As he spoke, he tore off Edgar’s cravat and used it to bind the man’s wrists. Neaves cowered, slumped to the floor.
“Stay there,” Aedan said. “Do not dare move.”
Christina came toward them. “How did you know he was looking for gold?”
“I heard what you were saying before I came down the ladder,” he said. “Then when I heard him go for you, I came down.”
“You let me fend for myself when you were right there?” she asked indignantly.
“You defended yourself nicely, madam. If you needed help, I would have interfered. I thought you might want to pummel Edgar yourself before I stepped in.”
She began to reply when Edgar lunged, bowling into Aedan’s legs. They rolled to the ground again, Aedan beneath, then rolling atop, grabbing at Edgar, who slithered toward the ladder. He attempted to scramble up the rungs, managing even with his hands tied.
Aedan threw himself toward the ladder to yank Edgar backward. Neaves somehow butted his head against the tarpaulin to push it aside. It dipped, and water rushed down, pooled on the heavy cloth, knocking Edgar to the ground with Aedan.
Then a gush and a deluge as rain and a slide of mud poured into the souterrain like a black waterfall. The cascade covered the ladder and sluiced over the earthen floor, making even more mud, dousing candles, crashing into pottery.
Christina shrieked as the flood of water and muck tore over her feet so that she lost her balance, falling into the thick rush of it. Choking, gasping, she slid into a wall. Her head hit stone so hard that sound and motion stalled, stopped.
The mossy stones behind her seemed to soften and dissolve, and ooze swept over her, pushing her through the wall. She went into the abyss on the current.
*
The mud slappedover him like a water beast. Aedan rose to his feet, covered in mud. Coughing, groping in the darkness, he grabbed at the wall, looking for Christina and Edgar both. He grabbed a stone broken from the wall like an anchor in a storm.
“Christina!” His voice echoed strangely.
He groped in the darkness, and stumbled over what he realized was Edgar. The fellow was slumped and motionless. He must have hit his head. Aedan sat him upright, propping him against something solid, and turned to search in the blackness. Water poured down from the opening, splashing, swirling. Overhead, lightning cracked, rain pounded.
“Christina!” Silence. He called again, desperate, hearing only the slap and slop and pound of water and mud against stones and earth.
Feeling along the wall, his arm plunged into a gap. Some of the stones had tilted somehow, driven further into the earth. Odd. There must have been a hollow space behind them for that to happen. He pushed through the gap on hands and knees, calling.
Even in darkness, he knew that he had moved into another chamber, so compact that he could not stand upright or see anything in the darkness. Lifting a hand, he felt a ceiling lines with stones. Another larder?
He edged forward, encountering something—someone in the pitch dark. His hands knew what his eyes could not see.
“Christina,” he murmured.
She lay on her back in mud, unmoving. Under his touch, her head lolled, her arms sagged as he knelt beside her and dragged her into his arms and out of the mudslide. Gently he gathered her to him, terrified that she was gone.
Then he sensed her faint breathing. She was unconscious. He probed to find the nature of her injury, felt an obvious bump forming on the side of her head. He searched in a pocket for hissilver flask, a slender candle stub, and a box of matches, items he always carried with him when working outside through the night.
Leaning her against him, he touched off a match to light the candle. It flared into blessed light. He set the taper on a stone, noticing then that the walls in the little crawl space were lined in stone like the outer chamber.
He stroked her face, brushing mud from her cheeks, her hair. She lay serene in his arms, peaceful, eyes closed. Frightened, he said her name over and over, touched her cheek, cupped the bruise and bump on her head. She must have been knocked against the stone and somehow pushed through the wall just at the weak spot that gave way.
He looked around. The space looked like an extension of the storage chamber, but different. Stones had collapsed inward, coated in muck now. And the space glowed.
It was filled with the glint and gleam of gold, bronze, silver and steel.
Frowning in the dim light, he saw so many things he could hardly take it all in. Pots, carvings, a bench, small objects piled in a corner.
And gold. He moved the candle in an arc and saw the golden glitter and wink of it everywhere. Bowls, pitchers, gleaming torques, hammered armbands and wristlets stacked haphazardly. Swords, daggers with steel blades and bronze handles. A bowl covered in filigreed gold. A glittering jumble of wire-wrapped brooches.
Stunned, he looked at it, then turned his attention back to the woman in his arms. She was far more important to him than an ancient king’s ransom. She was breathing, but it was shallow. He bent down.
“Christina, my love,” he whispered. He kissed her brow, her soft, unresponsive mouth. “Wake up. Please, God, wake up.”Desperation rose in him like a tide. “I love you,” he whispered. “I love you.”
