Dark Emerald

by Lisa Jackson

  “Why was Rhys banished?”

  “Do ye not know that story?” Rosie elevated a bushy brow, then sniffed.

  “Only that he was beaten and left for dead.”

  “Aye, that he was.” Rosie paused a moment to gather her thoughts. “So ye know that Rhys, he be the bastard brother of Tremayne.”

  Tara nodded as she worked the dough.

  “For that Tremayne never forgave him, though what happened was not his fault.” Sighing, she wiped her hands on her apron. “Nay, the bad blood started before Rhys was born. Merwynn was lord of Gaeaf and Helen, Tremayne’s mother, was his wife. When Tremayne was but a lad, Baron Merwynn took up with another woman—a peasant who sold lace. So besotted with the woman was he that for a while he turned his back on his wife and child, ignoring them for the comfort of the other woman. Belinda was her name, methinks, though I be not sure.”

  Rosie’s broad forehead puckered with deep lines as she tried to recall the details of decades-old gossip. “As I remember, Lady Helen was riding back from Rhydd, or maybe ‘twas Syth, I cannot say. But she was not with her husband that day. On the way back to the keep she was attacked, her guard killed, and … well …” Rosie’s lips pursed in distaste. “They all took turns with her. Drunk they were and ‘tis said they were soldiers from Twyll, though that was never proved.” She sighed heavily and crossed her ample bosom. “The lady, she died of shame or wounds, I know not which. But Merwynn laid the blame at the lord of Twyll’s feet.”

  “Lord Gilmore,” Tara said, kneading the bread by rote, her mind filled with horrid images.

  “Aye,” Rosie continued. “Merwynn swore his revenge and had it by laying siege to Twyll and killing Lord Gilmore and his wife. She was with child, ye know, about to deliver, or had … just had the babe when the attack took place. But the poor infant was never found and so there always be talk of ‘the true ruler of Twyll,’ as if the babe, now grown, will take back what is his.” She smiled sadly and tucked a stray wisp of hair under the edge of her scarf. “ ‘Tis all foolish whimsy, if ye ask me.

  “Though he was now a widower, Merwynn never married Rhys’s mother, but he doted upon Rhys and let the woman and her bastard son live in the castle.

  “Tremayne never liked the situation.”

  She wiped her hands on her apron, then stirred her stew slowly. She scooped up a spoonful of the boiling soup and touched it to her lips. “Hmm.” Tapping the spoon on the edge of the pot, she said, “Nor did Tremayne ever trust Rhys.” Sighing, she pulled a small jar from its shelf, then reached in for a pinch of pepper and dropped the grains into the stew.

  “There’s always been bad blood between those half brothers. ‘Twas only made worse when Rhys decided to bed Tremayne’s wife.”

  “Did he?” Tara asked, and she saw Pigeon enter through the doorway.

  “He wouldn’t do that!” the girl argued. She lifted her pointed chin proudly. “ ‘Tis a noble man Sir Rhys be.”

  Rosie chortled. “Noble? Nay, I think not. No more noble than his father, who slew the lord and lady of Twyll. Aye, they be a sorry lot, always fightin’ fer a castle and worryin’ about a stone that don’t exist. Y’know the one I mean, don’tcha?” she asked.

  “The dark emerald of Twyll.”

  “Aye. So now Cavan of Marwood, he thinks he’s the son of Gilmore, but no one has seen that damned stone, have they?”

  Pigeon shook her head violently and shot a petulant look in Tara’s direction.

  “And ye never will. I’ll bet my soul it never existed, no more than those gods and goddesses ye pray to do.”

  Tara didn’t argue. Her stomach was in knots, her mind running in circles over the treachery and deceit that had occurred in the very castle she thought might be her home. She turned her attention to the bread and tried to ignore the emerald ring, which seemed somehow heavier as it rested deep within her pocket.

  Chapter Seven

  “The plan be simple,” Abelard repeated as he pulled his horse to a stop at the crossroads—two deer trails that wound through the hills. One led east toward the forest surrounding Broodmore, the other angled north and would bisect the road leading to Marwood.

  Rhys held his nervous horse in check, though Gryffyn pulled at the bit. Somewhere in the underbrush a startled bird squawked. Dew and a thin mist sparkled under a pale winter sun that held little warmth but dappled the ground.

  Abelard lowered his voice, as if he were afraid he might be overheard by someone spying in the thickets. “You steal the ring from the witch, and I will approach Cavan. We will align with him and attack Twyll together. Marwood’s troops will lay siege with his army after our men have slipped into the castle. James and those who have secretly vowed to rid themselves of Lord Tremayne will help us enter as we always do—at night—and by dawn Cavan’s army will surround the fortress. After we have quieted any rebellion from the soldiers guarding the gates, we will open them for Cavan’s army. What could be easier?”

  Rhys snorted. “Aye, what?”

  “Do not mock me.”

  “Never,” Rhys said dryly as a morning wind rustled the trees.

  “Allying with Cavan and stealing Twyll from Tremayne. Will that not be sweet justice?” Abelard’s grin was a leer.

  Rhys rubbed the stubble on his chin with his free hand. “Why would Cavan throw in with a band of thieves? Why not use his own spies to gain entrance?”

  “Mayhap he has none. Aside from which, he will need all the allies he can get, as many men who would lay down their lives for him as he can muster—and,” Abelard added knowingly, “we have the stone. With the emerald we can prove that he be the true ruler of Twyll. With the emerald in his pocket, Cavan would convince even the most doubting that he is the true issue of Gilmore.”

  “ ‘Twould be a lie.”

  “A small one. A necessary one. To convince and unite those who live in Twyll.”

  “So you would give the ring to Cavan of Marwood?” Rhys’s fingers tightened on the reins.

  “Nay. ‘Tis not a gift. Oh, no.” Abelard’s lips protruded and he shook his head. “For our allegiance and the emerald, Cavan would pay and pay dearly. He is a rich man, ruler of Marwood and soon Twyll, which also includes Gaeaf, does it not?” Abelard’s face grew thoughtful. “We will strike a deal with his lordship. We will offer the ring, our men, and our allegiance. In return, Cavan will promise us Gaeaf.”

  “A barony?”

  “A small barony with a run-down castle.”

  “And what of Tara?”

  “The witch?” Abelard snorted. “She can conjure up her own damned castle!”

  “Nay. She, too, must profit.”

  “Bloody Christ, she’s but a woman.”

  Rhys’s jaw clenched. For the first time since he and Abelard had vowed allegiance to each other and made a pact to defy the law, he had a twinge of conscience. “She is in danger. Because of me. Tremayne knows of her.”

  “All the better that she does not have the stone, elsewise she would be his enemy.”

  “I fear she already is.”

  “Because she was seen with you.” Abelard let out a sigh. “She’s in this whether she likes it or not. We need the stone.”

  “I will talk to her.”

  “Nay! ‘Tis far past words. She has no choice. Remember that, Rhys. ‘Twas your decision when you brought her to us.” Abelard’s horse minced backward, and he reined the beast in further. Both animals were tired and nervous, their ears flicking. “We dare not tarry. ‘Tis now we strike, while Tremayne’s head is turned and his belly exposed. Should we wait any longer, or should Cavan fail, there will be not five men searching for us but twenty or fifty.” His whis-pered voice rang with conviction, and his gloved fist shook in the air beside his head.

  Dogs bayed in the distance.

  Abelard froze.

  Gryffyn gave off a soft, nervous neigh and pawed the ground.

  Rhys strained to listen. Again came the howl of dogs—not wolves. Without a word, Rhys and Abelard
exchanged glances. Dismounting and tethering their horses to the low-hanging branches of trees, they slipped through a thick copse of oak and pine and climbed a few feet to the crest of the ridge. Lying on their stomachs, they peered over the edge.

  Far below, through the thickets, bright colors clashed with the gloom of the forest. Horsemen wearing the emblem of Twyll—a blue dragon on a gold field—searched the woods. Rhys’s eyes narrowed on the soldiers as they rode, dogs swarming around the steeds only to bay noisily, dart through the under-brush, and flush out game. As James had warned, a party of five men with a pack of dogs was searching the forest. For Rhys.

  Searching for the outlaws who taunted their lord.

  For the first time in ten years, Rhys felt a frisson of fear slide down his spine. Not for his own life, nay, nor for Abelard’s sorry skin. Even the men who had banded with them knew the risks of their chosen profession

  But not Tara. She was being held against her will.

  Nor should Big Rosie and Pigeon be punished. They had joined when Rosie’s husband, Tom, was killed by Tremayne’s men. He’d been caught poaching in Tremayne’s forest, and the penalty for killing the boar was his own quick death. Tom’s act of treason, for that’s what the lord of Twyll had called it, was punished swiftly and publicly to keep any other men within the villages surrounding the castle from making the same mistake. Rosie had met Abelard in an alehouse, and he’d offered her a chance for retribution.

  So she and Pigeon had become a part of the band.

  She had known the danger, of course, but decided it was worth the risk. “I’ll not be livin’ me life under that bastard’s thumb—oh, excuse me,” she apologized to Rhys on the first night she and her daughter came to the camp, which at the time was only a wagon and two tents pitched near the river. She blushed to the roots of her hair. “Me tongue is me downfall, I fear. I dinna mean to—”

  “Worry not,” Rhys cut in quickly. “I wear the title with pride.”

  Rosie’s eyebrows raised, and Pigeon, hiding behind her, dared peek around her mother’s leg.

  “Aye,” Abelard clapped Rhys on the back. “This way his blood is only half the same as Tremayne’s.”

  “Lucky ye be, then,” Rosie said. “For the baron of Twyll be the very spawn of Satan, that one, and ‘twould be me pleasure—me and little Pigeon’s here—ta join up with ya.”

  Rhys eyed the woman skeptically. “ ‘Tis not an easy life.”

  “Easier than livin’ in fear.” She stuck out her fleshy chin and said, “I could help ye—all of ye.” She motioned with one arm to the few men who were part of their small band. “I can cook and clean, ride a horse and shoot an arrow straight as any man. I work hard and I’ll be no trouble—except if any of ye be takin’ the Lord’s name in vain—and I’m not speakin’ of that bastard lord of Twyll, but of Our Father and His Son. I’ll hear nothing but praise for the saints and the Holy Mother.” She crossed her big arms firmly over a bosom that was rising and falling with conviction.

  “This be a hard, lonely life,” Rhys said, not certain he wanted the responsibility of a woman and her child.

  “No more hard or lonely than livin’ where ye be afraid to say what ye think.”

  Rhys glanced at Abelard, who only shrugged. “She wants to be a part of it?”

  “Aye. ‘Tis a chance I can have to avenge me poor Tom.”

  Rhys wasn’t convinced, she sensed it.

  “I know what yer thinkin’, I do. A woman and her daughter would only be a burden to a group the likes of you. Cutthroats, pickpockets—a mangy lot ye are, but I can help ye, I swear it. I can make an eel pie that’ll make yer mouth water, or jelly eggs as quick as that.” She snapped her thick fingers. “I can sew a seam and mend a boot as well as chop firewood and wring a chicken’s neck. I’ll tend to wounds, whether ye get ‘em from that devil’s spawn Tremayne or by yer own hands. I take care of meself and me daughter, and any man who thinks not had better think again, as I could gut him as easily as I could carve out the innards of a stag in the forest.”

  Rhys was certain that letting her stay would be a huge mistake, but the others were more lenient. She talked her way into cooking that night and prepared a feast of jugged hare and salmon pie with the most rudimentary of utensils and little else. From the moment the men tasted something other than charred pigeon and venison, they all agreed that Rosie could join. She’d never left.

  Now, as Rhys, lying on his stomach and looking over the edge of the bluff, spied upon Tremayne’s handpicked group of soldiers, he thought of Tara and what would happen to her if she were captured. His eyes narrowed as the soldiers fanned out through the trees and brush, sending the dogs ahead. ‘Twas only a matter of time before these men, or the next group, would find them.

  Abelard was right. ‘Twas the time to strike.

  The search party disappeared, following the course of the creek that slashed through the canyon floor, the very creek Rhys and Abelard had crossed not two hours before.

  “So be it,”. Rhys agreed when they’d inched their way back to their horses.

  “You will steal the ring?”

  Rhys’s gut clenched, but he nodded and his gaze clashed with that of the man who had once, long ago, saved his miserable life. “Aye, Abelard,” he agreed. “Consider it done.”

  “I’m tellin’ ye, I would na trust James.” Red’s lips protruded, and he shook his head slowly as he stood in the constable’s quarters. The beard for which he was named was showing a few signs of silver and he worried a wool cap in his dirty fingers. “Him and me was near to Marwood when we split up, him taking the north, me goin’ south. I tied me horse to a tree in the woods and walked in totin’ a load of firewood, says to the guard that I be bringin’ it fer old Matilda in payment fer a pair of boots she fixed fer me. Then I goes about me business and keep expectin’ to meet up with James. But he never returns and so I, after seein’ what I had to see, came back here.”

  “You don’t think he was taken prisoner?” Tremayne said, rubbing his chin in one hand and cradling a cup of wine in the other. Warming his back in front of the fire, Tremayne shifted his gaze to the constable, whose frown was as dark and unreadable as the stars on a cloud-covered night.

  Red scratched his head. “Nay. I was in Marwood. If any of Cavan’s troops had found a spy, I would’ve heard of it.”

  “His horse returned riderless. Mayhap an accident.”

  Red snorted. “James be an excellent horseman.”

  “And a good fighter?”

  “The best. Quick with a dagger, swift at dodging a blow, fierce with a sword.”

  Tremayne sipped his wine, but his teeth were beginning to grind in frustration. Something was amiss and badly so. He smelled the treachery and deceit that had invaded Twyll. He lifted a finger from his cup and pointed at the constable, Regan. “What think you?”

  “I trust no one.”

  “Aside from that.”

  “James is a cocky bastard, to be sure.” Regan crossed the room, placed a polished boot on a bench near the table, and leaned closer to Tremayne. “Can his loyalty be bought? Nay, I think not. Would he turn against you for the thrill of it? Mayhap. Does he have the balls to defy you? Aye, he’s an irreverent son of a bitch. But why? Would he throw in his lot with Cavan?”

  Tremayne’s thoughts ran down the same crooked, gloomy path of questions, and as always he found no answers. “Would he?” Tremayne pushed himself to his feet and crossed the short distance separating himself from the spy. “Would you?”

  Red’s Adam’s apple bobbed. Sweat beaded his brow, though it was a cold afternoon and the heat from the fire wasn’t enough to take the chill off the stone walls and floor. “Would I throw in my lot with Lord Cavan and … and take up arms against ye? Oh, never, m’lord,” he said, shaking his head so vehemently that his floppy red hair swung low and covered his eyes. As if to prove his loyalty, he dropped to one knee and hung his head. “ ‘Tis at your service I be.” The man was nearly licking the pointed toes
of Tremayne’s polished boots.

  Still, Tremayne didn’t trust the groveling spy. No more than he trusted James or any of the other spies who came and went from castle to castle, reporting back to him what they’d seen … or what they wanted him to hear. The baron’s muscles tightened with the treachery that was afoot in the cavernous halls of Twyll. The same worrisome thought that had nagged at him ever since James’s horse had arrived at the castle without a rider burned through his mind now. “Is it possible,” he asked no one in particular, “that the outlaw be a part of this?”

  Red’s head snapped up, and he gazed upward from his kneeling position. His ruddy brow furrowed beneath his shag of hair and Tremayne squinted down at this rumpled spy who smelled of smoke, dirt, and sweat. “I saw him not,” Red said. “No trace of the bastard anywhere near Marwood, but a farmer, he came to the keep and he was spouting some nonsense of riders, mayhap a pack of thieves, near Broodmore.”

  “I have heard this not before. Broodmore?” Was it possible? Could the traitor be near the haunted castle? Broodmore?

  The bitter taste of betrayal climbed up Tremayne’s throat and though it could not be proved, he would bet his barony, every last fertile acre of it, that Rhys was behind this. He knew it in the darkest places of his heart.

  “Get up,” he snarled to the sniveling spy. He downed the rest of his wine but felt no warm glow start in the pit of his stomach or heat his blood. “Tell me, what did you see at Marwood?”

  Red scrambled to his feet, and some of his insolent manner returned. No longer did he squeeze his cap between his fingers. He was a man used to bartering, and Tremayne was certain he would as easily carve out Tremayne’s heart if offered the right price as lay down his life for Twyll. Oh, he was surrounded by ingrates without one fiber of loyalty in their bodies.

  “There be mercenaries and thugs arriving at Marwood daily—’twas the reason I entered so easily and unnoticed. Inside, the men, eager to do battle, quickly pledged their fealty to Lord Cavan and swore to join him on his quest.”