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With a new level of urgency, Simon scrambled to his feet. Doubleday had set his lantern near the door, but Fawkes’s was on the table, which meant a burning flame was within arm’s reach of their opponent. Doubleday had Fawkes cornered. The man had to be desperate. But desperate enough to kill himself along with everyone else? Simon did not need to think on the answer. The unnerving determination on Fawkes’s face spoke more clearly than words.

Fawkes’s left arm swung wide across the table. Simon dove forward, pushing the lantern out of the conspirator’s reach one heartbeat before Fawkes could have grasped it. Fawkes growled in anger. Simon shifted slightly and lunged again, this time reaching for the lantern’s handle and lifting it off the table. Undaunted, Fawkes swung his arm wide and seized the dagger. Swiveling, he turned on Simon and let the weapon fly.

Simon had no time to react. The dagger had only the width of the table to travel before it entered his abdomen. He heard his cry as if from a distance, and then pain, sharp and intense, started on his left side and spread to encompass his entire torso. His sword clattered to the floor. The lantern in his other hand wavered. He could not drop it. Not while he was surrounded by gunpowder.

Vaguely aware that Knyvett was shouting and Doubleday had Fawkes on the floor, Simon looked down. The hilt of Fawkes’s dagger was all that remained in view. Shock was instantly followed by a wave of nausea. Gritting his teeth, he set his hand around the dagger’s handle and pulled it free. Blood covered the blade and dripped to the floor. He raised his eyes, not willing to view his doublet. Wetness coated his fingers and abdomen.

“Tie his arms.” Knyvett was barking orders.

“There’s a cord.” The words came out in a groan. Simon could no longer remember where he’d tossed the fuse. Perhaps it did not matter. Doubleday was a guard. He surely had something on his person that he could use.

Pressing his hand to his wound, Simon attempted to move past the table toward the door. His legs trembled, and the lantern swayed.

“Bancroft!” Knyvett was at his side.

“Take the lantern,” Simon gasped through waves of pain. “We will all be blown to the heavens if it falls.”

Knyvett pried the metal ring from Simon’s fingers. As soon as the weight of the lantern was gone, Simon dropped his head and arm. Breathing deeply, he took another faltering step. He staggered. An arm came around him.

“This way, m’ lord.” Doubleday half carried him to the door and slowly lowered him to the floor.

“Fawkes?” Simon managed.

“Trussed up with his own fuse,” Doubleday said with satisfaction.

Knyvett stood above him, but Simon could not see beyond his shoes. Raising his head took too great an effort.

“We must take him to the king directly,” Knyvett said. “Are you well enough to travel to the Palace of Whitehall if we assist you onto your mount?”

It was noble of Knyvett to not simply abandon him, but it was a ludicrous question.

“Go.” Simon leaned his head against the wall. “Take Fawkes. Maidstone has gone for Cecil. They will arrive soon enough with extra men who can assist me.”

Knyvett did not waste time arguing. He surely knew that attempting to move Simon would simply slow them down and be an exercise in futility. Every man in that dank room was fully aware that there was no recovery from a deep dagger wound to the abdomen.

“We shall leave a lantern and will return when we have handed Fawkes over to the king,” Knyvett said.

Doubleday reached for the man sitting near the table with his hands tied behind his back. He hauled him to his feet and dragged him roughly toward the door. “The king first,” Doubleday growled. “An’ after that, the Tower.”

Ignoring them both, Fawkes shot Simon a contemptuous look. “I daresay you shall see the other side before me, my lord. May you be suitably punished for your work here this night.”

With all the strength Simon had remaining to him, he raised his head and kept it up until Doubleday had heaved Fawkes outside and Knyvett had closed the door behind them. He heard Knyvett’s voice and the men’s heavy footsteps. Then they were gone.

Breathing through the agony that encircled his core, Simon closed his eyes to the shadowy forms of the perilous barrels, closed his ears to the scratching of rats, and thought of Isla. Sorrow filled him, bringing the sting of tears to his eyes. The gunpowder plot was undone. The life of the king, members of Parliament, and countless innocent people had been saved, and yet Simon had failed. No matter his vow to the contrary, he would not return to her. The pain in his heart threatened to outweigh the pain at his side, but he pictured her beside him, their fingers intertwined.

“Forgive me, Isla,” he whispered into the darkness. “I may not be with you, but I shall always love you.”

Something was wrong. Isla could feel it as surely as she could feel the heat from the fireplace and the draft from the window. She paced the distance between those two locations in Martha’s parlor for the tenth or eleventh time. What she wouldn’t give for mobile phone service right now! A brief call—or even a one-word text—from Simon was all it would take to put her mind at ease. Instead, she was consigned to this torturous waiting and fretting. Was there something she’d forgotten? Something about the capture of Guy Fawkes that she was missing?

“Surely one of the gentlemen shall return soon.” Martha was sitting on the edge of the nearest chair, her hands clasped, her expression tense. She’d made the same statement twice already.

“I sincerely hope so.” Isla paused her mindless march to anxiously run her hands down her cream-colored gown, realizing as she did so that it was the dress she’d been wearing when she’d first arrived at Copfield Hall. She had been afraid then too. But for very different reasons. The terrified young lady standing on the manor’s doorstep that evening could never have anticipated how much she would come to love the Maidstones and Simon. She swallowed the lump in her throat. Especially Simon.

In the fireplace, a log shifted. Isla’s thoughts did the same. There should be no reason to fear. Her history books had reported that the general search at the Palace of Westminster had come up empty and that it was Knyvett and a guard who had captured Guy Fawkes later that night. Simon had gone for Knyvett. Surely the magistrate and his associate must have been willing and had responded to the call. After all, the two men would be hailed as heroes and be well rewarded for their actions.

The two men. Isla’s deliberations tumbled to a screeching halt. The two men. She reached for the back of the nearest chair to steady herself. If Simon had accompanied Knyvett and the guard to the undercroft, there were three men with Fawkes. Simon would not simply walk away when Fawkes was taken into custody. He would want to ensure that the traitor was safely delivered to the king. But if that had happened, there would have been a record of it.

Isla’s grip on the chairback tightened. Had there been any casualties during the capture of Guy Fawkes? With every man in the vicinity bearing a sword, it seemed almost impossible to believe that no one had been injured—or worse. The air left Isla’s lungs. Was there no mention of Simon in the history books because he had not made it out of the undercroft alive?