Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
O rlov herded the distraught ladies into the drawing room, feeling rather like a harried border collie trying to keep a bunch of frightened lambs under control. The torrent of tears had made him appreciate Shannon’s stoic courage even more. For all their fancy airs and graces, highborn ladies could use a lesson in true nobility
“Randall!” Lady Sylvia clutched at her sodden skirts. Her black hair, wet with rain, had come loose from its pins, and hung heavy around her pale face. She looked like a drowned crow. And sounded even worse. “Do something!” she screeched.
Jervis sank a bit lower in his chair.
“He’s not feeling up to polite conversation,” said Shannon.
“I need some laudanum,” he croaked. He held up the wrapping of blood-stained linen. “She nearly cut off my hand.
“Only a finger or two,” she murmured.
Orlov’s mouth twitched as Lady Sylvia’s lips formed an ‘o’ of horror. She sat down rather heavily on the chair next to her friend.
“Now that we are all together, milady, I suggest you tell me what is going on, and without delay,” said Orlov. “Otherwise, I shall have to turn the interrogation over to Miss Sloane.”
Lady Sylvia shrank back. “No, no, I’ll tell you everything!” She took a gulp of air. “I admit that we came here planning to kidnap the children, Randall helped me think of it . . .”
Jervis made a feeble protest
“But I swear, we never meant them any harm. You two added an unwelcome complication. At first, we were not sure what to do. Then Randall came up with the idea of asking you to join the hunting party. He was to keep you out on the moors for the day while I found a way to spirit the children away from their grandmother and Miss Sloane.”
“Drugging an elderly lady was a dangerous move,” said Shannon. “You could have stopped her heart.”
“It was only a few drops,” said Lady Sylvia.
“Why go through all the trouble?” he asked, though he could guess the answer.
“I need money. Desperately.” She looked at Orlov with pleading eyes. “My debts in Town were mounting and my creditors were growing more impatient. You have no idea how clutch-fisted my aunt is. Just because she was shunned by Society, she has no sympathy for the great expense required to be part of the beau monde . I was left with no other choice.”
Sensing the coldness of his stare, Lady Sylvia left off the litany of complaints. After a moment of silence, she went on .
“It was all meant to be harmless. Disguised so that Helen and Annabelle wouldn’t recognize him, Randall’s valet was to stop the coach and take the children to an abandoned gamekeeper’s cottage that we discovered during our morning rides. A ransom note would follow, instructing Lady Octavia where to leave the money. The amount was not so very great—and by handling all the details of the exchange we thought to gain her good graces as well.” She bit her lip. “It all seemed so simple on paper. You must believe me that we never planned to use any weapons. I swear, I have never seen the fellow who attacked the carriage.”
“And yet, your coachman lies murdered in cold blood.” Orlov frowned. “It seems too much of a coincidence that some stranger chose your carriage out of the blue. Did anyone else know of your plans?”
A sudden hiccup from Annabelle drew his attention. An unpleasant sensation skated up his spine.
“Miss Annabelle?” he said softly. “Have you something to say?”
The girl looked scared to death by the mention of a killer. “No, no, no, it couldn’t be,” she stammered. “He’s a gentleman. ”
Shannon swore under her breath, echoing his own sentiments.
“The gentleman you were secretly meeting in the woods? Lord . . . Nobody?”
Talcott roused himself enough to snarl at Helen. “ You were supposed to be keeping an eye on the chit, not let some Yorkshire looby lift her skirts.”
“I’m bloody tired of trying to keep scandal from our door. You try taking some responsibility for this mess, rather than reaching for a bottle of brandy or a deck of cards.”
They eyed each other with mutual loathing, too exhausted to continue the fight. No doubt it would resume again, now that the first overt salvo had been fired, thought Orlov. It was about time that Helen had mustered the backbone to stand up for herself.
But that Talcott skirmish was not the main battle. He looked back to Annabelle and nodded for her to continue.
She dabbed at her red-rimmed eyes. “Y-yes. He said he wanted to m-marry me. But first he needed to wrest his rightful inheritance from that spiteful old bat, Lady Octavia. He never said anything about m-murder!”
“Lady Octavia?” repeated Shannon, her expression turning incredulous
“Yes. You see, she is his grandfather’s sister, and a clutch-fisted miser who has kept a generous bequest from dear Stephen . . .” It took much stuttering and gulping, but the story finally came out—a woeful tale of an impoverished gentleman, denied his due by a rich, spiteful dowager. All her swain needed was his true love to help right a wrong in order to have a fairy tale ending.
“He was working out a plan to take the children, and then return them in exchange for the money that was rightfully his. So when I heard last night that Sylvia meant to bring the children along on our ride to the abbey, I left a note for him in our secret spot, telling him of the outing . . .”
Shannon’s disbelief grew more evident with each tearful word. “Ye gods, you have been reading far too many horrid novels,” she finally snapped, cutting short the last, woeful wail .
“Stephen,” muttered Orlov, trying to sharpen the vague stirring of disquiet hovering at the edge of his conscious thought. “He called himself Stephen.”
“Etienne in French,” offered the comte. “Is that not the name you mentioned earlier, Mademoiselle Sloane?”
“D’Etienne,” said Shannon
Everything suddenly snapped into focus.
“Damn!” said Orlov. “How could I have missed?—”
Before he could finish, he found himself thrown against a glass front cabinet as a deafening explosion rocked the room. Shards crackling under his boots, he skidded across the floor to where Shannon lay wrestling with a large marble plinth that had fallen on her leg.
“Are you alright?”
She nodded, though her face was a mask of pain. “The Tower—we must get to the Tower.”
He helped her up. Through the first swirls of acrid smoke, he saw that Jervis had been knocked unconscious by a section of ceiling molding. The ladies—for once mercifully silent—were huddled in a circle, while Talcott had taken cover under a chair. Only the comte, his face dusted with crumbled plaster, was making any attempt to clear away the debris.
“De Villiers!” cried Orlov over the rumble of s second blast. “The carriage is still outside. Gather your friends and servants and try to make your way to Boath. Alert the authorities there!”
The comte signaled his understanding.
“Alexandr!”
He jumped aside at Shannon’s warning, just as a ceiling timber came crashing down.
“Come on!” She paused just long enough to take down a small crossbow from the wall of weaponry. “This way! ”
The corridor was filled with a black, billowing smoke. Mixed with the moonlight, it had a strange, otherworldly luminance. Beautiful but deadly. Tearing his gaze from the spectral sight, he saw Shannon was limping.
“It’s not so bad,” she said, catching his glance. “Bruised, I think, not broken.”She quickened her pace. “Hurry.”
“A moment.” Orlov caught her sleeve and spun her around into his arms. He held her for a heartbeat, brushing his lips to her cut cheek. She tasted of smoke and salt, of blood and valor. “ Ya lublu tebya.”
Her singed lashes fluttered, hiding her eyes.
Had she heard him? The words ‘I love you’ were so foreign on his tongue that he wasn’t even sure he had spoken aloud.
“We must hurry,” she repeated.
He took her hand andbroke into a run.
The oaken door to the Tower stairs was still intact and locked from within. A good sign, hoped Orlov, as he pounded on the paneling. “Lady Octavia! Open up!”
The deadbolt slid back. “About time, young man. I was beginning to think I would have to take matters into my own hands.” The dowager, her walking stick held at the ready, had possessed enough presence of mind to bring the children down to the first floor parlor.
“It sounds like one of Uncle Angus’s experiments,” said Emma.
“Or the broadside of a pirate ship. Are we under attack, Mr. Oliver?” asked Prescott.
“Aye, lad,” he answered grimly. “But the boarders will soon see they are no match for our crew.” He felt his pockets. One pistol, and a blade in his boot. Added to the dowager’s stick and the medieval mechanism in Shannon’s hands, it was not much of a match for the enemy’s firepower.
As if reading his thoughts, Shannon said, “The first order of business is to get the children and Lady Octavia to a safe place.”
“Right.” Ignoring the dowager’s snort of protest, Orlov thought for a moment. “We’ll head back through the kitchen and out to the gardens. They can take shelter in the root cellar while we circle back to finish the fight.” He was already making a mental calculation of the distance. He should be able to carry both children and still help Lady Octavia, if need be.
But as he reopened the door, a wall of flames drove him back. “Bloody hell,” he swore over the heated roar of sparks“He’s used naphtha.“
“Greek fire,” muttered Shannon. “Damn, we’ve no hope of extinguishing it. Not with the resources at hand.” She eyed the way leading back up to the dowager’s quarters. “We can’t stay here—the smoke and heat will soon be overpowering. Much as I hate to say it, I don’t see any alternative but to retreat to the upper floors.”
“Wait! There is a hidden set of stairs leading to the cellar behind the far bookcase,” piped up Lady Octavia. “The first laird was a Papist and built this castle with a number of secret priest holes and escape routes.”
“Bless him,” murmured Orlov, wiping the smear of soot and sweat from his brow. “Show me where.”
“All the doors in this section of the cellar are locked shut,” reminded Shannon. “We made sure no one could break in—or out. Even the connecting passages have been closed off. The forged steel ismade to military specifications. It won’t yield to picks or hammers. Without the keys we will be trapped. ”
“Perhaps not,” replied the dowager. “We will come out in the area Angus used as a work room and wine cellar. If you shift the casks of ale, you will find an iron grating that can be removed with a knife blade. Behind it, there is an underground passageway that leads to a trapdoor by the edge of the lower terrace.”
“How on earth did you discover that?” asked Shannon.
“With two mischievous lads to keep track of, I daresay I know every nook and cranny of this place.” She tapped her walking stick to two of the intertwined acanthus leaves carved into the molding. “Press here, Mr. Oliver, and here. It takes a bit more muscle than I possess these days.”
He did as he was bade, and a section of shelving slowly pivoted on groaning hinges, revealing a sliver of space between the waxed wood.
“Quickly now,” urged Orlov. A noxious smoke was already seeping into the room. He helped the others to squeeze through, then hit the molding again and ducked inside.
Setting down the weapon she had grabbed from the medieval display, Shannon loosened her bodice and fumbled for the candle she had stuck inside her shirt. The layers of wool and linen were a cursed encumbrance. Her leg was aching, and the tangle of singed skirts was only slowing her down. As the wick flared to life from the spark of her flint, she stripped off her gown and tossed it aside.
Orlov paused in passing to eye her snug-fitting buckskins. “Has anyone told you how lovely you look in leather? ”
“Stop ogling my legs and pry that lock off the gate to the wine cellar.”
“I would rather drink my fill of your luscious form.” His light laugh tickled at her ear. Soft, sensuous .
Damnation, she needed to keep her mind on military tactics, not the way his lips had felt on her scraped cheek, whispering a few words. Strange, but for a fleeting moment back in the corridor, she thought he had said . . .
Amidst all the crackle and thunder, she must have misheard his murmur. Alexandr Orlov had made no bones about his aversion to emotional entanglements. They were friends, yes, and lovers. But when the smoke cleared, he would drift off to some new adventure, some new mistress.
She drew back. “Linger too long in flirtation, and we all may end up with our throats cut.”
“A sobering thought.” Orlov looked around the aureole of light cast by the candle. Spotting a length of iron lying among a jumble of old wood balusters, he grabbed it up and thrust it through the iron loop. A quick twist and the hasp snapped open.
“Scottie, come hold this flame aloft,” he called.
Shannon handed over the candle to the lad and moved awkwardly to Orlov’s side. Together they shifted the barrels of ale away from the wall. The grate was thick with rust and the tunnel entrance was covered in cobwebs and mouse droppings. Peering closer, she saw the passageway was barely more than a crawl space.
“When was the last time this was used?”
“A number of years ago,” admitted the dowager.
“I don’t like the looks of it,” she said slowly. “In a wet climate such as this, the earth is likely to be unstable. The smallest bump could cause it to collapse .
Orlov loosened the last screw and set the metal covering aside. “It looks to be carved out of rock,” he called as he dropped to his belly and slithered inside. His voice sounded strangely muffled, as if swathed in silk rather than stone. “An easy traverse. The distance can’t be very great.
“Alexandr, come out of there,” she snapped. It was, she knew, unreasonable to feel so uneasy. “At once.”
He reappeared a moment later, his hair matted with mud and several substances she did not care to identify. “What’s amiss?”
“I—I am not sure.” She shifted her stance, feeling a fool. Lud, her nerves were so jumpy that it seemed the earth was moving under her feet. She eased the weight off her injured leg, hoping to steady her thoughts. But the tremors grew more pronounced. An ominous rumbling, like the thunder of fast-approaching stormclouds, reverberated off the walls.
Her knee buckled as the force of a deafening explosion pitched her forward. Orlov caught her and took the brunt of the blow as they fell against the iron gate. Smoke and ash billowed from the tunnel, the acrid smell of burnt chemicals mixing with the earthier scent of decayed leaves. The sound deadened to a dull roaring in her ears.
“Lady Octavia!” It took a moment for the gun-grey swirls to dissipate.
“Here!”Her silvery head bobbed up from under the workbench. “And all in one piece.”
“We all are, thanks to Shannon,” said Orlov. “How did you know?”
She couldn’t explain it, not even to herself. “I sensed you were in danger.”
“A magical Merlin,” he murmured. His fingers twined in the delicate chain around her throat, caressing the silver hawk. “It seems you are my lucky charm.”
Her pulse thudded against his palm. The thought of how close she had come to losing him made her shudder.
“D’Etienne obviously had a chance make a careful survey of the terraces while we were otherwise engaged,” said Orlov in a louder voice. “His eye doesn’t miss much.”
The reminder sent a shiver down her spine.
“Sit down,” murmured Orlov. “Your leg needs a rest.” He dusted a corner of the workbench.
“I don’t need to?—”
“Sit!” he commanded. “Or must I sweep you off your feet?”
Shannon perched a hip on the scarred wood.
Orlov leaned in, his hand resting lightly on her thigh. His touch had come to feel like a part of her. When this mission was over . . .
She would worry about that when the time came. If the time came. Despite the bantering humor, she had seen in Orlov’s eyes that he, too, recognized the seriousness of the situation. It seemed that D’Etienne had switched tactics. He was no longer concerned with taking the children alive.
Her hands fisted in frustration. Their own expertise had come back to haunt them. With the tunnel sealed off, they had no way out.
D’Etienne could break his way in. But why would he bother to risk a hand-to-hand confrontation? It would be hours before any help could be mustered from the village. Given his deadly skill with explosives, he could take his time in setting a number of charges that would bring this part of the castle crashing down on their heads .
Dismay must have shown on her face, for Orlov began to whistle a spirited tune. Handel. Music for Royal Fireworks .
She felt her eyes light with silent laughter.
“Don’t be alarmed, Lady Octavia,” he said in between stanzas. “We shall find a way out of here, if I have to dig our way to Cathay with a teaspoon.” He took a turn around the perimeter of the workroom, pausing at the door leading out to the firewood shed.
“Alarmed? Hmmph.” The dowager had lost her stick but not her doughty resolve. “If he imagines he can frighten the mother of Angus McAllister with a paltry display of fireworks, he can think again.”
Emma shook the soot from her braid. “Uncle’s pyrotechnics make a much louder bang,” she said with some pride.
‘That’s because he takes special care preparing the ingredients,” added Prescott. “He says it is an art as well as a science.”
An all too lethal art. Shannon watched as Orlov probed at the latch and the thick doorframe with his knife.
“No use,” he said without looking up. “It would take a strong explosion to knock the door off its hinges.” He shook his head before she could ask. “I have only a small bit of powder for the pistol. Not even enough to make a dent in the oak.”
Prescott cleared his throat. “Mr. Oliver?”
“Yes, lad?”
“Would it help if we could make up a batch of our own gunpowder?”
“It would help a great deal. ”
“I’ve seen where Uncle Angus keeps a supply of saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal.”
“And where he hides the key to the lockbox,” chimed in Emma. “Though we’re not supposed to know he has such things in the castle.” She bit her lip. “I know we were wrong to peek. Will Uncle punish us?
“Don’t make a habit of spying,” said Shannon. McAllister had obviously taken a great deal of trouble to hide the hazardous material from his niece and nephew. However, he ought to have remembered from his own hair-raising exploits that children had an uncanny knack for uncovering secrets. “But in this case, I think we may show a little leniency.”
The siblings looked greatly relieved.
“The case is stored in the crate marked ‘Wool.’” Prescott pointed to a workbench piled high with assorted boxes and baskets. “The key is tucked inside the glove on the wall.”
Orlov dug a large iron box out from its sheepskin wrappings while Shannon took the old hawking gauntlet from its hook. It was stiff with age, but sure enough, when she turned it upside down and shook it, a small brass key fell out.
The oiled lock on the box opened with a soft snick. A marble mortar and pestle, much blackened from use, lay beside three brass canisters.
Saltpeter. Sulfur. Charcoal. The Chinese called their invention ‘firedrug’, a potent elixir of ying and yang —the cool essence of the female mixed with the hot spark of the male. Fire and ice. Shannon felt a bit giddy with hope that such alchemy would be their salvation.
“I’ve never actually made my own powder,” murmured Orlov. “Have you? ”
“It was a basic requirement in my school,” she replied. “We were put through a rigorous course of study.”
“I should like to attend that school,” said Emma from her seat in the shadows. “Rather than the horrid places that Mrs. Kelso describes, where young ladies must learn things like how to curtsey to a duke.”
Shannon smiled as she broke up a piece of charred willowbark and began to grind it to a fine powder. “Mr. Oliver and I will talk to your father about what school would be best for you, elf, if ever he feels you should be sent to a boarding school.”
“Is there a school for pirates?” asked Prescott hopefully. “The curate says all lords must go to Eton for their education, but it sounds very boring.”
“I have some other recommendations I shall discuss with your Papa, lad,” replied Orlov. He watched her open the sulfur canister and add several pinches of the pungent yellow substance to the pestle. His tone turned a bit more tentative. “I trust you received a passing grade.”
“I wouldn’t be here if I had failed.” Shannon looked up to find the children had crept closer to the table and were watching the procedure with great interest. Giving silent thanks for their eccentric upbringing, she decided that a lesson might be the best way to keep their attention occupied. They were, after all, a captive audience, so to speak.
“What I’m doing here is combining these three ingredients—charcoal, saltpeter and sulfur—in just the right proportions to make an explosion strong enough to blow the shed door from its hinges.”
The children nodded solemnly.
It was the Chinese who invented gunpowder, you know,” she continued. “For centuries it was used for magic tricks and celebrations.”
“While Western civilization decided to put it to a more practical use,” said Orlov dryly.
“The Chinese experimented with its use in warfare, too,” replied Shannon. “They created fire arrows, rockets and incendiary bombs for their catapults.” She took a moment to make an inventory of the other items in the lockbox. Fuses, a wad of sticky pine resin, an oval corning screen—all the basics were there.
“And cannons,” said Prescott. “Uncle Angus said one of the very first ones was called the ‘Nine-Arrow-Heart-Piercing-Magic-Poison Thunderous Fire Erupter.’”
“But it was quite crude,” commented Emma.
“Quite,” repeated Shannon. Molding the pine resin into a squat cylinder she lit it with the guttering stub of the candle. The substance would burn brighter and longer than wax. “Will you pass me the saltpeter, elf?” She reached for a measuring spoon. “One of the first great European battles won with the help of gunpowder was Crecy, where King Edward III used his new firepower to rout the French knights.”
Prescott mustered a martial scowl. “We will beat them this time, too. Though Uncle Angus says Napoleon is a very clever general, because he was first an artillery officer.”
“He’s not nearly as clever as your uncle,” said Orlov. “Or Miss Sloane. As you see, Scottie, females are every bit as capable of military prowess as men.” Leaning back on his elbows, he waggled a brow. “Perhaps we ought to retreat to the wine cellar and uncork a fine claret, seeing as the ladies are doing all the hard work.”
The lad’s eyes lit up. “Or a bottle of rum? ”
Shannon rolled her eyes at Orlov. “Be grateful I did not order you to drain McAllister’s brandy collection and then piss in a pot.”
His arms nearly slipped out from under him. “What!”
“I’m deadly serious.” She kept up her grinding. “The best gunpowder is said to be made from the chamberpots of bishops who imbibe brandy. The contents were boiled down for the nitrates and then . . . never mind the rest of the details.”
“Thank god,” he muttered. “If celibacy is part of the mix, we would have been doomed.”
“What’s celerbercy?” asked Emma. “Does Uncle put it in his powder?”
“I would rather you didn’t ask him,” said Shannon quickly, slanting a reproving look at Orlov. His look of unholy amusement had returned.
“Forgive me for raising another uncomfortable question, but ought we try to stop the smoke that is coming in under the door?” Lady Octavia, who had been unnaturally quiet for the last little while, pointed to the thick white fingers of vapor that were creeping in from under the doorway to the woodshed terrace. “It has a most unpleasant smell.”
“Damn,” Wiping the smile from his face, Orlov, pulled off his coat and stuffed it in around the crack. “ Sal ammoniac ,” he muttered after a tentative sniff set him to coughing.
A powerful poison, used in early smoke bombs. Shannon’s lips set in a grim line as she hurried her final preparations. So D’Etienne was also well-schooled in the alchemy of death .
“Find a metal container and cover,” she said to Orlov. “Somethingheavy.”
“Are you going to blast the bastard to Kingdom come?” demanded Prescott in a muffled voice. The dowager had gathered the children and covered their face with the silk skirting of her gown.
“First we are going to try to blow this door open, Scottie.” Deciding to overlook the lad’s bad language, Shannon scooped out a small indentation in the earthen floor by the outer door. “Then we will deal with the, er, bad?—”
“The bastard won’t stand a chance against Miss Sloane. She will gut him like a lake trout if she gets her hands on him,” said Lady Octavia through the lace of her handkerchief. “I hope you will allow me to hand you the fillet knife.”
“For now, would you mind tossing me the coil of matchfuse by your elbow. And Scottie, will you please fetch the crossbow I left by the foot of the secret steps.”
“Would that you had grabbed a blunderbuss from the wall,” quipped Lady Octavia. “I fear that old-fashioned arrows aren’t going to be of much good against the Frenchman’s firepower.”
Shannon kept up her grinding. “One never knows.”
“Speaking of firepower, have we a plan, once we blow the door open?” asked the dowager.
“Our original idea still seems the safest bet. Mr. Oliver will help you and the children to the shelter of the root cellar, while I create a diversion to draw D’Etienne’s attention.”
“I was beginning to think I was considered quite superfluous here,” drawled Orlov. His tone was nonchalant but his movements were swift, sure .
“Men have some useful purposes.” She grinned, in spite of the fact that her lips were so encrusted in cordite they felt about to crack.
Orlov grinned back, a half moon sliver of pearly white against the blackness of the cellar walls.
“I am glad to see you have finally discovered that, Miss Sloane.” Lady Octavia chortled. “I was beginning to worry about you.”
She hoped the coating of black powder on her face was thick enough to hide her blush. Did the dowager know of their new intimacy? Or was it merely a shot in the dark?
Shifting the light closer to her work, Shannon ducked down to examine the texture. Not perfect, but it would do. “Any luck with a container?”
A cast-off cooking pot thunked down upon the worktable. The handle was broken but the walls were over a quarter inch in thickness. “I found a roll of baling wire as well,” added Orlov. ‘Once everything is ready, I’ll make sure the lid is tied on tight as a drum.”
“Excellent.”
He cut off a length of the fuse. “Thirty seconds?”
“More than enough time.” She emptied the contents of the mortar into the pot. “Lady Octavia, kindly take the children into the wine cellar and take cover behind the ale casks. We shall join you momentarily.”
Moving to the doorway, Orlov made a few quick measurements. “I’ve moved your hole slightly to the left and added an inch of depth,” he said as he returned to wire the lid in place.
After a few mental calculations she nodded.
He carried it over and positioned it in place, carefully patting the dirt around the base. The fuse lay like a languid snake upon the earthen floor, waiting for a spark to ignite its strike.
“Ready when you are.”
Shannon drew in a deep breath, and set the flame to the tail.