Chapter 23
M ary rushed to get a meal served as soon as Brigid and Sandy staggered through the door. She had servants rushing this way and that, until the table was groaning under the weight of bread, cheese, slices of meat, and deliciously sweet fruit.
“Tam and I had no trouble at all,” Mary explained as Brigid stuffed her mouth with slices of a rich smoked cheese. “Edmondson’s men must have all gone after the two of you. We came straight home. We’ve been worrying about you for hours. Tam was considering riding out to look for you.”
“I’m glad he didn’t,” Sandy said. “Edmondson’s men would have spotted him in an instant.”
Brigid had never been so happy to sit down. Her legs absolutely throbbed - had she ever run so far in a single day? Even school cross-country running hadn’t been so difficult. Mary kept putting more food in front of her, and Brigid gratefully accepted it all. She was still utterly exhausted, but the throbbing in her head began to ease. They were safe. They had made it home.
At last, she began to feel a little more like herself again. She even paused eating long enough to take a swig of ale, although she grimaced at the taste.
“So,” she asked the others. “When will we return to Edmondson’s camp? It has to be soon. We might already be too late.”
Her panic began to rise again as she thought of Finn. Was he even still alive? She couldn’t bear to think that he might be gone.
The other three exchanged glances, but no one spoke. Brigid’s panic deepened as her stomach twisted.
“We are going to return,” Brigid insisted. “We can’t let this one failure stop us forever.”
“Don’t worry,” Sandy said hastily, reaching over the table to grip her hands. “We aren’t giving up. Of course not. I wouldn’t do that to you. But there is a new risk now.”
“A new risk?” Brigid asked, frowning. “What do you mean?”
“I worry that Edmondson knows who I am,” Sandy said, his own brow furrowed in a frown. “By now, he must know that your new husband and the highwayman are one and the same. He might use my secrets against me, in the hope I can be pressured into handing you over.”
Brigid’s stomach lurched again. Why had she not thought of this? She’d been so focused on Finn that she hadn’t even noticed all her other weaknesses.
“You wouldn’t betray me, would you?” she asked, her voice shaking.
Three voices assured her that they would sooner die than hand her over.
“You’re my sister now,” Mary said fiercely.
“But Edmondson has no scruples,” Sandy said. “He might act against my people, as well as against me. Before we do anything else, I need to make sure that the Tower and its tenants are safe. It’s a matter of urgency.”
Brigid wanted to tell him he was worrying over nothing. She wanted to tell him that Finn was their priority. But she thought about what she’d seen just a few days ago - those poor people, harassed and threatened over a few vegetables. How much worse would Edmondson’s men be, if they thought it would get them what they wanted?
“I’m going to ride around and speak to a few tenants before dark,” Sandy said, and downed the last of his ale. “Perhaps they can be persuaded to take shelter inside the Tower. Or at least to stay close, in case they need to take refuge behind its walls.”
Sandy’s eyes were dark with tiredness, but his energy seemed never-ending. He really would do anything to help the people who depended on him. How could Brigid have even imagined that her own worries were more important?
“I can come with you,” she offered. “I feel much better now I’ve eaten.”
Sandy looked at her thoughtfully and she tried not to cringe. What was she thinking? The people here hated her the minute she opened her mouth. Sandy would certainly not want her to come along.
But he surprised her.
“I think that might be a good idea,” he said. “I’m sure word has spread about how you rode to the rescue of some of my people. Yes, you should come along.”
Brigid felt oddly vulnerable, leaving the safety of Gillies Tower so soon after their arrival. But a manservant rode with them, and Sandy’s sword hung at his hip. Besides, they would not be going far.
The first tenant they spoke to seemed to take the threat seriously.
“Aye, I’ll come up to the Tower for a night or two,” he said. “No point risking my family out here. If you say there’s danger on the way, then I believe you.”
“There will be room for you all in the stables,” Sandy said. “Hopefully, it won’t be for long. I’ll have all of this sorted out soon.”
“Well, I for one can’t stay away for long,” the man warned. “It will be a long enough walk back to my fields in the morning. I can’t keep that up for long. But I do want to make sure my wife and children are safe.”
Brigid smiled at the man, relieved. One family at least would be safe from Edmondson’s machinations.
But the next tenant was not so cooperative. In fact, he flat-out refused to move - or even to consider it.
“This is my cottage, and my land to farm,” he said firmly. “I’ll not be leaving either for some vague, unlikely threat.”
Of course, Sandy and Brigid could not fully explain the danger to him. With no information beyond a possible threat from some Englishmen, the man had no intention of upsetting his daily routine with a move to Gillies Tower. The next tenant was the same, and the next.
By the time they turned their horses around and rode back to the Tower in the evening light, Brigid felt downright dispirited. Sandy tried so hard to help these people, but they didn’t listen to his warnings.
“Should we go to Gillieston as well?” she asked. “Warn people there?”
Sandy sighed. “I’ve thought about it,” he said. “But there is definitely no room for all the people of Gillieston to take shelter in the tower. At least there are more of them, though. They aren’t quite so alone and vulnerable. Hopefully, they will be fine.”
Brigid bit her lip and tried not to worry about all those people. Edmondson would not attack an entire town, surely?
When all of this began, she hadn’t even considered all the other people involved. She hadn’t thought about how many people might be affected by her determination to rescue Finn.
But she couldn’t let that stop her. She mustn’t let it stop her. Because she had to get Finn free before it was too late, or she would have lost the only person who really, truly loved her.
She needed to persuade Sandy to launch another attack on Edmondson’s camp. And, this time, they wouldn’t fail.