Winter of Solace (The Executioner Knights Book 5)

by Kathryn Le Veque

  In fact, Emelisse was one of those who nearly ended her life ingloriously at the bottom of the staircase because she had been fighting Covington’s knight so much that she ended up falling onto her bum, sliding at least four or five stairs before he managed to grab her by the hair to stop her from plunging to the bottom. It had been a terrifying and painful dose of reality.

  After that, she didn’t fight so much.

  With a heavily bruised bum and right thigh, Emelisse permitted the knight to take her to the bottom of the steps without incident, where a heavy iron grate was built into the walls of the stairwell. There was a guard there, in the confined space, who unlocked the massive iron lock by the light of a smoking torch. Shoving the door open, the vault beyond was revealed.

  Emelisse could barely see before her because it was so dark, but she could see enough to make out a single, circular room, lined with stone. It was literally one big chamber and there were already two prisoners in there, huddle over to one side of it. There weren’t individual cells, meaning Emelisse would go into the same holding cell as the rest of Winterhold’s prisoners.

  And past prisoners.

  There were at least two or three bodies in various states of decomposition that she could see, crammed over into a pile near the cell door. She could see bones and rotting flesh in the darkness, and she could certainly smell the death.

  Shocked at the sight, she resisted somewhat when de Wrenville’s knight pulled her into the chamber. He finally yanked and she came through, darting away from the rotting bodies and the two prisoners huddled on the other side of the chamber. She looked to de Wrenville’s knight, all of the fight and anger drained from her face as the horror of the situation became apparent.

  “I am to stay here?” she gasped. “Have you no mercy, my lord? Why would you put me here?”

  The knight met her gaze and Emelisse couldn’t tell if there was pity there. She didn’t sense complete hatred from him, and perhaps there was even some humanity in his expression, but it was impossible to tell in the darkness. All she could really see were his eyes glittering in the weak light.

  “You are a prisoner, Lady Emelisse,” he said. “For now, I have nowhere else to put you, so you must stay here.”

  Emelisse’s gaze traveled to the two live prisoners across the cell. She could only really see their outlines in the darkness and the fear within her heart began to transform into disgust and frustration.

  “I do not know why I should think you would treat me with dignity,” she said, yanking her arm from his grip and moving to the cell wall. “You and your liege have been barbaric and immoral from the start, so this is not a surprising action. Thank you for your time, my lord. You may leave me here to rot just as you have the others.”

  With that, she plopped down onto the cold, moldering ground, huddling her knees up against the icy temperatures. Leaning against the wall, she turned her face away from the knight, effectively cutting off the conversation. But she realized as she sat there that tears were very close to the surface.

  Tears of what had been lost on this day, tears for her poor father. Thoughts of Rupert de Thorington were heavy on her mind, but she wasn’t going to beg a de Wrenville knight to be kind with her father’s body and give it over to the priests of the nearby parish. He would probably spit on her if she asked, so she didn’t. But the thought of her father’s body ending up in Winterhold’s massive moat made her physically ill.

  Bile rose in her throat.

  As Emelisse closed her eyes to ward off the horror her life had become, the knight was still standing a few feet away. He hadn’t left her. She could hear his joints pop as he moved in her direction.

  “Lady Emelisse,” he said quietly. “I am going to offer you some advice. Whether or not you take it is your choice, but I would suggest you consider it. You are now Baron Darliston’s prisoner and he can do with you as he wishes. A cooperative prisoner will be treated much better than a combative one. De Wrenville has not touched you, but he can. If you push him with your resistance and bad behavior, he very well might. Though you do not belong in the vault, it can become your permanent home if you do not start showing a willingness to be obliging. Am I making myself clear?”

  Emelisse didn’t answer him. She had nothing to say. She turned her face to the wall and squeezed her eyes tightly shut, letting the tears come. It had been a day of days and physically, mentally, she had been cracked.

  Cracked, but not broken.

  She had earned the right to spill a few tears.

  The knight watched her lowered head in the darkness, waiting for an answer. When he realized she wasn’t going to reply, he turned to the two threadbare, filthy prisoners on the other side of the cell.

  They were two men, two brothers who had cheated Marius de Wrenville of a fine horse. They’d promised him one and when it was delivered, it was far below standard. Rightfully, they had been imprisoned and here was where they would die. Soon, by the pitiful looks of them. But that didn’t stop the knight from standing over the pair, menacingly.

  “Harass the lady and my justice shall be swift,” he said. “You will not go anywhere near her. Do you understand me?”

  The pair, weak and frail, cowered from him until one of them nodded his head. That was enough for the knight, who headed out of the chamber, slamming the cell door with a resounding clang that echoed against the stone walls.

  There was something final about that sound.

  Something desolate.

  But the knight wasn’t thinking about that. He was thinking about the lady trapped down there. She was correct; she shouldn’t be down there and they both knew it, but the knight didn’t have the authority to move her.

  But he knew someone who might.

  He went on the hunt.

  “My lady,” a servant whispered. “Sir Hallam is here.”

  Alice, Lady de Wrenville, looked up from the sewing loom. She was working on a scene with birds and clouds and cherubs, and she was quite talented. Though her heart had jumped at the sound of Hallam’s name, her hands were steady as she resumed her sewing.

  “Show him in, Matilde.”

  The well-dressed maid did. She opened up the chamber door, one of two great doors that guarded the entrance to Lady de Wrenville’s private solar. It was a solar she’d been unable to touch in any way because it had belonged to Covington’s first wife, Egraine, dead for ten years, and he kept it as shrine of sorts to the woman. Everything was as she had left it. He’d made it clear that Alice was just a visitor in it, and that’s exactly what she felt like – a visitor to a home she was supposed to be in charge of.

  This had never been her home and never would.

  As the maid opened up the door, Alice glanced up as a figure in mail entered the chamber.

  “That will be all, Matilde,” Alice said calmly. “You may wait outside.”

  The maid slipped out, shutting the door behind her as Sir Hallam Chadlington, commander of Winterhold’s army, approached the well-dressed woman at the sewing loom.

  “My lady,” he greeted politely. “I hope you have had a pleasant day.”

  Alice paused in her sewing, smiling timidly at him. “I have,” she said. “But from the looks of you, I would hazard to say that your day has been quite busy.”

  Hallam nodded, a weary smile on his lips. “Another day at Hawkstone,” he said. “We finally managed to breach the gatehouse, but I lost several men doing it.”

  Alice’s smile faded. “Then Hawkstone has surrendered?”

  Hallam shook his head. “Nay,” he said. “Caspian de Thorington is still in the keep, so we do not have control of that yet, but the rest of the castle is ours. That is why I have come, my lady. We have a bit of a… situation. I require your counsel and your assistance.”

  Alice looked at him, studying him as she had studied him since nearly the moment they had met. It had been Hallam who had come with the marriage offer from his liege and Hallam who had escorted her from her home at Dudley Castle
to Winterhold. He wasn’t a big knight as far as knights went, but he was strong and true and honorable. He wasn’t conventionally handsome, but there was something about him that was attractive and sensual.

  At least, Alice thought so.

  She hadn’t been able to take her eyes from him since the day they’d met.

  “You shall have it,” she said softly. “I was hoping that mayhap you’d come simply to see me.”

  Hallam looked at her, an expression in his eyes that was full of restraint and longing. His gaze lingered on her for a moment as if he wanted to say something, but he ended up averting his gaze.

  “Unfortunately, I have said everything that I can say, Alice,” he said quietly. “We both know it is futile to speak of… well, futile to discuss things that can never be. It is not good for either of us.”

  Alice knew that, but the truth was that she’d never loved a man in her entire life until she met the sweet and noble Hallam Chadlington, a seasoned knight who served a monster.

  Her husband.

  She blinked away the tears that threatened and looked back to her loom, steeling herself against her emotions. “You said you have come to seek my counsel,” she said, resuming her sewing with quivering hands. “How may I be of assistance?”

  Hallam watched her, his expression rippling with sorrow. Alice wasn’t the most beautiful woman in the world, but she was clever and kind and generous, and of great character. There was something about her that was warm and comforting, something more valuable than conventional beauty to him. Covington de Wrenville didn’t deserve her; not even in the slightest.

  Hallam cleared his throat softly.

  “When we took the great hall of Hawkstone, Rupert de Thorington’s daughter was there, tending their wounded,” he said. “She was brought back to Winterhold as a prisoner.”

  Alice’s head shot up. “Oh?” she said. “Where is she?”

  “In the vault.”

  Alice’s eyes widened. “In that terrible place?” she gasped. “Hallam, that is no place for her. Why on earth is she there?”

  “Because your husband ordered it.”

  Alice dropped her sewing altogether. Stabbing the needle back into the fabric so it wouldn’t fall to the floor, she stood up and faced him.

  “She cannot remain there,” she said. “It is inhumane to put a woman there. I do not care if my husband ordered it.”

  Hallam smiled faintly. This was exactly why he’d come to her. “I was hoping you would say so,” he said quietly. “I can make sure the guard in the vault is missing from his post if you remove the lady and take her with you. Take her anywhere; I do not care where and I do not want to know. Just take her away and hide her from your husband because he intends to use her for his own questionable purposes. This entire pursuit of Hawkstone is already unconscionable and…”

  He suddenly stopped, looking at Alice with an expression that suggested he’d already said too much. But Alice gazed back at him steadily, with understanding.

  “I know,” she murmured. “You are a fine, noble knight forced to do the bidding of a greedy and immoral man.”

  He held up a hand, quickly, to silence her. “Not a word,” he begged softly. “I am sworn to de Wrenville. I must carry out his commands without question. It does not matter what I think or what you think.”

  Alice shook her head. “It is not simply us,” she said quietly. “I have heard more than one person at Winterhold speak of Covey’s greed when it comes to Hawkstone. He tells people they are loyal to France and that it is his duty to confiscate the castle, but that is not the truth.”

  Hallam simply looked at her. “You will not repeat that, to anyone,” he said. “If de Wrenville catches wind that his own wife is speaking against him, it will not go well for you. Please, Alice… do not repeat what you have heard.”

  Alice sighed faintly. “I am not sure what more he could do to me that he has not already done,” she said. “I am merely a visitor in my husband’s home while he worships the memory of his dead first wife. I have money, position, and some power, but I had to get into bed with the devil for it. This was not as I had planned, Hallam.”

  Hallam snorted ironically. “This is not how any of us planned.”

  She could see the sorrow in his expression. Reaching out, she brushed his arm with her warm hand before turning back to her loom and sitting heavily.

  “When will you remove the vault guard?” she asked.

  He was still feeling her hand on his arm, like a ghost of things that would never come to pass.

  “Give me a half-hour,” he said. “The sun will be down by then and I will call him away on some pretext. Move swiftly and try not to be seen, especially by your husband. Lock Lady Emelisse away safely. We do not need her trying to escape and finding herself in a worse position than she is now.”

  Alice nodded, picking up her needle once more but making no move to actually sew. “I will be ready,” she said.

  Hallam simply nodded, perhaps thinking to say more to her but unable to summon the will. As he’d said, anything more said between them was futile. It was like self-torture, something neither of them wanted to indulge in. It would not change the situation.

  But the situation itself could not change what was in their hearts.

  With sorrow, Hallam quit the chamber as Alice silently wept.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  To the scent of rot and the sounds of sick men’s laborious breathing, Emelisse had fallen asleep, her head against the slick stone wall of the vault. She was cold and hungry, but her weariness superseded her other needs for the moment. Sleep was what she needed most.

  To sleep and forget.

  When next she realized, a soft female voice was filling her senses.

  She awoke with a start.

  “All is well, my lady,” a woman said, a warm hand on her arm to calm her. “Hurry, now. Help her to stand. We must remove her quickly.”

  Suddenly, Emelisse was being pulled to her feet. She was so exhausted and disoriented that she had no idea what was going on until she caught a glimpse of a rather plain woman in a wildly ornate gown. She had jewels around her neck, on her ears, and in her hair, and it seemed so very strangely out of place in the filth of the vault. Emelisse looked at her, blinking.

  “Am I dreaming?” she whispered. “Who are you?”

  The woman simply smiled at her. It wasn’t an attractive gesture, but it was a kind one. Before Emelisse realized it, she was pulled from the cell by several well-dressed female servants, up that treacherous stairwell, and out into the night beyond.

  The icy air of winter hit her like a slap to the face.

  She was a little more lucid now, enough to notice that she was being quickly moved by at least four servants from what she could see. The bejeweled woman was moving swiftly beside her, making sure her servants were huddled around Emelisse like a shield, urging them to move very quickly. She kept looking around nervously, which told Emelisse that she was afraid of being seen. It was very confusing.

  What in the world is going on?

  The servants took her in through a kitchen yard, which was vast and well-kept. The sharp animal smells assaulted her nose. The clouds had rolled in sometime during the day, covering up the moon, so the only light was from the torches on the wall of the fortress and the fires in the kitchen yard. They came up behind the keep and in through a door built into the lower level.

  It was dark in there, smelling of straw and grain. Emelisse didn’t sense danger or hazard from the women, which was why she was so willing to go with them. Anything was better than that hellish vault and they seemed to want to help her. Someone lit a pair of tapers and they hurried up a spiral staircase built into the wall of the keep, a narrow thing just like the staircase that led from the vault. Up and up they seemed to go, higher and higher, until they finally emerged onto a landing.

  “Hurry,” the well-dressed woman urged softly. “Take her in there.”

  She was pointing and the servants
moved swiftly. Emelisse was pulled into a larger chamber, through it, and into a smaller chamber off to the side. It was there that her flight came to a halt and the bejeweled woman with the taper shut the door behind them and bolted it. Holding up a taper to get a better look at Emelisse, she studied her for a moment before speaking.

  “Forgive me for the swiftness of our actions, my lady, but it was necessary,” she said softly. “You are Emelisse de Thorington?”

  Emelisse looked apprehensively to the women around her before answering. “I am.”

  The women nodded. “I am Alice, Lady de Wrenville,” she said. “Covington is my husband.”

  Emelisse wasn’t quite sure how to respond. She looked around at the serving women again, a small army who had moved her out of the vault, and she began to grow fearful and defensive now that she knew who the woman was.

  Was she about to face a fate worse than the vault?

  “Why have you brought me here?” she asked. “If your husband has sent you to interrogate me, then I will give you the same answers I have given him.”

  Alice shook her head. “You misunderstand,” she said. “You do not belong in the vault, even if you are a prisoner of war. You will be held in this chamber, but you will be made comfortable and treated as a lady should be treated. I do not like that my husband put you in that terrible vault and if it was not for Hallam, I would not know anything of it.”

  “Hallam?”

  “Hallam Chadlington. My husband’s knight.”

  Emelisse wondered if she was referring to the knight who took her to the vault and a wave of shock rolled over her. He didn’t believe she belonged there, as he’d told her, but duty had dictated that he obey his liege. But he’d said nothing about going to Lady de Wrenville with the situation, who was probably the only person in Winterhold who could contest or even amend her husband’s wishes. The power of the Lady of the Castle was not to be underestimated under most circumstances. Both shocked and relieved at the turn of events, Emelisse began to relax.