The Prince Kidnaps a Bride (25 page)

Nine swordsmen surrounded it, their costumes as elaborate as any cavalier’s and with Count duBelle’s family arms sewn into their sleeves. Two were older men, seasoned and stoic, but the other seven were young and proud, fingering their swords and looking at her with thinly disguised scorn.

“Gentlemen,” she said.

They ignored her. The hunter does not converse with the fox.

She petted the poor horse’s head and told Hubert, “I’m surprised it’s not an ox.”

“That’d take too long, and they need to get ye up there in time for—”

“Hubert, you forget yourself!” one of the swordsmen snapped. He had an aristocratic accent, a fashionable haircut, and a superior sneer.

But Hubert held the senior rank, and he snapped back, “What do ye think she’s going to do, young master? Escape and defeat Count duBelle? She’s naught but a woman, and a skinny one at that. I think I can safely say that we ten men can control her.”

The two older guardsmen laughed.

“You really are insolent, my man.” The young man put his hand on his sword.

The other young men followed suit.

He continued, “When I am master of the guard—”

“What’s your name?” Sorcha infused all Grandmamma’s haughtiness into the question.

The young man jumped. He looked down at her as if seeing her for the first time and his gaze faltered under her gimlet stare. “Baptiste. Baptiste Chapele, son of Comte d’Aubert.”

“You are never going to be master of the guard. When Prince Rainger hears of your impertinence to your leader, he’ll send you home to your father with a note chiding him for raising such a spoiled brat.”

Flushed with mortification, Baptiste said, “Prince Rainger is not in command here.”

“He will be.”

“He’ll be dead,” Baptiste said.

“Are you a betting man?” Sorcha asked. “Because I’ll take that wager.”

The young men exchanged glances, uncertain for the first time.

“Before the year is out, Prince Rainger will be crowned king of Richarte in the cathedral in Bellagrande. I will be crowned queen of Beaumontagne in the cathedral in Beauvallee. And we are married and will be king and queen for each other’s country, also.” She smiled. “Dear foolish lad, you’ve made a serious mistake.”

Hubert made a sound, the slightest wincing noise. Her arrogance alarmed him. But she knew Baptiste’s type: brash, ignorant, and easily swayed.

“Prince Rainger has no chance.” Yet his tone was uncertain.

“Prince Rainger is intelligent, ruthless, and has the power of Beaumontagne’s military at his disposal,” she answered.

“But he’s so soft, he doesn’t want to fight his own people.” Baptiste looked around at his friends for support.

To a man, they nodded.

“How many of the old nobility in Richarte will fight for Count duBelle? How many of the commoners will take up arms for Count duBelle?” Sorcha climbed into the cart and sank down on the straw, her spine braced against the board at the front. “Rainger won’t have to fight them. The people of Richarte will open the gates to him.”

One of the horses shied, and one of the other young men sputtered, “Th-that’s what Father said, Baptiste!”

Ah. Baptiste’s brother. Speaking to him, she added, “Taking me to be bait for a trap is the last act of a desperate man.”

“Father said that, too, Baptiste!” The brother was wide-eyed and nervous.

His bewilderment infected the other youths and they glanced uneasily at each other.

“Ye ought to listen to yer father.” Hubert gathered the reins of her horse. “He’s a wise one.”

Baptiste stared angrily at Hubert. “Oh, shut up.”

“Temper, temper,” Sorcha chided. The whole country was turned inside out. Discipline was needed and Rainger, with his steely gaze and unwavering resolution, was just the man to provide it.

With a jerk, the cart started, rumbling down rutted roads. Five men rode in front, five in back, keeping their hands on their swords. Obviously they’d been warned to watch for a rescue attempt and Sorcha, too, constantly swept the forest with her gaze. The cart turned off onto a track that led up the mountain behind the palace. The fir trees joined branches overhead, providing green dappled shade. Shrubs brushed against the side of the cart. The horse labored, its sides heaving on the uphill trek.

And once she thought she saw... something. She sat straighter and stared hard. A man. It looked like a man dressed in black looking back at her.

In the distance, she heard the blare of hunting horns and the sound of galloping hooves and raucous laughter.

And the illusion faded. No one was there.

“C’mon, lad,” Hubert said to the horse. “Count duBelle wants everything in place when he gets there, and that means we’d best finish the climb. He’s not one to spare the whip and ye’re not one who can bear it.”

Heavens, no. The poor horse didn’t need the whip to be miserable. It was already miserable enough.

Sorcha rested her arms on her upraised knees. She clenched her fists. She wished... she wished this was over. She wished she knew the best thing to do to help Rainger.

She wished she hadn’t been so unyielding with him. Yes, he’d tricked her and, more to the point, made a fool of her. But he’d had his reasons, and if she thought those reasons were fatuous—well, she was right.

But when he decided on his deception, he didn’t
know
her. He didn’t know she was meek, obedient, and dutiful.

Indeed, some of her behavior on their trip through Scotland may have given him the impression she had a mind of her own.

But that was simply because the adversity they encountered required ingenuity and intelligence to counter... All right, Rainger had reason to worry about her intentions for the future. She had enjoyed that trip through Scotland more than she’d ever enjoyed anything in her life. The cold, the rain, the mud, the hunger had been nothing compared to the pleasure of meeting challenges and succeeding against all odds. She’d never enjoyed such unimaginable freedom—and she never would again.

She was the crown princess now, with a princess’s duties and a princess’s authority. And using the skills and the wit she’d learned on the roads of Scotland, today she would prove herself worthy to be queen.

Again she flicked a glance around the cart. She had to be alert. She had to be ready to help Rainger. Because, God help her, she still loved him—and if he was killed rescuing her, she would die, too.

“Here we are, Your Highness.” Hubert pulled the horse to a halt. “Please, if ye’d descend from the cart and step over to that tree. Baptiste, help Her Highness out of the cart.” As the court rode nearer, Hubert moved briskly and without any apparent regard for Sorcha.

Baptiste did as he was told; he helped her out of the cart and led her to a stout pine. “Stand there and I’ll get the rope.”

The grove where they’d stopped was perfect for an ambush. The trees stood close together around the edge, then thinned enough to allow a clear view of her from the meadow below—and to allow the court a clear view of the trap. The guards had affixed a net and a blanket in the branches and when Rainger approached from below, they would drop the snare on his head and knock him to the ground. Then, while he struggled, the guards would wrap him up and Count duBelle would order them to take him back to the dungeon, there to rot forever.

Rainger’s plan was undoubtedly different.

Again Sorcha scanned the area, looking for help, but all she saw was the court, riding into the clearing. All she heard was their vapid laughter and endless chatter.

Baptiste headed her way with his coil of rope, but Julienne dismounted not far away and called him to her side. As she walked her fingers up his buttons, the young man looked embarrassed and panicked, and his desperate glances toward Count duBelle clearly said he feared reprisal. He lifted the rope, obviously using it as an excuse, and started toward Sorcha.

And Rainger stepped out onto the meadow.

“T
here he is.” Count duBelle stood behind Sorcha, his breath warm on her neck. “Your handsome young hero. Does he know about the snare set for him, do you think?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

Rainger looked wary as he strode toward them, glancing from side to side as if expecting an ambush.

“Perhaps not. There’s a rule of hunting that is a universal truth, and that is that prey never looks up.” Count duBelle ran his finger down her arm.

Her skin crawled at his touch.

“But even if he knows, I wager he’ll walk into the trap for your sake. He is such a gentleman. Such a prince.” Count duBelle’s deep, rasping voice mocked the concept of nobility. “He probably has some harebrained plan for rescuing you, for all the good it will do him. I constantly remind the people of Richarte what an awful leader he was and that they don’t want him back. And in case they forget, I’ve got hired mercenaries and members of the guard who are as loyal to me as they are to their families.”

So Count duBelle deliberately picked people like Hubert. People with responsibilities. People he could threaten.

“He’s getting closer... closer... ” Carelessly, as if he didn’t realize what he was doing, Count duBelle kissed her shoulder.

She wanted to wipe off the stench of his breath.

And Rainger had seen it, for he broke into a run.

She wanted to shout for him to go back, but she knew how foolish that would be.

Count duBelle chuckled in delight.

Sorcha looked around in desperation.

Julienne stood not far away, her attention divided between Rainger’s approach and her husband’s attentions to Sorcha.

Baptiste had dropped the coil of rope and retrieved his musket. Hubert held one, also. So did Baptiste’s brother and all the members of the guard.

Sorcha’s blood froze. She tried to dive down the hill. Later she didn’t know why, but it wasn’t a plan, it was an instinct.

Count duBelle caught her arm, twisting it painfully. Just as Rainger reached the center of the net, the Count shouted, “Now.”

The blanket and net covered Rainger. He struggled frantically.

The court watched. They laughed.

“He hates being confined in small spaces,” Count duBelle called to them. “It reminds him of his old home in my dungeon.”

“Rainger, please, Rainger.” Sorcha squeezed her fingers together, trying to pass some of her strength through the air. To him.

But to no avail. In but a moment, his struggles failed.

She had to
do
something.

“That’s always the problem with our Prince Rainger. He provides no great sport, for he gives up so easily.” Count duBelle shrugged as if disappointed.

She had to provide a diversion. What was it Madame said would distract any man’s attention anywhere? It wasn’t sex, it was...

“Ah, well,” Count duBelle said. “Shoot him and be done with it.”

“Shoot him?” Sorcha couldn’t believe it. “You’re going to take him to the dungeon.”

Count duBelle’s eyes grew lethal. “Not this time, my dear. I’m done with this prince. He’s going to die.”

The guards lifted their rifles.

Madam Pinchon had claimed that men like to watch women fight.

Sorcha freed her wrists from her bonds. Shrieking, “Whore!” she leaped toward the countess. With both hands, she grabbed Julienne’s blond hair and yanked. The hair held for one moment—then Sorcha staggered backward, holding an artfully arranged wig and its attaching pins.

Julienne stood revealed—her short, thin hair was a salt-and-pepper gray. Reaching up, she felt her head. She screamed from pain and rage.

Sorcha experienced one moment of intense satisfaction. She had succeeded. No shots had been fired. All eyes were on her and Julienne.

Then Julienne launched herself at Sorcha, shrieking, “Bitch, I’ll kill you for this!”

Her weight knocked Sorcha flat on her back. She hit Sorcha hard enough to make her ears ring.

Sorcha slammed her elbow into Julienne’s chest.

Julienne doubled over, gagging.

“You betrayed Rainger!” Grabbing her around the neck, Sorcha rolled her over, sat on her, and smacked her. Her own latent bubbling fury astonished her. “You destroyed his trust. You watched while they beat him. You harpy! You traitor!”

Julienne flailed beneath her, slapping at her, but Sorcha’s anger gave her strength. Dimly she could hear the crowd clapping, urging them on as if they attended a catfight.

She didn’t care. Nothing could dim her satisfaction.

Julienne
deserved
this.

In midflail, someone grabbed Sorcha by the arms and pulled her up.

Two of the guards.

Wild with rage, Sorcha fought them.

Julienne came to her feet. She landed a blow to Sorcha’s face. “Mongrel!” She raised her fist to strike again.

Count duBelle grabbed her around the waist.

Sorcha heard a man’s pleading voice in her ear. “I beg ye, Yer Highness... please, Yer Highness... ”

It was Hubert, restraining her, trying to keep her from harming herself.

All around them, the men and women of the court laughed and cheered.

Mud caked Julienne’s spiky hair. Grass stains marred the pristine velvet of her riding costume. Blood dribbled out of one nostril. She cried in gasping, furious sobs, and the tears tracked through the dirt on her face.

She looked like hell, and Sorcha was glad. Glad, proud, and still in a rage. She thought she probably looked as bad as the countess, but she didn’t care. It was about time someone taught Julienne a lesson, and she was pleased to be the one.

From the surreptitious grins and thumbs-ups being sent her way, she suspected everyone felt the same way.

“Princess Sorcha, that was very impressive,” Count duBelle drawled.

“What?” Julienne asked violently. “How dare you praise her!”

“But it won’t save your husband.” Count duBelle’s blue eyes gleamed with cold amusement. With a flick of his wrist, he pointed to the guards. “Fire on Prince Rainger.”

“No!” Sorcha flung herself at one of the riflemen.

As the rifles roared, Hubert pulled her back.

“No!”

Holes blasted through the wool cover and the net. The material smoked.

The crowd gasped, stilled... .

Sorcha heard a single shocked whisper. “The king... .”

Petrified and in agony, Sorcha stared around her. Men stood with their mouths open. Women held their hands before their mouths, tears in their eyes. Julienne stood with her hand over her heart.

Even these dissipated courtiers harbored doubts about killing their rightful ruler.

Then Count duBelle laughed. Laughed loud and long.

Sorcha’s hands curled into claws. She wanted to kill him. She wanted to sob. She wanted to die.

“At last. At last. Throw back the net.” Count duBelle grinned hugely. “Let’s see the body.”

Sorcha wanted to cover her eyes. But she couldn’t
not
look. More than anything, she wanted not to see Rainger’s corpse.

She got her wish.

The guards threw back the net.

A straw dummy lay there, its arms arranged in a rude, yet significant gesture.

From his place in the shadow of the trees, Rainger watched the rush of furious color to Count duBelle’s face. He listened to Julienne’s loud gasp and observed the way she shrank back against Count duBelle. He heard the murmur of amazement and alarm from the courtiers. All that gave him incredible satisfaction.

But more important, Sorcha stared at the dummy—and smiled with joy. Eyes alight, she looked around as if seeking him, and it was all he could do not to go to her and wrap her in his arms.

But the battle was not yet over.

Count duBelle made an abrupt gesture at his guards. One of the young, arrogant fools leaped down the slope onto the meadow and pushed the dummy and the loose leaves aside. He revealed the wooden planks beneath that. With his polished boot he nudged one of the planks away—and there it was. The trench through which Rainger had escaped.

Count duBelle’s ruddy color turned choleric. He took steps toward his worthless trap, then violently swung back toward his wife. “This is your fault.”

And Rainger stepped out of the shadows, his hand on his sword, gaze fixed on Count duBelle. “Surely you can’t be surprised at this turn of events. The one thing we all know you taught me was how to excavate.”

Count duBelle lifted a shaking finger. “Shoot him now!”

“Rifles down!” one guardsman shouted.

Rainger recognized him—Hubert. He’d been in the guard during his father’s reign. Somehow he had survived through to this day. But the past eleven years had etched age and cynicism into every line of the old boy’s face, and now those lines were set in determination.

“The man who aims at our prince answers to me,” Hubert shouted.

Grabbing the nearest pistol, Count duBelle aimed and shot in one smooth motion.

All around the courtiers, Rainger’s men materialized, rifles aimed, swords drawn.

But Count duBelle didn’t shoot at Rainger. He shot Hubert right in the chest.

The burly guard teetered, surprise on his face, then plunged over like a great felled tree.

Sorcha screamed. She dropped to her knees beside him.

The courtiers shrieked and tried to stampede like a herd of cornered deer.

Rainger’s grim-faced men stopped them.

Rainger walked farther into the light. “Beaumontagne’s army waits not five miles down the road, watching for the signal to march in and take Richarte by force. But there’s an easier way, Count duBelle. You and I... we’ll fight and the winner takes the country.”

“And the loser?” Count duBelle asked.

“The loser dies.” Rainger knew what he risked. Count duBelle had a fascination with weapons and a deadly fear of assassination. He practiced with firearms, with swords, with knives and his fists. He was older than Rainger, but he was also strong, healthy, and ruthless. Most important, like an indestructible demon, he walked in Rainger’s nightmares.

Count duBelle knew it, too. He smiled, that slow, cruel smile Rainger had seen so many times before. Had seen every year as the guards dragged him out of his cell. As he whimpered and cried and begged for mercy from a man who was merciless.

“Yes. The loser dies.” Count duBelle’s cold voice tasted the words with satisfaction.

The tone. That expression. Rainger could almost feel the skin on his back shrinking toward his bones, trying to avoid the blows he’d been trained to expect.

He needed to remember—remember that Count duBelle had killed Rainger’s father, imprisoned his friends, ravaged his country. Count duBelle had kidnapped Rainger’s wife and, given the chance, he would beat her, rape her, kill her. Everything depended on Rainger’s winning this fight. He must focus on only one thing—overcoming Count duBelle. Nothing else mattered.

The two men moved to the center of the clearing.

Count duBelle glanced at the raw young leader of his guard. “Baptiste, you know what to do.”

The youth was staring at Hubert’s body, at Sorcha crouched over it, at the blood on her hands and the tears in her eyes. And he nodded. “I know what to do.” He unbuckled his sheathed sword and placed it on the ground.

Count duBelle turned on him with a hiss. “Are you insane?”

“No, my lord. I’m quite sane.” The youth’s voice shook, but he crossed his arms over his chest, lifted his chin, and held Count duBelle’s gaze. “You shouldn’t have killed Hubert, my lord. My father says he is a... he was a good man.”

“Your
father
.” Count duBelle sneered. “To whom do you owe your loyalty?”

Rainger allowed his gaze to touch Sorcha. Slowly, she stood, Hubert’s body at her feet. She stared at Baptiste, a steady, clear-eyed stare.

Baptiste looked back at her, then cleared his throat. “I don’t know, my lord. I don’t know.”

Violently, Count duBelle turned to another of his young guards.

That youth’s hand trembled so much he could scarcely unbuckle his scabbard, but he, too, placed his sword on the ground. Together the young men moved to Hubert. One took off his jacket and laid it over Hubert’s face. They lifted him and placed him on the cart.

“It appears your men believe our fight should be fair.” Rainger lowered the tip of his sword.

Swift as a striking snake, Count duBelle lunged. “Too bad.”

Rainger snapped his sword upward, but his blade struck too late. He deflected Count duBelle’s death blow, but the point pierced his shoulder, striking bone.

Count duBelle leaped back—and laughed.

The pain, the laughter, slapped Rainger like a gauntlet, sharpening his wits, wiping fear from his mind.

The worst had happened. Count duBelle had drawn first blood.