When Mooktu reached the end of his questions, Gareth turned to the crowd. “Did this man attack anyone here?”
As he’d expected, the answer was no.
He looked at Perrot. “Uncle attacked me, and he ordered the kidnapping of Miss Ensworth and threatened her life, and, as you’ve heard, he’s ordered much worse while pursuing us. However, with luck, my party will cross the Channel tomorrow.” He looked inquiringly at Captain Lavalle, who had offered days before to take them.
Lavalle nodded. “The wind has turned. Tomorrow we can sail.”
Gareth looked back at Perrot. “So we can’t hand this man to the gendarmes, for there will be no one here to press charges against him.”
A dark murmur passed around the room. Before dissatisfaction could bloom, Gareth stated, “However, once we sail for England”—he looked at Uncle—“his mission will have failed. And his master, and the cult, have a long-standing practice of punishing failure with death.”
Gareth didn’t need to ask Uncle for confirmation—awakening terror etched his face, there for all to see. “I suggest,” Gareth said, “that the best way of dealing with this fiend is to hold him here, in the basement of the inn, until tomorrow. Then when my party is safely away, on our way to England, release him, and drive him out of town.” Gareth glanced around the crowd. “There are cultists still roaming the countryside. They’ll find him—and mete out the same punishment he would have dealt to any other of his kind who failed.”
Looking again at Uncle, he continued, “There’s no need for us—any of us—to sully our hands dealing with this sort of man.”
Murmurs rose up, some calling for blood, yet there were enough wise heads among the crowd to ensure agreement. Realizing what they planned, what would happen…Uncle seemed to crumple before their eyes.
When Perrot, having consulted with his neighbors, turned back, slapped the table, and declared, “We will do it—just as you say,” Uncle cowered.
Gareth noted it. With a nod to Perrot, he straightened, was about to rise when, quick as a striking snake, Uncle shot out his hand and clutched Gareth’s wrist.
Gareth’s skin crawled. He froze.
“Please…” Uncle whined.
Seated beside Gareth, Emily seized a wooden platter and thumped it down on Uncle’s wrist.
He snatched back his hand, cradling it to his chest, shot her a look more frightened and shocked than scarifying, but then he turned to Gareth as Gareth pushed to his feet, pulling Emily up with him.
“No! Please…” Uncle held out his other hand beseechingly. “You do not understand. Give me up to the Cobra, I deserve nothing less—but please…tell me—where is my son? Where is his body?”
Gareth frowned. “Your son?”
“He led the party who came against you with the Berbers in the desert.”
Gareth glanced at Mooktu, Bister, and the others. “Any ideas?”
Mullins looked at Uncle. “He was the leader of that lot—the cultists with the other group of Berbers?”
Uncle nodded. “Please tell me—where lies his body?”
Mullins snorted. “God only knows.” He looked at Gareth. “I think he was taken with the rest of them.”
“Taken?” Uncle looked from one to the other. “He lives?”
Gareth looked at the hope in the man’s eyes. “Did you send him to lead that raid?”
“It was his chance to gain glory—it is the way of the cult.”
“In that case, you and your cult have delivered your son into slavery. He’d promised the Berbers they could have us to sell—the Berbers took him and his men instead.”
Uncle’s face blanked. After a moment, he whispered, “My son…is a slave?” To him, it was unthinkable.
“No.” Slowly Uncle shook his head. “No, no, no-ooh!” Wrapping his arms around himself, he started to rock, softly keening.
The others stood, Perrot with them. “We will take him down and lock him up.”
Lavalle came forward. “The tide will be favorable tomorrow morning at ten.”
Gareth sighed, glanced at Emily beside him. “This isn’t over yet.” He looked at Uncle, being led off to the basement by the Perrots’ strapping sons. “There are cultists still out there. He knows there are.” Turning, he arched a brow at Bister, who grimly nodded. “And we know there are. There were some we didn’t pick up keeping watch along the road.” Gareth met the captain’s eyes. “We’ll need to make arrangements to ensure we get safely aboard.”
The captain grinned and clapped him on the back. “You have given us much excitement in a time of boredom. Come, sit, and we will drink to your health—all of your healths. And then we will make our plans.”
Hours later, mellowed by good cognac and the sweet taste of triumph, however temporary, Gareth followed Emily up the stairs to their chamber.
Their plans for tomorrow organized, the others had retired some time ago. The common room had largely emptied, the stories all told.
Tomorrow they would leave. The unknown, most unpredictable, unquestionably most dangerous part of their journey was behind them, weathered and survived. Tomorrow they would start a new leg, hopefully with less threatening challenges.
Tonight, however, was a time for…
Thankfulness. Gratefulness. Rejoicing.
Emily heard him shut the door, shut out the world. She paused by the bed, waited for him to draw near, then turned directly into his arms.
He smiled. His hands fastening about her waist, he bent his head to kiss her—
She placed her fingers over his lips. “No, wait. There’s something I have to say.”
He studied her eyes, arched his brows.
Her palms on his chest, she held his gaze. “Thank you for rescuing me.”
His lips curved.
“However,” she went on, increasingly stern, “while I most sincerely appreciate being saved, next time, do you think you could manage not to get hurt yourself?”
Curling her fingers in his lapels, she went up on her toes the better to say, “I don’t like you being hurt. When you get hurt, it hurts more than if I’m hurt—just in a different way. I panic when you’re hurt—and I don’t panic. I’m an indomitable Englishwoman and I’ve traveled the world, but you being hurt is something I can’t bear.” From close quarters, she stared into his eyes, one, then the other, then categorically stated, “I love you—do you understand that? I love you—so you mustn’t get hurt. Not anymore.”
She held his gaze for an instant more, then pushed her hands up over his shoulders, wound her arms about his neck, stretched the last inch and pressed her lips to his. “But thank you.” She kissed him.
“Thank you.” Another kiss.
“Thank you.” She whispered the last thank you over his lips, then met them in a kiss that this time didn’t end, but lengthened, strengthened, deepened as he took over, took charge, took her mouth, and she gave.
Surrendered.
Murmured, when his lips left hers to skate down the arching column of her throat, “Don’t you dare laugh.”
“I’m not.” His breath feathered over the sensitive skin where shoulder met neck. “I’m…cowed.”
She laughed, a short burst of disbelief that ended in a hiss as his hands closed about her breasts. After that, conversation was on neither of their agendas. Only one thing was.
One need, one want.
One passion, one desire.
One overwhelming craving.
Gareth had expected that—the age-old need to crown death’s defeat with a celebration of life, of the pinnacle of living.
Loving.
Loving her—and having her love him. The knowledge invested his every touch, made every caress she gifted him with one of precious delight.
Clothes drifted to the floor. Incoherent murmurs rose and fell as they uncovered, discovered, and feasted. As they fell on the bed and skin met skin, and passion rose and desire sparked, arced and drew them in.
Into the familiar whirlpool of
sensation, into the hungry, greedy joy.
Into the delight, the pleasure, the giving.
That night they loved.
Loved in a way they hadn’t before, at a deeper, more concerted, more attuned level, one where the sharing was richer, more vibrant, more vivid, and every moment resonated with a more powerful meaning.
Alive, wondrously so, naked they wrestled, taking, giving, wanting, yearning, gasping, and surrendering.
She took him in and rode him, wild and abandoned, her pearly skin kissed by the silvery moonlight, her breasts full and peaked as she rose and slid down, concentration etching her features as she pleasured him, pleasured him.
Loved him, loved him…
On a groan, he rose up and tipped her, rolled with her, sinking again into her welcoming warmth as her arms closed about him and he returned the pleasure.
The loving.
The love.
Until their bodies were filled, full and cresting, until passion was spent and desire razed and their blood pounded and their senses imploded and ecstacy rushed in, seized them, took them, shattered them.
Wracked them.
Bound them together with silken strands and slowly lowered them back to earth, back to the rumpled sheets, and the haven of each other’s arms.
They lay there, tangled, unable to move, unwilling to part, even just an inch. Hearts thundering, skin damp, breathing labored, they clung and quietly, carefully, held tight.
The moment was too precious, too new, too revealing to risk shifting and ending it just yet.
Yet time ticked on and the night closed around them. Muscles relaxed; satiation slipped in and soothed them, reassured them. Eventually she sighed, and he reached down and drew the covers up and over them both, tucking her against his side—where she now slept, where she now belonged.
Where he needed her to be from now on.
One arm bent behind his head, he stared at the ceiling, the other arm holding her close. After a moment of comfortable silence, he ventured, “So…does that mean: Yes, you’ll marry me?”
He felt her lips curve against his chest. “Perhaps. My answer is still perhaps.”
He didn’t want to ask, but…“Why perhaps?”
“Because…I want something more.”
He didn’t ask what more she wanted—he knew. I love you. He hadn’t given her the same, or even equivalent words. He’d answered her truly—he’d felt cowed. Awed by her confidence in uttering them—those infinitely powerful three little words. He’d heard women were like that—strong in such things, confident in their feelings.
Men—especially men like him…
Even now he had to quell a shudder at the thought of letting those words pass his lips. It was bad enough that he knew they were real. That his inner self, his heart—it seemed his very soul—had already accepted that reality.
Yet all he’d ever need to make him shy from saying those words was to remember how he’d felt earlier that day. When he’d heard she’d been taken, he’d felt…eviscerated. As if someone had reached into his chest and stolen his heart—literally. He’d felt empty there, hollow, as if he’d lost something so vital he’d never know warmth or happiness again.
The feeling had been profound, absolute, unshakable.
If anything could make him wary of love—of admitting it out aloud—it was that. He’d barely been able to function as he’d needed to, to take command as he’d had to, to get her back.
He’d been a soldier all his adult life. Never before had he felt vulnerable. Today, instead of the habitual invincibility essential to all good commanders, that sense of being protected by impenetrable armor even though one knew that wasn’t true, he’d felt…as if someone had carved a hole in his armor directly over his heart.
That vulnerable feeling hadn’t left him, not until he’d had her in his arms, not until he’d known that all danger to her had passed.
Even then…
She’d fallen asleep. He listened to the rhythm of her breathing, marveled at how soothing he found it. How reassuring the soft sound was, how he recognized it, knew it, at some level he couldn’t explain.
He was on the cusp of sleep himself when a stray truth wafted through his mind.
Today, she had been first and foremost in his thoughts—he hadn’t thought of the scroll holder and its safety. Hadn’t really thought of his mission per se.
For days—weeks—she’d been highest in his mind. She, her safety, and even more, her happiness.
He was a man of duty—he lived by that code, and always had.
Yet he put her above his duty—to his comrades, to his country, to his king. And he always would.
And that, he thought, as sleep dragged him down, said it all.
“We must strike tomorrow—we will get no other chance.” Akbar sat amid the ruins of the kitchen of the old mansion and looked at his second, then at the other two cultists who had been watching the road and had escaped with them.
“What about Uncle?” one of the pair asked. “Surely we should free him?”
“It was Uncle who led us to our terrible defeat.” Akbar flung out his arms. “How many comrades have we lost—has he lost—in this campaign?”
After a moment, he folded his arms and went on, “We should remember that the Black Cobra demands absolute obedience—and our orders do not include rescuing Uncle. He deserves nothing but our master’s punishment, but that is not for us to deliver, not tomorrow—not while the major is still on this side of the water, yet to board his ship.”
His second nodded. “Our orders are clear. They always have been.”
Akbar nodded. “We must stop the major and retrieve the scroll holder he carries, whatever the cost.”
The other two nodded. “You are right. So how will we do this?”
They discussed, and discussed, until the truth became clear.
“We cannot do both,” his second stated. “We can stop the major, or get the scroll holder, but with only four of us…we cannot do both.”
Akbar hated to choose, but…he nodded. “If we kill the major and his woman, the Black Cobra will be pleased, and those waiting in England will have a better chance of retrieving the scroll holder.”
Seventeen
13th December, 1822
Morning
Our room in the Perrots’ auberge
Dear Diary,
I am almost there. I can almost taste the ultimate victory—the joy I will feel when Gareth finally, finally, tells me he loves me. In words. Out loud.
He told me the truth last night, not in words, but in actions. Actions that spoke far too loudly for me to mistake his message.
So yes, he is now and forever my “one,” and yes, we will marry. While he is pondering how to give me that “more” that I require before agreeing to the inevitable, I find myself wondering what our union will be like, how it will work. Not in the specific but in general terms. What manner of marriage do I want? What form will be right for us?
Four months ago, I hadn’t even known such questions might be asked.
It’s really quite exciting, this new life unfolding before me.
E.
The people of the dockside quarter made their departure into an event. News had spread, and by nine-thirty that morning, when Gareth’s party needed to leave the auberge and board their ship, the narrow streets were lined with well-wishers, all smiling and clapping and cheering them on.
The sheer numbers of locals ensured no cultist would be likely to get close.
Gareth sent the baggage, then the others in twos and threes ahead. Their route lay straight down the street opposite the auberge, which led to the main quay, then to the left a short way, and out along one of the lesser wharves. Captain Lavalle’s ship was berthed midway along.
The skies were gray, but neither sleet, snow, rain, nor gales threatened. The streets were damp, if not dry, and the breeze was blowing offshore.
At the last, after much touching of cheeks, slapping of backs and s
haking of hands, he and Emily took their leave of the Perrots, and emerged from the inn.
Smiling, nodding to those in the crowd they recognized, they walked briskly down the street, onto the quay, and out along the wharf.
They were within a hundred feet of Lavalle’s ship, had paused to farewell a group of sailors, and were just moving on, when Gareth heard a telltale shi-ing.
He grabbed Emily, pushed her back and down, covering her body with his—but not before that first arrow sliced across her forearm. The next arrow thudded into the wharf beside her.
Two more found their mark in his back, but too weakly to do more than pierce his skin.
Pandemonium erupted all along the wharf. More arrows rained down, one slicing across his arm, but the archers had misjudged their range; the force behind the arrows was enough to wound, but only by sheer luck could they kill. Realizing that, some sailors seized craypot lids and other makeshift shields, and formed a protective wall between Gareth and Emily and their ship. Other sailors swarmed aboard the two ships from whose crow’s nests the archers were shooting.
Hauling Emily to her feet, Gareth rushed her to the gangplank and up it. Gaining the deck, he looked around and saw one cultist-archer dive from one crow’s nest into the harbor, while the other had been subdued and was being manhandled down the mast.
Captain Lavalle came striding up. The gangplank was already aboard. “We’re away. You’ll be glad to see the last of these attackers—”
Steel clanged on steel. Lavalle whirled. Looking past him, Gareth saw two cultists in the bow, wet and dripping, swords viciously slashing at sailors armed only with knives.
He thrust Emily at Arnia and Mooktu. “Tend her wound.”
With an oath, Lavalle ran for the action. Drawing his sword, Gareth followed, grimly pleased to have a release for the emotions roiling within him, evoked by having Emily hurt, especially while he’d been standing beside her.