When she woke again, she felt better. She lay still and realized that half of her pain came from a gag around her mouth. Her hands and feet were also tightly tied. She listened and felt and knew she was in a wagon, thrown onto a heap of straw. It was night, and she knew she must have slept through the day.
There were times when she wanted to cry from the pain of not moving. The ropes cut into her, and her mouth was dry and swollen from the gag.
“She’s awake,” she heard a man say.
The wagon stopped, and Roger Chatworth bent over her. “I’ll give you some water if you swear you won’t scream. We’re in a forest and no one could hear you anyway, but I want your word.”
Her neck was so stiff she could barely move it. She gave him her word.
He lifted her and untied the gag.
Bronwyn knew she’d never felt anything so heavenly in her life. She massaged her jaws, wincing at the bruised place Roger’s fist had made.
“Here,” he said impatiently, thrusting a cup of water at her. “We don’t have all night.”
She drank deeply of the water. “Where are you taking me?” she gasped.
Roger snatched the cup from her. “Montgomery may tolerate your insolence, but I won’t. If I wanted you to know anything, I’d tell you.” Before she could stop looking with longing at the cup he’d taken, he grabbed her hair, tossed the half-full cup aside, and replaced the gag. He shoved her back into the straw.
Through the next day Bronwyn dozed. Roger threw burlap bags over her to hide her. The lack of air and movement made her lightheaded. Her senses drifted about, and she was in a state of half awareness, half sleep.
Twice she was taken from the wagon, given food and water, and allowed some privacy.
On the third night the wagon stopped. The bags were taken off her, and she was roughly lifted from the wagon bed. The cold night air hit her as if she’d been thrown into icy water.
“Take her upstairs,” Roger commanded. “Lock her in the east room.”
The man held Bronwyn’s limp form almost gently. “Should I untie her?”
“Go ahead. She can scream all she wants. No one will hear her.”
Bronwyn kept her eyes closed and her body limp, but she worked on regaining consciousness. She began to count, then she named all of Tam’s children and worked at remembering their ages. By the time the man placed her on a bed, her mind was functioning quickly. She had to escape! And now, before the castle could settle into a routine, was her best time.
It was difficult to remain still and lifeless as the man gently untied her feet. She willed blood into them, using her mind instead of moving her ankles. She concentrated on her feet and tried to ignore the thousands of painful needles that seemed to be shooting through her wrists.
The gag came last as she closed her mouth and moved her tongue over the dryness in her mouth. She lay still, her mind beginning to race as the man touched her hair and her cheek. She cursed his touch but it at least gave her body time to adjust to the blood that was once again beginning to flow.
“Some men get everything,” the man said with a wistful sigh as he heaved himself off the bed.
Bronwyn waited until she heard a footstep and hoped the man was walking away. She opened her eyes only slightly and saw him lingering by the door. She turned quickly and saw a pitcher on a table by the bed. She rolled toward it, grabbed it, and slung it across the room. The pewter clattered noisily against the wall.
She lay still again, her eyes open only a slit, as the man rushed toward the noise. Bronwyn was off the bed in seconds and running toward the door. Her ankle gave way under her once but she kept going, never looking at the man. She grabbed the handle on the heavy door and slammed it shut, then slipped the bolt into place. Already she could hear the man pounding, but the sound was muffled and weak through the heavy oak.
She heard footsteps and just had time to slip into a dark window alcove before Roger Chatworth came into sight. He stopped before the door, listening to the man’s pounding and the indistinct voice for a moment. Bronwyn held her breath. Roger smiled in satisfaction, then passed her as he went toward the stairs.
Bronwyn allowed herself only seconds to calm her racing heart, and for the first time rub her aching wrists and ankles. She flexed her bruised jaw repeatedly as she slipped silently from the shadows and followed Roger down the stairs.
He turned left at the bottom of the stairs and entered a room. Bronwyn slipped into a shadow just beside the half-open door. She could see inside the small room quite well. There was a table and four chairs, a single fat candle in the center of the table.
A beautiful woman sat with her profile to Bronwyn. She wore a brilliant, flashing gown of purple-and-green striped satin. The delicate features of her face were perfect, from her little mouth to her blue, almond-shaped eyes.
“Why did you have to bring her here? I thought you could have her any time you wanted,” the woman said angrily in a sneering voice, so unlike her lovely face.
Roger had his back to Bronwyn as he sat in a chair facing the woman. “There was nothing else I could do. She wouldn’t listen to what I meant to tell her about Stephen.”
“Wouldn’t listen to you?” the woman taunted. “Damn the Montgomery men! What was Stephen doing at King Henry’s court anyway?”
Roger waved his hand. “Something about petitioning the king to stop the raids in Scotland. You should have seen him! He practically had the whole court weeping with his tales of the noble Scots and what was being done to them.”
