“How many?” Elodie asked before Gareth could sign the question.
“A dozen, my lady. Maybe more. They’re not carrying banners.”
Not Alaric’s men,Gareth signed rapidly.He would fly his colors.
“Could be refugees,” Elodie said. “The raids?—”
Could be anything.Gareth was already moving, his hand finding his sword belt by instinct.Bertram, sound the alert. Miles to the walls.
“Already done, my lord.”
Gareth paused at the doorway and looked back at her. For just a moment, the warrior’s mask slipped, and she saw the man underneath—the one who’d just bared his soul to her, who’d just admitted he was terrified of losing her.
Stay here,he signed.
“Gareth—”
Please.The sign was soft, almost a request.Until we know what this is. Please.
She wanted to argue. Every instinct screamed against letting him walk into potential danger without her. But she could see what it cost him to ask, could see the fear he was trying so hard to hide.
“Fine,” she said. “But the moment you know anything?—”
I will send word.He was gone before she could respond, his footsteps echoing down the corridor.
Elodie stood alone in the solar, her heart still racing from everything they’d said—and everything they hadn’t. Outside, she could hear the castle coming to life, men calling to each other, the clatter of weapons being readied.
She moved to the window and looked out over the courtyard. Gareth had appeared below, conferring with Miles, his hands moving in rapid signs. The guardsmen were taking positions along the walls.
The riders crested the hill.
Even from this distance, she could see they weren’t soldiers. The horses were too varied, the riders too ragged. Women and children, she realized with a jolt. Families. Fleeing something.
Refugees. People Alaric had driven from their homes.
More mouths to feed—and more opportunities for a spy to slip through.
She thought of Marian’s bright eyes, of the task Gareth had given her. Watch. Listen. Find the spy.
Somewhere in that approaching group, someone might be carrying Alaric’s secrets. Carrying his plans.
She needed to be there when they arrived.
“Spinach fudge,” she swore, and headed for the door.
CHAPTER 16
Elodie reached the courtyard as the first refugees stumbled through the gates. They came in a ragged stream—women clutching bundles of belongings, old men leaning heavily on walking sticks, children with hollow eyes and smoke-blackened faces. A young mother carried a toddler on her hip, both of them trembling. Behind them, a boy of perhaps twelve led a limping goat, his jaw set with the grim determination of someone who’d lost everything else and refused to lose this too.
The smell hit Elodie like a wall. Sweat. Fear. And underneath it, the acrid bite of smoke clinging to wool and hair and skin.
“Blessed saints,” Bertram breathed beside her. “There must be forty of them.”
More like fifty, Elodie thought, her mind already clicking through logistics. She’d worked during a couple of summers volunteering with the Red Cross, knew how to organize people. Fifty people meant food, water, shelter. Medical attention for the wounded. A woman collapsed near the well, and Elodie moved without thinking.
“You there—fetch water,” she called to a gaping stable boy. “And you, find Marian. Tell her we need every blanket in the castle. Now.”
The boy’s eyes went wide. The faerie woman was giving orders. But something in her tone must have cut through his fear, because he ran. Elodie knelt beside the fallen woman, checking her pulse, scanning for injuries. Exhaustion, mostly. Dehydration. A nasty gash on her forearm that had been bound with a strip of what looked like a torn petticoat.
