Ariana smiled again, conscious that her mask had slipped. She must appear carefree, nonchalant, a follower of the Beltane rites. She stepped forward and pressed the goblet into the guard’s hands, exerting pressure when she felt his initial resistance.
“Drink,” she urged. “You have stood on duty all through the night. It is only right you should have refreshment.”
“The earl does not like us to take intoxicating liquor when we are on duty,” he tried, a faint blush staining his pale cheeks.
Ariana shifted her stance so her skirts swayed around her ankles. “The earl is not here,” she whispered, greatly daring.
Had she gone too far?
Just when the hammering of her heart had grown loud enough to rival the overhead morning chorus, the guard finally allowed himself to smile.
“We always kept Beltane back home,” he nodded behind him, towards the village beyond the castle walls, before pressing the goblet to his lips and drinking deeply.
Ariana’s relief was but momentary, for he drained the goblet and handed it back to her, apparently unaffected by the potent sleeping draught Merek had so reluctantly provided for her. But no sooner had her mind leaped to this alarming possibility, than the young man swayed on his feet, frowned in puzzlement, and slumped to the ground.
Cautiously, she extended her foot and prodded him on the shoulder. The guard didn’t stir. He lay as still and lifeless as a rock. Alarmed now, Ariana pushed her hair away from her face and ducked down beside him. She held her palm close to his nostrils, weak with relief when she felt the warmth of his breath.
He lived still. Thank goodness.
But her time was limited. She had been entirely focused on drugging the guard but now the task ahead of her loomed large and insurmountable. With fumbling fingers, she fished in his stiff pockets for the large iron keys which banged heavily against her hips. Luck was on her side and the first key she tried fitted the lock of the squat tower. She heaved her shoulder against the unrelenting wood and stumbled through the door.
Darkness surrounded her. It was as if she had stepped into another world from the sunlit cheer of early morning. Here, the thick walls swallowed all sounds. Neither the torrential gushing of the river nor the chirp of woodland birds could permeate the ancient stone. All was silent and the gloom was absolute. Ariana’s shoulders shook with a mixture of cold and fear, but there was naught she could do but press on.
She recalled the bridge was set into the back wall of this first tower. That was where she must head. She took a deep breath of stale air and put one foot in front of the other, aware of the chill travelling up through the soles of her feet. After several paces, her eyes adjusted to the darkness, and she could make out the dim outline of walls. A scurrying shape past her feet made her heart leap into her mouth.
Only a rat, she calmed herself.
There must be dozens in here. It was best not to think about it.
Greatly daring, she reached out a hand and traced a line along the damp walls, finding her way from one side of the tower to another. When the featureless back wall loomed into sudden view, she didn’t allow her spirits to plummet, but bravely ran her palms all around until she encountered a catch in the stone. The door swung open, taking her by surprise, and as light flooded into the chamber, her knees fairly buckled with relief. She stumbled out onto the wooden bridge without a thought for safety, desperate to get out of the unrelenting darkness of thetower. Outside, the air was sweet and the light akin to a gift from the heavens. Ariana clung onto the wooden handrail and steadied her breathing. Through the wooden slats beneath her feet, she could see the fast-running river far below. She must watch her step. Just one rotten plank would spell disaster.
Easy now, she told herself. One step at a time.
The bridge held firm beneath her tentative footsteps and she arrived at the doorway to the second tower without incident. Here, she was sure she would find Ysmay. On her second attempt, she found the correct key for the doorway, and only then did a new thought occur to her.
What if Ysmay was not the only prisoner in Traitor’s Gate?
Worse, what if she was not the only one to be wrongfully imprisoned in Traitor’s Gate?
Ariana clung to the stone wall as thoughts chased around her mind. She had come here for one purpose only, to rescue her aunt. Not to mount an insurrection against Darkmoor. Such an action could have terrible consequences. No matter what she found, she would have to steel herself against pity for anyone else’s plight.
If she only had a torch to light her way.
Ariana had deliberately stood with her foot blocking the door, so a thin strip of daylight filtered into the gloom of the second tower. But here the darkness was not so absolute, for occasional thin windows allowed in a bleak glimmer of the outside world. Ariana blinked until her eyes adjusted and she could make out a steep stone staircase winding up through the center of the tower, then she moved her foot and the door closed with a dull bang.
Her heart thudded with anticipation. This was the moment she had been waiting for. She lifted her skirts and began to ascend, paying no heed to the rivers of damp running down the walls, nor the chilling echo her footsteps sent reverberatingaround her. The cold was harder to ignore for it seemed to have crept into her very bones. Though mayhap it was trepidation that made her shiver so. On and on she climbed, in a spiral that became ever tighter, until at last she reached a small galleried opening. She swallowed hard and forced herself to peer between the bars of the cell, fearful of what she might find. But her eyes saw only a poor heap of dirty straw and the remnants of an old candle.
The cell was empty.
Ariana was about to press on when a new sound reached her ears, and she froze in surprise. What was that? Hardly daring to breathe, she listened hard, warmth stealing through her when she realized what was happening.
Someone humming a melody.
It was a voice she recognized. Ariana’s spirits soared. It was Ysmay.
The humming dispelled both the gloom and her anxieties. Ariana ran lightly up the next spiral of the staircase, relieved that as the sound grew louder, the light in the tower grew brighter. Was the force of Ysmay’s inherent goodness dispelling the gloom of this dreadful place?
She stumbled out into a large circular room, set with regular square windows. In the center of the room sat a tall, thin woman with long cascading white hair. The woman held herself regally, despite her poor surroundings. She had her eyes closed and her hands folded in her lap. At one side of the room was a pallet of straw covered with a thin blanket. A larger shaft of light came from an opening to the battlements. Ariana crossed her arms over her chest, overjoyed to have found her aunt but reluctant to startle her. The conditions were not as dire as she had feared, but there was no question Ysmay would be cold and hungry. And frightened, knowing the execution that awaited her.
