Then they were before the gates of Fulkhurst, and Gilbert was calling out his false name, his status as Stephen’s messenger, his contrived tale of finding Rowena on the roadside. She did not listen to the story a second time, nor did she look up from her perch behind Gilbert so she might be recognized by the guards in the gatehouse. She did not feel like being any more helpful. She was there. She would do what she had to do. But more and more she was resenting that she had to.
She looked behind them one last time, and there…was that one of Gilbert’s men racing toward them down the road? And slowing when he saw them before the castle? Had those Kirkburough knights waited until near dark, then, to pass on her tale? Smart men after all. In the dark, Gilbert wouldnotgive chase. He would be inside the castle, waiting for an army to appear that would not, and thanks to her embellishment on Warrick’s ruthlessness, that army expectedthatto be the last they would ever see of Gilbert. But their strategy, fine for them, was too late to help her.
The man was already turning around, drawing the same conclusion. He was too late to give Gilbert warning. But mayhap he felt it mattered not. Mayhap Gilbert still had enough men left to serve his purpose…but that would not serve hers.
Rowena started to tell Gilbert what she suspected when the guard called down, “Wait there. My lord himself will take the girl from you.”
Rowena frowned, wondering what ruse they were perpetrating. But Gilbert looked off to the side and cursed. Then she heard it, the unmistakable sound of a great many horses approaching, and looked for herself. ’Twas indeed the dragon returned. In the last light of the day, his army was just barely discerned, but she had no doubt ’twas him. Neither did Gilbert.
He was still cursing, though not loud enough for the guards to hear. “Damn the man, he could not have reached Gilly Field and returned this soon. ’Tis impossible!”
“So he changed his mind.”
Her voice recalled her to him, and some of his composure as well. “Worry not,” he told her. “This merely alters my plan to a siege. Aye, my army is still larger than his, and I will return with it this very night. ’Tis fortunate I did not ask yet to spend the night, for now I will insist I must travel on.”
He could not mean what that sounded like. “You intend to stay here and greet him?” she asked incredulously.
“Why not? He has never seen me close enough or without armor to know me.” Gilbert was just short of laughing. “’Tis a fine joke on him, which I will be sure to point out when I return.”
’Twas more than Rowena could resist. It served her absolutely no purpose, except the pleasure of being the one to burst his confidence.
“I hate to mention this at such a time, Gilbert, but hewillrecognize you. He knows you only as my stepbrother, not as d’Ambray. But still you are another man he wants to kill, for you are the man who had him chained to a bed at Kirkburough. The joke, brother, was on you both.”
“Damn you, you lie!” he exploded. “I could not have had him and not known! And he could not have come with an army if he was chained to a bed.”
For her own sake, Rowena twisted the truth somewhat. “’Twas his army, but he did not lead it. They came not for you, Gilbert, but for him. And the moment they released him, he sent me here to his dungeon. He intends to make me suffer for the rest of my days for what I did to him. You he simply wants dead. But take not my word for it. You will recognize him yourself do you stay and greet him, so by all means—”
“Enough!” he growled as he grabbed her arm and swung her off his mount.
“What are you doing?” she demanded, furious, because she knew.
“They know inside the castle ’tis you. Do I take you with me, they will give chase, which does not suit me. So tell them my business was too urgent to wait. And fear not. My first demand when I return will be your release.”
He did not give her a chance to reply. He rode off, his men following, and ’twas dark enough now that they were gone from sight in moments. The approaching army could no longer be seen either, though the sound of it had grown louder.
It occurred to Rowena to wonder why she just stood there and waited. She could have easily slipped into the moat instead, with no one to see her do it. She could even hide under the drawbridge once it was lowered, then make her escape later, after all was quiet. ’Twould be assumed she had been carried off by Gilbert’s party. But that would lead to a chase, with Warrick in the lead. And Gilbert was heading straight for his army—or what was left of it. And Warrick would not take his with him, not to track seven men. And she was a fool, because she was still standing there when the first horse appeared out of the blackness and was halted next to her.
Torches were thrust into the outer walls, casting not much light—except into the moat. So she would have been seen in the water after all. For some reason that made her want to laugh. She did not, for ’twas Warrick himself who sat there on his great destrier looking down at her.
Chapter 37
“Is there a reason you await me out here, wench, instead of where you belong?”
“I escaped,” Rowena replied baldly.
“Did you?”
The skepticism of that reply, as well as Warrick’s smile, told her he did not believe her. Well and good. She would get more said if he thought her spinning improbable tales for his amusement—as long as she left out the key words that were sure to enrage him.
So she shrugged, sighing. “Alas, I am not noble enough to take blame here when blame is not mine. Ihadto leave, else I would have spent last eventide in your dungeon.”
“Ah,” he said, as if that explained all. “You dreaded a place that by your own words you found to be ‘really quite comfortable.’”
Did he have to remember what she had told the Lady Isabella?
“’Twould not have been sothistime,” she replied sourly, then quickly reverted to a nonchalant tone. “And I tell you true, I would not have returned, except I was found by the most dastardly lord who thought to use me to gain entry to Fulkhurst, which he came here to capture.”
When that did not raise a brow, she was annoyed enough to lay on the insouciance even thicker. “As to that, it might behoove you to enter Fulkhurst and make ready for a siege. On the other hand, I might have dispersed the army that was waiting in yonder woods with a few simple truths. I cannot be sure, mind you. But I explained to one of the knights that I knew for a fact that the lord he and his fellows were following had no right to their service, and so they ought to return to their rightful lord. I am afraid I also painted a rather black picture of you, on the off chance that fear might work where logic fails.”
