The man yelped; both dropped back. Their eyes gleamed as they took stock, licked their lips.
Crouching, they circled.
Gervase beckoned them forward. “Come on-don’t be shy.”
Behind him, her own sword held out of sight parallel to her leg, Madeline bit her lip; he sounded entirely relaxed, tauntingly confident.
Another man fell back from the melee in the center. He saw his two cronies, guessed their tack, and came to join them.
“Gervase…” Madeline warned.
“Yes. Time to change tactics.”
That was all the warning he gave before launching a ferocious attack on the two before him, driving them back.
But other nonlocals had now seen. Understanding their value-hers and Edmond’s as hostages-in desperation they scrambled away from the fighting and came rushing to secure what might be their only way to win free.
She heard Gervase swear; with a swinging slash, he cut down one of the two he was engaged with, leaving him whimpering in the sand clutching his arm, and fell back. Poised with sword drawn, he stood between her and Edmond and the onrush of men.
Charles had seen but was surrounded by heaving bodies; he couldn’t immediately come to their aid. Dalziel was far to their right; his task was to find the traitor and seize him, or, failing that, cut off all escape from the beach by taking and holding the only path up the cliff. Glancing across, she glimpsed him on the lower reaches of the path, sword slashing as he drove back men desperately seeking to flee. With nothing to lose, they redoubled their efforts, but the relentless ferocity with which he met them kept sending them reeling back.
Looking back at the men charging toward them, fanning out to come at Gervase from multiple angles, Madeline felt her heart thud heavily; her lungs had long ago seized. She swallowed, tightened her grip on her sword, drew her long knife from her boot, and edged closer to Edmond. “Follow my lead.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Edmond nod. Like her, he was watching the men advance; unlike her, there was not an ounce of fear in his heart.
The jackals circled, then two launched a ferocious frontal attack; Gervase met it, flung them back, but was immediately engaged by another. Meanwhile, two men slunk in, one on either side.
Seeing them advancing, Madeline stooped, picked up a handful of sand and flung it in the face of the ogre to their left; leaving him swearing and stumbling, pawing at his eyes, she stepped across Edmond, brought up her sword and thrust at the smaller man sneaking in on Gervase’s right.
The man leapt back, eyes wide, his expression scandalized. “The bitch has a blade!”
Madeline wanted to follow him, but didn’t dare leave Gervase’s back unprotected-then Gervase shifted, engaging the smaller man. She pulled back, glanced to her left-in time to see the ogre lift his short sword.
He went for Gervase.
She got her blade up in time to deflect the thrust, gasped when the force of it reverberated up her arm; crossing her knife with her sword, catching his blade in the V, she heaved, and sent the ogre staggering back. Mean, piggy-bright eyes fixed on her; with a roar he lifted his sword high and came at her.
She got her crossed blades up, caught his-
Then he yelled and toppled sideways.
She glanced down to see Edmond-he was clutching the back of her jacket-pull his knife from the man’s beefy thigh, just above his knee. She nodded in approval; as one they whirled away, leaving the ogre howling and cursing and rolling in the sand-he was large enough to effectively block others from rushing in from that direction-and swung to protect Gervase’s other side.
Just in time.
Gervase had accounted for two more-all nonlocals-but three more desperate men had arrived, determined to seize them. Two had engaged Gervase, drawing him forward; the other waited, then rushed in from his left-
Again she swung her blade, caught the man’s thrust and swung his blade over to lock between hers…but this time the man had the agility and momentum to turn with her-to shift his attack from Gervase to her.
She suddenly found herself face-to-face with a London bruiser, a heavyset man at least twice as strong as she. Her arms were braced, holding her crossed blades high, his trapped between…he’d ended standing firmly, legs apart, evenly balanced, hands locked on his sword hilt.
He smiled cruelly, and bore down.
Her arm muscles started to quiver, then shake.
Madeline stared into his eyes…then shifted her feet and kicked him, hard, between his legs.
His eyes bulged, his face contorted; uttering an inhuman shriek, he went down, dropping his sword to clutch himself-then he howled even more as Edmond darted out, stabbed him in the thigh, then darted back behind Madeline again.
She spared her brother only a glance-enough to see his eyes were alight; he was thrilled beyond description.
Dragging in a breath, praying her pounding heart would stay down in her chest, she checked that they were reasonably protected by the two fallen men on either side, then swung her attention forward-in time to hear Charles drawl, “Excuse me.”
A second later, the last man facing Gervase crumpled to the sand.
Gervase was breathing a trifle rapidly; he studied the inanimate form at his feet, then looked up at Charles. “Spoilsport.”
Charles shrugged. “You were taking too long.” He peered around Gervase. “All well here?”
Lowering his sword, Gervase turned around; he knew both Madeline and Edmond were all right-he’d glanced their way countless times. He’d been so aware of them the entire time, he’d had to battle to keep his eyes and instincts focused on the men fighting him-had had to force himself to trust in Madeline’s ability to defend Edmond…
What he hadn’t counted on was her defending him.
But she had, without hesitation. Although he’d known of each attack before she’d acted and would have done something to avert the worst, she-ably seconded by Edmond-had at the very least saved him some ugly wounds.
He met her eyes, saw concern in hers-and more. The exhilaration of battle still rode him, familiar and potent, but tonight some other emotion was threaded through the mix. He found his lips lifting; raising an arm, he slung it about her shoulders, hauled her to him and buried his face in her hair. “Thank you.” He whispered the words into her ear, hugged her close, then eased his hold.
Enough to look at Edmond; he nodded, still smiling. “Thank you, too-you did well. And you followed orders.”
Edmond glowed. He brandished his knife. “We made an excellent team.”
Gervase laughed, nodded. “That we did.” He’d never fought as a team before, but he thought he could grow used to it.
Madeline’s hands were pressed to him, splayed over his still-damp chest. They were both sodden and sand- covered to mid chest, but a slow burn of elation was rising within him, obliterating any chance of a chill.
His arm still about her shoulders-with her apparently perfectly happy to remain tucked against his side-they turned to survey the beach.
Charles and Abel, assisted by the fighters from the boats, were dragging and pushing the vanquished, locals and nonlocals alike, into a group a few yards from the bottom of the cliff path. None on their side looked to have sustained any mortal wound, nothing worse than slashes and cuts; some were nasty but none life-threatening. The same couldn’t be said of the wreckers; at least two of their number lay unmoving in the sand, and two others were being supported by their fellows, unable to walk unaided.
As he, Madeline and Edmond walked toward the gathering, Gervase grew inwardly grim. There would be more deaths to come; regardless of what happened to the Londoners, the surviving wreckers would hang. Quite aside from the seriousness with which the law viewed the activity, here in Cornwall, where most families had a long association with the sea, wreckers were beyond abhorrent.
Madeline, no surprise, had been thinking along similar lines. She murmured, “We’ll have to make sure their families don’t suffer for their acts.”
