me.
It was hard to say what might happen the next time their paths crossed in the intimacy of his room.

She tamped down the gnawing worry that she might have overplayed her hand. She was not entirely convinced, after all, that he had not turned into a true Promethean.

She simply couldn't tell, and it was a hard thing to love a man who was such an accomplished liar . . .

Ah, well.
She could have used a lot more illumination than what these candle stumps had to give. Wryly picking up her basket and the stool, she moved on to the next room in the rococo section of the castle.

Crossing the entrance hall to the opposite State Room, she heard the distant clash of metal on metal, faint battle sounds. They grew louder as she stepped into the gilded sitting room, where two maids were already at work, dusting the furniture and sweeping the floor.

They nodded to her when she arrived; she returned their greeting and was relieved that they seemed unperturbed by the sound.
It must be nothing.
Perhaps the guards were at practice somewhere nearby.

Not wishing to get in the maids' way, she started to leave, intent on returning later, when they were through. But one of the women said something to her in German and pointed to a door on the back wall.

Emily glanced over and saw through the bank of gothic windows a covered outdoor balcony, where, she gathered, more candles awaited her attention.

Two men loitered outside there, sheltered from the moody gray drizzle. One was smoking, the other leaning on the balcony railing as they talked.

One of the men was James Falkirk.

Instantly, Emily's guard went up. She looked uncertainly at the maid. "Should I wait?"

The woman answered, and though she probably did not understand the question in English any better than Emily could translate the German answer, her gesture, tone, and facial expression easily conveyed that it was fine for her to go and continue her task.

She got the impression that the gentlemen would not object or pay her any mind.

Emily hesitated but summoned up her courage and took the woman's word for it. She could go about her business as invisibly as any servant, she supposed, and besides, she would not mind the chance to eavesdrop on Falkirk's conversation.

She did not trust that canny old man one iota.

As she crossed to the gallery door, her heart pounding, the martial sounds grew louder. They sharpened greatly when she opened it to a damp, chilly burst of breeze.

Falkirk and the other man glanced over at her. "Why, Miss Harper," the old man greeted her with his cool, superior amusement.

Emily bobbed a curtsy like any humble maid and kept her head down. "Pardon, sir. I'm to tend the candles. Shall I come back later?"

"No, no, it's all right. Carry on." His gaze skimmed the step stool and basket she carried as she whisked past him, going obediently about her task.

Falkirk turned to his fellow conspirator and informed him in German who she was, or so she gathered.

"Ah," said the other man. He was at least a decade younger than Falkirk, with fiery dark eyes and a short black beard.

He eyed her suspiciously; Emily kept her distance. Skirting the wall behind them, she set her stool down under the first iron lantern she came to, then she stepped up on it and went about her business.

"
Spricht sie Deutsch
?" Falkirk's companion asked.

Does she speak German?

The old man shook his head. "
Nein.
"

And that was true, for that was the only part of their conversation she understood. Still, she was intelligent enough to realize they were talking about her. The other one asked some questions; James answered them, apparently informing him that she was the girl who had followed Drake.

From the skeptical tone of his voice, she got the impression the other man did not trust James's handsome head of security--and trusted
her
even less.

All the same, she pretended not to hear or notice anything as she changed out the fat, short candles inside the lantern. But she was unable to make her hands stop shaking in the proximity of such evil men.

Cleaning the lamp's glass casing with some vinegar on a rag, she noted the tone of urgency beneath their quiet exchange, but it was impossible to know the particulars of what they were saying.

Done with the first lantern, she went to the second and placed her stool beneath it, climbing up. From this vantage point, she was able to steal a glance over her shoulder at the scene below the balcony, and at last, she discovered the source of the battle sounds.

The stone balcony overlooked an enclosed courtyard where the castle guards were training and, of course, there was Drake, in the thick of the fight.

She went motionless for a moment, staring at him.

The fine rain had plastered his black hair to his head and soaked his ivory shirt so it clung to his skin; but as beautiful as he was, his onslaught against the three unlucky opponents surrounding him was downright vicious.

He swung and thrust and lunged as though he fully intended to skewer them. It did not look like practice from where she stood, at least.

When a scarlet slash bloomed across one man's arm, she shook her head in shock that they were not even using blunts on their weapons--and then she felt naive for even thinking that they would.

The wounded man withdrew from the fight, and another grimly took his place. Drake attacked him, too.

Staring at him, the droplets of rain flying off his blade, she barely breathed, chilled by how much he was clearly enjoying the chance to batter the men into a state of cringing fear.

She had never seen him fight. She had never been allowed. Now she rather wished that she had not, considering this wild creature was her roommate.

Swallowing hard, she tore her gaze away and turned back to her chore, but the brief glimpse of his ferocity made it clear the sort of fire she had been playing with last night.

The realization shook her. If he had wanted to, he could have easily taken what she had offered as a bribe.

It could have gone very badly if not for his discipline, his honor.

She also suddenly realized that the frustration she had whipped up in his blood last night was being vented on his opponents.

When another cry of pain from the courtyard rang out while she cleaned the second lantern's glass, she winced with a wry sense of responsibility for his wrath.

Drake had stabbed the other soldier in the leg.

Emily finished cleaning the lantern and decided to go back upstairs and fetch her bag of dried apothecary herbs. Knowing Drake's tendency to get into trouble, she had seen fit to bring it along. She would take it down to the surgeon and offer to make a poultice of comfrey.

He could apply it to his patients' wounds at the first change of bandages to ease some of the sting of their cuts and help keep their wounds from becoming infected.

Going down there would also bring her one step closer to Drake. Pleased with that prospect, she shut the little glass door of the lantern, then stepped down off the stool and picked it up to return inside. Sketching a quick curtsy in acknowledgment of the gentlemen, she walked away and got the door herself though her hands were full.

Falkirk and the stranger watched her go.

"L
ook at what he is capable of!" Septimus Glasse insisted. "I'm glad you are so sure of him, but you must pardon me if I do not share your confidence."

"I thought Drake laid to rest your doubts about him when he spoke to the Council about his conversion."

"The others might be satisfied, but I saw him from the start. It was my men who captured him, remember? I saw him when he was very much an Order agent, and I know firsthand how dangerous he is. It took a dozen of them to bring him down. This man fought like a demon, and yet here he is--and we are simply to accept that he is now one of us?"

"He took the Initiate's Brand," James pointed out. "That's no small thing."

"Pshaw! So we seared his body. That is nothing. You have not seen the man's tolerance for pain. I have."

James shook his head, serene, but frowning. "Septimus, my friend, you are jumping at shadows. I fear defying Malcolm has rattled your nerves."