Chapter 12
Conor sat atop his snorting stallion and stared across the open field at Maurice de Saint Michael and his forces assembled in formation three-deep.
He hadn’t needed to send a messenger to announce their presence, for the baron’s watchmen atop the castle walls had clearly raised the alarm that Conor and his clansmen had arrived at the outskirts of Athy.
The late afternoon sun sinking toward the horizon after the arduous hours-long ride from Glenmalure during which they had stopped only to water the horses and partake of oatcakes and strips of dried venison—although Conor hadn’t eaten much and neither had Annalise.
They had spoken little to each other, as if the terrible gravity of their journey had rendered them both mute, but Conor had decided it was best that way.
Annalise looked as distressed as he felt…
especially now when the ransom exchange was only moments away.
Joffrey and his two O’Byrne guards had already ridden ahead to give Ronan’s warning to Maurice and then returned to the opposite side of the field, and now the steward appeared to tremble from head to foot as he glanced nervously at Conor.
“Lord, I am done here, yes? I am no fighter—ah, God, allow me to leave for Dublin, where I may board a ship to take me home to my wife and family—”
“Go on with you, man.”
At first Joffrey appeared wholly startled, but after a nod at Annalise, he veered his horse around to the east and rode off at a hard gallop…never once looking back.
Halfway into their journey, the steward had told Conor of the death of Annalise’s father that he had kept to himself since returning from Athy the day before—not wishing to bring more grief to his mistress.
For that kindness alone, Conor had already decided to allow Joffrey to return to England. Now it would be Maurice to give Annalise the sad news since Conor hadn’t wanted to cause her further distress, either—God grant him strength!
How was he to get through these next moments with his clansmen watching him to see if he faltered? Conor had never felt more torn in his life between his duty to obey his father’s decree for the sake of his clan and his overwhelming desire to ride straight back to Glenmalure with Annalise.
She met his eyes as Maurice gestured across the field for the exchange to begin, Conor unable to resist reaching out his hand to clasp Annalise’s.
“Remember…no matter what occurs,” he murmured for her ears alone as he squeezed her trembling fingers, as if to reassure her as much as himself.
Her eyes welling though he could see that she fought to maintain her composure, and gave him a small nod as she whispered, “Remember…I love you, Conor O’Byrne…always.”
Conor swallowed hard and had all he could do to release her hand—by God, he would not give up hope, he could not! Somehow he forced himself to take the reins of her mare and watch grimly as one of Saint Michael’s knights set out across the field, an oblong chest held under his arm.
That accursed ransom…
“My lord, we outnumber them by four to one. Mayhap there is no need for an exchange of ransom at all—”
“Didn’t you hear that scrawny steward?” Maurice cut off his knight through gritted teeth as he and his men faced nearly two score Irish rebels just outside Athy, in truth his fingers itching to unsheathe his sword.
“If we attack now, my bride might be killed in the fray. We will proceed with the agreed upon plan at least until the exchange is done, and then…”
Maurice couldn’t finish for the rage tightening his throat as another of his knights rode into the middle of the field holding a brass-bound chest in the crook of his arm.
A ransom in gold to secure Annalise’s release, Maurice deciding then and there he would make her pay for this indignity every day of their married life—since he blamed her for not insisting that her entourage wait upon repairs to their ship instead of venturing into the Wicklow mountains.
His fury only intensified as she was escorted on horseback onto the field by the rebel leader Joffrey had informed him was the very son of Ronan O’Byrne, a whelp named Conor.
Their mounts too close together to suit Maurice, who ground his teeth now at the lingering glance Annalise gave her black-haired captor, her fair cheeks flushed pink and her expression stricken.
What devilry was afoot here? Maurice didn’t miss, either, the similar glance Conor gave Annalise, though his jaw was tight and his expression somber. By God, if that bastard had so much as touched her…
“The Irishman is inspecting the ransom—”
“I can see that, man!” Maurice bit off to his knight as he caught a glimmer of gold coin in the late afternoon sunlight.
His gold, damn it all, now in rebel hands as his knight took the reins of Annalise’s horse to lead her toward Maurice, the exchange done.
Conor O’Byrne rode back to his clansmen with the chest while Maurice waited impatiently for Annalise to reach him, her face ashen and her eyes welled with tears.
Another long glance over her shoulder telling him everything as his gut clenched in white-hot rage. When she drew alongside him, he reached out to slap her so violently that she nearly toppled from her horse, until he caught her roughly by the arm to right her.
“Do you come to me pure and virginal, woman? Or mayhap that Irish bastard plowed you before me?”
Maurice got his answer by the defiant tilt of Annalise’s chin as she stared at him with tears running down her cheeks—and he waited no longer to sound the attack.
“Kill them! Kill them all!”
A great roar went up from his men even as piercing war cries unexpectedly came from within the town behind them.
The acrid stench of smoke now tinging the air as Maurice twisted around in his saddle to see towering flames from the direction of the castle.
Stunned, he grabbed Annalise from her horse to pull her onto his lap and then dug his heels into his mount’s sides, shouting out for his men to follow him.
A great thundering of hooves and more war cries filling his ears while townspeople on every side—mostly women and children—shook their fists and spat at him and his knights as they galloped through the winding streets.
Yet no sooner had they reached the iron-reinforced gate yawning open—his men-at-arms’ quarters outside the castle walls fully engulfed in flames—than Maurice incredulously realized they were under attack by the townsmen of Athy.
Deadly arrows suddenly whizzing all around them and striking his knights one by one behind him while Maurice rode across the drawbridge and into the bailey filled with men engaged in mortal combat.
The ground already soaked with blood, but he didn’t stop until he had reached the entrance to the great hall, where he dismounted and pulled Annalise with him.
She struggled wildly, but another blow made her go limp against him and he threw her over his shoulder before lunging through the entranceway.
His only thought to climb the tower where he would barricade himself inside his bedchamber on the uppermost floor until his knights and men-at-arms regained control of the castle.
Shopkeepers and tradesmen were no match for his seasoned fighters, Maurice grunting with disgust as he charged up the tower steps.
God’s blood, he would slit the throats himself of any townsmen left standing and hang their severed heads on pikes for all to see!
Breathing hard, he rushed into his bedchamber, but before he could shut and bolt the door, he heard someone laugh from off to the side.
A harsh masculine laugh that sounded triumphant as Maurice turned to face a hulking figure of a man dressed in a blacksmith’s garb.
“How do you like our welcome for you and your bride-to-be, Baron Saint Michael? While you were on the outskirts of town with most of your men, we attacked your castle—ah, but we’re only ignorant folk, aye?
Too stupid and spineless to fight back when you plunder our homes and rape our daughters—my daughter, you Norman bastard! ”
Maurice backed up and dropped Annalise, moaning, to the floor to yank out his sword, but already the blacksmith charged toward him.
A huge axe in his hand that barely missed Maurice’s head as he dodged the blow and lunged into the center of the room where he had a better chance of fighting off the attack—for clearly the blacksmith intended to kill him.
“I don’t know what you speak of—by God, if anyone is to blame, it’s my knights!”
“You lie, Saint Michael, my daughter, Tressa, uttered your name with her last breath. You ravished her first and then gave her to your men like the filthy beasts you are and dumped her into the street to die. My only child!”
Maurice sucked in a breath as he dodged another death blow, his sword sinking into the blacksmith’s left shoulder that should have felled him as the man screamed in anguished rage and agony.
Yet his opponent was so big, so muscular that it would take more to bring him down even as smoke billowed into the bedchamber, Maurice realizing that the tower was on fire.
He threw a glance at Annalise, who had regained consciousness and was crawling on hands and knees toward the door, but he could do nothing to stop her as the blacksmith swung at him again.
This time Maurice didn’t move fast enough and the axe blade sliced his right arm, an intense wave of pain nearly blinding him as he tried to lift his sword.
Yet it wasn’t the blacksmith’s axe swinging toward his neck but a sword as if out of nowhere in a swirl of black cloak.
No sound but a gasp of surprise coming from Maurice as blood exploded before his eyes and he slumped to his knees, blackness engulfing him.
“Annalise!”
Coughing from the smoke, she lifted her head to see Conor lowering his bloody sword while the blacksmith sank his axe into Maurice’s lifeless body and then staggered toward her.
He was dying, she could tell, his lifeblood spilling down his dark leather apron from the deep gash in his shoulder.
Yet somehow the man seemed to rally as he pulled a wicked-looking knife from his belt, though Conor lunged between them.
“No! She is to be my wife—”
“By God, man, a Norman?” the blacksmith countered in disbelief, blood trickling now from his mouth.
“Aye, this marriage to Saint Michael was not her wish or choosing—and she is innocent of your daughter’s death. I heard your words as I ran up the last steps. Let us help you from the tower before the floors collapse—”
“No, nothing will save me now. Take your woman and go…and may this accursed castle be razed to the ground.”
Annalise winced at the throbbing in her head as the smoke thickened, Conor coughing now, too, as he uttered, “As the son of Ronan O’Byrne…you have my eternal gratitude.”
Now the blacksmith seemed to raise himself up to stare at Conor and then at Annalise.
“A famed chieftain’s son…aye, then it is well that I die here.
The fire will consume me to ash and that one there”—the blacksmith turned his head and spat upon Maurice’s body—“so the Normans will believe her dead, too. May they never trouble you in your Wicklow mountains—ah, God, go now. Go!”
With an agonized sigh, the blacksmith collapsed to the floor near Maurice as Annalise was swept up into Conor’s arms and he covered her with a blanket he had wrested from the bed.
Her eyes tearing from the thick smoke and such overwhelming relief that she couldn’t have said a word while Conor held her against him and lunged down the steps.
He didn’t uncover her even when she felt him hoist himself onto a horse and spur the creature into a hard gallop with the sounds of battle still raging around them.
Annalise thought she might suffocate for how long he rode before stopping at last to draw the blanket from her head—his kisses raining down upon her forehead, her tear-stained cheeks, until lastly, he claimed her lips.
When he lifted his head a moment later, he was staring down at her as if he couldn’t believe he held her in his arms…his face covered in soot and his hair damp with sweat.
They both reeked of smoke, while around them, she saw that his clansmen were gathered in the field where she had thought she would never see Conor again.
“I commanded they wait for me here…I didn’t want any of their deaths on my hands. If I didn’t come back with you, they were to return to Glenmalure and tell my father I died trying to save the woman I love—but you live, Annalise, my love, my heart!”
“And you live, my beloved,” she whispered against his lips when he bent his head to kiss her again. “Take me home to your people…my people. It’s time we were properly married, yes?”
His husky laughter caught her by surprise for she had rarely heard it since she had known him, but when he drew back and smiled at her, she laughed softly, too, her heart soaring.
“Aye, Annalise, it’s time you become a true O’Byrne bride.”