“You have a funny way of showing it.”
“Things got more complicated than when we originally planned our escape,” I admitted.
“You and Devyn.”
I needed to stop talking. How had we got here?
“Yes.” I tilted my head, looking at him as if I didn’t quite follow. “He’s the one who found me and told me the truth. That’s all.”
“Of course it is.” Gideon didn’t say anything more. Don’t fill the silence, I told myself. Nothing more I could say would help. I had got him to agree for the time being. That was enough.
I backed out of the alcove.
“I like these boots better.” The taunt followed me down the corridor.
My boots. I didn’t have another pair of boots.
I stopped.
A soft chuckle sounded behind me.
Chapter Twenty
“You need to convince Devyn of our plan,” Bronwyn whispered to me as she took her place beside me at dinner that evening.
“I can’t find him,” I returned under my breath. I had been everywhere and there was no sign of him. The antipathy the inhabitants of this castle felt towards me as a citizen didn’t help my search as all enquiries were met with a shrug. Devyn’s room was empty. Frustration and worry fizzed through me.
“He’s in the dungeon.”
I gaped at her. Was she kidding? They had thrown him in an actual dungeon?
“He’s under arrest until the trial,” she said as if that explained everything. He was barely recovered. I couldn’t help but glare in the direction of the head table where the Prince of Gywnedd was busily playing the convivial host. “It’s not his fault.”
I continued to glare until Llewlyn’s partner Rhys caught me and I lowered my eyes to my clenched fists. They sat there merrily eating and drinking in the warm hall while Devyn rotted in some dank dungeon. At least, I presumed it was dank – weren’t all dungeons? A bloody dungeon. Devyn was Llewelyn’s family.
“Cassandra, never mind them. You need to talk to Devyn before Rion does or our plan is blown,” she said, pulling my attention back.
“What do you mean?”
She exhaled noisily. “He is refusing to conceal your identity, even if it’s the only hope of saving his neck.”
Of course he was.
“Go down there and get him to do as he’s told.”
“What’s wrong with him?” I grumbled.
“He’s stubborn,” Bronwyn replied equally sourly. “And too damned honourable. Now focus. See the girl over there by the door in the black skirt?”
Scanning the edges of the hall, I saw a girl with long brown hair and a black skirt watching us.
“She is supposed to take his dinner down. He is still the lord’s nephew after all. She’ll lend you her cloak and you can carry his tray down. Don’t wait too long,” she commanded. “The guards will be suspicious if the serving girl delays too long with him.”
I slipped from the table before Bronwyn had even finished speaking. I got it. I wasn’t an idiot. I followed the girl to the kitchen and she handed me her cloak and tray with directions to cross the courtyard and take the guarded door to the north tower before descending to where Devyn was locked up like a criminal.
I gritted my teeth as I smiled sweetly at the Mercian warriors standing by the door.
Unlike the cell at the arena, this was a prison more equipped for regular detention. Balls of light bobbed above my head as I went down and down.
I made my way past two empty cells before finding an occupied one. Sensing my arrival, Devyn was already at the bars.
Anger rolled off me but Devyn smiled mildly back at me.
“Calm down, Cass, it’s protocol. I’m awaiting trial. I told you, I’m considered a criminal here.”
He waited while I wrangled my temper under control, cursing the burn in my blood which made my emotions so volatile.
“Fine,” I said slowly. “I’ll be calm if you’ll be quiet.”
“No,” he responded, catching my meaning instantly. “I will not deceive him.”
“It’s your best chance,” I argued. “Bronwyn says you have no hope if they learn we put your safety above mine.”
His eyes darkened. “That seems fair to me.”
“Devyn. You promised.”
“I did not promise to deceive my liege lord.”
“No, but if you tell him then he will never let us be together,, and then you break your promise to me,” I argued.
“Maybe.” He shrugged.
Was he out of his mind?
“If you do this, I will deny it,” I said fiercely, yet also as quietly as my temper allowed. This was taking too long. “I will deny everything. Without evidence of my power, why would they believe you? Which is easier for them to believe – that you’ve gone mad in search of a dead girl or that Marcus Courtenay’s betrothed is just a lost city girl trapped by the handfast into coming here against her will?”
I could feel him steeling his will against mine.
“If they won’t let us be together I will have no reason to stay. As soon as this cuff is off, I promise I will return to Londinium. Let them do with me what they will. What will I care?”
His eyes darkened at my threat.
“They will kill you if you go back,” he stated starkly.
“Maybe.” I shrugged.
“Touché.” His lips tugged unwillingly upward.
“And what if whoever gave you that poison was trying to hurt me? Who will protect me and get their own stupid arse poisoned next time?” It was a stretch; it seemed most likely that Devyn had been the intended target. That would never occur to him though.
“Fine,” he agreed. “Just until the trial is over.”
I followed up, sensing him already regretting his capitulation. I heard footfall on the stone stairs – one of the guards coming to see what was taking me so long.
Devyn’s lips twisted before he finally nodded in agreement with my proposal that he keep his mouth shut. I flashed him my teeth in victory and spun on my heel, apologising blithely for the delay as I passed the incoming guard.
We broke our fasts in the great hall.
