Her Rebel Heart (22 page)

“Or for the lives of the people within these walls?” Deliverance said.

Penitence gave her sister a look that mingled despair with defiance and ran from the Great Hall.

Deliverance rose to go after her, but Luke laid his hand over hers. The touch of his calloused fingers stilled her and she sank back in her chair. He removed his hand as if it had been scorched.

“Let her go, Deliverance. It's a natural reaction after weeks of a siege.”

“She knows Jack is out there,” Deliverance said. “Her heart is breaking.”

Luke's eyes, cold and hard, met hers. “This is war, Deliverance, not a time for love and broken hearts.”

The message, intended for her, jarred home with a physical pain. Deliverance gathered her dignity and stood up.

“I can only hope, for her sake, that when this war is over and the swords are hung back on the walls, there will be a time for her and Jack,” she said.

“Provided he survives,” Luke said, his gaze holding hers. She tried to read the smoky depths but saw only cold resolve. He had made his choice and it would never be her.

Ned, the uncomfortable witness to a conversation he didn't really understand, shifted in his seat. “Do you think it would be wrong of me to polish off Mistress Felton's meal?” he asked.

Deliverance broke her gaze and looked at the unappetising mess on Penitence's plate. “Eat it. We can't let a morsel go to waste and your need is greater than my sister's.”

She went in search of Penitence and found her sister huddled in a window seat in the upstairs parlour. The damage had been roughly mended making the room vaguely habitable again, despite the boards on the broken windows. Just as Deliverance used the library, this room had always been Penitence's refuge.

“Pen...”

“Go away, Liv,” Penitence responded without lifting her head. “I just want to be alone.”

“Pen, if you want to leave Kinton Lacey, I won't stop you.”

Penitence raised her head. “What? Walk out, just like that?”

Deliverance nodded. “Just like that. I have every confidence Jack would ensure you had safe passage to Father in Gloucester or Aunt Elizabeth in London.”

Penitence looked away. “I can't leave you.”

“You can. You will be quite safe. You have Jack.” Deliverance tried to sound braver than she felt. “I know how you feel about him. Do you think he still feels the same way about you?”

Penitence's shoulders heaved and she laid her head on her bent knees, wrapping her arms tighter around herself. “Of course he does.”

Deliverance frowned. Something about her sister's certainty made her uneasy. Apart from that fleeting moment at the start of the siege, to the best of her knowledge Penitence had no contact with Jack since the start of the war.

“How do you know?”

Penitence raised a tear-stained face, her eyes wide with fear. “I just know.”

Deliverance crossed to her sister and put her arms around her. “Then if he loves you, he will wait for you.”

As Penitence sobbed into her sister's shoulder, Deliverance heard her say. “You are so lucky never to have been in love, Liv.”

Deliverance sighed and held Penitence closer. If her sister felt even a fraction of the agony she had experienced in the last few days she must be in real pain.

Since the scare with the miners, Luke had taken to doing a late night round of all the sentry positions. On his way to inspect the guard on the sally port, he stopped on the east wall in the shadows of the Jewel Tower, which stood in the north-eastern corner of the castle.

Deliverance had told him that the name had derived from a story that the crown jewels of the Welsh Kings had once been stored in its depths. Luke doubted the truth of the story but it made a pretty name for an otherwise utilitarian piece of architecture. He preferred the Hawk Tower with its weathered carvings of hawks in flight affixed to its ramparts.

He leaned on the wall looking down over the river. The moon glinted off its ripples as it flowed on its never changing path towards the sea. No enemy campfires lit the far side of the bank, and from this side of the castle it was almost possible to believe the world was at peace.

He turned his face to the night sky, clear and bright after the days of rain. A full moon illuminated the courtyard and above him the stars arched, timeless and unconcerned with the petty affairs of men. He straightened and turned back to his lonely patrol.

A movement, below him, caught his eye and he stiffened, stepping back into the shadows. When nothing moved he thought he had imagined it. He peered over the wall into the dark shadows thrown by the castle wall and just for a fleeting moment he caught a glimpse of a silhouette moving in a crouched position along the hidden pathway outside the castle that led to the sally port.

His hand instinctively went to his sword hilt and every nerve now attuned to potential trouble, he swivelled to look into the castle grounds. He stiffened as he saw a cloaked and hooded figure slip from the door to the Jewel Tower, also keeping to the shadows.

At first he couldn't tell if the figure was male or female until it passed below him through a patch of moonlight and he caught a glimpse of skirts.

He followed the woman's progress, briefly losing sight of her behind an outbuilding. She emerged from the shadows and he saw with grim satisfaction she was heading for the sally port.

Was this the castle traitor meeting with one of Farrington's men?

He slipped noiselessly down the stairs to ground level and worked his way along the wall until he had a good view of the sally port. He could see no sign of the man he had placed on sentry duty.

The man, Truscott, one of the Kinton Lacey men, may have stepped away to answer a call of nature or, and Luke's mouth tightened at this thought. Truscott may have been turning a blind eye to whatever liaison had been planned for the night. If that was the case the man would pay dearly for this treachery.

An owl hoot came from beyond the wall and Luke had a sudden flash of memory, recalling the long hours he and his brother had practised bird calls. The owl had been particularly satisfactory.

He heard the gentle swish of the woman's skirts, and soft footsteps on the cobbles. The woman, holding something in her right hand, passed by him without a sideways glance, her gaze fixed firmly on the sally port.

Even with the hood of her cloak pulled well up, Luke recognised the slight figure, and his heart sank.

After Penitence's breakdown at their midday meal, Luke had nurtured an uneasy feeling about the girl. It was not anything she had said. Her reaction after weeks of siege warfare was perfectly understandable but the knowledge that Penitence's lover waited outside the wall gave him cause to be concerned, a misgiving that had not been misplaced it seemed.

Penitence took the large key to the door from her skirts but it dropped from her fingers hitting the cobblestones with an audible clang. The girl froze, looking up at the battlements and around her to see if the noise had disturbed anyone. Luke drew back further into the shadows.

When nothing happened, she retrieved the key and he could almost hear her desperate breathing as she fumbled again with the key in the lock. Well-oiled, the key clicked home and Penitence slipped through the door into the tunnel beyond that led down to the gate. Luke broke his cover and, well-schooled in moving silently, even in boots, he made the door in a few strides.

In her haste to reach whoever waited beyond the gate—and Luke would be willing to wager it was Jack Farrington—Penitence had left it ajar. The tunnel bent at a right angle as it neared the gate. The light of a lantern spilled over the cobbles. The lantern must have been the object she carried.

The low murmur of voices reached him. The man sounded soft and reassuring but the high tone in Penitence's voice, even speaking in a whisper, betrayed her distress. The man said something and she gave a choking sob.

Luke drew the pistol from his belt. He should get assistance but he didn't want to alarm the lovers or lose time in summoning his men. If he alerted the trysters, Jack would be gone and probably Penitence with him.

He rounded the corner and levelled the pistol into the tunnel. Illuminated by light of the small lantern, Jack held Penitence in his arms. The couple sprang apart as Luke cleared his throat.

“Raise your hands where I can see them, Farrington,” Luke said.

“Luke! No, you don't understand.” Penitence stepped in front of her lover.

“And you, Mistress Felton.”

“Me?” Penitence sounded genuinely mystified. “I haven't done anything wrong.”

“Both of you. Shall we proceed out into the fresh air?”

Stooping to pick up the lantern, Luke followed Jack and Penitence out of the tunnel. He shut the door to the sally port with his foot and bellowed for the traitorous guard he knew would be somewhere nearby.

“Truscott! Out here now.”

He heard the man's boots on the walkway above him, coming from the direction of the Jewel Tower where he must have been sheltering.

“Sir?” He sounded breathless.

Luke would deal with Truscott later. “Sound the alarm,” he ordered.

“But, sir...” Truscott began.

“Now!” Luke said in a tone that brooked no argument

The man grunted and Luke Truscott's retreating feet was followed by the clanging of a bell from the Jewel Tower. In less than a minute, the night guard led by Sergeant Hale, bristling with weaponry appeared in the courtyard.

Hale looked from Penitence to Jack and back to Luke. Luke's pistol had not wavered. Penitence began to cry, the wetness on her cheeks silvered in the moonlight. Luke regarded her without sympathy.

“We have traitors in our midst, Hale. Take Captain Farrington and Mistress Felton under guard to the Great Hall and,” he jerked his head at the Tower, “put Truscott under guard in the darkest most rat-infested dungeon you can find in this place.”

“Luke! For pity's sake...” Penitence sobbed but he was in no mood for pity or mercy.

He lowered his pistol as Hale accompanied by four of his men marched the prisoners away.

Ned, who had come late on the scene, caught his sleeve. “Collyer, what's going on here?”

“I just caught Penitence Felton in the embrace of Jack Farrington. We've got our traitor.” Luke leaned against the wall, rubbing a weary hand over his eyes.

“Penitence? Surely not. I'm sure there is an explanation.”

“Of course there is,” Luke snapped, “and I can't wait to hear what story our two lovebirds come up with. Now see the sally port is secured and put one of our own men on to guard it.”

In the Great Hall, Jack Farrington and Penitence sat side by side at the long table with two armed men standing behind them. Standing across the table from the pair, Luke put his hands on his hips and surveyed them. Jack's hat lay on the table in front of him and the young man looked pale and drawn. Penitence, dry-eyed for the moment, had placed her hands over his and she glared at Luke.

Before he could speak, Deliverance's voice came from behind him.

“What's going on? I heard the alarm,” she said.

He turned. Deliverance stood at the screen, a candle in her hand, dressed in her nightgown with a loose robe flung over it.

“Meet our traitor,” Luke said.

Deliverance looked at him, her gaze flicking to her sister and Jack Farrington.

“No,” she said with a disbelieving laugh catching her words, “you don't mean Pen? Surely not.”

He fixed her with an uncompromising glance and saw her swallow.

Without taking her eyes off him, she addressed her sister, “Pen? What is he talking about?”

Penitence gasped and releasing Jack's hands she sat back, her hands grasping the arms of her chair.

“You don't think that I...? No! I'm not a traitor.” She turned to her lover. “Jack, tell them.”

Jack looked up. “I just had to see her, that's all. It was a tryst, nothing more. She's not a traitor to this castle.”

Luke brought his hand down on the table with a thump that made them all jump.

“This is not the time for lover's trysts, Farrington. I don't care if you had met to play backgammon. She,” he pointed to Penitence, “is a member of this garrison. You,” he pointed to Jack, “are the enemy. That immediately makes her suspect. As you well have cause to know someone in this castle is in contact with your brother and right now it looks like Mistress Felton.”

“No, this is wrong,” Deliverance touched his arm. “Penitence would never betray us.”

He rounded on her. “We are at war, Deliverance. This man,” he pointed at Jack again, “has four hundred armed troops out there with no other intention but our annihilation.”

Deliverance stared back at him, her eyes wide and fearful. He saw her glance at her sister. Penitence looked away.

Luke turned on Penitence. “How many times have you met?”

Her lower lip began to quiver and Jack answered for her. “This is the third time.”

“And how do you arrange these assignations?”

Penitence swallowed. “I light a lantern and shine it from the window of the Jewel Tower. Three times and Jack knows it is safe.”

“Safe? Is it only safe when the man, Truscott, is sentinel on the sally port?”