Chapter Thirteen #3
“Please,” Emelisse whispered hoarsely. “I must see him. Please let me see him.”
Caius heard her heartbreaking plea. He turned to the old soldier again.
“Please open the door,” he said. “I am not asking you to surrender the keep, but the lady has a right to see her brother.”
The old man hesitated a moment before nodding wearily. “And you’ll keep those Winterhold bastards away?”
“I will.” Caius leaned in Morgan’s direction and muttered. “Once Hallam has the Winterhold men out of the bailey, put our escort at the gatehouse to block them from entering again. And find Maxton; I want him on the gate, also. Keep them out while we are conducting our business.”
Morgan nodded and rushed off. Meanwhile, the old man had disappeared and Caius went to Emelisse, who was standing there with her head down, trying desperately not to collapse.
First her father, now her brother… Caius could only imagine what she was feeling.
Gently, he reached out and took her by the elbow.
“Come, my lady,” he said softly. “Let us see your brother.”
Emelisse nodded and looked up at him, trying very hard to be brave.
He’d called her brave, once, and somehow, she didn’t want to disappoint him.
She would be brave. But the moment she looked into his sympathetic face, a man she was coming to view as her savior, her features crumpled and she ended up burying her face against his chest.
Shocked, Caius wasn’t sure what to do. With Morgan gone and William now beneath the keep door as those inside labored to open it, he was virtually alone with Emelisse.
The woman was seeking comfort, perhaps from him personally because she felt safe with him.
He gave her a sense of security, of hope, things she desperately needed at the moment.
It wasn’t as if she had anyone else to turn to.
Throwing caution to the wind, Caius put his arms around her and held her tightly in one of the better moments of his life. She was so sweet and soft and warm.
His heart began to race, just a little.
“Be brave just a while longer, please,” he murmured into the top of her head. “Caspian is waiting.”
She was pressed up against him, burrowing deep as her body shook with sobs. But his soothing words had her pulling away, taking deep breaths to force away the tears. She wiped furiously at her wet face.
“Of course,” she said. “Forgive me. I mustn’t keep him waiting.”
Caius was sorry she’d pulled away, but he was glad at the same time. He’d very much liked the feeling of her in his arms, but he also did not want anyone to think he was sympathetic towards her, considering that he was trying to maintain a mostly neutral position in all of this.
But that was a lie.
He wasn’t neutral at all.
With a grip on her elbow, Caius gently led her to the spot where William was standing just as those inside managed to free the entry door and yank it open.
Dust and bits of snow and wood rained down upon them, and Emelisse brushed the debris from her shoulders and from her carefully coiffed head.
She looked up, seeing the old soldier standing in the entry.
As she watched, a worn ladder was lowered from the doorway.
She stepped back as the ladder found its footing at the base of the keep. Caius helped steady the ladder to make sure it did not slip out from underneath whoever might be climbing it, because in this case, it would be Emelisse. When she moved to mount the ladder first, he held her back.
“For safety’s sake, I will enter first,” he said. “Come up after me.”
Emelisse didn’t argue with him. She stood back, watching his big frame mount the ladder and climb lithely to the top. As he came off the ladder, he crouched down next to it and held it steady for her.
“Come along, my lady,” he said.
Emelisse obeyed, taking the rungs of the ladder cautiously because her dress was so long. She was afraid she was going to step on it and end up falling back into the muddy snow. She was just nearing the top when Caius reached out and grasped her, helping her up the last two rungs.
Finally, she was home.
Emelisse took a moment, simply breathing it all in.
This was the place where she had spent most of her time, as a child and even as an adult.
This was where she had most of her fondest memories and the smell of the keep flooded into her senses, filling her with memories of the family she no longer had.
The memories were both beautiful and taunting, causing her to be terribly torn now that she was finally here.
This had once been the place of her greatest comfort and now it was the source of her greatest pain.
Pain for everything she had lost.
Her gaze fell on the old soldier and she went to him, forcing a smile as she reached out to touch his arm.
“Harcourt,” she said appreciatively. “I am glad to see that you are well.”
The old man’s eyes crinkled, happy to see his young mistress. “And you, my lady.”
“Where is my brother?”
“In his chamber.”
Taking a deep breath for courage, Emelisse headed towards the spiral stairs that were built into the corner of the keep.
One staircase went between all floors and this was the only access.
Mounting the stone stairs, her pace slowed the nearer she drew to the top, knowing what would be waiting for her when she got there.
It was like a bad dream she would never awaken from.
The top floor of the keep had two large chambers.
Her brother had one and she had the other, the larger chamber of the two.
Memories came back to her as she came off the stairwell, seeing the narrow landing that separated the two chambers.
As children, she and her brother would fight over why she had the larger chamber.
A smile came to her lips as she remembered her brother, quite young, and his determination to confiscate her chamber on behalf of his greedy little heart.
Caspian always thought he should have had the larger of the two since he was not only the male of the family, but the eldest. It had been a source of contention when they were younger, and he had seen the need to try and lay siege to her chamber door many times, but her father would always beat him back.
Funny how she remembered that now.
She found it ironic that the smaller chamber he felt so beneath him had now become his final resting place, and more than likely, that was where he had died. But she could not think about that now. When she was feeling stronger, she would ask for the details of his passing.
But not now.
Now, she simply needed to see him.
Caspian’s chamber was dark and cold. As the old chamber door creaked open, Emelisse felt a chill of despair run through her.
It did not seem right to her that her brother should be laying in such a cold and dismal chamber, with the shutters nailed closed against the Winterhold siege.
Caspian had always been such a vital man, always so full of life and so full of opinions.
To see that vital life ended in such a dark and dreary place simply did not seem fitting.
Emelisse’s gaze moved over the room, seeing the familiar objects and familiar sights.
The same old chair was in front of the hearth, and the same old cowhide rug that had been there for many years.
But she looked further, into the shadows of the room, and she could see Caspian’s bed.
It took her a moment to realize that she was looking at his feet as his body lay upon the straw mattress.
Quietly, she made her way over to the bed.
Emelisse wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, but what she saw wasn’t horrific.
Her brother simply looked as if he were sleeping, a peaceful expression upon his ashen face and lips that were a strange shade of blue.
The blond hair was the same, as was the neatly trimmed beard he kept. Everything was the same.
Except he was dead.
The tears returned with a vengeance.
“Oh… Caspian,” she murmured, reaching out to touch the stone-cold flesh.
“I am so sorry it came to this. I am so sorry that I could not help you. But know that I am well and I intend to stay well. There is so much I want to tell you, so much to say, but it all seems so futile now. But trust me when I say that I will do what needs to be done. I promise I will. God bless you and keep you, my darling Cas.”
With that, she bent over and kissed him on his cold forehead, standing next to the bed and holding his stiff, cold fingers.
There wasn’t anything more she could say to him, or anything more she wanted to.
She simply wanted to be with him, to think about a future without her father or brother in a world that was very different from the one she’d always imagined.
Everything, and everyone, she knew was gone.
Behind her, Caius and the others stood in the doorway, watching the tragic scene before them.
It would seem that Emelisse was the only member of the de Thorington family left, and there was great irony in that.
She had been a prize, and she had also been a prisoner, which should have very well been a death sentence.
The woman had no way to fight back, yet she was the last of her family to survive.
Weapons or no weapons, she had managed ably.
Emelisse remained by her brother’s side for quite some time, not speaking, but simply standing.
Caius and the others continued to stand by silently until Caius finally herded everyone out into the dark landing and quietly shut the door, allowing Emelisse some privacy to grieve.
Once they were out on the landing, he faced the old Hawkstone soldier.
“How many men are in this keep?” he asked.
The old man was thoughtful. “Thirty-one, my lord,” he said. “I have them all down in the storage vault below.”
“What is their condition?”
“Some are wounded, but not badly. Mostly, they are cold. We’ve no fuel for fires unless we want to burn our stores, and no one wants to do that.”