The Hostage Bride

Chapter 19

“There are severe sanctions for sleeping on duty.”

Portia opened her eyes and yawned. She smiled blearily at the large figure standing over her, blocking the sun. “I’m not on duty.”

Rufus nodded solemnly. “As of ten minutes ago, you were.”

“Oh, that can’t be!” Portia sat up on the mossy grass. “I can’t have slept that long.” She struggled to her feet, hauling herself up by the tree trunk in whose gnarled roots she had been sleeping so peacefully.

Juno bounded along the riverbank toward them, barking delightedly. She dropped a stick at Rufus’s feet and sat on her haunches, tongue lolling, looking up at him with clear invitation. He bent to pick up the stick, then hurled it along the bank. The puppy sped away.

“I don’t know why I fell asleep, I only sat down for a few minutes,” Portia muttered, shaking out her jerkin, brushing twigs and bits of moss off her britches. It kept happening. An invincible wave of sleepiness would break over her and she’d find herself nodding off where she sat. “Now George will grumble and look reproachful.”

“No he won’t. As it happens, someone else is taking your duty.” Rufus sat down on the grass with his back against the tree and patted the moss beside him.

Portia didn’t immediately accept the invitation. She frowned. “Why?”

“I have a more important task than sentry duty for you.” He shaded his eyes against the warm May sun as he looked up at her.

Portia glanced around. Her eyes glowed with a lascivious light, and her tongue touched her lips. “Here? Isn’t it rather public?”

“For once, you insatiable wench, that was not what I had in mind,” he declared, laughing at her. “Come, sit down, there’s something I have to tell you.”

Portia regarded him thoughtfully. She sensed some current of excitement in the air. His expression was superficially as calm as ever, but his eyes had taken on that electric hue of summer lightning, and there was a barely restrained tension in his powerful frame as he leaned with apparent nonchalance against the tree at his back.

“What’s happened?” She sat down beside him.

“A messenger from Oxford.” He closed his eyes, raising his face to the sun, and a little smile played over his mouth.

“From the king? No, Juno, take it away. It’s all covered in slobber.” Portia picked up the stick the puppy had deposited in her lap and dropped it with a grimace of distaste onto the grass.

“From the king,” he affirmed, still with the same smile, still without opening his eyes.

“Am I supposed to guess? Here, Juno, fetch this instead.” She hurled a pinecone and the puppy raced after it.

“No, when you’ve stopped playing with that animal and can give me your full attention, I will tell you.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She leaned sideways and gave him an apologetic kiss on the corner of his mouth. “I am all attention.”

“The king, in his infinite wisdom, acknowledges the services of his loyal subject by granting the house of Rothbury a full pardon and complete restitution of lands and revenues.” His eyes opened and Portia read there deep jubilation, an inexpressible satisfaction, and something else that gave her a little shiver of disquiet. Triumph… the triumph that comes from the utter humiliation of an enemy, from putting a foot on his neck as he lay at one’s feet.

Juno returned, shaking the pinecone and growling. But something in the atmosphere made the puppy turn aside and flop on the grass with her new toy between her paws, her eyes fixed adoringly on Portia.

“There’s more,” Portia stated. “What is it?”

“I have orders to lay siege to Castle Granville,” Rufus continued. “After our defeat in April, the rebel army far outnumbers the king’s in the north. If we can remove Granville from the equation-permanently prevent him from bringing his militia into battle during the summer campaigns-we’ll go some way to improving our odds.” His hand moved unconsciously to his swordbelt, his fingers playing over the plain hilt of his great curved sword.

“What better person to entrust with the task of capturing the marquis and his castle than his neighbor and blood-sworn enemy, the earl of Rothbury, the king’s most loyal subject?”

The shiver of disquiet became a full tornado. His triumphant words were laced with acid, and it dawned on Portia that Rufus Decatur’s loyalty to his king was not based on principle. He was engaged in this conflict purely for his own ends. And she knew that wasn’t true of Cato. Cato had chosen Parliament’s side out of deep moral conviction. Did that make Cato the better man… the more honorable man?

It was not a question Portia wanted to answer. She knew that the king’s armies were hard-pressed now, after a stunning defeat at Selby in April. A move to disable Cato and his force was only logical. “When do you invest the castle?”

“We leave at nightfall.” He stood up in one lithe unbroken movement and reached down to pull her to her feet. “I intend to be in position at the castle gates when Cato opens his eyes on the morning. Go to the cottage and put your things together.”

“I’m to come?”

His eyes narrowed, the color darkening to the blue of midnight. “You are part of this militia. Every able-bodied Decatur man will take part in the siege. It will be long, tedious for the most part, but I intend to have Cato’s submission before the summer is out… whatever I have to do.” His eyes raked her face. His voice was now very quiet as he said, “Do you have difficulties with this, Portia?”

Her pause was infinitesimal but she knew he’d marked it. She shook her head. “No.”

He continued to scrutinize her countenance, as intently as if he would see into her mind, then he said, “I am assuming Granville will be well prepared for a siege. Is that a correct assumption?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice low. “He has stocks of grain, his cellars are full. I saw the preparations when I was there.”

Rufus’s face was expressionless. “But there is one thing he does not have in plentiful supply. One thing that he and his people cannot live without. Do you know what that is, Portia?”

She frowned, thinking. But her impressions of Castle Granville had been of an impregnable stronghold. Run with superb efficiency. Nothing left to chance. She shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

He smiled but there was no warmth, no humor, no pleasant quality to the smile. “You’ll discover soon enough.” Then with a short nod he strode away.

In the hole left by his departure, Portia became aware of movement, of excitement. Men were running, calling, the drums were beating the roll call, and trumpets blasted from every watchtower, summoning any who were absent from the village. The time for skirmishes was over. The men of Decatur were going to take part in their first real engagement of the war.

And what of the innocent people in the castle? What of Olivia and Phoebe? The babies? Even Diana? What had they done to be made war on? To face starvation and privation? To see the enemy at their gate? To endure the attacks of battering rams and cannon? The relentless firing over the walls? All the miseries of a siege?

Portia could feel no excitement, only a swamping depression. She had to take part if she was to keep faith with Rufus. And yet she wanted nothing to do with it. And what was this secret he held that would bring the walls of Castle Granville tumbling to the besieger?

She went back to the cottage, her step lacking its customary buoyancy. But Juno made up for any shortage of ebullience as she pranced and darted ahead, investigating scents, disappearing headfirst down rabbit holes, her plumed tail waving in frantic excitement.

The cottage was quiet, the fire in the hearth low, used in these warm spring days only for heating water. Portia went upstairs to gather together her possessions. They were sparse; when laid upon the bed, the little pile looked almost pathetic. A change of underclothes, stockings, her buff jerkin, and two linen shirts. Absently she began to fold the squares of linen she used during her monthly terms, laying them on the pile. Then her hands stilled. She stood looking down at the bed.

Surely she was late this month. How late? She tried to think, to remember. But she’d never paid much attention to this monthly inconvenience. It came when it came, and it was always a nuisance. She knew very little about the workings of her own body, having had few female confidantes in her growing, and no one to take the place of a mother. When she’d first bled, she’d run to Jack in tears, certain some dreadful wound had opened in her body.

He’d been drunk, as usual, but he’d pulled himself together enough to tell her that it was just one of those things that happened to women and she’d have to put up with it. The next day, he’d taken her to see the madam of his favorite brothel in Glasgow. The woman had given the bewildered girl a rough-and-ready education in the facts of life, and Portia had managed her own affairs with very little attention ever since.

But that lack of attention had its disadvantages. She ran her hands down her body. It felt the same. If she had conceived, when would it feel different? She felt perfectly normal in herself. Surely if something as momentous as conception had occurred, she would have noticed something.

The front door flew open and banged shut below. “Portia… Portia… Portia!” The excited shrieks of the boys drove the disquieting puzzle from her mind for the moment.

“What is it?” She went downstairs.

“We got to get our things together ‘cause-”

“Yes, an‘ I want to take my soldiers,” Luke shrilled, interrupting his brother’s more measured speech. “Only I can’t find ’em… I thought I left ‘em with Silas, but he hasn’t got ’em.” He began to throw bedcovers on the floor, diving and swooping like a demented seagull.

Juno, who’d come in with the boys, joined in the hunt with excited yaps. Toby, bouncing on his toes to reach a wooden trumpet on the shelf above his bed, grabbed at the end of the shelf, bringing it toppling down on him in a shower of toys and wooden puzzle pieces.

“What the hell is going on?” Rufus’s voice, very close to a bellow, crashed through the turmoil. “It’s a madhouse in here.”

“They seem to think they’re coming with us,” Portia said. “They aren’t, are they?”

“I can’t leave them here. There’ll be no one to look after them,” Rufus pointed out above the continued hubbub. “Be quiet!”

The roar brought a moment’s silence. The children, totally unabashed, stopped and regarded their father inquiringly.

“You can’t take children to a siege,” Portia said. “It’ll be dangerous.”

Rufus ran a distracted hand through his hair. “Every able-bodied man is coming with us. You’re not suggesting I leave this pair to the care of the infirm, are you?”

That thought did not bear contemplation. “No, of course not. But surely there’s someone else. What about with the women at Mistress Beldam’s?”

“I’m not leaving them in a brothel.”

“I can’t see that that’s any more unsuitable than an armed camp,” Portia said.

“What’s a brothel?” Toby inquired.

“A place where women live,” Portia answered.

“We don’t want to live there,” Luke said with disgust.

“No… not there,” Toby agreed vigorously, wrinkling his nose. “I got to find my soldiers!” He returned to the hunt with renewed enthusiasm.

Rufus stood frowning as the noise level rose anew. “They have to come,” he said finally. “It’s not as if we’ll be fighting a pitched battle.”

“It’s your decision.” Portia turned back to the stairs. “You’re their father.”

“But I value your opinion.” Rufus followed her, leaving the uproar behind them.

“Then answer me this. You’re the earl of Rothbury. No longer an outlaw… no longer a moss-trooper. You have your estates back. You will rebuild your house. You’ll take your place in the world of law. Where are the boys going to fit into that society?”

Rufus realized that in all his careful, ruthless planning, and now in the flush of triumph, he hadn’t given thought to such issues. He hadn’t even considered how he himself would fit into that society. He’d left it at the age of eight. He had no practice in its rules or its customs.

“I don’t know,” he said quietly. “I haven’t thought that far ahead…” Then with a flash of defensive impatience, “For God’s sake, Portia, I only received the news this morning. And we’re in the middle of a war. I have other things on my mind.”

“Yes, of course you do.” Portia turned once more to the clothes on the bed. “I’ll see to the boys’ packing, and ours. I’m sure you’re needed elsewhere.”

Rufus hesitated, puzzled by the tenor of the conversation. He had the feeling that he was missing something, that Portia had some point she was trying to make, but it had eluded him. “I really don’t see any alternative to taking the boys with us,” he said, returning to what had begun the discussion.

“No, I suppose not,” Portia said. “I wasn’t thinking very clearly. I don’t imagine it’ll be any different for them there than here, really.”

“Except that they’ll be living under canvas.”

“Well, that’ll certainly find favor.” She flashed him a smile over her shoulder as her hands kept folding and refolding the same shirt. “You’d best get back to work.”

“Yes…” Still he hesitated, then with an uncertain shrug he hurried away, his sons’ voices billowing out through the door in his wake.

Portia sat on the bed, holding the shirt forgotten between her hands. She’d been speaking of herself, she realized. Or at least, including herself with the children. What place would there be for her in the rehabilitated household of the earl of Rothbury? She belonged to the armed camp, to the outlaw’s way of life, just as Luke and Toby did. And what if she was carrying a child? Another of Rufus Decatur’s bastard offspring…

“Portia… Portia… we need you!” Luke’s head popped up at the top of the stairs, his father’s vivid eyes aglow. “I can’t find my green shirt. An‘ it’s my absolute favorite.”

It was also in rags, as a result of one too many encounters with a thornbush. Rufus, on one of the infrequent occasions when he noticed what his sons were wearing, had spirited it away, hoping that out of sight would be out of mind. It had worked for a week. No longer, apparently.

Portia stood up, telling herself firmly that moping about imponderables was pointlessly wearying. There were enough practicalities to occupy her. “I’ll see if I can find it, Luke.”

It was dark when the main body of the cavalcade passed between the sentry fires of Decatur village. Portia rode beside Rufus at the head, Juno sitting on her saddle, upright and alert beneath her cloak. Luke and Toby had gone ahead, riding in the cart that carried Bill and the mess, a pack train of laden mules accompanying them.

Portia, even after five months in the Decatur stronghold, was astonished at the speed and efficiency with which this massive operation had been put under way. And even more by the utter secrecy. Boats laden with arms and ammunition had been dispatched downriver. They’d be met and unloaded onto carts in the dark hours before dawn, just before the river snaked out of the hills into the valley at the foot of Castle Granville. Farmers’ carts trundled through the countryside, their burden of culverins concealed beneath bales of hay for cattle feed.

The village had been left with a skeleton guard. There was nothing to steal there, no armed troops to be destroyed. Rufus had reasoned that rebel marauders would not waste their time on a near-deserted village, populated by the elderly and infirm.

There was no conversation in the ranks of riders. They were all dark clad, blending into the moonless night as they rode in close rank through the desolate landscape. But there was a prickle in the air, a quiver of excitement and anticipation to which only Portia, it seemed, was immune. She could sense it in Rufus beside her. He rode without his usual relaxation. His body was taut in the saddle, his eyes darting from side to side, missing nothing… not the flicker of grass as a hare loped by, nor the faint crackling in the undergrowth made by some night creature. An owl hooted, an animal screamed in pain, the sound shocking in the still night. Juno trembled and crept closer to Portia.

For the most part, Rufus took a route that kept them away from habitation, but once they rode through a shuttered hamlet, moving their horses onto the grassy verge that ran alongside the gravel lane running through the center of the village.

Portia found it eerie, riding right through these sleeping people, horses’ hooves muffled by grass, the wicked glint of sword, dagger, pistol, hidden beneath dark cloaks. They would waken in the morning and have not the faintest idea that an army had passed among them.

At two in the morning, they reached the wooded hillside opposite Castle Granville. Concealed among the trees, the men dismounted, tethered their horses, and ate the provisions they’d carried in their saddlebags. Leather flagons of wine were passed around, but there was little sound… nothing that could carry across the valley to the watchers on the ramparts of Castle Granville.

Portia, nibbling a thickly buttered bannock, walked to the edge of the trees and stood looking across at the bulk of the castle, grayish white in the darkness. Rufus intended to make his move just before daybreak, bringing his men up to assault and surround the castle walls before the sentries fully realized what was happening. Once the besiegers were in place, the castle would be sealed tight as a drum.

She turned, feeling rather than hearing the footstep on the mossy ground at her back. Rufus came up beside her. He placed a hand on her shoulder and held a flagon of wine to her lips.

She drank the rough red wine with pleasure, but shook her head when he encouraged her to drink again. “What will you do if Cato sends his men out to fight?” Her voice was barely a whisper, in keeping with the inhabited silence around them.

“He won’t,” Rufus returned, a glint of satisfaction in his eye. He drank deep from the flagon. “Not without suffering unacceptable losses. He’d have to lower the drawbridge, and we would block it at our end.”

“Yes, of course. But will you have enough men?”

“A troop of Prince Rupert’s infantry will join us by midday. Infantry and engineers experienced in digging siege-works. There’s no way Granville and his men will be able to leave.”

From nowhere the image of the concealed door beneath the drawbridge flew into her head. She could feel the lines in the stone against her hands, could see the low narrow runnel winding through the vaults, up the stone stairs, emerging into the scullery.

She hadn’t mentioned the door when she’d told Rufus of the conversation she’d overheard between Cato and Giles. She’d had only one thought, to warn Rufus of the trap. Extraneous details had been lost in the mists of her exhaustion.

Should she tell him now? But an entire troop couldn’t leave by that exit. They would emerge onto the moat within the besiegers encampment, and while one man might evade the sharp eyes of Decatur watchmen, a group could not.

She had no need to tell Rufus of the door. If Cato couldn’t use it to evade the royalist siege, then Rufus didn’t need to know of it. She could forget it existed.

But if Rufus knew it existed, he could use it to gain entrance to the castle.

The pit of her stomach seemed to drop. Her skin prickled as if she’d walked through a bed of nettles. If she was truly loyal to Rufus, she would tell him what was to his advantage. Surely she would?

“Rufus?” Will’s voice came out of the darkness, and Rufus turned away from Portia. She breathed deeply. The moment was passed… for now.

“Is it done, Will?” There was a ring of urgency, of anticipation in his voice.

“Aye.” Will stepped up to them.

He had not accompanied the cavalcade, and Portia saw now that his face was blackened with dirt, his teeth glimmering white as he grinned. She could see his excitement, feel it coming from him in waves. “It’s done. They’ll be without water within the week.”

“Good man!” Rufus clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ve set a guard at the dam.”

“Aye.” Will grinned.

“What d’you mean?” Portia laid a hand on Rufus’s arm. “What dam?”

“Ah, well, I told you I had a little surprise for Cato.” Rufus smiled the smile that Portia hated to see. “The one weakness of Castle Granville is the water supply. The well is fed from a stream up in the hills behind us. Dam the stream, deny the well.” He opened his hands palm up, indicating the simplicity of the tactic. “When Cato finds himself short of water, then we shall see him jump.”

Portia knew logically that she couldn’t fault the tactic if she didn’t fault the siege itself. It was in everyone’s interests that it be over as soon as possible. But she hated Rufus’s triumph, his gloating satisfaction. He had not gloated so over the defeat of Colonel Neath and his men. He had treated them with respect and honor, friendship even. But Colonel Neath was an ordinary enemy. Cato was not.

She knew she was not going to tell anyone of the secret entrance to the castle.

The figures came out of the dark, swarming up the hill. They came with the crack of musket, the beat of drum, the shrill of pipe, the bright orange flare of torches. The watchers on the battlements of Castle Granville were for an instant frozen with shock and the terror of the unexpected. The night had been quiet. The sentries had paced the ramparts, the guards in the watchtowers had played cards and dice. Only night sounds had disturbed the peace. And now, out of the night, in the hour before daybreak, a shouting horde advanced upon them.

Fire crackled on the narrow ledge beyond the moat, at the very base of the castle; smoke rose in choking greasy billows. Somehow, sometime in the night, the fires had been laid under the very eyes of the watchmen. Somehow the attackers had carried the kindling across the moat to pile it against the walls. Now the flaming torches arced through the dark to fall among the dry brushwood. The foul stench of burning pitch and tallow wreathed the castle walls, and the clamor from the assaulting force grew fiercer, wilder. A dreadful taunting designed to intimidate, to humiliate.

Cato was aroused from the first deep sleep he’d had in weeks. Diana shot up in bed. “What is it? What’s that noise?”

Cato didn’t answer. He scrambled into his britches and ran barefoot and shirtless from the chamber. Giles Crampton was racing toward him down the corridor.

“ ‘Tis a siege, m’lord. They’ve surrounded the walls, bridged the moat. We didn’t see ’em. Didn’t ‘ear a peep. Christ an’ his angels, sir, I swear they must ‘ave come up like ghosts.” He wrung his hands in distraught defense, but Cato barely heard him and made no response.

He burst out onto the ramparts, heedless of the sharp stones beneath his bare feet, and ran to the watchtower over the drawbridge. “Mother of God!” He looked beyond the smoke and flames to the ranks of men crowding the far side of his moat. He coughed as the filthy, oily smoke filled his lungs. The fire would do no damage to the castle itself. The stone walls would need more than a bit of burning brushwood and pitch to bring them down, but it made observation almost impossible. But it also meant that the besiegers could not see to fire upon them.

He signaled that the men should retreat from the battlements to the outer bailey, where they could take stock. Diana appeared on the steps from the donjon. She was wrapped in a cloak over her nightrail, and she looked terrified.

“My lord, what is it? Are we under attack?”

He controlled the urge to dismiss her. Of course she was frightened, and deserved to know what was happening.

“It rather looks as if we are besieged, madam,” he said, trying to make his voice light as he came up the steps toward her. “But there’s nothing to worry about. We are well prepared to withstand months of investment. Our cellars and granaries are full. And Fairfax will come to our aid. He’ll raise the siege in no time.”

Putting an arm around her slender shoulders, he eased her ahead of him back inside. “I must dress. It will be for you to calm the household… and the girls, of course. Make sure they understand that there’s nothing to alarm them.”

He put Diana from him and strode past her. She stared in disbelief, for the first time in her adult life utterly at a loss. The shouts and musket fire continued unabated. She put her hands over her ears, trying to shut them out.

“Diana, what is it? What’s happening?” Phoebe came flying toward her, Olivia on her heels. “What’s going on? Is it a battle?”

Diana shook her head, her hands still clapped to her ears. Her face was whiter than whey. She stumbled past them, leaving them gazing after her.

“Lord, I’ve never seen Diana look so sick,” Phoebe observed in wonderment. “Never expected to, either,” she added.

“Come!” Olivia tugged her sleeve impatiently. “To the b-battlements. We’ll find out what’s happening.” She pulled Phoebe toward the door and began to run.

They reached the outer ward as the sky was lightening, pink and orange streaks appearing on the horizon. Men were racing from the barracks, milling in the court, hefting muskets, drawing swords. Olivia kept to the edge of the court, Phoebe following suit, until they reached the narrow flight of stairs cut into the wall. Olivia darted up to the battlements, then choked, doubling over.

“Filthy!” Phoebe gasped, stumbling to the parapet to look over. “Look at all those men, Olivia. There’s thousands of them.” It was a serious exaggeration, but in the eerie light of the smoke-wreathed dawn, the apparitions below seemed myriad.

“They’re attacking the castle,” Olivia said with a thrill of excitement that quite superseded fear. “Just like Portia said would happen.”

“What did Portia know about it?” Phoebe was instantly curious.

“Portia knows everything,” Olivia said simply.

“I doubt that,” the more realistic Phoebe said. “Even though she’s joined with the royalists, she can’t know everything.”

“Well, she knows a lot,” Olivia stated, and Phoebe was prepared to let it go at that.

“Whose standard is flying?” Phoebe leaned over the battlements, blinking vigorously in an attempt to clear her watering eyes. “Is it the king’s? Yes, I believe it is, but there’s another one… an eagle, I think. Azure on a gold background.”

“Decatur!”

The girls spun around. Cato stood behind them, his face a mask of rage, all semblance of his previous tranquility vanished. His enemy was at his gates. And the enemy was not King Charles.

A herald’s fanfare blew through the drifting smoke. The light was growing, the fires dying down. Rufus Decatur, astride his chestnut steed, rode forward to the edge of the moat, to the point where the drawbridge, had it been down, would have given him access to the castle.

He sat his horse, the standard of the house of Rothbury planted in the socket of his saddle. He signaled for the herald to sound again.

Cato’s own herald responded immediately and the marquis of Granville took a step up onto the ledge immediately below the parapet. The rules of war and of parley ensured his safety.

Rufus stood up in his stirrups and his voice rang out through the hush of dawn. “My lord of Granville, I am come in the name of your most sovereign majesty, King Charles, to demand that you lay down your arms of rebellion and surrender your person and your castle to His Majesty’s mercy.”

Cato answered, his voice as measured as his adversary’s, his words as formal. “In the name of Parliament, I will uphold the cause of the people. Castle Granville will not surrender.”

He stepped back off the parapet. The silence was complete. It seemed to Phoebe that no one knew what to do next. Then Cato said harshly, “You two shouldn’t be outside. Go in, and stay within doors.”

They obeyed without a moment’s hesitation.

In the back rank of the Decatur force, in the hush that followed the declaration of battle, Portia was overcome by a wave of nausea. She fought it, but it was invincible. She scrambled off Penny and stumbled behind a bush, heaving up her guts in bleak misery.