The Hostage Bride

Chapter 21

“What is it? Who’s there?” Phoebe’s alarmed voice broke through the darkness.

“Hush! It’s only me,” Portia whispered back.

“Portia! Is it you?” Olivia shot up in bed, her nightgown a white gleam in the shadows of the bedcurtains.

“Yes. Do be quiet.” Portia flitted to the bed, where the two girls sat side by side, staring at her in astonishment.

“It’s all very well to say ‘It’s only me,’ ” Phoebe declared with some indignation. “How could we possibly expect to see you?”

“No, how could you?” Portia agreed. “But please whisper.”

“You’re all wet?” Phoebe said. “You’re dripping all over the floor.”

“I had to swim across the moat.” Portia shivered, hugging her arms across her chest. “And I don’t seem to be getting much of a welcome for my trouble.”

“Oh, Portia, of c-course you are!” Olivia leaped from her bed, flinging her arms around Portia in a convulsive hug. “Oh, you’re so cold! You’re soaked to the skin!”

“I know,” Portia said gloomily. “I brought you some fruit.” She took the offering from her pockets and laid it on the bed.

“Take your clothes off.” Olivia began to pull and tug at Portia’s jerkin. “We can try to dry them.”

Phoebe had climbed from the high bed herself and was rummaging in the linen press. “Here’s a woolen robe you could borrow.”

“Oh, thank you!” Portia flung off the soaked and clammy jerkin and peeled down her britches. “Wet clothes are the most disgusting things.”

“Here’s a t-towel.”

Portia scrubbed herself dry and was suddenly vividly reminded of Rufus scrubbing warmth and life back to her deadened body after she’d been lost in the blizzard. Somewhere, she thought, if she were warm enough to find it, there was a supreme irony in her present situation.

She thrust her arms into the sleeves of the robe that Phoebe held out for her and wrapped it tightly around her body. Her teeth had stopped chattering at last.

“I brought you some fruit,” she said again, gesturing to the bed. “It’s not much, I know, but all I could carry.”

“I don’t understand anything,” Phoebe said, taking a hearty bite of a pear. “This is good… How on earth did you get in here? No one can get out, so how did you get in?”

“There’s a way in,” Portia said, seating herself on the window seat. “But I can’t tell you about it. I needed to see how you both were. I was worried about you.”

“It’s horrid,” Olivia said, hitching herself onto the bed. “We c-can’t cook anything because there isn’t any water.”

“And there’s only ale to drink,” Phoebe put in. “And Lord Granville is so angry all the time, and Diana blames him for everything, only of course she doesn’t say so, but she takes it out on us. It’s most uncomfortable.” On this understatement, she tossed the core of her pear into the empty grate and carefully selected an apple.

“And it’s so hot,” Olivia said. “We c-can’t open the windows because of the smoke. And my father won’t let us go outside because of arrows.”

“Will it soon be over, do you think?” Phoebe regarded Portia shrewdly.

“I don’t know,” Portia said. “And I can’t talk about it.” A fierce frown furrowed her brow. It was harder than she’d expected to keep faith with Rufus while offering comfort to her friends. She hadn’t anticipated such questions, but of course she should have done.

“You can’t talk about it because you’re the enemy” Phoebe observed with customary bluntness.

“Portia’s not the enemy!” Olivia exclaimed, her voice rising in her indignation. “How c-could you say such a thing?”

“Strictly speaking, Phoebe’s right,” Portia said. “But I didn’t come here to talk about the war. At least, not directly. I wanted to see how you were. And… and… well, I wanted to talk to you both.”

“Is it lonely, being in the army?” Phoebe asked.

Portia shrugged. Phoebe’s bluntness verged on the tactless, but she had an uncanny way of fingering the truth. “I didn’t expect it to be, but yes, it is a bit.”

She realized that she had always been lonely, always dependent only upon herself, even when Jack was alive. But she’d persuaded herself she hadn’t needed companionship and so hadn’t missed it. But Olivia and Phoebe had given her an insight into what female friends could offer, and it was something that no amount of passion and loving between a man and woman could replace.

“But what of Lord Rothbury?” Phoebe persisted, with the same directness. “Aren’t you still his mistress?”

“I’m having his child.” Portia found herself blurting her news.

“Oh!” Olivia’s eyes were round as saucers. “B-but you aren’t married.”

“You don’t have to be, duckie,” Portia said wryly. “As I am the living proof.”

“Won’t you get married, though?” Phoebe asked. “Before the child is born?”

“I shouldn’t think so.” Portia’s eyes were on her hands, twisting in her lap. “I haven’t told Rufus yet, but…” She looked up with a tiny rueful laugh. “But I’m not exactly the kind of woman of whom countesses are made. Can you imagine me as Lady Rothbury?”

“But the earl is an outlaw.”

“Not any longer. The king has pardoned the house of Rothbury and granted restitution of their lands.” Portia reasoned that divulging this piece of information would not be a betrayal. It was no secret, and if Cato didn’t know it already, he soon would.

“I think you’d make a wonderful c-countess,” Olivia said stoutly.

“But would you wish to be?” Phoebe again asked the shrewd question. “You’ve always said you weren’t conventional… that you wanted to be a soldier… that you weren’t supposed to be a girl.”

“Yes, well, nature obviously didn’t agree with me,” Portia responded a shade tartly. “Otherwise I wouldn’t be finding myself in the ultimate female condition.”

The little gilt clock on the mantelpiece chimed three o’clock and Portia jumped off the window seat as if stung. “I have to go! I didn’t realize how long it had taken me to get here.” She threw off the robe and scrambled back into her wet clothes, shuddering.

“No one knows you’re here?”

“Only you two. And you mustn’t say anything!”

“Of course we wouldn’t!” Phoebe exclaimed.

“Will you c-come again?”

“If I can.” Portia buttoned her jerkin. “But I don’t know what will happen next.” She regarded them helplessly. “I wish I could do something for you.”

“The fruit was lovely,” Phoebe declared comfortingly, adding with straightforward curiosity, “Do you feel sick? I’ve heard pregnancy makes people sick.”

“Almost all the time,” Portia replied with a grimace. “As soon as I wake up until I go to sleep again.”

“Oh, how horrid. I’m glad I’m not going to get married,” Olivia said, reaching up to kiss Portia.

“But Portia isn’t going to get married,” Phoebe pointed out. “It’s passion that causes the problems, not marriage.”

Portia chuckled, her depression lifting. “How right you are, Phoebe. Stay a virgin and then you’ll have nothing to regret.” She blew them both a kiss from the doorway. “This war can’t last forever.” Then she asked what she realized now she’d come to ask. “Will you be godmothers to the baby?”

“Of course,” Olivia said.

“Send us your ring when the time comes and we’ll come to you… somehow,” Phoebe declared.

For once, Portia didn’t find the notion whimsical and unrealistic. She’d given her baby two godmothers and she knew her friends would find a way to stand by that obligation. Even the bastard child of a bastard could have friends in high places. And Olivia and Phoebe, whether they married or remained spinsters, would never lack for worldly comforts.

There was a warm place beneath her ribs that seemed to keep the cold and the fear at bay as she crept back along the corridor, through the scullery, and into the black tunnel. It seemed to take her much less time than it had coming, and within minutes she was at the opening to the moat.

The lever on the inside was not hidden, since obviously there was no need to conceal it from those who would use it. Portia lifted it softly and pushed. The door swung open. It was still night, but it was a grayish darkness after the pitch black of the tunnel. She could make out the tents of the besiegers across the moat, and the flickering torches of the watchmen. The fires at the walls were dying down now, and the smoke was less thick and acrid.

She slid down into the moat, and the water felt almost warm through the clammy cold of her wet clothes. She reached up to pull the door closed, and in that moment, as her body was outlined against the gray wall, a torch threw its light across the still, dark waters of the moat.

Portia felt the light on her back, felt herself exposed like a black dot against white parchment. Her heart hammered. She didn’t dare to move. And then the shout came and she knew she was lost as the alarm was raised.

There were excited cries, racing feet, the bright light of more torches. Portia slid into the water, not knowing what else to do. As the surface closed over her head, a musket cracked and the ball smacked against the wall behind her. She swam desperately underwater, trying to get a sense of direction. Was she going toward the bank? Musket balls whizzed over the water and she knew that they were waiting for the moment when her head broke the surface and gave them a proper target. Her lungs were bursting.

When she knew she must breathe in air or water, she raised her head. Someone shouted from the bank and a musket fired again, the ball splashing just by her head. She ducked again, with a lungful of air. That second had given her back her sense of direction, and had also shown her that three men stood on the bank, muskets at the ready. If she could get them to fire all three at once, then she’d have time while they reloaded to declare herself.

Portia had given up all hope of escaping. Now she wanted only to stay alive. She thrust her hand above the water. A musket fired. She raised the other one and was rewarded with another crack. Then she lifted her head and ducked instantly below the water. The third shot landed in the water so close to her head she could almost smell the gunpowder.

She raised her head and yelled the day’s password. Then she screamed, “Hold your fire!” as she splashed her way to the bank, making as much noise as she could… making it clear that she was giving herself up.

The three watchmen reached down and hauled her up onto the bank. She lay on her belly, gasping for breath, choking with the water she had swallowed in the last frantic moments. They stood over her. She could see their boots. Then one of them pushed her onto her back with his foot. She looked up into unfamiliar faces. These were not Decatur men, they were from Prince Ruperts battalion and they wouldn’t know her.

“I belong to the Decatur militia,” she got out.

“What’s a Decatur man doin‘ comin’ outta the castle?” one of the men demanded, prodding her again with his foot.

“Reckon he’ll be answerin‘ questions soon enough,” one of his companions said. “Let’s get ’im to the captain.” Two of them bent and grabbed her under the arms, dragging her to her feet.

“I can walk,” she protested, but they ignored her, dragging her along through the sleeping camp to the tent that housed the captain of the guard.

The guard captain of the prince’s battalion was sitting over a pot of ale, throwing dice with his second in command He looked up with interest as the sentries marched in with their prisoner.

“What have we here?” He pushed back the canvas stool and stood up, coming over to Portia, who had been thrust to her knees on the ground.

“Caught ‘im comin’ outta the castle, sir. Outta the wall… some kind o‘ concealed entrance. ’E was swimmin‘ across the moat.”

“Scrawny looking lad,” the captain observed. He reached down and yanked Portia to her feet by her collar. “So, let’s hear your story, m’lad.”

Portia shook her head, then reeled as the captain’s hand slammed across her mouth, his heavy signet ring cutting her lip.

“Come, come,” he said, all persuasive malice. “You’ll be singing soon enough. Who are you?”

Portia wiped blood from her mouth with the back of her hand. “I’m with the Decatur militia.”

The captain struck her again across her cheek and she reeled and fell to her knees. “Fetch Lord Rothbury,” she gasped through the tears of pain that clogged her throat. She had never been mistreated in such a way, and with her terror came a surge of rage that anyone would dare to use her with such uncalled-for violence. “He’ll vouch for me.”

There was a moment of silence. Then the captain said, “And just what d’you know of Lord Rothbury, fellow-me-lad?”

“I told you. I’m with his militia,” Portia repeated doggedly. She staggered to her feet.

The man hesitated, uncertain how to proceed in the face of the prisoner’s apparent certainty. “All right,” he said eventually. “But if this is some kind of trick, my lad, you’ll pay for it” He turned to one of the sentries. “Go and rouse Lord Rothbury. The rest of you go back on watch.”

The sentry’s urgent call roused Rufus from sleep. He had sat up and was out of his cot in one movement, reaching for his britches. “What is it?”

“Captain of the guard sent me, m’lord. We’ve caught a prisoner, sir, comin‘ outta the castle, swimmin’ across the moat. Captain wants to interrogate ‘im, but the prisoner says as ’ow you’ll know ‘im.”

“Sounds interesting,” Rufus observed, dressing rapidly. An escapee from Castle Granville was certainly an interesting development.

He followed the sentry through the camp, ducking into the entrance of the guard tent with a cheerful, “So, what have we here, Captain?”

Portia was standing somewhat unsteadily in the center of the tent. Rufus took in her soaked clothes, her swollen and bleeding mouth, the dark swelling on her cheekbone.

“What in the name of sanity…” he began, turning angrily to the captain of the guard. “What the hell is this?”

The captain found himself blustering under the livid glare of the earl of Rothbury. “We caught him trying to swim the moat from the castle, m’lord. The watchmen saw him come out of the castle by a hidden door.” He saw the earl’s expression change and said with more assurance, “He says you know him, m’lord.”

Rufus ignored the captain. He turned to Portia, his face now carved in granite, his eyes empty. “What were you doing in the castle?”

Portia touched her lip again with a fingertip. It came away sticky with blood. “I went to see Olivia and Phoebe.” It seemed simpler to tell the plain truth without protestations and defenses at this point. But she saw with a desperate sinking of her heart that Rufus was already gone from her.

“How did you get in?” There was no expression to his voice or on his countenance. It was as if he had not the slightest interest in the person whom he was questioning, only in the information.

“There’s a concealed door,” she said miserably. “I discovered it when I was staying in the castle.”

Now that deep and apparently baseless unease was explained. Now it seemed to Rufus that everything fell into place. She had known of the door and she had said not one word. The siege could have been ended long since if the besiegers had been able to enter the castle by surprise. She had had that information and she had not divulged it. And there could be but one reason for her silence.

Now he knew that she had been deceiving him all along. She had come to him with information that would convince him of her credentials, but Granville had offered him the treasure only as a means to plant a spy in his camp. It was so simple and he’d fallen for it. He had just once dropped his guard with a Granville, and they’d made a fool of him.

The cold dispassion left him and the dreadful devils of rage that he thought would tear him asunder pulsed in his voice. “You’ve been using it to gain entry to the castle ever since we began the siege. You’ve been visiting your family, carrying information, providing comfort. What has Cato to say about-”

“No!” she cried. “No, I have not. This was the first time. I did not betray you, Rufus. I wanted to see my friends. That was all.”

“Your pardon, m’lord, but I’m confused.” The captain spoke up hesitantly. “This is one of your men, then?”

Rufus leaned forward and plucked the cap from Portia’s head. “No,” he said distantly. “She’s not one of my men, but she travels with us.”

“Oh, aye.” The captain nodded his understanding. Camp followers were common enough, although it was unusual to see them dressed as this one was. But then, this one had been up to something more sinister than merely following the drum. “But she’s been spying, you say?”

“So it would seem,” he said as distantly as before. “And not for the first time.”

“No, I haven’t!” Portia heard the desperation in her voice. She couldn’t believe that Rufus had denied her to the captain… had relegated her to the status of a whore. “You know I haven’t, Rufus.”

He ignored the appeal. “You do not deny that you entered the castle by a secret entrance?”

“No.”

“You do not deny that you knew that by so doing you were consorting with the enemy?”

“Olivia and Phoebe aren’t the enemy,” she said, her voice dull as she understood that she was not going to convince him of the innocence of her errand… not this time.

“You were in that castle. You were among the enemy.” He waved a dismissive hand. “You swore allegiance to the Decatur standard and you betrayed that allegiance.”

Portia shook her head, her cheek and lip throbbing. “Please, Rufus – ”

“Did you take anything into the castle?” The interruption was as hard and rasping as a file against iron She looked at him, bewildered. “Just fruit,” she said. “I thought they might be thirsty.” And then she heard how she had finally condemned herself.

The captain said swiftly, “That’s offering comfort and succor to the rebels, the king’s enemies. It’s treason and a matter for headquarters.”

Rufus looked steadily at Portia. “How could I have been so deceived?” he said. “You are a Granville. You carry the germ of deceit and betrayal in your blood.” He turned away with a gesture of disgust.

“It’s a matter for headquarters, m’lord,” the captain repeated. “She’ll be sent there for questioning as soon as it’s light.”

“Rufus…” Portia held out her hand in appeal. He couldn’t walk away from her. Surely he couldn’t.

He glanced over his shoulder and said with the same cold distance. “I can do nothing for you. You condemned yourself.” He pushed through the tent door and was gone.

Portia stared at the tent flap still stirring where he’d roughly thrust it aside. She couldn’t believe that her whole world had collapsed, so suddenly, so completely, and so without just cause. But they were binding her hands with thick, rough rope and prodding her forward, out into the night, and the reality of imprisonment, of the horrors of interrogation that awaited her in York, of the spy’s noose at the end of the agony, filled her mind. She wanted to scream at the injustice, but her tongue was locked.

They forced her to sit at the base of a tree a few hundred yards from the guard tent, and they tied her securely to the trunk with rope beneath her arms. They used the loose end of the rope that held her wrists to bind her ankles as well, and then they left her trussed, wet and shivering, to await the dawn.

Rufus walked through the camp. He was blind and deaf, locked into his own world where the rage burned bright as a volcano, and the hurt was a black pit as cold as the rage was hot. But at last something broke through the trance, and he heard his own voice over and over in his head, “There is nothing I can do for you.” It became a chant, blocking out all else, and finally he stopped walking and turned back to find Will.

Whatever she’d done, he could not condemn her to what awaited her in York. The madness of obsession had driven him to speak as he had done, but he was in control now. Oh, the rage still burned, and the hurt still froze some central core of his being, but he was rational again and he could not forget what she had been to him, what she had meant to him. He could not stand aside while they hurt her, and he could not watch her death. She was false, she deserved what they would do to her, but he could not let it happen.

Will listened in disbelief to what had occurred, but he offered no comment, recognizing that the master of Decatur was but newly in control of his devils. He heard his orders and slipped away through the camp.

Portia leaned her head against the trunk of the tree. Her face burned and throbbed, and she had lost feeling in her hands. When Will appeared out of the trees behind her, she merely looked at him, her mouth too swollen to move even had she thought of anything to say.

He knelt and swiftly cut her bonds. “Come. You must be away from here before they come to take you.”

She managed to speak. “I don’t know whether I can walk.” She didn’t even know whether she could stand. Her mind could no longer keep track of what was happening, and her body seemed simply to have given up.

Will didn’t reply. He lifted her easily and at a half run carried her back to Rufus’s tent. Rufus was waiting for her, but his eyes were cold and distant as Will set her down on her cot and then hurried out.

“Get out of those wet clothes, quickly,” Rufus instructed, indicating the pile of dry clothes he’d set out. “If you’re still here at dawn, I won’t be able to save you. Be quick.”

In a daze, Portia stripped and dragged on the clean garments and her spare pair of boots. The silence that bound them was hideous. She couldn’t bear to look at his face and see there the dreadful contempt and the betrayal in his eyes. She sensed that the terrifying rage was gone, but this cold and scornful disdain was almost worse. But she did not venture a word more in her defense.

George entered just as she’d pulled on her boots. “Horses’re ready,” he said, and seemed deliberately to avert his eyes from Portia.

“You’ll need to help her to mount. She’s exhausted.” It was the first time he had acknowledged her condition, and Portia felt an instant’s hope. But when she looked toward him, he merely looked through her as if she were made of air.

George simply lifted her as Will had done, carried her out, and hoisted her up onto Penny. “I’ll lead her. Just hold on to the pommel,” he instructed.

Portia obeyed. Rufus had not followed them out of the tent, and she couldn’t even summon up the energy to ask where George was taking her. As he clicked his tongue and set their horses in motion, Juno barreled out of the undergrowth, yapping excitedly, prancing on her hind legs demanding to be lifted up to the saddle. George ignored the puppy and urged the horses to a trot.

“George, please.” Portia could hear the tears in her voice. “Juno…”

George swore. “My orders said nothin‘ about that damn puppy.”

“Please.”

He looked at her properly for the first time, it seemed, and there was a softening to his mouth. Then he drew rein and when Juno bounded up, he leaned down, caught her by the scruff of the neck, and yanked her upward. “ ‘Ere.” He handed the puppy across to Portia, who managed a painful smile of thanks. She didn’t know where she was going, but having Juno was an immediate comfort.

The next hours passed in a daze. She didn’t know whether she slept or was just unconscious some of the time. All her being was centered on her hands clinging to the pommel. If she didn’t let go, it didn’t matter that her eyes were closed, her head drooping, her body swaying. Her mind had ceased to work. She couldn’t think of what had happened, or what might happen. She existed only in this moment, this little spate in time that contained her body.

She was barely aware when they passed through the sentry posts into Decatur village. The posts were unmanned, the fires unlit. The village was no longer a martial establishment, and its few occupants were content with the small rituals of daily living that provided a threat to no one.

George led Penny to a stone building on the outskirts of the village. It was small and square, its windows barred, its single door of massive oak kept closed with a heavy bar across it on the outside. It was the Decatur prison.

Portia half fell into George’s arms as he reached up to help her dismount. She was clutching Juno as if the puppy were her only connection with life. She didn’t take in her surroundings, merely stood swaying as George raised the iron-bound bar across the door and opened it. He urged her inside into the dark and musty interior. There were two cells. Small, stone-floored, barred spaces, each containing a narrow cot and a bucket. It was a prison, not designed for comfort.

“In ‘ere, lass.” George swung open one of the barred doors and gave her a little push into the cell. “I’ll fetch ye some water an’ some bread. The master says y’are to stay ‘ere until ’e’s decided what to do wi‘ ye.”

Portia dropped onto the cot. There were two thin blankets and it seemed like heaven. She rolled herself into the blankets and was instantly unconscious, Juno curled tightly against her breast She didn’t hear George return with a pitcher of water and a loaf of bread, which he set down on the floor of her cell, didn’t hear the key grate in the lock or the heavy bar fall in place on the outside door.

Juno awoke her hours later. It was dark and Portia for a moment had no idea where she was, or even, for a terrifying instant, who she was. The puppy was scratching and whining at the barred door, clearly desperate to go outside.

“Oh God!” Portia sat up, memory flooding back and with it the now familiar misery of waking nausea. Her face felt stiff and sore, her mouth twice its normal size. She stumbled to the bucket and retched, but it was so long since she’d eaten, she brought up nothing. Juno continued to whine.

“I can’t let you out.” Portia sat back on her heels on the cold stone floor, for the first time fully aware of her predicament. “I can’t let either of us out.” A faint diffused light came from the barred window high up in the wall and she guessed it was moonlight. There was total silence. Was she to be left moldering here forever?

It was a terrifying thought, almost worse than the prospect of what had awaited her in York. She forced down the panic, swallowed the tears, and broke off a piece of bread. Plain bread sometimes helped the nausea. She nibbled it slowly, feeling her stomach settling. Juno had yielded to the force of nature and was squatting in the far corner of the cell, looking apologetically at Portia.

Then came a sound. The scrape as the heavy bar was raised on the outside door. Lamplight poured into the space and Portia couldn’t help a little cry of relief.

“Eh, just what’ve you been an‘ gone an’ done?”

Josiahs rather creaky voice was the most welcome sound Portia thought she had ever heard. The old man set his lamp down on a table outside Portia’s cell. A rich aroma drifted upward from the covered dish he set beside the lamp. Josiah approached the cell, the lamplight shining off his round bald head, giving the fluffy- white tonsure a pinkish tinge.

“I’d best take the pup out… oh, too late.” He spotted the puddle and shook his head with annoyance. “I looked in a couple o‘ times, but you was both dead t’ the world. I’ll fetch ye a mop.”

“Can you let us out?” Portia stood up and approached the bars.

“Just the pup, George says.” Josiah unlocked the door and opened it. Juno raced out between his legs, and the old man closed the door again. “I’ll be back wi‘ that mop.” He shuffled out of the building, Juno darting ahead of him.

Portia sat down on her cot and contemplated her situation. It was better than she’d thought a few minutes ago, but it seemed she was to be kept a prisoner in this tiny space.

Josiah returned with a bucket of water and a mop, which he passed to Portia, unlocking and locking the door with great caution. “So, what ‘ave ye gone an’ done? George wouldn’t say.”

“Nothing, as it happens,” Portia said grimly, cleaning up Juno’s mess. “But Rufus thinks I have.”

“ ‘Tain’t like the master to be unfair,” Josiah stated, clearly not believing Portia’s claim. “Not in all the years I’ve known im… an’ I’ve known ‘im since ’e was nobbut a nipper.” He unlocked the bars again to take back the bucket and mop.

“There’s no need to keep locking and unlocking those bars,” Portia said wearily. “I’m not going anywhere. Where’s Juno?”

“Runnin‘ around outside.” Josiah hesitated, looking at the prisoner’s wan and battered countenance, then he turned to the table, leaving the bars unlocked. “Ye want some supper?”

As usual these days, Portia’s stomach was giving mixed signals, but she knew she needed food. “Can I come out and eat it?”

Again Josiah hesitated. Then he said, “If’n ye promise-”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Portia repeated swiftly. She stepped into the main room. “What did George tell you?”

“Just that the master’s ordered that y’are to be kept in prison until ‘e says otherwise. I’m to take care of ye, since there’s only us old folk left be’ind.” He lifted the lid on the dish. “There’s a spoon fer the stew.”

Portia ate standing up because there was no chair. And with the first spoonful she found she was ravenous. “Could you bring me some warm water to wash, d’you think?”

“Aye, I’m to give you anything you need,” Josiah said with a nod. “Empty the bucket an‘ such like… bring ’ot water and food. I’ll bring ye wine, or ale, when I comes in the mornin‘.”

Portia set down the empty bowl and returned to her cell. “Can you bring me something to do? Paper, a quill and ink, perhaps, and one of Rufus’s books? Any one will do.”

Josiah looked doubtful. “Take things from ‘is cottage when ’e’s not there? I dunno.”

“I don’t think he’d mind,” Portia said. “And if he does, he won’t blame you, he’ll blame me.”

Josiah frowned, his weak, faded eyes examining his charge. She looked desperate in her unhappiness and he could think only of how vibrant and happy and exuberant she had always been. Whatever she’d done, this imprisonment in the near-deserted village was harsh enough without adding to its severity.

“I s’pose I could,” he said after a minute. “An‘ it’ll get awful tedious sittin’ in ‘ere on yer tod.”

“Thank you.” Portia managed a stiff but grateful smile.

But when Josiah had returned Juno and left, and the bar fell heavily across the outside door, Portia lay down on the cot, assailed by misery.

She could see Rufus’s cold eyes, hear the bitter contempt in his voice, and it was unendurable that he should believe what he did of her. She loved him and she had dared to think that he loved her. But he believed her false, and if he had loved her, he would have known she could not have betrayed him. If he had loved her, he would have accepted her… accepted who and what she was, and none of this dreadful confusion and wretchedness would have happened.

She was so very tired of steering a path through the obstacle course of his vendetta. So very tired of denying some part of herself in order to satisfy Rufus. It was too high a price to pay for his… his what?

Regard? Love? Passion?

Oh, what did it matter anymore? Everything was dust and ashes. Portia curled herself up in the blankets, and sleep brought temporary end to misery.