Page 43 of The Unwilling Bride
“And if Constance doesn’t prove a problem. I’m not convinced—”
“You leave my niece to me. If she wasn’t such a beauty and didn’t have a considerable dowry, I’d be more worried. But as it is, I think we have little reason to fear.”
Algernon nodded, but he continued to look anxious. “What of our allies in the north?”
“They grow impatient, as such men do. I’ve told them we must wait until all is well in hand here. I’ve assured them things are progressing as they should, but no doubt more letters will have to be sent. They’re like children who need to be told again and again that nothing can be achieved by haste. Now you’d best go back to the hall before we’re seen here. I’ll join you in a moment.”
Algernon put his hand on Carrell’s arm. “I’ll never forget what you’re risking for me.”
“And my daughter,” Carrell reminded him in case the stupid fool remembered that Carrell’s family stood to gain, as well.
Algernon checked to make sure no one was watching, then crept out of the alley and headed for the hall.
As Lord Carrell watched him go, his lip curled with scorn and he thought, with great satisfaction, of the lands he would rule in his daughter’s name when her envious, self-pitying idiot of a husband was dead.
EVEN LATER THAT NIGHT, TALEK stared into the fire in Peder’s stone cottage. He was dressed as any traveler might be, in cloak, tunic, breeches and boots, with a full purse tucked inside his wide belt, and a sword dangling at his side.
“Twenty years I’ve served the lords of Tregellas—twenty years!—and he dismisses me as easily as if I’d come yesterday,” he muttered, kicking the bundle that held his clothes and everything else he possessed. “Wasn’t I a good servant to him when he was a boy? Didn’t I follow him about like a dog, just as I was ordered, and him the most spiteful, vicious brat in Christendom? I only wish I had stuck him with my boar spear!”
“Then you’d be dead for sure,” Peder replied.
Talek took another swig of ale.
Peder leaned forward, trying to see Talek better in the dim light. “So it was an accident, then?”
“Aye,” Talek muttered, running his hand over his close-cropped hair. “Why would I want to kill him?”
“Because he wants to put a stop to the smuggling?” Peder suggested.
Talek snorted. “That’s not likely to work, no matter how hard he tries. This coast is too tricky to patrol, even with the army he’s got at Tregellas. He’d be no more of a nuisance than his father.”
“Maybe you wanted to help Lady Constance be free of him.”
“Me and my men would have backed her if she’d asked us.”
“Could be she’s afraid to refuse him,” Peder proposed.
“Her? Afraid?” Talek scoffed. “If she wasn’t afraid of the old lord, why’d she be afraid of the new one?”
“She wasn’t betrothed to the old one. Now she’s lost a man who’d protect her.”
Talek whistled softly. “That bloody bastard.”
Peder poured them both more ale from the pitcher athis elbow, then stretched out his legs and shifted, trying to find a comfortable way to rest his aching hip. “Where’ll you go now?”
Talek’s wide mouth turned up in a smile and his eyes blazed with determination. “Not far.”
IT BEGAN IN THE HOUR JUST before dawn two nights later, with a small spark set to an oiled rag tucked into a pile of straw in the shed beside the mill. From there, the fire spread to the barrels of tallow used to grease the gears in the wheel pit of the mill. Then to the old, dry timbers supporting the roof. Squeaking in panic, mice and rats scurried from their holes, seeking escape as smoke filled the building.
When the timbers were well ablaze, the wind picked up more sparks and sent them spinning in the air toward the mill and the sluice channeling the water from the leat to the wheel. The great wooden wheel itself and the main shaft of white oak were too wet to catch fire, but the cinders blew into the wheel pit. There the fire found more to feed on—tallow around the lantern gear, and the dry wood of the inner shaft and spindle.
Like capering children the flames raced up the spindle to the rap, the shoe and the hopper, onward to the floor above. The millstone casing caught fire. And the garners storing the grain to be ground. Eventually the entire inner workings of the mill, the beams and the floors were all aflame.
CHAPTER NINE
THE BEDCHAMBER OF THE LORD of Tregellas was dark, save for the flickering light of a single candle on the table beside the large bed, its heavy dark blue curtains drawn.
How or why Constance had come there, she didn’t know…but she knew she shouldn’t linger. She had no business here. She should go…except that her feet wouldn’t—couldn’t—move.
