* * *
Ivor waited at the bottom of the stairwell, his unease building. Every second that they spent inside was a risk. More than that, every second that they spent here was another moment that Eithne was left alone with thatmonster.
She can handle it. I need to trust her.
And hedidtrust her. That didn’t mean that he was fine with leaving her all by herself with a man who had slaughtered hundreds of people. Ivor’s anxiety clawed at his stomach, his every instinct screaming at him to run back to Eithne’s side. He’d take his chances with MacDuff’s men. He’d be outnumbered, but—
“Ivor?”
Soft footsteps on the stone stairs wrenched his attention back to reality. The pretty blonde girl who had called his name who rounded the corner now was not Eithne, of course, but Myrna was almost as welcome a sight. Behind her, Jonah emerged, leading a weeping woman clutching a baby.
“Ye found her,” Ivor said, breathing out in relief.
The woman’s quiet sobs paused as she took in the man in front of her. “Ye’re the mercenary. The hero.”
Ivor glanced at Jonah. “I dinnae ken what yer brother’s been telling ye, but—”
“Betty,” Jonah’s sister said firmly. “And dinnae give me that modesty. Me husband is dead, me faither is gone, and me own brother nearly betrayed the woman he loves as a servant to the man who did it.”
Ivor saw Myrna blush from the side of his eye. Despite his own embarrassment, he couldn’t help but smile a little at that. He gestured to them, leading them further down the hidden servant’s corridor that Eithne had described to him on the way to the castle. As long as he correctly remembered the turns she had told him to make at the right times, they would soon be free of the keep.
“But ye,” Betty continued as they all walked, the baby mercifully fast asleep in her arms. “Ye didnae slay him when ye discovered the deception. Ye risked yer life for Eithne Kinnear, and ye camebackto end him. Ye gave me brother a chance when many would have ended him, and now ye’re helping save us as well. Ye’re a grand man, Ivor Sinclair, and me family are in yer debt.”
“Och, dinnae see it that way,” Ivor said. “Any decent man would want to help. I ken what it’s like to be blinded by pain. Jonah’s a good lad. He just needed a wee push in the right direction.”
“I willnae stop thanking ye anyway,” Betty insisted.
Ivor glanced at Jonah, who gave him a half-shrug and a smile in response. He almost wanted to laugh. He certainly didn’tfeellike a hero. He was just…Ivor. A mercenary. A man who’d killed his own sister.
That isnae really what happened, Ivor. When are ye gonnae let yerself live?
He was startled. That voice in his head was soft, feminine. It sounded like Eithne, whispering to him, soothing him. It sounded like that wonderful woman giving him strength.
Yes. Strength. Ivor could fight, but Eithne was the real source of power between them. It felt wrong to have left her alone with Rory MacDuff, wrong to leave her with only a pathetic dagger for her own defense, and yet there was nobody else in the world that Ivor would trust more to get this job done.
“It’s a right here,” Myrna whispered. Ivor blinked out of his reverie, noticing they’d all lowered their voices. He’d nearly walked off in entirely the wrong direction.
Pull it together, Sinclair.
The small group turned left and down one more set of stairs. The door was stiff, but Ivor and Jonah put their shoulders hard against it, pushing hard. With a loudcreakthat Ivor prayed nobody had overheard, the door swung open.
Ivor stepped out first. It was deep, dark, inky night, and he could barely see an inch in front of his own face. That was good – it would make it harder for any guards to see them either. As far as he could tell, there was nobody around. No patrols. All that he had to do was get them along the path to the village in silence. Then he’d return to help Eithne.
They were in the gardens. Apple trees grew around them, and Ivor knew that if he wanted to find it, his name and Killian’s would be carved in eternal friendship on one of these trees.
“Ivor?” Myrna asked in a voice so low it was almost just a breath. “What’s wrong?”
“This garden is where Killian saved me life all those years ago when I was just a starving bairn,” Ivor mused softly. “And now I’m here to save his sister.”
Myrna took his hand and squeezed it in a sisterly gesture that made Ivor miss Iona and Killian both more strongly than he’d expected it to hit. “Killian would be proud of ye,” she said quietly.
“As he would be of ye,” he replied. He nodded to Jonah, who moved to his side. “Let’s go.”
The four of them moved slowly and quietly as they walked with the still quiet bairn in his mother’s arms, staying close to each other as much as they could, Ivor and Jonah in the lead. The gap in the perimeter was just ahead, just as Eithne had told him – just as he himself remembered it being all those years before.
“On my count,” he said, after scouting ahead a little to make sure that none of the soldiers were in sight range. “We run for the gap.”
In the dim light, he thought he saw them all nod. He pushed Myrna forward first and counted down from three. On one, she rushed across the open garden and tumbled through the fence to her freedom.
