Fire Raven (32 page)

Chapter Sixteen

A
S THE SCENE UNFOLDED
before her eyes, Kat’s hand dropped to the sword hilt at her side. Perspiration made her grip slippery and she wiped her palm on her breeches.

“
Sacre bleu!
” Adrien Lovelle swore, at Merry’s blank stare. “Little idiot. You still do not understand, do you? ’Twas I who seized and burned your sister Katherine’s ship.”

Kat inadvertently gasped, but Lovelle was so intent on his prey he did not hear her.

“Ah, do not look so stunned, Meredith. You could never be as shocked as I, when I saw
Le Petite Chatte
here at Court, quite alive, every bit as defiant as she was when I confronted her on the high seas.”

Adrien smiled at the memory. “Poor, stupid Meredith,” he said conversationally as he toyed with a strand of Merry’s bright hair. “I fear you will never be the firebrand your sister is. Nor half the beauty either — such a disappointment. How could you truly believe I desired you?” He laughed cruelly at the misery he saw sketched in Merry’s pale face.

“Ah, I see you did, little one. Well, remember this,
ma petite
: Never trust any man who says you are beautiful.”

Merry whimpered. Saville drew the unprotesting redhead into his arms as if to embrace her. Kat knew her sister was in shock, unable to fight or defend herself. She heard Saville mutter:

“My true name is Adrien Lovelle. Say it, bitch! I want to hear it on your lips before you die.”

He punctuated his demand with another fierce shake. Merry was like a rag doll in his cruel grip, her head snapping back and forth. Her lips parted; all that escaped was a pitiful sob. Infuriated, Lovelle hurled her back bodily against the tree trunk and continued to rave.

“I will have my satisfaction, do you hear me? Tanner may have ruined my sister’s face, yet he cannot escape justice forever. Though your queen sided with Tanner, Elizabeth Tudor, too, will come to appreciate the length and breadth of Lovelle justice.”

Merry realized by now she could not escape the madman, nor hope to overpower him, but she tried to stall him nonetheless.

“Adrien, there has been some terrible mistake. Oh, nay, wait,” she begged, appealing to any hint of conscience he might have.

Lovelle ignored her pleas. With a calculating smile, he mused aloud at the thought of what forms his revenge might take.

“Perhaps I should just slash your cheeks, scar you as my sweet Gillian was scarred. A living death is worse, to one accounted fair. Yet you are hardly a beauty,” he critically observed. “
Non
, ’tis not enough. Only death will suffice to right a wrong so grievous. I wonder what
Capitaine
Tanner’s reaction be when he hears of your demise,
ma petite
? Ah, I really must go to Ireland and find out. Perhaps he will be driven to madness — perhaps — ”

As the disgusting diatribe poured forth from Lovelle, Kat felt as if a great iron gate crashed opened in her mind, spilling details and pictures so quickly she was unable to assimilate them all. She was drowning again, albeit in a new way. Sensing the emotional flood coming fast and fierce, she braced herself.

Once again, the redheaded man’s agonized expression flashed before her eyes. This time there was a name and history attached to the face, making it all the more agonizing.

Rory Shanahan: Her first mate, her young husband. Together, they had learned the ropes from the deck up, and if Rory’s Irish temper exploded like a thunderstorm in moments of stress, it just as swiftly melted to sunny skies. Tolerant Rory, who let Kat tag after him when he was fourteen and she was still a little girl, more a mischievous irritant in those days than material befitting a future wife. Kat rode on his broad shoulders until she was old enough to swab a deck and shimmy up a mainmast as well as any boy.

Rory, who had grudgingly ruffled her hair as the O’Neills did, until Kat grew too old to be cosseted, and then he wooed her instead. Her five little brothers and all the other clan children all feared and admired Rory, who, at fifteen was already as big as a Celtic warrior of old and sported a wild banner of flaming-red hair besides.

Romantic Rory, who wed Kat on St. Agnes’ Eve, because, at seven years old, she had glimpsed her future husband’s face in the spring waters of Ennis Brock and was foolish enough to tell him so.

Passionate Rory, who made love as tempestuously as the sea they sailed together, whose passions ran as deep as those waters. Later, the same sea he loved would lay claim to his life.

Ah, blessed, vital, gentle Rory, who had shared everything with his bride, even wept like a babe beside his young wife when the disappointment of their barren union became clear.

Dear Rory! Kat had never loved him as he deserved to be loved, as she loved Morgan, heart and soul, yet she never desired his death, and he had not deserved such a cruel fate. Rory had met his end thanks to this spineless French coward. Kat recalled the soft hands belonging to the immaculately dressed, arrogant man who murdered her crew. Those same hands now moved to draw a thin, wicked rapier and touched it to her sister’s abdomen.

“Beautiful it was, an offering to the gods,” Lovelle reflected dreamily, as he described the burning of the
Fiach Teine
to Merry. “She was proud, your Irish bitch of a sister, proud and defiant to the end, raining Gaelic curses down upon my head. Jesu, she was stunning in her rage. I was mightily aroused. I had to mount the first woman I saw after burning the ship. She just happened to be my sister.” He laughed at Merry’s visible disgust and horror. “Surely you do not begrudge me a little pleasure after such unpleasantry,
ma doucet
.”

“You are insane,” Merry cried.

“No more so than your noble English sire when he tried to poison Gillian,” Adrien snarled. “I shall see justice done if it takes a hundred years. Fortunately your sister seems to have a weak memory now, but eventually she will remember all. Such a risk is unacceptable. So, you see, when you are found dead in the morning, Katherine will soon follow. Rest assured, little Meredith, you shall not be alone in the afterlife. You and your sister were born together and will die together, as well.”

Merry screamed. Kat saw the sharp edge of Lovelle’s blade digging into the gap between her sister’s stays, and he moved as if to thrust the sword into Merry’s rib cage.

She waited no longer. Leaping from the shadows, she drove her shoulder into Lovelle’s side, letting her weight and momentum lend advantage. Her crashing blow sent him reeling sideways. The hilt flew from his grip and his weapon went skidding across the ground. Stunned, he stumbled and dropped to one knee, staring up at the two women.

After striking Lovelle, Kat rushed forward to shield Merry, while he scrambled to regain his footing on the dewy grass. Her own rapier hissed warning as she yanked it from its cradle. “You,” she muttered.

Lovelle looked at her, his gaze wild and angry. He seemed to be debating the wisdom of rushing at them in a final desperate bid for revenge. In a protective gesture, Kat thrust Merry behind her.

God willing, she would send Lovelle to the grave, as he had Rory and the rest of her crew. She remembered Lucien’s words from one lesson in particular:

“Make no mistake, ma petite, it is a risky and dramatic endeavor. It is the last resort for a cornered man — or woman. Once the attack is launched, it cannot be withdrawn.”

Kat’s hand stopped shaking. Her protective instincts kicked in, completely banishing any fear of the madman. Though it was too dark perhaps to test Saviolo’s
lunge flèche
properly, she found she did not need daylight to assuage her nerves. She was gripped by a curious, exhilarating calm.

Lovelle glanced at her blade, saw her grip tighten on the hilt and gave a deprecatory chuckle. Yet she thought she detected a hint of uneasiness in his mirth, just the same.

“Come on, Lovelle. I’m here, waiting for you. Easy prey. Kill me if you can. Take the risk to discover, again, that cats truly have nine lives.”

To Kat’s satisfaction — and admitted surprise — Lovelle crossed himself instead. She almost laughed. The coward was more superstitious than any Welshman!

He lunged for his weapon nearby, snagging it up as he came to his feet. Merry clinging to Kat slowed her reaction; had she been free, he never would have risen again. Lovelle grinned cockily at his feat, facing Kat with his own weapon snug in hand.

Gently but firmly, Kat shook off her sister. “Merry, step away.”

“Kat — ”

“
Now!
”

There was not another peep from the redhead. Kat did not look to see where Merry went. She focused on her opponent, remembering with aching clarity the fatal mistake she had made the first time she met this man — glancing at Rory distracted her enough to be disarmed. She grimly vowed it would not happen again.

She fell into the cross-step stride of a duelist. He did the same, in mirror-reverse.

“I see you are not unschooled,” Lovelle said, with grudging admiration.

Kat did not respond, except to test his reflexes with a single hard beat, striking his blade with her own, hoping to provoke him into a rash move.

He countered easily, though he saluted her mockingly for her speculative jab. “How fierce you are, my little fire raven! Much braver than your mousy sister,
non
?”

She feinted and Lovelle parried, then he launched a riposte that drove her back almost against the tree. His style was savagely brutal; had she not trained with an equally ruthless Lucien for months, Kat knew she could not have reverse parried in time. As it was, she barely escaped a mortal strike when his blade caught the cuff of her billowy shirtsleeve, rending it almost to her shoulder.

With the tip of his blade snagged in the material, Kat seized her chance. She launched a furious counter-attack that sent him stumbling back, and even in the shadows she saw flashing eyes and gritted teeth that showed her three emotions at once: shock, respect, and fear.

She knew that he recognized the
lunge flèche
, and they both knew she opened herself to mortal injury from the mere attempt. The flying lunge gave her enough momentum to counter his greater strength and stronger sword arm, but the risk of losing a secure stance by leaving the ground was risky.

Kat did not care. This man had killed her husband, her crew, and tried to murder her sister. There was no mercy in her heart, nor apparently her eyes, for she recognized the look in Lovelle’s right before her blade pierced his heart: Terror.

M
ERRY FLED BACK INTO
the castle to fetch Lucien, her nearly incoherent babbling dragging the captain from his contemplation of a pretty countess’ busom. All he could make out were the words Kat, sword, and fight, but it was enough to send up an alarm.

“Stay here,” he ordered Merry, gripping her shoulders to impress the gravity of his command. Pale and shaking, she nodded, and managed to choke out the location of the duel. Lucien was gone before she finished the sentence.

When he reached the gardens, he saw her at once: Kat, standing alone in the deep shadows, her sword hilt still clutched firmly in hand. At her feet, a man lay unmoving.

“
Merde
,” Lucien muttered, running to her, further alarmed when she never glanced at him, not even when he pried the hilt from her cold, rigid hand. He did not need to ask what happened. He set the weapon aside and knelt to check the man on the ground for a pulse. There was none.

At last Kat spoke. She sounded tired, numb. “It’s over.”

“So I see,
chère
.”

She shook her head. “Not the duel.”

Quizzically, he looked up at her, but she did not speak again. She was gazing off into the distance, her green eyes unfocused.

Lucien heard a murmur of curious voices in the distance. Having perhaps bore witness to Merry’s distress, a number of courtiers poured from Whitehall, quickly headed in their direction.

Without hesitation, Lucien picked up her sword and rose. “Say nothing,” he commanded Kat, but he need not have worried. She did not speak again that night.