Chapter 18

18

H arold Falconard had flown into a rage after being told of the ambush in the forest. Only two of his men had managed to escape to bring back the news that they had been attacked and driven back by overwhelming numbers. At least a dozen knights in the ambuscade, they declared, as well as bowmen who cut down the sheriff's men with terrifying, cold-blooded precision.

Falconard had instantly recalled the other trackers he had dispatched to follow the witch's scent. He had immediately assembled a troop of fifty guardsmen and twenty knights, the sheer numbers of which should have at least impressed the king's envoy with his swift response and fierce determination.

Unfortunately, the Butcher of York was not so easily impressed. He had arrived at Nottingham a day after Enndolynn Ware's escape and he was not the smallest bit pleased.

Luther de Vos was the king's man. He currently served as captain of the royal guard but he had spent almost a decade being one of the most highly paid and highly successful hunter-assassins. He was tall and deceptively handsome, with hair the color of ripe chestnuts and a smile that lured many of his victims into believing he was a kind and belligerent man. In truth, he fed on terror. If he caught the scent of fear, his slender nostrils would flare and his dark eyes would glitter with anticipation. His skin would flush and his lips would turn as red as the blood he was rumoured to drink after each of his kills.

He had ridden to Nottingham at the head of twenty equally ruthless, sadistic guardsmen. Two women who had been sent along to accompany Enndolynn Ware on the return journey to London, had been raped so many times, and with such brutish disregard, they had died along the way and been tossed away like garbage.

Combining his forces with Harold's brought their numbers up to nearly a hundred, all of whom were now camped in the thickest part of the forest less than a mile from Bloodmoor Keep.

A small party of men had been roused before dawn. Luther and Harold had ridden ahead to see the lie of the land for themselves and had stopped at the edge of the forest just as the weak gray light was starting to rise in the east. The mist was thick across the moor but they could see the black silhouette of the castle rising above the milky whiteness on the other side.

"Bloodmoor Keep," Luther murmured, his breath causing a small cloud of vapors. "I have heard tales of its storied past but I confess I have not set mine eyes upon it until now. An imposing fortress, to be sure."

Beside him, Harold Falconard started to point out various obstacles to a frontal attack, but Luther de Vos held up a hand to silence him.

He was scanning the distant battlements with his own experienced eyes, assessing the defensive strength of the walls, the barbican towers, the flooded moat. The drawbridge was raised, but even the poorest soldier in the feeblest light could see the futility of a frontal attack. For one thing, the road that cut through the moor was barely wide enough for four men to ride abreast, and while a straight line across would measure slightly more than half a Roman mile, the road zigged and zagged back on itself like a slithering snake, effectively trebling the distance to cover, all the while exposed to archers on the castle walls.

On either side of the road, beneath a thick layer of distorting mist, the bog was a slimy morass of mud and weed that could suck a man in up to his waist. The base of the outer wall, assuming it could be reached, was submerged in a moat and offered no solid ground on which to use ladders or grappling irons. The castle itself sat on a promontory, at the edge of a cliff that had a sheer drop to the sea below.

"My compliments to the clever Norman bastard who build this place," Luther de Vos's voice, like the rest of him was smooth and cultured, intimating there was noble blood in his past.

"I'm damned if I can see a way in,"

De Vos turned his head slightly. "Then we had best see if we can get them to come out."

"How do you propose we do that?"

"They are bound to be curious as to why there is an army on their moor."

"If the girl is inside, then they already know why."

"Then they will come out if only to try to persuade us that she has already been and gone."

"My lord!"

A pair of guards came up behind them dragging a semi- conscious man between them. He was dressed in drabs and a torn leather tunic. His face was battered and there was a wound in his shoulder that had spread blood down to his fingers.

"We found ‘im up a tree, my lord. Caught ‘im and another before they could send a warning to the castle."

"Where is the other one?"

"Back in the trees. With ‘is ‘ead cleaved in two."

"A pity. But I suppose this one will have to do." De Vos leaned forward and smiled at the battered, bloody face of the forester. "I look forward to you telling us all about Bloodmoor Keep."

"Not sayin' aught," the man managed to spit.

Luther's smile widened. "Oh yes you will. You will tell me everything I want to know and scream out a good deal more." He straightened and looked at the guards. "Take him back to the camp and build me a nice hot fire."

Without further comment he wheeled his big horse around. He raised an arm and twirled his gloved hand in a circle, and a moment later, he and his guardsmen melted back into the wall of mist that shrouded the edge of the forest.