WINDKEEPER (13 page)

There was knock on his door. He jumped, his heart skipping a beat.

"Your Grace? I have your wine," the servant girl called.

"Damn it, you idiot!" he cursed under his breath. "Get yourself together, McGregor!"

He opened the door, grabbed the wine goblet, drained it, and handed it back to Gezelle. "I ordered a decanter," he snapped as he slammed the door in the girl’s startled face.

Gezelle stood there for a moment and then shrugged. In her left hand she held the empty goblet that had been intended for the lady; in her right was the full decanter of port His Grace had asked for. Should she knock and give him the decanter or leave him alone?

"I’d leave him alone if I were you, ’Zelle," Belvoir told her as though he sensed her uncertainty.

Gezelle smiled at the big man. "I think so, too, Sir Belvoir."

Without removing his breeches this time, Conar stretched out on his bed and looked at the ceiling. His thoughts strayed across the hall. He thought of the intrusion this girl had brought into his life, and he smiled.

She was a distraction, that was a certainty. Her sweet smile and gentle voice, her angry and flashing eyes, her beautiful face enticed him. Her stubbornness and female logic confused him. Her expertise with the weapons she carried annoyed him somewhat; but her utilizing of them to save his skin made him proud.

She fascinated him as no other woman ever had. He could close his eyes and see her as clearly in his mind as he could the tall peaks of Mount Serenia that he had viewed nearly every day of his life. He could hear her lilting laugh and soft voice; feel the texture of her skin against his fingertips although a full twenty feet or more separated them. He could even taste the silk of her lips on his own.

Aye, he thought with some dismay. The girl had intruded into his life, not gently and insidiously, but like an avalanche.

"Conar’s pretty little intrusion," he thought aloud and grinned, thinking that was the same phrase Rayle Loure used to characterize his wife, Aurora.

He supposed all wives were an intrusion into a man’s life. They came; they stayed; they tormented you. But some, like his Liza, would never make life’s journey dull. She would make him a most invigorating and challenging wife.

He jerked up as though stung by a wasp. Where the hell did that notion come from? Liza as his wife? The thought of her in that capacity shook him to his very core and he mentally tore his train of thought away from such a dangerous idea. Thoroughly aghast, he lay down and pulled the pillow over his face, groaning with frustration.

Within a matter of seconds he was fast asleep.

He never heard the panel across the room from his bed slide open on well-oiled hinges. Never heard the soft, urgent voices speaking as they bent over his unconscious form. Never felt the hands that lifted him and carried him through a secret passageway into the very bowels of Norus Keep.

Across the hall, Liza turned fitfully in her sleep, calling out softly. She had refused the wine Gezelle brought to her, instead, giving it to the servant girl who had never before tasted wine.

Gezelle tossed in her own sleep, smiling, thinking what a wonderful thing was this wine.

His head ached with a blinding agony that reluctantly dragged open his eyes. He knew immediately where he was.

"Galen!"

He jerked viciously on the chains that bound him spread-eagle to the uprights on either side of him, but his wrists and ankles were banded with thick iron manacles. Jerking on the restraints broke open the flesh along his wrists and sent pain shooting up his arms.

Another howl of pure rage tore through the darkness.

To be stupid enough to be drugged was one thing. To wake up, trussed like a common criminal, in the dungeon of a keep that by all rights belonged to him, was something else. He screamed in fury and tore at the chains again, feeling a trickle of blood slipping down his left wrist.

"Galen McGregor! You’re a dead man!"

His attention went to a glowing brazier filled with long-handled instruments that glowed in the bowels of the fire. He threw back his head and howled again. By the gods, he would cripple Galen McGregor!

He didn’t feel fear as much as boiling, rigid anger, and then that anger bubbled over into humiliation at the realization that he, and he alone, was solely responsible for his own predicament. Arriving at Norus without benefit of his own personal guard had finally proven to be his undoing. His own ego and arrogance had put him in such dire straits.

Conar knew, without a doubt, that Galen intended to use everything at his disposal to see that his brother abdicated the throne to him. One more look at the torture instruments in the brazier and Conar wasn’t so sure that, come morning, the crown would still belong to him.

And then what? his fevered mind asked. What happens after you’ve been forced to sign away your birthright? Galen could ill-afford to let him leave with visible signs of torture on his body to negate the document he would be forced to sign. Would he be kept at Norus? Caged inside one of the filthy cells that lay beyond the studded oaken door off to his right? He didn’t think Galen would have him killed, but he wasn’t all that sure. Dead men could not challenge a writ of abdication.

He glanced at the instruments again. He knew well how much torture he could stand. His memory had not failed him. He groaned. Maybe torture wasn’t all that Galen had planned. A shadow of evil loomed within his inner vision, a cadaverous face grinning at him out of the darkness, and he shivered.

"Sweet Alel, no!" he whispered. That he could not stand.

He tugged helplessly against his bonds, groaning with fear. Death would be preferable to the things Kaileel Tohre could do to him. He tightly squeezed his fingers together and prayed, beseeching every god he had ever known to let him die before Kaileel could lay hands on him again.

"Good eve, Milord," a sweet voice spoke.

Conar swung his head and stared at the silhouette of a woman striding confidently toward him. Her back was to the burning rushes so he could not see her face, but he knew that voice. His blood ran cold as she neared the brazier with its red-hot tongs and pokers. The light cast from the brazier made her face look evil and deadly.

How could he have been so dimwitted? The thought of her being in league with his brother filled him with despair and he thought his heart would break. When she giggled, his despair turned to bleak and icy rage.

"I am glad you find this amusing, Mam’selle," he growled, stung by her duplicity, in agony over her betrayal. He strained at his manacles, the chains rattling.

Liza placed her hands on her hips and turned her face to one side. "You have this uncommon habit of getting yourself into mischief when you’re around me."

"Aye, that I do," he spat. It was so hard to look at her beautiful face and not feel such terrible pain in his heart.

"Why do you think that is?" she asked sweetly.

"I thought with the wrong head!" he snarled, blowing an angry stream of breath through his bared teeth.

"Isn’t that usual for you, Milord?"

"Normally I’d have better sense."

"But when you’re around me, you forget yourself?" She giggled.

"Leave me the hell alone!" he shouted as he pulled against the bonds. "Haven’t you caused enough damage? Galen will see that he gets the crown. What did he promise you for your part in trapping me?"

"He’ll not get the crown as long as you live, Milord."

A deadly missile of fear ran through his heart. So, they did intend to kill him. He should have realized that. He would always be a threat to Galen if he lived.

"And you’ll watch while they take my life, won’t you, you power-hungry bitch?"

Liza smiled at his silly assumption. "Would you like some help getting free, Milord?"

"Don’t play with me, woman!" he bellowed, pulling fiercely on his fetters.

Liza folded her arms over her chest. "You don’t know a friend when one comes to your aid, do you, McGregor?" She sighed. "I am not one of Galen’s minions, Conar. I was sent to help you, but if you would rather stay here at your brother’s mercy…" She shrugged one delicate shoulder and started to turn away.

"Wait!"

"Aye, Milord?" she sweetly replied.

Conar shrugged helplessly, hating to admit he needed her help. "If it would not be too much trouble for you, Mam’selle, I would appreciate your help. ’Tis a most uncomfortable position in which I find myself."

"I can see that, Milord. I suppose I could help you, then. I shall have to…" She turned to stare into the darkness, her hand going up to the rune stone around her neck, her fingers caressing the smooth black surface. When he started to question her, she held up her hand to silence him. "It seems I have happened along just in time," she snarled. "They have miscalculated this time."

Conar frowned. "Who? What are you talking about?" Her face was shadowed with fire from the burning brazier and the deeper darkness of the room, but it glowed with an eerie incandescence that made the hair along his neck stir. The green of her eyes was chatoyant, like a cat’s eyes in the sudden glare of light. He watched as she knelt on the floor, her hands out in front of her as though she were searching for something among the rushes. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Come, my Little Ones," she whispered to the darkness. "I have need of you."

Something stirred in the rushes, mewed, hummed. From out of the darkness a soft, pulsing sound rose, rising and falling with husky, grating sighs. Tiny mews came from different directions at once; blending, harmonizing, echoing, and breathing long gusts of purring rhythm. The sound grew into one long, continuous purr of contentment.

"Come. Come and meet our master." Liza’s voice was as soft as the gentle purring.

Small, darting shapes moved in the rushes, rustling across the stone floor, pushing aside whatever was in their way. A sniffing sound stopped somewhere near the large stone ledge on which Conar stood and then moved on to Liza. An inquiring purr came from close by and then the shapes converged, flung themselves at Liza’s ankles, twirling around her feet, rustling her gown, pushing against her legs.

Conar couldn’t make out what the shapes were, for they moved with a blur of motion, but he had the impression of small cat-like beings with green eyes that glowed as they regarded him. Something brushed against his own leg and he flinched, looking down as a shape darted away, its mewling voice raised in question.

"Aye, my lovely," Liza crooned to the mewling. "He is the one."

A slow, long purr filled the dungeon as though the beings were conferring and it seemed to Conar as though some unseen entity spoke his name.

"Aye, it is Raphian’s familiars they send," Liza answered. "I can hear Them coming for him through the fire. We must protect him."

Conar strained his eyes to see what it was she was speaking to, but all he could see was the blur of rapid motion against her legs as she bent down to caress some flash of movement along the floor.

She stood, her arms raised to the heavens, her head tilted back, and her voice joined the loud purr of sound.

"Zheil les easnth neum. Abas et meinth bas. Castra hav Bastus. Hyal hav Bastus. Ni have Bastus, Zhad. Ilith dor gritia, Thesius."

Six times the incantation was spoken. Six times the cat-like entities stilled and became silent until the last word of the chant was spoken. Six times the glow from the brazier dimmed.

A vile stench slowly began to drift under Conar’s nose. His nostrils quivered and he wrinkled his forehead. He had experienced that smell before. It was the acrid aroma of burnt flesh. He looked about him, but saw nothing.

"They are coming, Milord," Liza told him, never looking his way. "They are coming through the fire for you."

The hair on his scalp moved. He was helpless where he stood. "Liza! Unchain me."

"There’s no time."

"Liza!" he called, for the purring was growing louder, the shapes darting about Liza’s legs in agitated fury. "Don’t leave me here like this!"

Around her legs the cat-like entities were moving with a whirring, growing speed until they were no longer individual shapes but one solid whirl of multi-colored light that sparkled. Her chant echoed once more, the incantation spoken in a language as old as time, and the walls shook, the chamber filled with the eerie beauty of her voice.

"For the love of the gods, Liza! Unchain me!" The stench was so bad he was beginning to gag. He could feel the damp and chill of the dungeon giving way to a fiery blast of heat that washed over him with cloying, smothering waves. Although no light had broken the dimness of the dungeon’s atmosphere, he knew there was a vast furnace of fire close by.

"The doors of the Abyss are opening, Milord," she told him, lowering her head and turning to him. "You will feel Their anger soon." She began her chant once more.

Her voice was an awful incarnation of the Feminine Dark Forces that had walked the land centuries before man had ever drawn breath there. Its unearthly beauty stirred the soul and moved the sexual organs to arousal. Conar was amazed that he could be so aroused at a time such as this. His manhood strained against his breeches just as he strained against the manacles holding him captive.

"Unchain me, Liza!" he demanded, acutely aware of his passion rising like molten lava in his veins.

"We will protect you, Beloved. You have nothing to fear."

Wind came whistling through the dungeon, lifting, swirling the long white nightgown she wore; pressed it tightly to her body so Conar could see every curve and mound beneath the gauzy fabric. His manhood leapt at the sight and he had to dig his nails into his palm to keep from groaning, so intense was his desire.

Spinning around and around her feet, the cat-like beings spun a web of multi-faceted color as they revolved around the hem of her gown. Sparkles of light washed up and over the gown and turned it to a brilliant, shining silver mesh.

As Conar watched her with avid fascination, Liza seemed to be lost to the world in which she stood. Her face was radiant, her lithe figure standing tall and erect as the spinning mass of purring entities began to tunnel up her gown, covering her body in a wash of blinding multi-colored light. The mass shifted, expanded in diameter and height until soon she was engulfed within a shimmering, cyclonic band of phosphorescent light. Her long black hair, turning a glimmering blue-black color, whipped behind her in the wind as she raised her hands high to the heavens.