Rather than ease or comfort her, his words inflamed her and she whirled on him, infuriated. “You will cease with your sweet words,” she hissed. “All that comes out of your mouth are lies and coercion. You have been doing it since you came to Babylonand I will no longer listen to you, so cease with your attempts to be kind. I am immune to them.”
His brow furrowed in puzzlement. “Lies and coercion?” he repeated, rather taken aback at such strong words. “How could you think….?”
She cut him off, rudely. “Stop it!” she shouted, putting her hands over her ears. “You only lie to gain your wants but I am not listening to you any longer! I know the truth, Kenton le Bec, so you can stop pretending to be kind and attentive. Your actions are filled with lies just like the rest of you. If you want to know what I know about Edward’s movements or my husband’s allies, then I wish you would simply ask me. You did not have to pretend to be kind to me in order to gain your wants.”
Kenton was stunned. “Is that what you think?” he asked, aghast. “That I have been pretending to be kind to you in order to extract information?”
Nicola burst into painful sobs. She was trying to keep her hands over her ears but she couldn’t do that and point for the ladder that led from the vault, so she was forced to drop a hand and gesture most strongly towards the exit.
“Getout,” she screamed at him. “Get out and leave me alone. I do not want to see you again, ever!”
Kenton was pale with sorrow and anguish. He could hardly believe what he was hearing. “Who told you this about me?” he demanded, his voice hoarse. “Who told you such lies that you would believe them?”
Nicola was beyond rational thought at that moment; all of the pain she had been feeling at the realization that Kenton had only been using her was flooding out all over the place, through her veins, bleeding out of her pores, and filling the very air around them with anguish. She started screaming at him.
“Get out, get out!” she roared. “God damn you to hell for what you’ve done to me, le Bec! God damn you for making me feel… for making me hope… get out of here before I kill you!”
She was far gone with rage and hysteria. Kenton sat there, watching her, realizing that he was close to tears himself. In those few stammered words, he could see that she had felt something for him as well. She felt something for him now. It was the only way to explain the utter agony she was exhibiting. She was feeling something for him just as he was feeling for her but somehow, someway, someone had poisoned her against him. Someone had lied to her. Someone had convinced her that his intentions were not honorable and she had believed them. He could see, simply by her reaction, that she was as heartbroken as he was.
He’d never felt so much pain in his life.
Quietly, he stood up and made his way over to the ladder, hearing Nicola’s sobs all around him, echoing off of the cold walls of the vault. They were like blows to his body, causing him physical anguish. There was a lump in his throat as he put a hand on the ladder.
“I am leaving,” he said, his voice tight, “but you will listen to me before I do. I do not know who has told you that my intentions towards you were dishonorable, but nothing could be further from the truth. I love you, Nicola Aubrey-Thorne, and when I return from Manchester, we will have this discussion again. If it takes the rest of my life to convince you that my feelings for you are true, then so be it. I am willing to give the rest of my life to you, and only you, because I have never loved anyone before. You are my first and, God willing, you will be my last. This is not over.”
Nicola couldn’t help but hear his words. They carved through her like knives, causing her entire body to weaken.I love you. No one, save her children, had ever told her that. Hearing thosewords from Kenton’s lips was the most glorious and most tragic thing she could have ever experienced. She wanted to believe him, to tell him that she loved him also, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. He was lying…wasn’t he?
Distraught, Nicola collapsed on the floor of the storage vault in a fit of deep sobs as Kenton mounted the stairs and left, just as she’d asked him to.
She never saw the tears on his face that he quickly wiped away before anyone else could see them.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Kenton’s army leftbefore dawn the next day when the weather had surprisingly cleared up. As the eastern sky turned shades of pink and purple, and dark clouds slashed across the heavens as a reminder of the terrible winter weather they’d so recently suffered, Kenton departed the great gates of Babylon with around twelve hundred men, leaving the remaining two hundred at Babylon to watch over the castle until he returned.
He took all of his knights with him except Conor, whom he left in charge of Babylon in his absence. Kenton didn’t expect any trouble in the foreseeable future, as his spies had returned saying that the army that had attacked them the previous week had sought refuge at Conisbrough, and it was likely that an army that had suffered such a defeat wouldn’t be ready to regroup any time soon. He gave them a month or two before they came out at him again, which was plenty of time to gain control of Manchester and then retreat back to Babylon. That was what he was counting on.
But even as he left Babylon, his heart was heavy after his encounter with Nicola the evening before. He’d tried to shake the sense of sorrow he felt, the sense of hurt, but he hadn’tbeen able to do it. He was nearly desperate to know who had poisoned her against him but he would feel like a fool for asking any of his knights, so he didn’t. He bottled everything up inside him. Consequently, his mood was darker than usual and the men sensed it. The preparations for the departure had run smoothly because his men, including the knights, were fearful of upsetting him.
Wellesbourne and de Russe had accomplished most of the preparation with the men whilst Gerik and Ackerley had been focused on the provisions, animals, and equipment. They were going to subdue a large city– and Rochdale was without perimeter walls– therefore, most of their weaponry was meant for hand-to-hand combat situations. Spears and shields were the main things they made sure the men were carrying with additional weaponry stationed in two big wagons they were bringing. The preparations ran all evening and most of the night.
While Kenton focused on his army, he assigned Conor to deal with Lady Thorne and the castle in general. The army needed to take supplies with them, as foraging in the dead of winter was difficult, so Conor and Gerik spent the most time with Nicola taking from her what she could spare the army. Kenton wasn’t anywhere to be seen during this time, which seemed odd to both Conor and Gerik. Where Lady Thorne was, Kenton usually was, so it was then that they began to suspect a rift had arisen between the pair.
But they kept their thoughts to themselves because whatever was occurring between Kenton and Lady Thorne didn’t matter in the great scheme of things. Nicola was polite and helpful with them but she wasn’t particularly friendly and when they were finished stocking the army, she quickly vanished. Even as they left the gates of Babylon before dawn, she was nowhere to be seen. The lady had retreated to her apartments and there she apparently would stay.
Without the Lady of Babylon to see them off, Kenton and his army headed out into the dawn of a new day in the direction of Rochdale, which was about an hour’s ride from Babylon. Since they were already close to their target, Kenton sent his scouts out almost immediately, along with Wellesbourne and de Russe, who rode ahead to get the lay of the land and decide what the best course of action would be. Battle was on the horizon and intelligence had to be gathered.
For Rochdale, a rather bustling burg to the northeast of Manchester, the course of action had been relatively easy. When de Russe and Wellesbourne rode into town to confront the lord mayor, who was also the town’s surgeon and beer maker, and told the man to surrender his village or suffer the consequences to Warwick’s forces, the beer-making surgeon-mayor had immediately folded. It would seem he was not willing to put up any manner of resistance and by noon that day, Rochdale was secured in the name of Henry.
Leaving about two hundred men in Rochdale to keep close tabs on the operations of the city including who came in or out, Kenton and his men camped on the north end of town that night as they planned to march on Manchester the following morning. Already, Kenton sent out scouts towards Manchester, including Wellesbourne and de Russe again, but Manchester turned out to be not so entirely welcoming to Henry’s troops.
In fact, there were some of Edward’s troops staying in the town, as Kenton had seen on the day they had done their shopping there, and those men were most resistant to le Bec’s army or the suggestion that the town and its occupants were not loyal to Henry. It was an unfortunate stance, considering they were undermanned, and Wellesbourne and de Russe killed those who refused to surrender. But it was only a hint of what was to come.
On dawn of the following day, Manchester became a battleground.
*
Conor sat inGaylord Thorne’s solar, reading a missive he’d just received from Kenton. Six days after leaving Babylon, Kenton and his army were in heavy fighting in Manchester; the city had not surrendered as easily as Rochdale had, and there was a definite Edwardian influence, so the pocket of fighting had been vicious indeed. Frustrated that he was not part of the fighting, Conor let the missive fall onto the table that had once been cluttered with cups and books and maps belonging to Gaylord.