Medieval Master Warlords (35 page)

Edward glanced at him over the top of his cup. “What is it?”

Christopher’s attention returned to the flame, seeing death and destruction within the flickering embers. He simply couldn’t help the feeling of doom in his heart. “B
ehold a pale horse,” he murmured, “and his name that sat on him was Death. A
nd Hell followed with him.”

They sat in silence after that until the wine was gone and the fire died out. Even then, they continued to remain, each man lost to his own particular thoughts of disaster. No matter which side of the Marches one was sitting, the Devil seemed to be approaching from all sides.

And Hell would undoubtedly come with him.

℘

CHAPTER THREE

Cloryn Castle

Welsh Marches

Three long weeks.

Well, at least she thought it had been three weeks because she had scratched off every passing day on the wall with a small rock. It had been three weeks since she had been abducted from Alberbury Priory and taken to an unknown castle and put into a vault that was dank, dark, and dirty. Moss grew on the stone like green slime and there was a constant water drip against one of the walls, puddling up on the floor and giving everything a terribly moldy smell. It also made Allaston sneeze and she had been doing little else since being locked up in this dismal hole. It was a horrible, depressing place.

She had a bed of old straw to sleep on and a few rough blankets that smelled like horses, so she assumed they were for the livestock. Normally, she would have shunned such things, for she grew up in a house where she wanted for nothing. Her parents had spoiled her, just as they had spoiled all of their children, but the past year had seen her attitude for finery change dramatically. The nuns of Alberbury had pushed thoughts of material pleasures right out of her mind, which had been difficult considering how overindulged she had been. Her pride, and tastes, had been a difficult thing to contain, but now, sitting on her bed of straw and covered with horse blankets, she found she had no pride at all in material things. If she hadn’t the blankets, she would have frozen to death so she was grateful for what she had, however raw.

Three weeks
. Those words kept rolling around her head because she was fearful that she was going to spend the rest of her life down here in the darkness. Since the cell had no window, she really only knew the number of days from the meals she had been brought. She was given food to break her fast and then a small supper every night, usually consisting of terrible leavings from what looked to be bigger feasts. She was given the scraps. Hungry as she was, she ate them.

Allaston hadn’t seen the blue-eyed knight since the day she had been brought to this place and locked away. The only people she saw were soldiers as they brought her food, and those soldiers spoke with Irish accents. Two of them did, anyway, which confused her but she didn’t dare strike up a conversation with them to ask them where they were from. They didn’t seem to be the conversational type.

So she sat and waited, but waited for what, she didn’t know. She had no idea why she was even here and she had long since gotten over being terrified for her plight. No one had hurt her or had even tried to in spite of the face that she was a prisoner. She was cast into the vault and left alone, forgotten. She was positive she was forgotten.

Until the morning of the nineteenth day of captivity. She had slept a miserable night, cold and hungry, and the sneezing she’d suffered from since her arrival had turned into a cough. Her head was stuffy as was her chest, and her throat felt as if it was on fire. As she lay on the straw, shivering, she heard the iron grate at the top of the stairs open. The stairs led down from the gatehouse into the vault and she could hear heavy bootfalls on the stone as someone descended. She assumed it was a soldier bringing her some food but she was too weary and ill to sit up. Besides, there was no reason to eat if she was going to spend the rest of her life in a dank cell. The quicker she hastens her death, the better. She didn’t want to live like an animal for the rest of her life and from her perspective, she couldn’t see any way out. She was trapped.

So she lay there, unmoving, as someone came to her cell door. She heard the bolt being thrown and the door as it was jerked open. Because of the moisture in the vault, the oak door tended to swell and stick. Big, heavy footsteps entered the cell.

“Get up, woman.”

It was a deep, raspy voice. Allaston had heard it before. Startled, her head popped up and she struggled to sit up as her eyes fixed on a man of enormous proportions. He was clad in a leather tunic, woolen breeches, and massive boots, and she would have had no idea who the man was except that she recognized the vibrant blue eyes. They were the eyes of the knight who had burned Alberbury.

Stunned, Allaston managed to sit up enough so that she was on her arse, but the entire time her focus was riveted on the man before her. He had black hair, cropped short, and a square jaw beneath a sprouting beard. His neck was thick and muscular, just like his shoulders, and his arms were easily as big around as her torso. She’d never seen such size. True enough, he’d been covered with tunics and mail the night they had met and she had attributed that to his colossal size. She was coming to see, however, that the man was simply big in general. The mail and other protection didn’t make a significant difference in his overall bulk. He was, simply put, built for the raw brutalities of warfare.

The knight stood in the cell, filling it up with his fearsome presence. His gaze was steady upon Allaston as she stared back apprehensively.

“We must speak on a few things,” he said in that rumbling, hoarse voice. “I am assuming that three weeks in this hole has not dulled your sense of reasoning. I am assuming we may carry on an intelligent conversation or has the mold gone to your head?”

Allaston shook her head, her fear turning into disgust at his callous attitude towards her current situation. It was in his tone, in everything about him. He couldn’t have cared less for her state of being. She should have known that from the three weeks he had left her in the vault, but hearing him speak was the ultimate confirmation. In fact, the more she looked at him, the more disgusted she became. He was heartless, cold, and evil, and biting her tongue had never been one of her strong points. She spoke before she could stop herself.

“What kind of man would keep a woman locked up in this… this beastly place?” she asked. “I have committed no crime yet you treat me as a criminal. Why have you done this to me?”

The knight’s gaze remained even. Slowly, he cocked his head. “I suppose it is natural that you want to know who I am and why you are here,” he said. “That is a fair expectation.”

“Fair?” she repeated, her tone bordering on incredulous. “What would you understand about fair? Fair is not locking an innocent woman away in a horrible, moldering cell when she has done nothing to warrant it. How have I wronged you that you would abduct me from Alberbury and lock me away?”

It was a snappish tone she used, one of rebuke. Her abhorrence toward him was evident, but the knight’s expression didn’t change.

“I would suggest you not speak to me in such a fashion,” he said evenly. “You might not like my reaction.”

Frustrated, furious, Allaston sighed harshly and turned away. She couldn’t stomach looking at the man any longer. She started coughing, struggling with the illness that was sweeping her, and trying not to succumb to the depression that grasped at her like cold, knowing fingers. Those fingers knew she could be easily snared given her circumstances. As Allaston grappled with her emotions, she could hear the knight’s joints popping as he shifted on his big legs.

“My name is Bretton de Llion,” he said, his raspy voice low. “I was born in Wales at a castle called Four Crosses. It is north of our location, near Powis Castle. When I was five, a great plague swept through the Marches, destroying everything in its path. Castles were burned, men put to the stake and murdered, and babies crushed. The plague soon came to Four Crosses and killed my father, my mother, and my sister. That plague had a name - Ajax de Velt.”

Allaston, who had been facing away from him, remained still as his words sank in. Even when the full impact hit her, she didn’t look at the man because, suddenly, everything was coming clear. Now, she understood why he had taken her from Alberbury without benefit of further explanation. Aye, she understood a great deal now.

As she’d know on that bloody, terrible night when Alberbury burned, the knight, now given the name of Bretton de Llion, had come to the priory with a purpose. He had been seeking a de Velt, but the mystery had been his purpose. Now, he had revealed it. Allaston was no fool. She could smell vengeance upon the still air of the cell. She knew what her father had done those years ago. Her parents had never hid the fact, although the man Jax de Velt was today was quite different than the man he was years ago. The man back then had been an animal. This knight, this big and horrible knight, was out for vengeance against that animal. Allaston’s depression deepened.

“Just kill me now and be done with it, then,” she muttered. “That is why you took me from Alberbury, is it not? To kill me? Then do it and let us be done with this madness.”

Bretton continued to stare at her. He was very good at remaining impassive. “Who said anything about killing you?” he asked. “I do not intend to kill you, at least not at the moment.”

Allaston sighed heavily. “Is that so?” she asked, turning to look at him with dark-circled eyes. “If you do not intend to kill me, then you must intend to punish me somehow for what my father did to your family. That is the only reason I am here, is it not? I will say again that if you intend to torture me, get on with it. Your hesitation and your mind games do not impress me. If you are going to make me suffer, then do it.”

Bretton met her gaze without flinching. It was difficult to tell if she had angered him with her slander against his behavior because he hadn’t reacted one way or another. The man had a good deal of self-control. That much was clear. After a moment, he folded his big arms across his chest.

“I am not intending to impress you or tease you,” he said. “But you wanted to know why you are here. Now you know.”

Allaston shook her head, her dark hair stringy and dirty along her cheeks. “You have told me that my father killed your family,” she said, “but you have not told me
why
I am here. What do you intend to do with me?”

She had a point. Bretton cocked an eyebrow. “That should be obvious,” he said. “I intend to use you to get to your father.”

Allaston stared at him then she burst out in weak, taunting laughter. Illness and fatigue had weakened her manner and she found she had little control over what she said. She felt so terrible that it didn’t matter any longer. She’d spent three weeks in this hellish hole. The only way out was death and she was coming to welcome it. She was so very, very tired.

“Is that it?” she asked. “You intend to use me as bait? Lure my father to his doom? He is too smart for that and too smart for you. You have wasted your time, knight, and now you would waste my life with your foolish plan. He will never come. You will have to think of something else if you plan to engage my father.”

Bretton didn’t react for a moment and Allaston didn’t particularly care one way or the other. She coughed heavily after the laughter faded and averted her gaze once more, too sick to give in to the fear that had clutched at her these many weeks. Now that she knew why she was here, it all seemed so foolish and wasteful. As she lost herself in a powerful coughing fit, Bretton broke from his stance.

One minute he was standing near the cell door and in the next, he was unsheathing a sharp dirk that was strapped to his left forearm. Allaston saw the flash of the knife as he descended on her, flinching away from him just as he grabbed her hair. He snatched the entire bunch of her dark hair, which hung loose to her knees and, looping the mass in his fist, he used the dagger to cut through the loop and therefore cut off about two feet of her hair.

Allaston gasped as she watched the man come away with a big fistful of her hair. She grabbed at her remaining strands to see how much he had cut off and was met by blunt-cut ends that were about the length of her buttocks. Her hair had been very long before and was now just simply long, glorious strands of liquid silk. Her eyes flew to Bretton accusingly and he met her gaze, as impassionate as always.

“We shall see how foolish my plan is when your father receives your hair as proof that I hold his daughter captive,” he said, sounding rather confident. “We shall see if that brings him to my doorstep.”

Allaston was furious that he had cut her hair. “It will
not
.”

“We shall see.”

“And if it does not?”

Bretton cocked a dark eyebrow. “Then mayhap I shall use you as a concubine,” he said, watching her pale cheeks flush red. “What could be worse to the almighty de Velt than to have his daughter a slave of an enemy? I shall impregnate you, again and again, and teach my sons to hate their grandfather. I shall breed an army of warriors against Jax de Velt from the loins of his own daughter.”