“Shit.” Ned began to run, tugging Cecilia with him, despairing ofthe gallery’s stark length but needing instinctively to get Cecilia as far as he could from her father.
“There’s a staircase at the end of the gallery,” Alex said, hurrying alongside. “It goes down to the kitchens and a back door.”
“Lead the way,” Ned ordered him, but then staggered as Cecilia suddenly wrenched her hand from his hold. Before he could catch her again she hurried over to the gallery wall.
“I know I’m uncultured,” Alex said, staring at her incredulously, “but is this the best moment to appreciate art?”
“Secret passages,” Cecilia said. Frowning up at the portraits, she muttered as she rapidly sidestepped beneath them, tapping the wall under each frame. Ned heard fragments of names—“Zenobia, Mary, Arthur”—and recognized them as characters from Branwell Brontë’s early writing. He’d tried to read those stories once as part of his preparation for infiltrating Morvath’s mad brain but hadn’t got far. They were dense, strange, and altogether disturbing. One thing he did remember was Morvath’s favorite character, the great pirate and rogue Alexander Percy.
And there he was, all bright ringlets and snazzy collar, gazing poetically along the gallery from within a gilded frame. Ned dashed over to the portrait. Surely the most likely place for a secret doorway would be beneath this original, albeit imaginary, lord of Northangerland. But Cecilia shook her head.
“Maria Henrietta,” she whispered, and shoved at the wall beneath a small ink sketch of a woman. The wood parted, and Cecilia turned to flick her hand at him, urging him to hurry. Ned glanced along the gallery, ensuring they were unseen, then slipped after her through the opening. An intense odor of rot made him grimace, but it was more appealing than being murdered by a lunatic pirate. Alex entered after him, and as he eased the door shut as silently as possible, a pitch blackness shrank the world into nothingness.
“Does he know this passage?” Ned whispered.
“Yes,” Cecilia replied, so close her voice brushed warmly against his throat. “But it originally opened under Percy like you thought. My mother switched the portraits; I just couldn’t remember which one. If we—”
Ned clapped his hand over her mouth. Footsteps knocked slowly along the gallery floor.
“Cecilia,” Morvath called. “Don’t hide from me. It’s not a nice way to treat one’s father.”
The steps drew closer. The three pirates huddled back from the door, unwilling to move through the narrow passage in case Morvath heard them—but anxious he would hear their breathing, their heartbeats, if they stayed still.
Tap. Tap.He was testing for the secret door.Zenobia—Mary—
Cecilia thought she would suffocate. She bit Ned’s hand and he yanked it away with a hiss. But it did not help. The old, stale darkness was pressing against her, forcing her breath back into her lungs. She felt a scream building inside.
“Come now, daughter,” Morvath called. “Where is your loyalty? I know you’re with that two-faced Lightbourne. Don’t listen to him. Don’t trust a word he says. He’s no scoundrel; he doesn’t have a truly bad bone in his body. You’ll be so much happier with Frederick. You and he will be the prince and princess of thieves, and I will be England’s king.”
He thumped the wall barely inches from where they stood. Ned shifted closer against Cecilia; beside them, Alex made the tiniest sound as he unsheathed a weapon. Cecilia bit her lips desperately to keep silent.
“Damn it, girl! You’re going to be sorry. For every half hour you stay hidden, I will slit the throat of a pirate lady.” His voice shudderedthrough the timbers. His smile cut the dark. “I’m sure you don’t want that, do you?”
Cecilia moved instantly to open the door. Ned caught her, pushing her against raw wood and spiderwebs. She struggled, but he was gentle, confusing her instinct to resist. He brushed back her hair, soothing her, calming her, until she eased beneath him.
“Cecilia!” Morvath shouted again, but his voice was fading, and his footsteps moved away. Finally he was gone.
Ned shifted back, but Cecilia pulled him to her again with unthinking need, her arms and her heart clinging to the comfort of his steady self-assurance.
“Pardon me,” someone whispered in a high, fine voice. “I don’t like to interrupt, but you are blocking our escape.”
Ned immediately stepped away from Cecilia. “Who’s there?” he demanded.
A sharp scratching sounded in the blackness, then light flared. As the pirates squinted against it, the light bloomed, filling the passage. Their eyes adjusted; they saw a rotund woman holding up a lantern.
“Who are you?” Alex asked, raising his sword.
“Captain Anne Brown, at your service,” she said archly. “Who are you?”
“Miss Brown!” Cecilia sidled past the men to grasp the woman’s hand. “You’re safe! You’re free! Is my aunt also?”
“Ah, Cecilia, so good to have found you. Your aunt is about six people to the rear of me.”
Cecilia felt a rush of relief so powerful, she might have wept from it had Miss Brown not been watching her with sharp, cynical eyes. “Morvath said he would kill you if I didn’t return to him.”
“Yes, dear,” Miss Brown replied, patting Cecilia’s arm. “We heard him. But we have all escaped. Except Miss Fairweather and hergranddaughter Jane. They were taken from us yesterday and we fear the worst.”
“The worst indeed, Miss Brown,” Cecilia replied. “Jane Fairweather is a traitor! Captain Lightbourne can tell you all—”
