“Get out, both of you,” he said again.
He didn’t pepper the command with any threats this time, so Kevin and Hallam quit the solar together. They were both heading for the entry to the keep when Hallam came to a halt and Kevin beside him.
“Where are you going now?” Hallam asked him quietly.
Kevin gestured to the main gatehouse. “Out to join Maxton with the army,” he said. “He will want to know about this conversation. Something tells me that Marius would not be beyond trying to use The Marshal’s army in spite of everything.”
Hallam shook his head wearily. “Nay, he would not,” he said. “Mayhap he will lose patience and demand to rush the keep and force Caspian from it.”
“It is better if the situation does not come to that.”
Hallam nodded. “I agree,” he said. “I will seek you and Maxton out later.”
With that, he started to turn for the stairs, but Kevin stopped him. “Where are you going?” he asked.
Hallam tried not to look sheepish, or guilty, or both. “To see to the posts for the night and then see to Lady de Wrenville,” he said evenly. “It is part of my usual rounds.”
With that, he headed up the stairs. He explained himself as if he had a perfect right to check on Lady de Wrenville, but Kevin knew differently. There was much more to it, but that wasn’t any of his business.
As Kevin headed out into the dusk, his thoughts shifted from Hallam to Caius, hoping that the man had married LadyEmelisse already. Kevin could see that they were going to have trouble with Marius, so there was no knowing how long they could keep up the charade of hunting down an escaped lady. Kevin suspected they had a couple of days at most.
After that… after that, all he knew was that he and Maxton would sit tight with The Marshal’s army to keep the de Wrenvilles from getting their hands on it.
The rest was up to Caius.
As Kevin headed out to secure The Marshal’s army, inside Covington’s solar, there was a good deal of angst still going on. After the news they had just received, Covington was caught in a world of both hope and confusion, while Marius was hoping his string of lies about his relationship to the king wasn’t about to fall apart. They muttered to each other about Hawkstone and Caspian, complained and pointed fingers, but the strong Spanish wine had them generally dissolving into useless oblivion.
Shortly, Marius left the solar and headed to the hall where the evening meal was being served, but Covington lingered in his solar. He was thinking on the past three years with Hawkstone and the plans that had somehow gone awry. He’d married Alice de Gras for the support her uncle could give him, but that had all turned sour.
He had Alice, but not The Marshal’s army. That was all he ever really wanted.
Into a new bottle of wine, a thought occurred to Covington. Perhaps if he had Alice appeal to her uncle, things might be different. Perhaps that was where he’d gone wrong in the first place– he’d never had Alice ask anything of her uncle when he should have done that from the beginning. How could William Marshal deny his niece anything?
Why hadn’t Covington been smart enough to think of that?
Perhaps that had been the key all along.
Wine in hand, Covington decided to pay a little visit to his wife.
*
It was quieton the upper floors of the keep, on the level containing Lady de Wrenville’s private chamber. As Hallam came up the narrow stairs, he slowed his pace, listening for any sounds of his beloved Alice.
She had a series of chambers on this level, all of them well-appointed, all of them representative of a wealthy lady of standing. Three of the chambers were hers, personally, and contained her bedchamber, her sitting room, and another room used to store her clothing and her bath. Her maids, a small army of five women, slept on the floor above her in two small chambers that had a tiny connecting staircase down to their lady’s chambers. She had brought the women with her from her home of Dudley Castle, and they were women who had been with her for many years. They were fiercely loyal.
Hallam was well-aware that the maids knew of his affair with their mistress, but they all went to great lengths to make sure their lady and the man she loved were protected from gossip. They were a silent, protective horde that he greatly appreciated.
When he finally came off the staircase, he paused a moment, listening for any conversation or any activity. He could hear the soft buzz of conversation on the other side of the sitting room door. This room was different from the solar she had taken over from the previous Lady de Wrenville, and she spent more time in the sitting room than she did in her solar for obvious reasons. Though the sitting room was small and not nearly as luxurious as the solar, it was hers and everything in it belonged to her. There were no remnants of some dead woman.
It was the first place that she told Hallam she loved him, so it meant something to him, too.
It was a special place for them both.
Silently, he made his way to the chamber door and knocked softly.
“Who comes?” came a voice.
“’Tis me, my lady,” he replied.
