Conor nodded shortly. “I give you my word that I will cooperate with whatever plan you may have in mind purely because I will be unable to help Kenton, at this point, any other way,” he said. “What did you have in mind?”
Nicola stood up from the cold, stone bench, brushing at her wet and dirty bum. “I will find out from St. John where they have taken Kenton if, in fact, he is still alive,” she said. “St. John suggested he would be taken to Conisbrough, as the nearest stronghold for Edward. I will insist that St. John send word to the men in Manchester to see what has become of Kenton and then we shall know how to proceed.”
Conor watched her as she moved towards him. “And Forbes, le Mon, de Russe, and Wellesbourne,” he added. “You should find out what has become of them, too. All of those excellent knights… it is hard to comprehend if they are all lost.”
Nicola stood over him, feeling extreme guilt with his words even though she didn’t sense he had said them to offend her. He was simply stating his thoughts.
“I will find out what I can, I swear it,” she said. “I did this. I will do what I must to right it, no matter what the cost.”
Conor’s eyes flickered. “You speak of enemy knights, my lady.”
“I speak of men who were kinder to me than my husband, or his men, ever were.”
Conor could hear the emotion in her voice when she spoke. “Then what now?” he asked. “What would you have me do if I am to be an accomplice in your plan?”
Nicola pondered that a moment. “I will claim you as one of Gaylord’s men and none who are loyal to me will dispute that,” she said. “Hopefully we can carry on the charade until we find out what has happened to Kenton. When we do, we will decide what course to take.”
There wasn’t much Conor could say to that although he didn’t think her plan for him was going to work. Sooner or later, someone would talk. They would mention the big knight who had come with le Bec, a knight who was now being claimed by Lady Thorne as one of Gaylord’s men, and St. John would realize he had been lied to, which made Conor realize that he could not remain at Babylon for any length of time. He had to escape and allowing Lady Thorne to think that he was going along with her scheme was essential to his own scheme.
He had to flee Babylon and find Warwick.
With his own plan in mind, Conor watched Nicola as she left the cell and went to the stairs, calling up to the guards and to St. John on the level above. She was demanding help in removing him from his cell and shortly, men appeared to carry him out. He could walk, but barely, and it was slow-going until he reached the light of the inner ward above. After that, he ended up in the third floor of the keep in the room where Lady Thorne’s boys used to sleep. There was a single bed there now, restful and padded, and he was grateful for the peace and comfort.
Now, he had his own plans to make.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
March (Spring)
They had returnedeverything to Kenton but his weapons. They’d even returned his horse. Several days after his defeat at Manchester, Kenton and Saxilby and about five hundred men had made the trek back to Conisbrough Castle, including a couple of hundred of Kenton’s men who were prisoners.
They departed Manchester on a bright day, nearly the first of spring, but it was still terribly cold. The roads, because of the late snows and wet weather, were terrible and nearly impassible at points, but the Saxilby army managed to move through or around anything that seemed like a blockade. Travel was slow-going, however, due to both the road conditions and the number of wounded they were carrying, and a trip that should have taken two days in decent conditions ended up taking four.
Kenton had seen Conisbrough Castle many times from a distance but he had never been inside the structure, which was quite vast. Much like Babylon, it had an enormous keep with mural stairs that led to different levels, and a great hall in thebailey. While his men had been shuttled to a protected area next to the hall, Kenton had been taken inside the keep.
Surprisingly, Saxilby didn’t put him in the vault, which is what he had mostly expected. He was a prisoner, after all, and a valuable one, so Saxilby treated him with a goodly amount of courtesy by placing him in a small, guarded chamber on the fourth floor of Conisbrough’s keep. His armor was taken from him, however, and he was left with nothing but his clothing. He was not allowed to attend meals in the hall or outside of his room, but the meals were generous and he did not want for food. He was given no utensils at all, nothing that could be used as a weapon, but it didn’t particularly bother him. In fact, nothing seemed to bother him any longer.
Nothing seemed to matter to him any longer.
Kenton was a career knight from a long line of career knights. His grandfather had been the great Richmond le Bec and his grandmother a bastard daughter of Henry IV, so he was distantly related to the current king. From the time he was old enough to understand, he knew what had been expected of him– serving men sworn to the king and making a difference in his world. He had earned a great reputation alongside The Lion of the North, Atticus de Wolfe, but he’d amicably parted ways with Atticus years ago to pursue his career with Warwick. Atticus was more concerned with holding down the north and the Scots borders while Kenton headed into heavy battles flying Henry’s banners. It was a life he had been trained to do and something he did very well. But the most recent events in his life, particularly with a widowed lady whose husband had once served Edward, seemed to have sucked everything out of him.
Everything he thought he ever knew was unimportant any longer.
Nowadays, instead of plotting his escape, he seemed content to be a prisoner. As long as they were treating him well, therewas no real reason to try to break from Conisbrough, which he couldn’t do anyway. The place was virtually impenetrable and, not knowing the layout, he would be foolish to try and escape. Until he knew the place a little better, or perhaps until he had more of an opportunity to escape, he wasn’t going to make the attempt. He’d find himself worse off than he already was and he knew it. He had their trust for the moment and wanted to keep it.
But it was more than that. He simply didn’t feel the urge to escape. What was there to escapeto? The woman he loved had betrayed him and he still couldn’t believe what she had done. He’d tried not to think back to the stolen kisses they had shared, or the joyful times in Manchester shopping or even the gaiety after they had returned home. Everything had been more delightful and satisfying than he’d ever known. Spending evenings supping with Nicola and her children, or helping the boys learn to fish… it was a life he’d never known to exist, a life that revolved around a beautiful woman and her intelligent boys whom he was quite fond of. He was quite fond of themallso to know that what he had enjoyed so much, that fleeting taste of heaven he’d experienced, was all a lie was something he could not accept.
So he stood next to the tiny lancet window of his tiny chamber, peering out into the sky and thinking of things he probably shouldn’t think of. He could hear the bailey down below, the hustle and bustle of it, and at night he could hear the sentries on patrol, but he didn’t pay much attention. His mind wandered back to Babylon every night, remembering how difficult it had been for Nicola to put the boys to bed because they wanted to remain in the hall and watch the knights play their games of chance. He remembered sitting with Tab when the crazed old woman burst out of her closet and explaining to the terrified young lad that the frightful creature in white tatterswas not, in fact, a ghost. He helped the child to grow, to realize that there was nothing to be afraid of.
He’d liked that feeling of accomplishment.
He couldn’t even become upset at himself for letting him grow close to Nicola’s boys because there had been no way to prevent it. For some reason, he had been drawn to the boys and they to him, and he had enjoyed every moment of Tab’s boldness, of Teague’s sweet lisp, and Tiernan’s expressive silence. It made him want sons just like them, sons from Nicola, but that had been a fool’s dream. He had been foolish to even think such things.
Nay, he couldn’t muster the strength to become angry with himself in any fashion for what had happened. He kept going back to his conversation with Nicola in the storage vaults of Babylon when she had screamed at him. It was at that moment that he realized things between them had changed and he was convinced someone, perhaps one of his own men, had convinced Nicola that his intentions were dishonorable. Thathewas dishonorable. He didn’t blame her because she didn’t know any better. She was a woman, after all, and a very smart one, but their relationship had been so new and so tenuous. It hadn’t even been a relationship at all, to be truthful.
It had simply been his dream.
Therefore, he stood against the wall, gazing from the window and reflecting on what could have been. He hadn’t the strength or need or urgency to do anything else and on this dusky evening as the sun set against the western sky, his thoughts and intentions were no different. He didn’t even know how many days had passed since he’d been brought here; he hadn’t been keeping track. But he knew, by the color of the sky, that soon his meal would be brought to him, another meal in an endless line of meals that he wouldn’t particularly eat. Food made him think of Nicola. In fact,everythingmade him think of Nicola. As helingered by the window, the bolt on the outside of his door was thrown.