7

T he door to the castle swung open.

Elizabeth lowered her twin battle-axes with a smile. "I knew I was good at diplomacy."

For the space of a heartbeat, she waited for a butler to appear, then hurried across the threshold before whoever had opened the door decided to close it in her face.

The heavy oak door clanged shut behind her.

Elizabeth stood still as she assessed her new environment. She was now in some sort of antechamber the size of a cozy parlor.

"Antechamber" was perhaps the wrong word. Ante meant before, implying that this room led somewhere else. But the only doorway in sight was the one she had stepped through.

There was also no butler. Nor anyone who might have been the person to open the door for her, then close it behind her.

She gazed about in bewilderment. "What the dickens is this?"

The center of the small stone room was empty. The walls and ceiling, on the other hand, were lined with ropes and pulleys and wheels and strange artifacts.

Hard as she looked, there was no other exit. The two windows on either side of the door were the narrow, slotted sort for firing arrows. Loop-hole embrasures, she believed those were called. A kitten couldn't squeeze through those narrow openings, much less Elizabeth. And the exterior walls themselves were four feet thick. It made no sense. Why would the front door lead nowhere?

"One of the interior sections must be false," she murmured.

It's what a Wynchester would do. What the Wynchesters had done, on any number of occasions. At the Puss & Goose in London, they kept a secret room that was only accessible through the back of a wardrobe.

Not that there were any wardrobes in here. Just a spiderweb of rope and wires, with a staggering number of strange objects attached to or suspended from the peculiar net.

She took a step forward.

The stone beneath her feet immediately gave way, falling two inches without warning.

Elizabeth gasped and flailed her arms, which was difficult to do when carrying a battle-axe in each hand. A strange clicking sound echoed throughout the stone room as she windmilled for balance. Her back gave a vicious twinge of warning and slipped from a healthy seventy percent down to sixty-five.

"To the devil with you, Densmore," she shouted. "You can't keep me out."

All at once, the clicking sound stopped—and several gallons of ice-cold water dropped over her from the ceiling.

She gasped as the unexpected wave coursed down her back and between her breasts. The brim of her bonnet had protected her face but was now so sodden it hung limply, blocking her vision altogether.

With an axe protruding from each fist, she fumbled to untie the wet bow beneath her chin, then flung the waterlogged bonnet aside.

It slapped wetly against the bottom edge of the embrasure window—and sent a tall series of interlocking gears into motion. Elizabeth watched in fascination as the movement climbed up the stone wall, then activated an odd pulley, which tilted a metal pipe… which began shooting marbles directly at her face.

"Aaugh!" She leapt out of the way just in time, then wobbled for purchase on the uneven floor. This time, the stones hadn't moved beneath her boots. The danger was the old castle, worn in irregular patches from centuries of feet.

Elizabeth restored her equilibrium, arms outstretched, her blades like wings—or the talons of a raptor. But she did not feel like a bird of prey. She felt like a popinjay trapped in a birdcage.

Puffs of smoke shot out from the walls at either side of her head. No, not smoke—clouds of colored chalk, coloring her blond hair pink on one side and blue on the other. The suffocating dust filled her lungs, and she let out an involuntary hacking cough.

"You will not best me!" she rasped.

This was the most dangerous terrain she'd ever attempted to cross. Not only was the gray stone floor uneven and rigged against her, it was also now wet and littered with marbles. Carefully, she took another step, adjusting her weight in slow increments.

She fervently wished one of the battle-axes was her cane.

Elizabeth inched forward despite the increasing risks to her person. What else could she do? No one was coming to rescue her. She was the one meant to do the rescuing. Miss Oak had legally inherited this godforsaken pile, and by all that was holy, Elizabeth was determined not to leave without clutching the will and deed in her hand.

A Wynchester didn't give up. A Wynchester won the fight.

"Densmore, you blackguard!" she called out. "Afraid of a girl, are you? Show yourself!"

Her voice echoed against the stones. No earl appeared, recalcitrant or otherwise.

"I'm not afraid of your puzzle room," she shouted. "But you'd better be scared of me !"

Nothing.

She glanced over her shoulder at the external door she'd come through. It was still shut tight. Perhaps it was locked, and perhaps it wasn't. But she didn't want out. She wanted in. She was going to force a meeting with that court jester of an earl if it was the last thing she—

A tiny breeze whispered across the base of her cold, wet neck.

She spun back around.

There were still no other visible entrances or exits. The room was a solid mass of stone from floor to ceiling.

But there, before her, stood… the strangest man she'd ever seen in her life.

The Earl of Densmore's clothes were ordinary enough, if abominably wrinkled. He appeared to be of average height and average build. His chin was freshly shaved, as was the fashion. But atop his head was a strange leather helmet. It completely hid his hair from view, as well as most of his face. His left eye appeared thrice as large as it ought to be, due to a large monocle attachment that magnified the blinking orb threefold. His right eye was hidden altogether behind some sort miniature telescoping lens that appeared to move and whir of its own accord.

"Shoddy hospitality," Elizabeth informed him. "I am cold and wet and those marbles could have killed me."

"Improbable. Those particular traps are calculated merely to bruise skin and break limbs," Densmore responded, his voice smooth as fresh cream and his words absolutely infuriating.

"Is that right?" Elizabeth lashed out with her axe. "See how you like being under attack!"

In one quick stroke, she sliced open all three layers of his plum coat, jade waistcoat, and white cambric shirt—without breaking the skin below. A piece of chalk fell from a cut pocket and shattered on the stone floor. Only his cravat remained untouched.

The earl's tattered garments fell away to reveal… a surprisingly chiseled chest and abdomen.

Elizabeth tried not to look.

All right, so she looked. How could she not? She rarely saw muscles that defined outside of a marble statue in a museum.

"Quite the introduction," he said dryly. "How do you do?"

"Charmed, I'm sure," she managed, forcing her gaze back to that enormous light-gray eye with its long curling eyelashes. "Take off your helmet. It's ridiculous."

The earl considered her for a moment, then removed the helmet.

Had she thought his abdomen chiseled? Good God, that face . Densmore could cut glass with that jaw and those cheekbones. A mass of soft, wavy brown hair only called more attention to the angular beauty of his absurdly handsome visage.

"I changed my mind," she said hoarsely. "Put the helmet back on."

He did not.

"Look," she said. "I'm sorry about the door. I'm supposed to avoid unnecessary property damage, because I promised my siblings I'd only use my weapons to kill people."

He took a hasty step back. "What?"

"Listen closely." She edged toward him. "This is your final opportunity."

The earl retreated another step. "Final? I've never seen you before."

"And if you play your cards right this time, you'll never see me again. Just hand over that deed."

He held up his palms. "I haven't any deed."

"Don't waste my time." She angled her deadly battle-axes toward each side of his neck. "You saw me cut down that door. Do not annoy me any further, Densmore, or I shall cut you down, too."