Chapter 26 #2
Weston takes advantage of her careless mistake to get close to him, and grabs hold of her wrist, yanking her firmly into the bars.
A strangled cry erupts as her face slams into the iron, and he reaches for her belt and the weapons stored there.
The other guards are there in an instant, grabbing her by the arms and dragging her out of his reach as she lets out a string of curses.
“Open the fucking cell!” she screams, but I barely register that the guards don’t jump into action.
I’m too busy still reeling over one part of her confession, the part that was the last piece of the puzzle, that final piece of information that makes sense of the worry that started coiling within me from the moment I saw the guards at the gate.
A plan. There’s something bigger happening.
The murmur of a guard in the corridor pulls me from my reverie. “He threatened us if we touched her.”
Brynne’s face twists with rage and disgust. “And none of you can take an unarmed man? There’s one of him and ten of you!”
“Do you want to try?” Weston growls, his shoulders tensing and emphasizing his commanding height.
Brynne looks from him to the group of guards, and there’s a flash of hesitation in her eyes before she yells, “Open it! Now!” Park scrambles forward, pulling the ring of keys off his belt, but Brynne rolls her eyes in frustration.
“Ugh, give me the fucking keys!” She snatches them out of his hand, and fumbles through them, looking for the one that must fit into the lock of the cells.
“Weston,” I plead, using the distraction to sink my fists into his clothes and pull him to face me. “He’s here. Dane’s here.”
It’s the only explanation. The first step in their plan was to infiltrate the castle to get close to me; the second was for me to get the healing waters. Dane always planned to return for my mother. Even after all this time, he couldn’t let her go.
Back on Dawnlin, we wondered where Dane could have gone, where he had disappeared to, and why.
But now, it all clicks, the pieces all fitting together for this plan that has been in place for most of my life.
He came here. For her. And that is why we are locked in the dungeon.
The understanding lights in Weston’s eyes, followed by the hardening of his jaw. The iron lock clangs behind me, and Weston’s hands grip my shoulders, spinning us so he’s between me and the entrance.
“Remember what I told you.” His voice is firm, but his face is pleading, and I blink up at him, my head shaking in disbelief as everything unfolds around us. How could this be happening? Where is my father, Edmond, Tila? How could Brynne do this to me?
“Weston,” I breathe, my breaths starting to rise and fall more rapidly, and his hands wrap around my face.
“Who’s fucking idea was it to put them together? Get him in chains now!” Brynne barks.
“Lennox, tell me you remember.” His voice booms around me as I stare into his eyes, trying to block out the flashes of horrifying possibilities of what the guards might do to him if we’re separated.
My mouth falls open, but no words come out as the guards spill into the cell, led by Guthrie, who stands to the side, barking orders.
We’re outnumbered. He’s unarmed. No one knows we’re here. My dagger will do nothing against all of them.
My limbs won’t move, my body frozen in time as Weston is pulled away from me, his arms wrenched behind his back. Everyone is shouting, their lips moving rapidly, but I hear none of it, just a distant hum as Weston thrashes against their hold, throwing his arms wildly as he strikes at the guards.
A scream pierces my ears when one of them wraps an arm around his throat, squeezing tightly, and the sound comes back in an instant. Weston reaches up to the guard’s arm, grabbing it with both hands and wrenching it away from his windpipe, but another guard acts too quickly.
Metal clangs as manacles snap around his wrists, bound together by a single loop, preventing him from using his arms. His eyes stay locked on me, his jaw clenched tightly, as the guard finally releases his hold, and Weston sucks in a deep breath.
The group drags him backward, and someone reaches out to rip off his cloak before they push him stumbling through the cell door and into the dungeon corridor.
“Her turn,” Brynne says, nodding at me, and another smaller set of guards files through the doorway. My first instinct is to grab my dagger. I can hear Weston’s voice in my mind, telling me exactly that.
Use it if you have to.
But if I reach for it, if I show them I have it, I have this one chance. There are too many of them, and only one blade. It’s better that they don’t know about it.
The guards grip my arms roughly, and yank them out in front of me, shackling them in the same way they did Weston.
“Lennox!” he yells, the warning in his voice clear as the guards next to me stiffen, and I see Park in front of me, clearly nervous despite Weston’s confinement.
“I’m fine,” I call back, even though I feel anything but fine.
I need to snap out of this. I need to find my strength, my training that has been drilled into me, even if my confidence in it wavered the moment Brynne admitted to ensuring I wasn’t as skilled as I should be.
Weston has more than made up for it in the short time I’ve known him, but after watching him be choked, subdued, and shackled in front of me, I don’t feel like the fierce warrior the crew thought I was just last night.
I need to find her.
They pull me through the door, and I stumble and trip on the stones trying to keep up with them.
The guards at my sides yank me upright and continue to shove me along between them as we walk through the dim dungeon toward Brynne.
There are sounds of a scuffle ahead, grunts and scraping of shoes against the stone.
I wrench myself to the side, trying to see past her, only to find Weston struggling against the guards as the group closes in tighter on him.
“Stop her right there.” Brynne steps toward me, closing the distance and towering over me like she always has. Never before have I felt uncomfortable when she did it, but now, after all of her revelations, after the sneer on her face and the hatred in her voice, I don’t want her this close to me.
Their hands fall away from my arms as Brynne narrows her eyes. “Where is it?” she snaps.
My jaw works as I glare at her. “Where is what?” There is only one thing she can be talking about, but I won’t give it up freely. I won’t let her know I still have it. The guards took Weston’s weapons, so there’s a chance she will think I’m unarmed too.
“Don’t play stupid with me. You aren’t in charge here anymore. Tell me where the fuck it is.”
I hold her glare. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
My head snaps to the side as her palm strikes my cheek. The sting of the slap bites into my skin, but the shock and pain was exactly what I needed.
This woman lied to me. She manipulated me, just as Dane did. She was one of the few I trusted, who I thought cared about me, more than just in her role as my guard.
But I was wrong.
And now she is taking over my castle, my kingdom.
She’s hurting the man I love, and helping the one I hate, the one who stole my mother and my life from me.
I will not let her get away with this. I will fight back, because I know that no matter her skills and training, or her belief that she ruined me, I’m smarter than her, and now, I have more to lose.
Dawnlin gave me that.
“Don’t fucking touch her!” Weston thunders, his yell followed by more commotion behind Brynne. Bodies crash together, followed by the sounds of fabric ripping and blows landing. It only adds to my anger, knowing they are hurting him all at her command.
“Get him under control!” Brynne screams. She looks over her shoulder at the group of guards, and I shift just enough to see past her, the sight making bile burn the back of my throat.
Blood drips from a gash on Weston’s forehead, the skin on his face red and swollen from the blows of the guards.
I take in the ripped seams of his uniform, the fabric hanging open with the rest disheveled, and his hands still bound before him as he shoves the men that try to hold him.
I swallow down my emotions when my eyes rise again and land on his, unflinching and only focused on me, as if the beating he’s been taking hasn’t bothered him at all.
I shake my head subtly, and he stills. His jaw remains clenched, his muscles still bulging against the restraint of the guards and the cold iron manacles, but he stops fighting.
This isn’t the place to fight. We can’t get away from them bound and outnumbered as we are, not until the right time, and the more of a beating he takes, the harder it will be for him to fight when he needs to.
“Fucking finally,” Brynne groans before spinning back toward me, her face pinching in frustration.
“Trust me, Lennox, you don’t want to do this the hard way.
” Without warning, she reaches out, her movements rough as she searches my body for weapons.
While Sig treated me, a complete stranger, with respect and dignity as she searched me all that time ago, Brynne shows absolutely no familiarity as she wrenches my body around, tugging at my clothes and searching for my dagger.
My eyes flutter closed the moment she finds it, and regret surges through me.
I should have hidden it in my boot. I should have given it to Weston, although he probably wouldn’t have taken it.
I should have done anything to keep her from finding it, but instead, I was too relieved to see the guard I thought would help us, not the one who would further harm us.
Opening my eyes once again, I find fury lacing her features. She rips my dagger from the back of my waistband, holding it in front of me, and the gold and jewels glitter in the dim light.