“You’re alive,” she breathed. “I thought when I saw the blood?—”
“Takes more than Alaric’s dogs to kill me, girl.” Bertram managed a weak smile. “You did well. The passages. The children. All of it.”
Marian’s chin trembled, but she mastered it.
“The refugees from the caves are returning now. All sixty-three accounted for. The grain store held—I barricaded it before I led them out.” She paused. “I saw where they took her. Toward Dunharrow, the eastern road. Cecily was with them.”
Gareth rose to his feet. The courtyard had gone quiet around him, his men and servants alike watching their silent lord with expressions that ranged from fear to fury to desperate hope.
The tunnels,he signed to Marian.You said you know every passage in this castle.
Her eyes widened, then narrowed. “I do. The servants’ ways, the old tunnels, the forgotten doors. Places even Bertram doesn’t know.” Her gaze flickered toward where Elodie should have been standing. “She taught us to speak to you. Let me teach you how to disappear.”
The parallel hung in the air between them—the faerie woman who’d given a kitchen maid a voice, and the kitchen maid who’d used that voice to save so many lives.
“I can help.” Marian’s said. “I know how to move through tight spaces. How to be silent. How to?—”
He held up a hand before she could argue.You’ve done enough. More than enough.He glanced toward the old mare, standing patiently where Marian had left her. The creature’s head drooped with exhaustion, her coat still flecked with the mud of a twenty-mile ride.
The mare,he signed.She carried you through the night. She’s yours now.
Marian blinked. “My lord?”
Yours. A horse for a hero.He allowed himself the ghost of a smile.Take her to the stables and see she’s well cared for. She’s earned it.
For a moment, Marian looked like she might cry. “I’ll name her Courage. Because she had more of it than I did.”
You had plenty.Gareth gripped her shoulder one final time, then turned toward the armory. There was still work to be done.
Behind him, he heard Marian’s voice, soft but fierce. “I’ll take care of her, my lord. I swear it.”
He didn’t doubt it. The girl had proven herself ten times over in a single night.
Now it was his turn.
The armory was quiet, lit only by the gray light filtering through arrow slits. Gareth moved along the racks of weapons, his hands trailing over hilts and handles, testing edges with his thumb. He selected a sword first—not his heaviest, but the one balanced for close-quarters, for tight corridors and cramped spaces. A long dagger for his belt. A shorter blade for his boot.
He did not select a shield. Shields were for men who planned to defend themselves.
Miles appeared in the doorway, watching his lord arm himself with an expression that grew grimmer by the moment.
“My lord. Provisions?”
Gareth shook his head once. He wouldn’t need provisions. Either he’d be back by dawn with Elodie in his arms, or he wouldn’t be back at all.
“Water, at least. The men?—”
The men can bring what they need.His signs were curt, dismissive.I travel light.
Miles’s jaw tightened, but he said nothing. He’d served with Gareth long enough to recognize the stillness that came over his lord before battle—the way everything extraneous fell away until only the objective remained.
Gareth buckled his sword belt and turned toward the door. Then he paused, his hand on the frame, and looked back at the racks of weapons gleaming dully in the half-light.
His father’s voice echoed in his memory, as clear as if the old man stood beside him. Every fortress bleeds somewhere. Remember where this one bleeds.
Dunharrow.He’d been seven years old when his father had taken him to see the drainage systems being reinforced—a favor to the old lord, back when the de Montrevains and de Clares had been allies instead of enemies. He remembered the dark tunnels, the smell of damp stone, the way his father’s torch had illuminated passages that seemed to go on forever.
Remember, his father had said.You never know when you might need to know a castle’s weaknesses.
