It made utter and complete sense to Bretton, but he refused to believe it. He couldn’t. “God has never done anything for me,” he muttered, wiping at the tears on his face. “I find it hard to believe he has taken an interest in me now.”
“He has,” Allaston assured him. Her cheek was against his armored thighs and she turned her head, kissing his legs tenderly. “You must also understand something. I will never have the opportunity for a respectable marriage given the fact that my father is Ajax de Velt. What family in their right mind would marry their son to a daughter of The Dark Lord? So your assertion that I should find a good and true man to marry is invalid. I cannot. Furthermore, the moment you abducted me, you announced to the world that I was your property. No one will want me after I have been in your custody. Therefore, if you do not want me, then I will have no choice but to return to the cloister. I am meant for you and no other, Bretton.”
She was absolutely right on both accounts and it fueled his confusion even more. He tried to move away from her but she wouldn’t let him go, and he ended up dragging her across the floor.
“Let me go,” he told her again. “Allaston, release me. I demand it.”
Allaston shook her head, holding his right leg tighter than she ever had. “I will not,” she declared. “Please, Bretton, do not tell me you love me and then abandon me. I cannot stomach living my life without you.”
He ended up stumbling, falling against the wall and sinking to the floor as Allaston maintained her grip on him. As he fell, she released his leg and pounced on him, her arms around his neck. Bretton, slumped against the wall, sat on his hands to keep from holding her. He knew if he did, all would be lost.
“Listen to me,” he hissed. “Allaston, listen. It is true that I love you and, God knows how honored and touched I am that you would love me as well. Hearing those words from you has somehow made my life worthwhile. I have lived my whole life to hear it. But it does not change what I must do… it does not change the fact that my vengeance against your father must be exercised. It does not change that I must kill him.”
Allaston didn’t say anything for a moment. After a lengthy, brittle pause, she released her grip around Bretton’s neck and sat back, pulling away from him. He watched her, distraught, as she sat back on her heels, eyeing him, seemingly confused or lost in thought. In either case, it was evident that there was a good deal on her mind. She was at the end of her wits and pure instinct took over. She appeared pale and disoriented as she stumbled over to the chair she had once sat in, near the hearth, and plopped down on it. As Bretton began to push himself up from the floor, Allaston spoke.
“I understand that my love cannot stop your revenge against my father,” she said, her voice dull and hollow. “But hear me now. The day you kill him is the day I take my own life. I cannot live knowing the man I love would choose vengeance over my love. Life would not be worth living. There would be nothing left for me.”
Bretton felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He rose to his feet, slowly, and went to stand before her. His expression, as he looked down on her, was a mixture of horror and sorrow.
“Nay, Allaston,” he beseeched. “You must not say that. You must not….”
“Why not?” she looked up at him, cutting him off. “If my father’s life is not of value, then surely mine is not of value. I am a de Velt, after all. What difference does it make if one or more of us dies?”
His jaw ticked. “It matters to me,” he said, his voice hoarse. “It makes all the difference in the world to me because I love you.”
“You do not love me more than you love your vengeance against my father.”
He growled, frustrated and grief-stricken. “Can you not understand that this is something I must do?” he begged. “It is a part of me, it is who I have become. Why must you threaten to kill yourself unless I give up this one thing that has kept me alive all these years?”
Allaston was shattered, cold, alone, and empty. She looked away from Bretton, devastated that her love was not enough to deter him from his revenge. She was not enough. Therefore, it didn’t matter what became of her. At the moment, she didn’t care one way or the other.
“Go away, Bretton,” she told him, a lone tear trickling down her cheek. “I do not wish to speak with you any longer. Go and do what you must do. I will do the same.”
He felt as if he couldn’t breathe. “Please do not do this, Allaston,” he begged softly. “Do not leave me with this horror.”
She wouldn’t answer him and Bretton had never felt so broken or hollow. Allaston’s head was turned away from him and it took all of his strength not to reach out and stroke that dark, lovely head. He couldn’t stand it and his control broke. A big hand extended, the dirty fingers barely touching the dark strands, like the brush of butterfly wings. Allaston felt the touch, gentle and faint, and she broke down into gut-busting sobs. She wanted to grab his hand, to kiss it and touch it, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. The hands meant to touch his ended up covering her face.
Bretton fled the room before he started weeping, too.
*
It was dawn.
Allaston hadn’t slept the entire night. She’d been up thinking about Bretton, about their life that was never to be. It was odd, truly. Thinking back to the moment she met him as Alberbury burned around them, she would have never imagined falling for a killer. Aye, he was a killer. She had always acknowledged that. But Bretton de Llion was a complex creature. He was intelligent and skilled, driven by something that happened to him in childhood, something that had both fed and destroyed his soul.
She wondered what he would have been like had Jax de Velt never killed his father. He would have probably grown up with love, fostering in the best homes, and emerging a stellar knight with a bright future. Instead, Bretton had been forced to scratch and claw and fight for everything he had. It was all he knew. And now, she was asking him to change that way of thinking. Perhaps she had been wrong all along. Perhaps it was unfair of her to ask him to become something he wasn’t. That very question had been tearing at her all night.
Shades of sunrise were beginning to color the eastern horizon. Allaston could see it clearly as she sat in the oriel window that faced over the eastern portion of the castle and a section of the bailey. She could see men moving around down below, going about their tasks, and she could smell the scent of baking bread. It would grow strong when the winds changed after sunrise.
Thinking that perhaps she should go down to the kitchen and help Uldward, she slid off the bench seat of the window and headed over to the wardrobe against the northern wall, the one that held the clothing she had borrowed from Lady Miette, garments Grayton had brought her so long ago. She hadn’t seen Grayton for quite some time and was told he had remained at Comen Castle. Not that she cared. The man had been against her ever since the day she hit Bretton with the poker. In fact, she sensed that all of Bretton’s men were against her to varying degrees. But none of that mattered now.
Bretton. She hadn’t seen him since he fled her chamber the night before, and it was probably best that she hadn’t. They were both too emotional about the situation and needed time to gather their wits. As Allaston changed into the yellow garment that Bretton had torn down the front during his fit of passion, the mending of which was now covered up with the bib of a white apron she had stitched on, Allaston knew without a doubt that she would never leave the man. He could try to send her back to her parents but she wouldn’t go. She was determined to remain with him, to convince him that they belonged together, because she knew once she left him that her life would be a lonely and desolate thing. She didn’t want to leave the only man she had ever loved.
So she cinched up the surcoat, tightening it over the linen shift, and pulled on her boots, boots she had borrowed from Lady Miette. She combed her hair thoroughly and braided it, pulling a kerchief around her head to keep loose strands out of her face and out of any food she would work with. On the table was a small polished mirror she ha
d found in Lady Miette’s possessions and she held it up, inspecting her face, seeing a woman of determination gazing back at her.
She seemed to have aged over the past several weeks. When Bretton had first abducted her, she had been a somewhat naïve girl. Now, she felt as if she had done enough growing to spread over a lifetime. She had seen much, and experienced much, and the love she felt for Bretton was engrained in her very fabric. Nay, she would not leave him, not even if he tried to force her. The only thing that was going to separate them was death.
As she set the mirror down, she began to hear a commotion down in the bailey. She could hear men shouting and, curious, she went to the window to see what the fuss was about. Her gaze was naturally drawn to the men below, running around, and she could see a portion of the gatehouse but not beyond it. She could, however, see over the wall towards the east where there was a sharp slope and groves of trees, and then the rolling green hills of Wales beyond. As she looked off to the east, it began to occur to her that, upon the horizon, a black tide seemed to be moving.
There it was, spreading across the green fields, moving towards Cloryn in a long, dark line. She watched, curious, until she realized that she was looking at the approach of an army. She had no doubt who was at the head of the army. Her blood ran cold.
Allaston bolted from the chamber, racing down the dark, narrow stairs towards the keep entry. Bolting through the door, she took the steps far too quickly and almost stumbled at the bottom, but she caught herself and began to run towards the gatehouse. All she could think of was warning her father off, of telling him to go back and away from Bretton’s wrath. She was halfway across the bailey when someone caught her around the waist.
Frightened, she looked up to see that it was Teague who had a hold of her. She had never had much interaction with the warrior but she knew, like the rest of Bretton’s commanders, that he was not friendly towards her. Panicked, she began to fight him, kicking and hitting, until he was forced to loosen his grip. But he didn’t release her entirely. He held on to her. A shout filled the air and they both stopped their wrestling.
Bretton was heading towards them from the direction of the gatehouse. As he drew near, he brusquely waved Teague off, who obediently let the lady go and vacated. As the big knight with the piercing dark eyes headed off, Bretton moved closer to Allaston, his eyes riveted to her.
“Where were you going?” he asked softly. “I saw you running out of the keep.”
Allaston looked at him, defiantly. “I saw the army to the east,” she said. “You know it is my father. I was going to warn him off. I do not want him coming near this place for obvious reasons.”
Bretton gazed steadily at her. He hadn’t slept all night, either, trapped in a world that was tearing itself apart, an engrained hatred against a love that consumed him. He’d been fighting with himself every hour of the night, trying to determine if he was doing the right thing by maintaining the hatred that had kept him alive all these years. Would he be a traitor to himself if he gave in to Allaston’s love? God only knew how happy he could be with her. But how happy could he be if her father was still alive, reminding him of his discarded vengeance at every turn? More than that, would he end up resenting Allaston because she had taken away that which had kept him alive? He could only wonder. Gazing into her lovely face now in the soft light of morning, he could feel himself starting to weaken.
“We are not certain it is him,” he said quietly.
Allaston scowled. “Of course it is him,” she said. “You sent him a missive telling him to come to Cloryn Castle and, more than that, you told de Lohr the same thing when the earl tried to intervene. Of course it is my father – who else could it be?”
She was correct and he knew it. Of course it was de Velt, and de Lohr was more than likely with him. Reaching out, Bretton tried to grasp her arm but she pulled away from him, unwilling to let him touch her. A look of genuine pain crossed his features.
“Please go back to your chamber,” he said. “I am asking you politely to do this. If you refuse, I will put you in the vault until this is over. Is that clear?”
Allaston’s first reaction was to run from him, but he would only catch her. She knew that. Her rebellion turned to sadness, and sadness to pain. She struggled against the tears that were already threatening.
“Will you please tell me what you are planning to do?” she asked. “Please, Bretton. This day will see me lose one man that I love dearly and I would like to know what you are planning, I beg you.”
He was in no mood to argue with her but on the other hand, he couldn’t quite seem to make her go.
“Much depends on your father,” he said. “My actions will be dictated by his.”
“He will want me returned,” Allaston said. “Will you show him that I am in good health? Will you at least let me speak with him?”
Bretton didn’t think that was a particularly good idea but he was curious about it. “What would you say to him?”
Allaston thought on that a moment. “More than likely the same thing I would say to you,” she said quietly. “I would tell him that I love him and I am sorry it has come to this.”
Somewhere overhead, the sentries sounded out a cry that the army was drawing closer and Bretton acknowledged it with the wave of a hand. But his attention was on Allaston. With a gentle sigh, he reached out, taking her hand. Feeling her soft, warm fingers in his grasp nearly undid him.
“I could not sleep last night for thoughts of you,” he murmured. “No matter what this day brings, Allaston, please know that I love you deeply. I always will. I have never loved anything in my life as I have loved you.”
She wanted so badly to believe him but she knew it wasn’t true. She pulled her fingers away from him.
“You do not love me more than you love your sense of vengeance,” she said. “I wish it was true that you loved me more than anything, but it is not.”
“I am sorry you feel that way.”
“So am I.”
They simply stood there and stared at each other, thoughts and emotions as tangible as rain filling the air between them. It was a painful moment, one that perhaps made them realize that they were two individuals with two destinies rather than two individuals with one destiny, a destiny of marriage and love and a future. Allaston couldn’t stand the tension or the agony and eventually lowered her gaze.
“Will you please let me speak to my father?” she asked. “If you are going to kill him, then at least let me say what I will to him. Do not deny me what my father denied you. Let me speak to my father one last time.”
He couldn’t refuse her. “Very well,” he said, sounding dull and defeated. “When it is over, I would expect to turn you over to de Lohr. He will ensure that you are returned to your mother.”
Allaston was so full of anguish that it was difficult for her to think straight. To face losing her father, and losing Bretton, was more than she could appropriately deal with.
“If… if you kill my father, then I will be taking his body with me,” she said, her throat tight with tears. “I will not return home without him.”
“Agreed.”
“But if you should die, Bretton,” she turned to look at him, tears in her eyes, “I will not leave here without you, either. I will make sure you have a proper burial, someplace that I can visit, if only in my dreams. I will make sure that, at the end of your life, you are treated with the dignity and respect you were denied while you were living.”
Her words stunned him, touched him, as he had never been touched before. He’d never heard anything more gracious. “Why would you do this?” he asked, perplexed. “I have killed people and left them to rot. I have not treated the dead with any dignity whatsoever. Why would you treat me with dignity after death when it is not deserved?”
Her tears spilled over. “Because I love you,” she said. “That is reason enough.”
Bretton didn’t think it was possible for him to feel worse than he already did, but he was wron
g. Peering into Allaston’s beautiful eyes, he felt cruel and shallow, wicked and shattered… all of those things he had felt when he realized she deserved someone better than him, he was feeling them again, more strongly than before.
“This will more than likely be the last time you and I will have the opportunity to speak to one another, privately,” he said softly. “I want you to know that… that the day I abducted you from Alberbury was the day my life changed forever, only I did not know it at the time. You have shown me life and love and beauty, Allaston, such things as I had forgotten to exist. I pray that, in the future, no matter how this day turns out, that when you think of me, there is a measure of kindness in your heart towards me. Forgive me for not being the strong, virtuous knight you deserve. If I could be that man for you, please know that I would be. But my path is set and my world is dark. As I told you before, I do not want to pull you into that world. I love you enough to know that I must set you free.”
Allaston listened to him, tears trickling from the corners of her eyes. She flicked them away. “I have pain in my heart such as I cannot comprehend,” she replied. “I fear that no matter what happens here today, I will love you until I die, regardless of the outcome.”
Bretton was feeling the same pain in his heart that she was. “Do you still plan to kill yourself if I kill your father?” he asked.
“I do.”
“I will do all in my power to prevent it, you know.”
She shook her head. “You will not be fast enough.”
He grunted. “I will lock you in the vault for your own safety, then.”
“I can still kill myself in the vault,” she whispered. “Do not think to presume you can stop me. If you kill my father… my life is over. I will have nothing left to live for because you will have proven to me that your love for vengeance is greater than your love for me.”
He sighed sadly. “Please,” he pleaded softly. “Please…do not do anything rash or foolish. Allaston, I beg you.”
She wouldn’t answer him. She simply hung her head and Bretton stood there, staring at her. He knew there was no way to prevent her from killing herself if she was truly serious. He could only pray she wasn’t, that somehow, someway, some bit of reason in her mind would stop her from doing it. He wasn’t a praying man but, at that moment, he found himself saying a prayer for divine intervention. If she, in fact, killed herself, then he would have nothing to live for, either. At the moment, he was coming to hate himself for his sense of duty, his sense of revenge. But he could not stop that which was already in motion.
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