Jagger chuckled at his joke or Wolf’s consternation, Wolf knew not which. Robin, swallowing a smile, stared at the ground. Around his waist he wore a new leather pouch from the boar that had nearly taken his life.
An answering cry split through the forest, so loud it nearly parted the shroud of fog that clung low to the hills.
“I’ll be damned!”
“No doubt, Jagger. Come.” Wolf leaned forward in the saddle and urged his mount to the edge of the lake where another rider appeared through the icy mist. “Jack.”
“Aye, and how d’ye be, Wolf?” the hunter asked, his eyes dark and worried.
“I’ve been better.”
“Haven’t we all? Haven’t we all?” Jack said. “And the lady? Is she safe?”
“Megan?” Wolf asked, alarm causing the hairs on the back of his neck to rise. “Is she not at the castle?”
“Nay, the messengers came in peace, bringing your letter
of ransom, but Holt turned on them.” Quickly, Jack explained about the capture of Bjorn and Jagger, as well as the return and imprisoning of the sorcerer. According to the hunter, Holt had control of the castle and sent search parties out patrolling for his wife, but his two most diligent men, Sir Connor and Kelvin of Hawarth, had become disinterested.
Holt had reprimanded them and they’d laughed in his face. Furious, he wouldn’t give the men any more chance to snigger at his foolishness. He planned not to pay ransom for his wife and had declared it a sign of weakness to give in to the demands of criminals. His answer was that he intended to flog the truth from Bjorn and Jagger and any other poor soul who might have some knowledge of Megan’s whereabouts and happened to wander through the gates of Dwyrain.
“But Lady Megan, no one has seen her?” Wolf asked again, fear congealing his blood.
Jack scratched the whiskers on one cheek and shook his head. “Yer men claim she is with you.”
“She escaped,” Jagger said with a wide grin. “Think on it, a tiny woman like that, slippin’ away from Wolf.”
Robin’s smile was smug, as if he thought it a great joke that the bit of a woman he adored had tricked Wolf.
“She’s not returned to Dwyrain,” Jack said.
Desperation took a stranglehold on Wolf’s throat. ’Twas possible she was safe with friends somewhere, that she had decided not to return to her father’s castle and her husband’s ire, but ’twas unlikely. She could have been captured by another band of outlaws—there were many in the surrounding woods—but Megan was smart, an accomplished horsewoman, and was riding the best steed in the land. Also, he was certain that she would be more careful than she’d been on her wedding day, when Wolf had abducted her.
“So there has been no sign of the lady, but my men and a strange sorcerer are being held captive?”
“Aye.” Jack studied the rocks and ferns on the ground. “Not only being held, but beaten as well. Two days past, they were flogged within an inch of their lives and when I left the castle on this hunt, one, the dark-haired one—”
“—Cormick.”
“Aye, he be the one. He … well, he was lingering near death. The priest had already been called to his cell.”
“Nay!”
Jack lifted his eyes. “Aye, Wolf. ’Tis the truth I speak.”
Robin’s grin disappeared and he swallowed as if with difficulty.
Guilt galloped through Wolf on sharp, steel-shod hooves that ripped at his heart and soul. He should have expected this, he decided, fingers clenching around the reins, but there was an unwritten law—a code of honor that outlaws and noblemen alike respected—that messengers were not to be handled as prisoners, though he knew some of his men had at times attacked the bearer of bad news rather than the source.
Torn, he glanced behind him, as if in studying the undergrowth he could determine what had happened to Megan. Surely she was safe and, after hearing of Holt’s reign of terror, he was grateful she hadn’t returned to Dwyrain … but where was she?
“We needs save Bjorn and Cormick,” Jagger reminded him, as if reading his pained thoughts. This was his fault—everything that had gone wrong could be laid at his own feet—but he could undo nothing, and if he followed his heart, he would chase down Megan wherever she was and demand that she become his wife—the bride of an outlaw of the forest. The thought was like salt water on a wound, for he physically jerked when he imagined giving up his freedom for a woman. But not any woman, he reminded himself bitterly—Holt’s wife.
Jagger cleared his throat and glared at Wolf as if he suspected him of some deep treason. “Aye,” Wolf agreed reluctantly, “we must save the men and then we will find Lady Megan. Dwyrain is but a day’s journey from here.” That thought, too, was worrisome. Mayhap Megan was indeed still trying to return to Dwyrain. Mayhap her horse was stolen or lame and she was on the road. If ’twere so, she had to be stopped afore she walked innocently through the gates of the keep, like a calf to the slaughter.
The knock on the door was firm. “Cayley, child,” Father Timothy greeted her as he let himself through the door. “I’ve come to pray with you.” He closed the door behind him and Cayley shivered at the thought of being alone with him. She was also expecting Rue soon; the nursemaid had promised to help her with plans for her escape. Time was passing much too quickly and if Cayley were to help her father, she had to ride for help soon—tonight, for the moon was full and bright in a cloudless sky. Drat and spit that this was the night the good father chose to come to help cleanse her soul.
“Kneel beside me,” he ordered, and Cayley lowered herself onto the rushes, where the priest was already positioned so that he could face the door. “Aye, that’s good,” he said when she was beside him. Clearing his throat, he held his breath for an instant, then said so softly she barely heard him, “I have a confession to make.”