“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.”
T
“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
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
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 – ”
