The Highwayman (5 page)

“I require that you let me go,” Alex replied.

“You are a tedious talker, my lady,” he replied, tossing his pelt of skins onto the floor and stretching out on it, clad only in his tight woven leggings and skin boots. His panther-like grace in movement did nothing to dispel her fears. If she twitched the wrong way, he would be on her in an instant, and she knew it. “You want a bit of variety in speech, it livens up a dull day.” He crossed his arms under his head and closed his eyes.

“You won’t get away with this.”

“You’d never ken what I plan to get away with, and more,” he said, without opening his eyes.

“A savage like you will never outsmart my uncle.”

“Savage, am I?” he countered. “As compared to who, the civilized English with their civilized royalty? Old King Henry, too busy murdering his wives to run the country? The boy Edward, whose ministers persecuted the Catholics; his sister Mary, who purged the new religion from her realm by burning so many heretics her own people called her Bloody Mary? And now Elizabeth, who beheads any who disagree with her and plants their heads on Tower Bridge to rot as an example? If that’s civilized, I’ll be savage, and grateful.”

This was the most Alex had heard out of him since she’d met him, and she was momentarily stunned into silence. She found her voice only after a long moment.

“When Carberry’s men finally find you, they won’t miss,” she said.

“Carberry’s men have been missing me for years,” he replied, unperturbed.

“My uncle is very fond of me.”

“I don’t see him pelting after you.”

“He’s .. . he’s probably planning an attack, that takes time. And when he finds out what’s been done to me ...”

Burke opened one eye and turned his head toward her slightly. “And what’s been done to you? Are you hungry or cold? Have you been ravished or beaten, mistreated in any way?”

“I’m tied up like a dog!” Alex wailed.

“My dogs are much better behaved. Go to sleep.”

Further attempts to elicit information failed, and Alex watched him fall asleep with remarkable ease. She waited until his chest was rising and falling in an even cadence. Then she took out the piece of pottery and began to fray the rope on her leg with the ragged edge, working until her wrists ached from the repetitive motion. She kept it up relentlessly, her fingers going numb, until finally the unraveling hemp snapped and fell away, leaving her leg free and the tether still attached to the peg.

As her gaze fixed on Burke, she was afraid to move. He slept on, not stirring, and eventually she found the courage to creep past him soundlessly, too terrified to breathe. Once she had made it to the flap of the tent she looked back anxiously, but Burke was still in the same position.

She glanced out into the clearing, which was empty except for several smoldering campfires, doused but still sending thin trails of gray smoke skyward. She was sure there were guards around, but she couldn’t see anybody. The sky was the sapphire blue of pit water, moonlit, and the chilly spring night was filled with the faint sound of birds and nocturnal animals.

Alex took a deep breath and bolted across the camp and out into the woods on the other side. She ran for her life, not sure where she was going but seeking only to put distance between herself and the rebel camp. She ran until her lungs were on fire and there was a violent stitch in her left side, until she could not remain on her feet an instant longer. Then she collapsed under a tree, falling onto a bed of crushed ferns and mossy twigs that received her yieldingly. Too spent for any further effort, she dozed and then drifted into slumber.

* * * *

Alex did not know it, but Burke never slept straight through the night. Years of insurgence against the British had trained him to take short, refreshing naps. Alex had only been gone a brief time when he stirred and glanced over at her corner. Finding it empty, he leaped to his feet, muttering profanities when he saw the frayed rope and the pottery shard lying on the ground. He dashed out of the tent.

Curse the woman, she was clever. He didn’t waste time wondering how she had managed her escape or chastising his guards. Instead, he glanced up at the moon and realized he’d been asleep barely an hour. He shrugged into his tunic and checked the placement of the knife at his hip as he ran. He must not lose the English girl, as she was essential to his plan for getting his brother back.

Tracking through the woods was second nature to Burke. He found her trail easily and smiled to himself when he saw that she had gone the wrong way, toward the sea and away from the castle. All guts, no skill. Still, he had to admire her. Not one captive in ten would have even tried to escape.

Burke tracked her to where she had fallen, almost tripping over the prone figure. She lay limp, as if dead. Her short hair was plastered to her head with perspiration, her linen shift stained by dirt and grass, and her bare feet abraded from running through the underbrush. He knelt down next to her and shook her roughly.

Alex opened her eyes and looked around helplessly. When she focused on his face, she tensed visibly, and he could see the pulse pounding in her neck.

“I’ve a mind to tie you to a tree and leave you here for the animals to gnaw,” he said grimly.

Her body went rigid as a drawn bow, and she fell back into his arms in a dead faint.

Burke sighed wearily. Scaring her to death was not part of his plan. He scooped her up and carried her to a softer bed of long grass. Then he went to a nearby brook and wet a strip torn off from his tunic. He returned to Alex and wiped her face with the damp cloth briskly.

Her eyelids fluttered, and she looked up at him fearfully, swallowing with difficulty. “Don’t,” she whispered.

“Don’t what?”

“Hurt me.”

“I’ll not hurt you,” he replied gruffly, “but you must stop scampering away.”

“You can’t expect me to stay with you and accept it,” she said, her eyes glistening.

Burke considered the situation. Maybe if he told her why she had been taken, she would see reason and cooperate. Otherwise this chase scene might be repeated, and if she kept running, it would waste valuable time, and she might injure herself doing it.

“It won’t be for long,” he said finally. “I took you to exchange for my brother, who’s being held at the castle. I sent a message this morning to Carberry, and I expect a reply in a short time.”

Alex stared up at him, and he could see her turning over the information in her mind.

“So you see, I have no plans to keep you as a slave, or throw you to the wolves, or whatever else you’ve been thinking. Calm yourself. Your uncle will soon buy you back with my brother’s freedom, and all will be well with you.”

There was a timbre in his voice she had not heard before, not gentleness exactly, but an appeal to logic that convinced her he meant what he said.

“Do we have to go back now?” she asked wearily, her lower lip trembling.

“And why not?”

“I’m so tired,” she said, brushing the auburn fringe back from her forehead.

“We can wait for the light. It’s only two hours ‘til dawn. Rest now, go back to sleep.”

Alex lay back and tried, but the dim outline of his large, lean form propped against a tree kept her awake, and the cold air didn’t help. The night was raw and misty, with a penetrating damp that seeped into her bones and made her shiver visibly.

“What’s amiss?” he asked, his voice a deep basso in the encompassing darkness.

“I’m cold.”

There was a long pause. “Come here to me,” he finally said.

Alex hesitated.

“Do you want to shake yourself to cinders, my lady?” he asked.

Alex climbed unsteadily to her feet and went to his side.

He reached up and took her hand, settling her in next to him and draping his arm around her shoulders.

“Better?” he said.

“Yes,” she murmured. It
was
better; he felt so large and solid and warm, and he smelled like the homemade soap he had given her to use, not like a savage at all. It was difficult to remember that not long ago she had been running away from him.

Burke held her loosely, wide awake. He was careful not to arouse any feelings beyond the desire to keep her safe so he could surrender her to the English when the time came.

His body heat slowly melded with hers, and as Alex drifted into sleep she snuggled closer.

When the sun finally rose and penetrated the thick canopy of leaves above their heads, its light shone on two people entwined on the ground like lovers.

Chapter 3

A device fit for the Irish and other such savages...

 
—Queen Elizabeth I, on the installation
 

of a water closet in Richmond Palace

Burke awoke at first light,
as he usually did, and studied the still figure asleep in his arms, clutching his tunic in one fist like a child. Her skin was poreless, with the faint blush poets associated with an English rose. The chopping job she had done on her hair could not disguise its vibrant color or fine texture, and he was restraining himself from touching it when her eyes opened and she looked directly at him. His hand fell away.

Alex gave a start when she realized where she was. She sat abruptly and pulled back from him hastily, arranging her clothes. She drew her legs up and hugged her knees, avoiding Burke’s eyes.

Burke stood in one smooth motion and held out his hand to help her up. She ignored it and got to her feet herself, wincing when her lacerated soles took the weight of her body.

“Can you walk or shall I carry you?” he asked.

“Of course I can walk,” she snapped as she stumbled.

Burke took a step toward her. “Put your arms around my neck,” he instructed.

Alex hesitated.

“Do as I say or on my oath I’ll leave you here where you stand,” he said. “I must get back to my men, I’ve wasted enough time on you already.”

Alex hooked her arms around his neck, and he hoisted her into the air as if she weighed no more than the morning mist that surrounded them. He set off through the trees without another word, taking them back the way they had come the night before, his deliberate pace covering the ground quickly. Alex tried not to think about the solid feel of his shoulder under her cheek or the strong grip of his hands as he held her. She closed her eyes and drifted into a dreamless somnolence, which ended abruptly when his arm dropped and he set her once again on the ground.

They had reached the camp in less time than Alex would have believed possible. It had seemed so far when she was fleeing the night before. Burke sent her back to his tent and instructed Rory to tie her up again and, in the future, to serve her food in a napkin.

Alex didn’t see Burke for the rest of the day. She was almost asleep that night when a commotion at the entrance to the tent disturbed her. She looked up to see Burke gesturing for two other men to carry a prone figure inside and put it on his pallet.

Alex sat up straight when she saw that what they were carrying was an injured man. His wound, obviously long festering, was badly inflamed and draining from his side. Burke didn’t even glance in her direction as the men laid the invalid on Burke’s bed and then stepped back, making room for Burke to crouch by the sick man’s side.

Alex looked on as he spoke soothingly in Gaelic to the feverish man, who sweated and rambled incoherently, seeming to fix on Burke’s face in rational moments and then descend into delirium again. Alex sucked in her breath when she saw Rory coming through the tent flap with a white-hot knife, recently withdrawn from the flames of a campfire.

Burke gripped the mumbling man’s shoulders and spoke a sentence clearly, holding his gaze. The man’s eyes widened as he realized what was about to happen to him, and a second later Rory plunged the knife into the festering wound.

The man screamed and Alex looked away, unable to watch as Rory cleaned and cauterized the wound, making several trips out to the fire to reheat the knife. By the time she looked back, the injured man’s moans had subsided, but he was still gripping Burke’s hand with enough strength to whiten his knuckles.

Burke never stopped talking to him, keeping up a line of reassuring commentary while signaling with his eyes to the other men, directing them what to do. He didn’t let go of the invalid’s hand until the man had subsided into blessed unconsciousness. Then Burke stood watch while Rory washed and bound the wound, not moving until Rory had drawn the rough woolen blanket up to the man’s chin and left the tent.

“What were you saying to him?” Alex asked.

Burke glanced at her as if he had forgotten she was there. He didn’t answer.

“Will he be all right?”

“I know not. If not, one less savage for your queen to worry about,” he replied shortly, and left the tent.

Rory came in a while later to offer water to the sick man, but he was too weak to drink.

“May I have some?” Alex asked.

Rory looked at her sourly but came to her side with the flask.

“What was Burke saying to him? When you were cleaning his wound?”