Page 40 of Come the Morning

She spun around a corner, seeking the entrance where they had come into the residence hall of the castle. Yet when she had nearly reached the door, she skidded to a dead halt, for a man had stepped into the doorway.

A guard. A big man, large enough for the bulwark of his frame to fill the entire space of the doorway.

She backed away. Perhaps he hadn’t seen her.

“Lady Mellyora!”

She gasped, stepping backwards again. It was Sir Harry Wakefield. The very man she had eluded earlier.

“Come, m’lady, the game is up.”

“Sir Harry, if you’ll just step aside …”

“Now, ye know, m’lady, that I cannot.”

She turned to run down the hall in the opposite direction. She rounded a corner, unfamiliar with the corridors, but certain that there had to be other exits from the residence halls.

There, ahead of her, lay an archway. She ran toward it, dismay filling her along with an awareness that she was beginning to run in circles like a cornered rat.

She turned left toward an archway. And there, at the opening which should have allowed her access to the courtyard, stoodanother of the king’s men. This man she did not know, though he seemed vaguely familiar. He was huge, bald, and his right cheek was deeply scarred. He looked like the sorry end of many a long battle, and seeing him, she was suddenly forced to realize the enormity of what she was doing, that she was fighting a king. She had defied David, and he had discovered her missing, and he had sent out the most hardened, vicious, and mercenary of his troops to find her. She had been so desperate that she had allowed her captor to play her for a fool. He would have known that the entire fortress would be alerted to be on the lookout for her. He had probably helped plan for it to be so.

She turned quickly, hoping she had done so before the bald man could see her. Racing wildly down the next corridor, she saw a tapestried alcove to her left. Slipping behind the tapestry, she leaned against the wall, gasping for breath, breathing deeply as she debated her next move. Should she try running up a flight of steps, perhaps finding an escape by way of the parapets once again? Should she hide a while, wait? How could she possibly escape now when the king had warned every guard to be on the lookout for a wayward young woman?

She suddenly became aware that there was breathing other than her own going on in the alcove. She caught her breath, and held it. Someone else was in here. Someone silent. Someone trying to hide as well, or someone waiting to pounce on her?

She fought a rising sense of fear and reminded herself that these alcoves were the place of many a secret tryst, and she assured herself that she was cornered with someone equally determined to keep his or her presence quiet.

She braced herself, hearing footsteps in the hall. “Have you seen her?” one man called to another.

“Aye, the Lady Mellyora came this way, but where she ran from here I do not know,” came the reply.

“Warn Tristan she’ll try the south entrance next,” came another voice.

The voices and the footsteps faded. Mellyora remained frozen, waiting. Then she heard a soft whisper. “Mellyora MacAdin?”

It was a woman’s voice.

A woman could betray her as easily as a man. She held silent.

“Mellyora!” The voice was a whisper, hesitant, afraid. “Mellyora! It is Anne Hallsteader.”

Mellyora exhaled on a long breath. “Anne! What are you doing in this alcove?” Anne was the daughter of the youngest son of a Danish jarl and a MacInnish heiress. Her father had been slain soon after her birth, and she had lived with her mother’s family since she’d been a child. Her home was north in the Hebrides, but close enough to Mellyora’s island fortress that they had seen each other often enough over the years. “What are you doing here?” she repeated.

“You tell me first. Why are they looking for you? What have you done? Why are you hiding here?”

“I haven’t done anything,” Mellyora replied quietly. She was growing accustomed to the darkness in the tapestried alcove. She could make out Anne’s shape, just feet away from her. By day, the tapestries were drawn back and richly carved chairs allowed residents and guests to sit and talk in small groups in relative privacy. By night, Mellyora had heard, much more went on, though she often wondered how, since this evening was proving that the alcoves could be crowded.

“I swear, I didn’t do anything. I’m just avoiding the guards—obviously,” Mellyora said. “My father died, you know. I am the king’s ward.”

“Aye, I’ve heard. They say he will wed you to one of his men.”

“Aye, and I’m seeking to … leave.”

“You’re in dire trouble,” Anne said with sympathy.

“Anne, what are you doing here?”

Anne was silent a long time.