As Ella was to realize painfully later, it wasn’t the novices walking with the goats that were the problem. It was that they had Rowan as their protector—a role that Deputy Marshal Rowan Pierce took very seriously.
The night before all their plans began to unravel, Rowan and Ella met away from the ears and eyes of the convent in Greta’s chamber. Greta had heard a disturbing rumor that she needed to share with them. While she trusted every woman in the nunnery with her life, she would not take the chance of paying for that trust with the lives of her two American friends.
“This is the last of it, I’m afraid,” she said, handing each of them a glass of brandy.
“Probably just as well,” Rowan said. “Clear heads are needed in the days ahead.”
“That’s exactly what I wanted to talk to you about,” Greta said, pulling on the corded belt of her habit in a gesture of unease that Ella had never seen her do before. “We may not have days.”
Rowan downed the brandy in one swallow and placed the glass on the tray at Greta’s bedside.
“What have you heard?” he asked.
“There is talk that it was a warlock living in Heidelberg who saved the boy from the executioner’s axe a few weeks ago.”
“Oh, shit,” Ella said, holding her own brandy without drinking. “I was hoping they’d forget all about that.” She looked at Rowan. “My first day here, I interfered with a public execution.”
“That’s my girl,” he said. “How’d you hear about this, Greta?”
“One of the novices delivers bread to the pub and heard people talking.”
“It’s already a full week past the time Axel said he’d come,” Rowan said. “But the way I see it, we can do this thing all the way or half-assed. They’re not onto to us yet. I say we keep with the plan.”
The next morning, Ella left the convent at just before daybreak. In their effort to come up with a plan that might help them extract something usable from the castle, she, Greta and Rowan had gotten little sleep the night before. As it happened, Ella left the convent with a solid plan for hurrying things along. Problem was, it wasn’t the plan she had agreed on with Greta and Rowan. That plan involved Ella spending the night in the stables and Rowan setting a fire in the main courtyard inside the front gate of the castle at midnight. She was to use the diversion as an opportunity to sneak into the castle interior one last time and look for anything they could use to discredit the Krügers.
Normally, Ella would have argued with Rowan that it was too dangerous for him to be so close to the castle. The guards were vigilant and killed intruders on sight—no questions asked. But because she planned on sneaking into Krüger’s private chamber this morning and being home by lunchtime, she had agreed to Rowan’s plan. She would explain to him later that she knew the fire idea was too dangerous and she didn’t have the time or energy to make him see it. She knew he would be furious with her. But then, if she managed to get the information they needed, he would also forgive her pretty quickly, too. At least, she hoped so.
Rowan watched Ella walk down the lane toward the castle. The next time he held her in his arms, he thought, the hardest part would be over. She will have survived her last workday from hell. He will have evaded capture at setting the fire. Ella will have discovered something they could work with and, God willing, escaped back to the safety of the convent. A sick feeling began to grow in the pit of his stomach and he fought to ignore it. That was a whole lot of bullets to dodge, he thought, as he watched her dark cropped hair and jacket of rags disappear at the end of the lane. He stared after her for a few seconds before turning to the two young novices waiting patiently next to him.
Would either of them get out of the seventeenth century alive?
The smell of five goats the novices were leading assailed his nostrils as he walked beside them. Greta had said that the girls had taken the goats to the far pasture many times before and did not need an escort. But he could tell she was relieved when he insisted upon going with them. The tragedy of the two nuns assaulted just the week before was still fresh in everyone’s minds.
As Rowan looked at the two girls, dressed in chin to toe black habits that swept the dirt from the cobblestones as they moved, he wondered if they felt any safer with him along. It seemed to him that they feared all men. Perhaps in 1620 they had good reason for that fear. Greta had told him that many of the novices had fled the unnatural attentions of their male relatives or had been sold to the order by their fathers. Although now broke, there was a time when the convent had funds to rescue these girls. However, there had not been a new recruit to the little order in nearly four years. The word in town was out: it was no longer safe to be a nun in Heidelberg.
Rowan was sure that the two novice goatherders could not be more than fourteen years old. They walked silently behind the goats and kids with downcast eyes, counting, presumably, on the homing instincts of the goats to get themselves to the pasture. Rowan walked well behind them, both for their comfort and for his need to spot danger before it was upon them. He wore his gardener’s rags but had wrapped his cowboy boots in felt and leather so that he could walk down the street in comfort while still looking like a seventeenth century peasant.
As he looked around at the ancient storefronts and alehouses, he had trouble processing the fact that he was in a different time. While he wasn’t very familiar with Heidelberg, he had been in town long enough to notice it seemed to display fewer signs of modern life than most cities. In his few days there, he had seen no Pizza Huts, Starbucks or chain grocery stores. He took a moment to imagine that the street he was walking down this morning was actually in 2012.
It was, of course, the moment Axel’s gang chose to attack.
Because he was one hundred feet behind the novices, even daydreaming, he saw the men in time. Unaware that the girls were not alone, the three men on horseback never bothered to look around before they rode in and scattered the goats into the adjoining alley. One of the girls had the spirit to poke her crook at the closest rider to her. It looked to Rowan like she was attempting to keep the man at a distance, but the rider grabbed the cane and dragged the girl to him, slashing at her hands with a short handled knife. Then, laughing loudly, he reached down and pulled her across his saddle. He was in the process of turning to crow to his companions when the bullet hole sprouted from the center of his forehead.
Rowan stepped closer to the melee, his arm straight and his Glock pointed at the next rider. The girl across the dead man’s saddle fell to the ground and scrambled to her feet. Rowan could see her hands were covered with blood. Spotting Rowan, one of the other men pulled his sword and idiotically charged him. Rowan dispatched him with a bullet to the chest. In his mind he could hear the girls screaming and the sounds of horses’ hooves against cobblestone. As he turned his gun onto the fleeing and final assailant, he hesitated to shoot him. There were probably enough eyewitnesses at this point to make it irrelevant if the man lived to give a report of the attack. Rowan looked down at the unharmed girl at his side, who was now staring not at the man who had tried to abduct her, but at Rowan. He steadied his Glock and shot the retreating rider in the back, then watched him drop from his horse to the hard street.
Ella’s morning had been long and painful. The other stable boys were bolder in their taunting of her and she had to work harder to stay out of their way. Her moment finally came when the stable master ordered her to the castle to deliver an armful of wood for the castle kitchen fire. He also sent her with instructions to steal as many biscuits as she could, disregarding the fact that her hands would be lopped off at the wrist if she were caught. Ella gathered up the faggots in her arms and rushed up the pathway to the castle, dodging two riders coming down the path toward the town. She was amazed again at how little value seemed to be placed on the lower classes in 1620. If either of the riders had killed or maimed her, the castle would merely be compensated for their financial loss—something along the lines of the cost of a tavern supper, she guessed—
and that would be the end of it.
Once inside the castle kitchen, Ella realized that something had happened. Cook and the other women were excitedly moving about and talking loudly. Since she was supposed to be a mute, she couldn’t ask what happened—and her understanding of 1620 German wouldn’t allow it anyway—but she sensed that this was her opportunity and she didn’t want to waste it. Heike ran by holding an empty kettle and Ella put her hand out. She tried to communicate with her hands and facial expression: what is wrong? Heike blurted out: “Herr Axel’s men have been murdered in the city! Seven men slain by a warlock!”
Ella stared as the rest of the kitchen continued its frenetic activity around her. Why does this smell like Rowan? she thought, as worry and tension began to build in her chest. She dumped the wood in the basket by the fire, then strained to understand the seventeenth century German being spoken around her. When she heard the word Kloster, she felt sick to her stomach. Kloster meant convent. It was Rowan! Dear God, was this his idea of creating a distraction? What happened to the timeline? What happened to the bonfire idea? Torn between bolting for the convent immediately and going forward with her plan, she quickly realized she couldn’t waste the opportunity the disruption created—whatever its source—by leaving.
It was easy to slip out of the kitchen unnoticed. Ella grabbed a basket of freshly baked scones and went through the interior door that led deep into the castle. This time, she didn’t hide from the voices she heard ahead. With the ruckus over Axel’s murdered henchmen no one was interested in a simple kitchen worker carrying a basket of muffins through the castle. Unlike the last time, she knew exactly where she was going.
Careful not to get eye contact with anyone, Ella straightened her shoulders and acted like she had every reason to be walking down the great hall to the stone staircase that led to the upstairs rooms. She saw the stairs and again found herself praying no one would be coming down as she ascended. It was one thing to pass her disguise off at a distance of twenty feet, but quite another pressed face to face on a narrow stairwell.
She was only a few feet from the stairs when a powerful hand clamped down on her shoulder and twisted her around. She cried out and nearly dropped the basket. The man looked closely into her face. He had a lazy eye and his mouth was full of broken, brown teeth. It was all Ella could do not to cringe away from his hideous face. She recognized him as one of the castle footmen when she saw his livery and gloves.
“Wo gehen Sie?” he said.
Ella held up the basket and pointed to the stairs.
“Hat Herr Axel sie bitten?” he asked. His tone was a little less aggressive, Ella thought. She nodded, hoping she looked the picture of obsequiousness. It occurred to her that this guy probably enjoyed terrorizing the infirm but would draw the line at getting in the way of a direct order from his lordship.
“Schnell! Schnell! Lass ihn nicht warten!” he shrieked. Ella turned to run up the stairs, her heart pounding. When she got to the top of the stairs, she looked down the long hall.
Her plan was to hide herself in a closet or behind a drape in order to hear something useful, then sneak out undetected. She knew if she’d shared the details of her plan with Rowan, he’d probably have tied her to the kitchen sink. Even though he knew as well as she did that they had run out of time and she was the only one who could move things forward.
She passed two closed doors down the hall. One she knew was Axel’s bedroom. She stopped in front of a closed set of double doors. She hesitated, holding the basket and trying to decide what to do. She could hear voices inside. She peeked through the gap in the hinges into the room’s interior. It was Krüger’s office. She could see a massive desk and velvet drapes on the wall behind it. Ella sucked in a breath. There, behind the desk, was none other than Axel Krüger talking to the lord of the castle, himself.
“I tell you, it will be the final crushing blow that delivers all of Germany to us,” Krüger said.
“We have enough with Heidelberg,” Axel said. He was slouching in a blatant pose of boredom and disrespect.
“For now, perhaps,” Krüger said, leaning intently toward his son and lowering his voice. “But the Prince has twisted in the wind many times and may well again on this issue.”
Axel snorted in derision but said nothing.
“My sources tell me he is sending Reicher to open the market fair in ten days time,” Krüger said.
“Eric Reicher is a fool,” Axel said. “And a papist.”
“Nonetheless,” Krüger said, “he has the Prince’s ear.”
“I will not woo the prince’s pet dog,” Axel said. “You have gone insane to even think it.”
“I would not ask you to woo him.”
“What then?”
“Kill him,” his father said. He spread out his hands in a flourish as if presenting a gift to his son.
Axel was silent for a moment and then laughed. His hand went to the hilt of his sword.
“You want me to kill him,” he said.
“Be quiet! You must tell no one of this! When the citizens of Heidelberg see that we have eliminated the Catholic emissary from Rome and along with him any chance that their precious Church of the Holy Spirit will ever be returned to the papists, we will be poised to claim all the territory between the Nekker and the Rhine. They will cheer us in the streets as their champions.”
“God’s teeth, Father, do you really think you can be king?” Axel said, still grinning. “Is that what this is about? That is a dangerous game.”
“Which is why you must tell no one until it is done,” Krüger said. “Not your men, not your whores. And it is why it must be you and no one else.”
So entranced was she in what she was hearing and so focused on trying to hear the low tones of the old man that Ella did not notice the sounds of footsteps coming up the stairs. When she finally realized that someone was coming, she whirled away from the door. The end of the hallway was too far to cross before whomever was coming was upon her. Without thinking beyond the fact that she needed to hide, she stepped through the door to the immediate left of Krüger’s office.
The room appeared to be a vacant bedroom. Ella, still clutching her basket of scones, stood behind the door and watched as Dojo, the head house butler, strode by and banged on the double doors of Krüger’s office.
“Is the kitchen making unscheduled deliveries now?”
Ella dropped her basket at the sound of the voice and turned to stare at the sight of a man kneeling by the bed. She grabbed the doorknob when she heard shouts erupt from the room next door. She looked at Christof as he slowly stood from the bed and dusted off the knees of his corduroy trousers.
“Don’t be afraid,” he said. “I won’t hurt you.”
Whether he would or wouldn’t wasn’t the issue at the moment, Ella realized. Things were happening next door and she very much needed to be off center stage when events fully erupted. Obviously, Dojo had brought the news to Axel of the attack on his men. She looked around the room in desperation for a hiding place.
“There’s always the closet, little mouse,” Christof said with a chuckle. “I, myself, have often used it to avoid certain members of my family.”
Without thinking whether she could trust him—and realizing she had no choice one way or the other, Ella grabbed her basket and ran to the closet. Without a word or a glance, she slipped in and pulled the door, leaving a crack to look through.
Within seconds, Christof’s bedroom door swung open and banged against the wall. Axel filled the doorway. Again, Ella found herself shocked by how handsome he was. His eyes were a cerulean blue that would have been dazzling if they weren’t so cold. He was dressed elegantly, but his sword, long and deadly, hung at his waist destroying any illusion of fussiness. The man was a killer, Ella reminded herself.
“He has killed three of my best men!” Axel shouted. “And Father knew! I tell you, he is soft in the head. He admitted that he knew the convent harbored the evil spirit who killed the axe man and
he did nothing! And now my men are dead!”
Ella couldn’t understand everything Axel said. He was ranting. But she got enough of it. The attack had been thwarted by the convent.
He knew about Rowan. And he knew where he was.
“That’s impossible, Brother,” Christof said. “Calm yourself. No evil spirit killed the axe man. Father had him killed.”
“Shut up, you bastard! Shut up!” Axel pulled out his knife and waved it in the air. “I will kill everyone at that convent. I will burn the head witch and throw her fellow witches onto the pyre like kindling!”
Ella fought a terrible urge to burst from the closet and run to the convent and warn them that an attack was imminent. She knew she was sweating and her hands were shaking just watching his display of unrestrained fury.
“Axel, be sensible!” Christof said. Ella could see him hold out a hand to his older brother. “Even you can’t justify killing a convent full of nuns. No matter what your past sins are, this is a chance for you to come into the light. Come into the full light of understanding and love that is our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Whatever else Christof had intended to tell his brother was lost in a terrible gurgle as Axel screamed incoherently and launched himself at his brother, plunging his knife into him. Stunned, Ella pulled away from the opening in the closet door. She could hear Christof’s cries and the sound of Axel stomping out of the room. As she listened, Christof’s breathing was labored and then he was silent. She burst from the closet, leaving her basket behind, and dashed down the hall.
She ran until she heard the sound of many feet pounding up the stairs. In a panic, she again turned to the nearest open door and stood in the shadows trying to catch her breath. She reasoned that as soon as the hall filled with people she would be able to escape unnoticed. She was about to leave the room when she heard the voice of Dojo heading her way. He was screaming.
“Someone get help!” he shrieked. “Herr Axel has slain his brother! Get help!”
[Tempus Fugitives 01.0] Swept Away Page 19
