She nodded firmly. “In Levens,” she said. “It is a mile or so to the east.”
“Then that will be our first destination on the morrow.”
She giggled happily, throwing her arms around his neck. Brandt responded by wrapping his big arms around her, hugging her so that her feet dangled more than a foot off the ground. Then he kissed her, warm lips against warm lips, tasting her sweetness as if he had been starving for it all his life. If he didn’t know better, he might have suspected the love he had never known was already upon him.
“Come, now,” he breathed against her mouth. “Let us return to the hall and finish our meal.”
Ellowyn nodded, rather breathlessly, as he set her on her feet. “Not a word to my mother,” she told him as he took her hand and tucked it into his elbow. “She might try to stop us.”
“And your grandmother?”
“She will fight my father to let me go with you.”
Brandt grinned at her as they headed into the warm, fragrant hall beyond. They had a plan, just the two of them, and he feltexcited and nervous about it like a giddy young squire. But it was the best feeling in the world. He could hardly wait for the morrow.
As they moved back to where the feasting was taking place, the solar door creaked open and Deston stood there. He had heard every word through the door, as he had been listening with his ear up against it. He knew the scheme, and he knew he must stop it. For Ellowyn’s sake, he had to. His beautiful young daughter was not meant for a killer such as de Russe.
Shortly before dawn, Ellowyn was locked in her room by her own father, who told her it was for her own good. When Brandt found out, he unleashed his men and laid siege from his prime position of inside Erith’s massive inner bailey. He wasn’t leaving the fortress without Ellowyn.
It was a very bitter and exhausting day.
*
If Brandt deRusse was one thing and one thing only, it was a military mastermind. He knew how to get his wants, and he knew how to make things happen. His systematic and rather strange siege of Erith would be something they would speak of for years to come in military circles.
When Deston had told him, from behind the bolted keep door, that he had no intention of allowing Ellowyn to sneak disgracefully off with the duke, Brandt had not been particularly surprised. He stood on the steps leading into Erith’s big keep, hearing Deston’s refusal and looking at the de Lara brothers, standing next to him, for their reaction.
Their response, of course, was immediate. They spread the word to St. Hèver, de Reyne and le Bec, and the five knights spread out and sequestered their four hundred and ninety-twomen from the de Nerra troops. Once they were all separated, Dylan returned to Brandt for instructions.
Brandt was still standing on the top step of Erith’s keep. He was looking at his men, now separated from the de Nerra soldiers, and he was assessing the situation, the strengths and weaknesses, and their probable loss ratio. By the time Dylan appeared, Brandt was prepared.
“Does the man really think I am simply going to pack up and leave?” he asked, somewhat rhetorically.
Dylan, in full battle armor, shrugged as his gaze moved up the side of Erith’s towering keep. “Perhaps he is hoping,” he said, focusing on Brandt. “Your orders, my lord?”
Brandt, too, was in full battle regalia. He was well prepared for any sort of military undertaking. He sighed as he latched the chin strap of his helmet.
“De Nerra?” he called in his booming baritone. “I will ask you one last time. Will you turn Ellowyn over to me peacefully?”
From behind the enormous oak and iron door, he could hear the muted response. “Nay!”
Brandt looked at Dylan. “Is the vault in the gatehouse?”
Dylan nodded. “Aye, my lord.”
“How many people would you say it will hold?”
Dylan cocked his head thoughtfully. “There are four cells plus a sublevel. It would hold fifty men at most.”
Brandt came off the steps. “Then jam as many of de Nerra’s soldiers as you can into it and lock it up,” he said decisively. “Then I want you to strip the rest, of their weapons and clothing and everything else, and pin them in the outer bailey with fifty of my best archers trained on them. If anyone moves, kill them. The rest of us will lay siege to this big beast of a keep and breach it.”
The corner of Dylan’s mouth twitched. “Stripde Nerra’s men, my lord?”
Brandt nodded shortly. “A man cannot fight and protect his privates at the same time,” he said. “I guarantee you that if given the choice between having his head or his manhood cut off, a man will choose his head every time. Being stripped of everything should give de Nerra’s men cause to think twice before trying to resist us. They will be too busy protecting what is most precious to them.”
Dylan’s smile broke through as he turned away from Brandt, barking orders, which the other senior knights took up in chorus. Two hours after sunrise, a full-scale siege was taking place in the inner bailey of Erith.
Brandt knew he would have to be very careful in opening the keep, mostly because he didn’t want to use his usual tactics. Those normally resulted in fatalities and since Ellowyn was inside, he wanted to make sure she stayed safe and whole. Therefore, he was cautious with his plans.
