A Knight's Pledge, page 23
“Aye, Sir Lucan. You take care now, lass,” Effie’s father said to her. If Thomas Annesley was beset by nerves, he was hiding it well.
Lucan looked to Gorman now. “Meet at the Strand.” He spurred Agrios into a trot, he and Tommy leaving the rest of them clustered together on the road.
No one said anything for a pair of awkward moments, and for some reason, Effie felt as if everyone was looking at her. Thankfully, Bob broke the tense silence.
“Are we to do anything with that one?” he said, motioning with his head toward the body in the dirt. “We’re fearful close to the gates. Someone could come along at any moment.”
“I don’t clean up after Lucan Montague,” James said stiffly. “I say we leave him there. If questioned, we tell them that a man dressed in black dispatched him in defense of a mounted attack.”
“Aye,” Chumley said at once.
Gorman nodded. “Agreed. Keep it simple. Effie?”
“Fine.” She turned her horse’s head southward once more.
She tried not to let her thoughts dwell on the idea that the last time Lucan Montague had ridden into London with her father, it had led to a sentence of death. He could even now take Tommy straight to the king and put end to the whole thing, gain his reward and be gone before any of the band even realized what had happened.
No, Effie told herself, remembering the way Lucan had dispatched the slave trader on the road. If he didn’t care at all, he would have simply let the man pass and not risked his life to make sure the villain never harmed another soul again.
Trust him, a voice said. Even if he cannot love you, he is always true to his word. And he knows Tommy is innocent.
Something brushed her arm and Effie looked over to see that it was Kit Katey who had touched her.
“It will be all right, Effie,” she said with a gentle smile. “He is bad now. But he is still good. And very soon, you shall see George.”
Effie faced forward with a frown, not understanding what her friend meant. But one thing she said was true: on the morrow, she would have her son back, no matter who or what it cost.
* * * *
They were not stopped at the gates of the city, but Lucan hadn’t expected they would be, which is why he’d insisted on taking Thomas ahead. It pleased him that no one paid him and Thomas Annesley much heed as they traversed the crowded, narrow streets toward Lady Margaret’s home, other than to call out their wares and attempt a sale.
Thomas didn’t say much, and Lucan suspected it was from worry. His breeding certainly showed through—not many men could be expected to carry on for a second time toward a meeting that almost certainly meant his death. He allowed Thomas his silent reverie out of respect, and also because, in truth, Lucan felt he himself had never been so troubled of spirit.
He was relieved when the tall façade of the Strand House at last came into sight. The stable boys took hold of the mounts at once, and Lucan was a bit surprised when Stephen didn’t appear.
“A moment, lord,” he said to Thomas. “While I announce us.”
The English noble-turned-Scots-fisherman only nodded and struck up a cordial conversation with the lads while Lucan mounted the steps to the ornate door. Two raps with the knocker had yet to entreat a response, and so Lucan looked back down to where Thomas and the stable boys still congregated.
“Anyone about the house?” he called out to the lads.
“Aye, lord,” the older one said with an enthusiastic nod. “Fair ta burstin’ about the house of late.”
Lucan frowned and raised his hand to grasp the iron knocker again when the door at last opened and the solemn face of Stephen appeared in the opening.
“Ah,” he said coolly. “Sir Lucan, what a surprise to see you again. Good evening.”
“Good evening, Stephen,” he said, preparing to step forward in the moment the steward moved from the opening.
But Stephen did not move. “How can I be of assistance?”
Lucan hesitated. “Am I no longer welcome at the Strand?”
“Of course you are welcome, Sir Lucan,” Stephen replied. “On Lady Margaret’s express orders.”
“Good. I’ve a smaller party with me this day that will be arriving momentarily, if you would alert the staff.”
“I’m very sorry, Sir,” Stephen said. “But that won’t be possible. We’ve not room with Lady Margaret’s other guests.”
“Other guests? Has Lady Margaret returned from Greece?”
“Indeed she has, Sir.”
“I’d speak to her, please, Stephen.”
“I’m afraid she is rather occupied at the moment, Sir Lucan,” Stephen said calmly. “Perhaps you could call on her on the morrow.” He glanced toward Thomas. “May I tell her with whom you’ve arrived?”
Lucan opened his mouth, but paused as a figure walked briskly across the entry hall behind Stephen, glancing toward the door as he went. Perhaps it was only his imagination, but the man had the same coloring, the same hawkish features as the spy at the inn.
Perhaps the same man that had followed them to the Swan.
Perhaps the same man who had stolen the satchel.
“Who was that?” Lucan demanded.
“I beg your pardon, Sir?”
“Behind you, just now,” Lucan clarified, leaning to attempt to see around the steward. “That man.”
Stephen pulled the door slightly tighter about him. “I’m sure I don’t know, sir. Lady Margaret has many guests at the moment. And who have you arrived with, again?” he pressed.
Lucan’s instinct tingled. He hadn’t trusted Stephen at the very last of their stay at the house on the Strand, and now the man’s prying and refusal of entrance shouted danger to Lucan.
“No one,” Lucan said. “Only a servant.” He stepped back from the door. “You’ll tell Lady Margaret I called?”
“Certainly,” Stephen assured him. “May I tell her where you can be found while you await your audience with the king?”
Now Lucan knew something was afoot. He took another step back. “No. No, that won’t be necessary, Stephen.”
“Very well. Good day to you, Sir Lucan.” The steward closed the door.
Lucan trotted down the steps and took Agrios’s reins from the stable boy. “Come on,” he muttered to Thomas. “Quickly. Keep your head down, and don’t look toward the house.”
“What is it?” Thomas took charge of his mount and they both gained the saddle, Thomas following Lucan away from the house.
“Something is amiss,” he said as they trotted down the street, retracing the path on which they’d just arrived. “The house is no longer safe for us.”
“Why isn’t it safe?”
“I don’t yet know,” Lucan said. “But Margaret has never turned me away before. And I swear I saw a man within that looked like the one that tried to waylay us on our journey north.”
“Could it be him that took the satchel?”
“I don’t know, Thomas,” Lucan said. “I just don’t know.”
They only waited perhaps a quarter hour before Lucan spotted James Rose’s tall, lean frame in the saddle, weaving toward them. Lucan could tell that, despite the young man’s animosity toward him, James was alarmed at Lucan’s and Thomas’s presence at the head of the alley. He turned aside and spoke words that did not reach Lucan’s ears, and a moment later, Effie came riding through the group, concern on her pale face.
“What is it?” she demanded.
Lucan briefly told the group what had transpired at the house, his refusal at the door, and his suspicions. Chumley cursed quietly.
“Where do we stay, then?” Gorman asked. “If Lady Margaret is somehow in league with our enemies?”
Lucan looked about at all of them. “We could try our luck at one of the inns,” he said. “I’m not at all certain we won’t be followed.”
“Why would they follow us now, though?” Bob asked. “They already have the satchel.”
“To kill us,” Effie answered at once. “Or at least myself or my father. Perhaps Sir Lucan, as well.”
Lucan nodded. “If Caris Hargrave has the evidence in her possession, all that is needed to guarantee her victory is for the witnesses against her to be dead.”
“But what about your sister?” Gorman asked. “She’s in the very lion’s den.”
Lucan nodded, the dark realization coming to him as his gaze automatically went to Effie’s. “Indeed, she is.”
Effie looked away, her expression crestfallen.
James Rose sighed. “Would you care to share with the rest of us what is apparently so obvious?”
“We’ve got to go on to Westminster, at once,” Lucan said.
“Now?” Gorman clarified with a frown. “Tonight, unprepared?”
“It’s the safest place for us,” Lucan said. “At least, safer than any in the city will likely be, if indeed Lady Margaret is against us.”
“You led us into a trap,” James Rose accused. “That bloody fancy house was never safe. We shouldn’t have gone there in the first bloody place.”
Lucan didn’t argue with the man, for he could in fact be correct.
“Must we all go?” Kit Katey asked. “The king knows not of us.”
“And it’s right to keep it that way,” Chumley said.
“There is an inn on the west side of the city, not far from the Strand,” Lucan said. “The Red Hart. It’s expensive, but safe. Gorman and Kit Katey, you two arrive together; Chumley, you arrive after with James and Bob. Perhaps…you could insinuate you were a sheriff surrendering a criminal to the crown.”
Chumley grinned. “Why, Sir Lucan, are you suggesting we tell an untruth?”
Lucan gave him a half grin.
“No,” Gorman interjected. “I’m coming, too. It’s my boy’s life on the line here. I’ll fight to the death so that he comes out of Westminster at my side.”
“We can’t go in swinging sword, Gorman,” Effie said. “This isn’t Darlyrede. Give us a chance to—”
“To what?” Gorman demanded, and it was perhaps the first flare of temper Lucan had ever seen the man display toward Effie. “As soon as they see Tommy, he’ll be locked in a cell. They’ll not let you leave, Effie. And Sir Lucan will surely be followed if he tries to send word.”
“Ulric, my captain, is trustworthy,” Lucan said. “I can send him with any news.”
Chumley cursed under his breath again. “No. No more goddam outsiders. Would that Gilboe had come. He can at least come and go largely undetected in his monk’s garb.”
But Gorman was shaking his head. “The three of you are most at risk and so it stands to reason they’ll not let you out of their sights. Regardless of Sir Lucan’s confidence in his captain, Chumley’s right. And I can’t sit back and wait for word that may not come or come too late. That’s not me. Effie, you know that’s not—”
“I know,” Effie insisted calmly. After a brief pause, she looked to Lucan. “Perhaps a knight’s apprentice is called for?”
He caught her intent at once. “Indeed, I do think it’s time I took on an assistant.” Lucan looked toward the tall, resentful young man glaring at them all. He nodded. “James.”
He rolled his eyes. “They’ll never take me for it.”
“Why not?” Lucan pressed.
James met his eyes and glared at him. “You don’t know what you’re asking of me.”
“I do,” Effie responded.
“You don’t have to do it, James,” Gorman interrupted. “I’ll go myself. As George’s father, it’s my responsibility.”
“Gorman,” Kit Katey said quietly, reaching over to touch his thigh. “It is a good plan. They can succeed.”
“James will be free to come and go as is needed,” Lucan said. “He can be the messenger, without being tracked. I wouldn’t suggest it if I didn’t think he was more than capable. And if there is trouble, I’d have no other’s ready sword at my side.”
“Just so,” Chumley agreed. “None better than James.”
James Rose’s expression was unfathomable as he looked at Lucan. But he seemed neither flattered nor impressed.
Lucan turned to the group. “What say you all?”
A moment later, Lucan was forced to look away as Effie maneuvered her horse near Gorman’s and clasped his hand firmly before leaning to meet him in a brief kiss.
The four of them rode on toward Westminster.
“I’ve never had an apprentice before,” Lucan mused, seeking to dispel the tension. “How are you at shining boots, James?”
“Fuck you, Montague,” James muttered.
Effie and Thomas both laughed aloud.
And in that moment, Lucan understood that they were, at least for this night, still bound together. And it gave him courage.
Chapter 22
They were taken at once through the maze of Westminster to a large antechamber, where the king’s own secretary was entertaining. The man, blond, with a high forehead and slim beard seemed annoyed at the guard’s interruption as he leaned down to speak low near his ear. The secretary was on his feet at once, setting aside his wine goblet and striding toward them.
“You allowed him to walk freely through the place?” he was growling as the guard hurried at his heels. “Restrain him,” he spoke to the other two guards standing just behind the group while he flicked his fingers at Effie’s father. “Take him to a cell at once.”
Effie opened her mouth to protest, but felt the touch of Lucan’s hand on her own. His frown and the slight shake of his head stayed her.
“I’ll be alright, lass,” Tommy said as the two burly guards bustled him between them. He looked old then, frail, flanked by the stern-looking guards, their chests plated with armor. “I’ve been the king’s guest before, eh, lads?”
“Take him; go,” the secretary commanded. He looked to Lucan. “Montague. So you’ve proved true. Who’s that with you?”
“My apprentice,” Lucan said at once. “Hello, Hatteclyffe; good to know the king still lives, despite your care.”
The man ignored Lucan’s sarcastic greeting. “You had no apprentice before.”
“He stayed in the city,” Lucan explained. “I’d no reason to believe we’d be detained, so I had no need of him.”
“But now you do?” the secretary asked with a smirk. And then he looked to James. “Does this apprentice have a name?”
“James Montrose, lord,” he said with a slight bow. “From York.”
The secretary’s pale brows rose. “The Belgians? Ambitious.”
Effie could feel Lucan’s curiosity, but he said nothing.
“I’m certain the king will see you on the morrow,” the secretary said, still to Lucan. “You’ll have a chamber for you and your boy for the night. Certainly, you’ll wish to see your captain.”
“If he is not otherwise occupied,” Lucan acquiesced.
“Giles will locate him, if he’s not already gotten wind of your arrival. As for you,” he said, turning at last to Effie, “I’ll put you in with the rest of your lot. Giles?” The guard standing to the rear of the secretary stepped to the side to face his superior. “Take her up to the north wing with the other Scots rubbish.”
Effie felt her face heat, but she said nothing as the guard approached her, his hand out, as if he would take her arm.
She pulled out of his reach. “I’m not a prisoner, am I?”
The secretary gave her an oily smile. “Certainly not yet.”
“I want to see my son.”
He looked at her with a touch of confused amusement. “Do you?”
“I’d speak to the Scots before I retire, Hatteclyffe, if you don’t mind. They were part of my duties, after all, and I’d see that they’ve been cooperative.”
“Not cooperative in the least,” the secretary said. “But His Grace well expected it.”
“My son,” Effie insisted. “Where is he?”
Hatteclyffe turned an exasperated face toward her. “You don’t have a son until the king says you have a son. You really shouldn’t wear trousers, mistress,” Hatteclyffe advised in a mock confidential tone. “They make you forward. Unbecoming.” He glanced back to Lucan. “Very well,” the secretary said dismissively. “Giles will wait for you to show you to your room, lest any ideas of subterfuge come to mind.”
“Perish the thought,” Lucan said. “I’ll send Montrose for more suitable clothing for the lady before he retires.”
“Wise, wise.” Hatteclyffe said with a nasty smirk, and then turned away even as he spoke. “Good evening, Montague.”
“This way, sir,” the guard said, leading them from the antechamber and through dark, echoing corridors.
No one spoke further as the frigid air within the compound wrapped about the group like a shroud—so much colder than out of doors as they walked briskly through the twisting passages that Effie’s skin broke out in gooseflesh beneath her sleeves. She tried to still the panic that wanted to rise within her, saving her questions for Lucan when they were afforded some sense of privacy.
Was she being taken to a cell, after all? Hatteclyffe had not struck her as a man whose words could be trusted.
But they ascended rather than descended staircases, and at last came to a set of double doors in the center of a wide corridor, flanked by two more guards.
“I’ll wait for you here, sir,” the guard advised Lucan.
“Thank you, Giles,” Lucan said and then reached for the handle and charged through the door just as easily as if he was entering his own home. Effie and James followed.
The space was long and tall like the corridor they’d just left, but a hearth presided over the far, narrow end, and the center of the floor was occupied with a long trestle and benches. To either side of the hall were four doors, all at various stages of openness, and interspersed with short couches and chairs. Muffled chatter seemed to filter out into the smoky central chamber.
