Chapter 22

22

MERCY KEEP, PRESENT DAY

I t was Ellen's second morning waking up in the elegance of an Elizabethan manor house, the likes of which she had never even thought to visit much less wander about without a security guard watching that she didn't touch anything. The previous full day had been spent on a tour of the house and grounds. Wormsley had escorted her around room by room to familiarize herself enough not to get lost. They had walked through the stables and the vast gardens, then stood at the entrance to the garage bays—plural—and she had stared wide-eyed at the gleaming row of cars. Nine vehicles lined up in order of their age from a new Range Rover to a '39 Packard convertible in pristine condition.

She had not seen Benjamin Chase at all during the day, nor had he joined them for the evening meal. Ethan had waved off her casual inquiry as if it was the duty of a professor to be both absent and absent-minded at times.

On this second, sunny morning, after enjoying an enormous breakfast in the solarium, Ethan mentioned he had to drive to the local village to fetch a packet he was expecting from London and asked if she wanted to accompany him.

"Unless you would rather just potter around here by yourself. I shouldn't be too long."

"Actually, I think I slept through the village on our arrival, so I wouldn't mind coming along."

"You more than likely just blinked and missed it, my dear. I'll have Roderick bring the car around."

He hadn't been joking about blinking. The village, Bryony Tofts, was barely large enough to warrant signage. It was more of a populated crossroad with perhaps two dozen buildings and thatched cottages dominated by an ancient Norman church that sat on a landscaped rise. Behind the church was the obligatory graveyard with darkly weathered stone markers, the whole enclosed by a low fieldstone wall.

The central building on the main street housed a multi-purpose store that sold everything from newspapers to groceries to farm implements. There was a mail order desk in one corner filled with catalogues, and a small post office at another.

Wormsley picked up his packet from the post office and took the opportunity to introduce Ellen to the postmistress, Mrs. Bunkin. "Bunky" was a short, stout, woman with prodigious bosoms and hair bleached the color of burnished brass. She handed Ellen a bundle of saved junk mail and thanked Wormsley for sparing the mailman, Mr. Bunkin, the drive out to Mercy Keep.

"Might well take a paper while you're ‘ere," she said. She reached to the stack she had just sorted and handed Ethan one with her ink-stained fingers. "Bertie don't like making that trip out to the moor just to deliver local adverts an' nuisance papers. Don't go out that way a'tall unless it's for proper mail an' there's been hardly any o' that since Mr. Henry passed." She looked at Ellen and her nostrils flared slightly. "I suppose we'll be getting more now. From America?"

Ellen smiled. "I'm sure the bill collectors will find me."

Bunky's snort sounded like a blast from a trumpet. "Aye, dearie. They always manage, don't they. Be there a Mister Bowe?"

"No. I'm afraid there is just me."

"Oh, aye?" Her eyebrows shot upward. "Only you ramblin' about that great huge house? They'll be crawlin' out o' the woodwork, they will, mark my words."

"They?" Ellen looked to Wormsley for guidance but he had his nose in a fishing magazine. "Who is ‘they'?"

"Why every two-legged hound in a hundred miles will be sniffing around, they catch wind o' a pretty young heiress all on her own. That includes the ones already there at the manor. One in particular who wheedled ‘is way into Lord Henry's good graces. Free room, free board, free whatnots whenever he fancied them." She leaned forward and lowered her voice to a duller roar that would only be heard along half of the street outside. "I heard tell there weren't a single female at the Keep he didn't try his nasty ways with."

She straightened and nodded. "Aye, them professors might look bookish an' handsome with all that dust in their hair, but they ‘ave a third leg they use just as much as any lusty farmer. One o' the young maids had to move away, she did, her belly out to here, if ye catch my meaning. An him not owning up or doing aught about it to make wee Rosalind an honest woman."

"An honest woman would keep her nose in her own business," Ethan said calmly. "And she would not believe every snatch of slanderous, ill-founded gossip that got passed around. We will bid good day to you now, Madam. "

He took Ellen by the elbow and led her outside into the sunlight. "Gossiping old cow. That is the trouble with country hamlets like this. Nothing to do all day but natter amongst themselves, and if there is nothing salacious to talk about, they pull something down out of thin air and make it up as they go along. While it is true young Rosalind moved away and true that she was with child, it is not true that Benjamin Chase was the father. That honor fell upon one of the gardeners who has since been encouraged to find employment elsewhere."

"Does Dr. Chase know that he is being blamed?"

"He does, yes."

"And he does nothing about it?"

Ethan tugged at his waistcoat to straighten it. "As it happens, the culprit in this case was Abigail Winklebottom's nephew, Josiah. The boy was only seventeen at the time and was not only dismissed from employment, but he was forced to marry the girl or risk getting a blast of buckshot from her father. I expect Benjamin thought the punishment was sufficient and there was no need to have the Winklebottom name dragged into the gutter. For that, of course, Abigail thinks the sun shines out of his arse. And while she has no grounds on which to justify her nephew's behavior, she continues to hold his dismissal against me , as if I was to blame for the whole sorry mess." He paused again and glanced at her. "I trust I may rely on your discretion in this matter?"

"Of course. I wouldn't dream of saying anything."

"Good. Because I have no doubt Mrs. Bunkin is on the telephone as we speak, telling everyone to rush to their front windows to have a look at the new American Mistress of Mercy Keep."

He snorted with disdain and started back toward the car. Ellen stood on the paved walk and looked up then down the narrow, cobbled street feeling, suddenly, as if there were eyes in every window behind every curtain staring at her. And those stares were not the least bit friendly.

When they arrived back at the manor, Wormsley asked her to accompany him to the library.

"Your mention of bill collectors made me think this little matter might be time sensitive."

He slid a small blue booklet across the desk along with two plastic cards.

"This one," he touched the first card with a fingertip, "is a credit/debit card in your name. The booklet will show an opening balance of ten thousand pounds. This is strictly for your personal use. Clothing, entertainment, other sundries that might go wanting. The second card is for household expenses such as gas, or repairs to the motor, or pens and pencils, whatever. Do you have any immediate expenses that need resolution?"

"My share of the rent on my apartment is due the end of the week."

He waved his hand. "That has already been taken care of, it was the least I could do for insisting you fly over here. And should you choose to accept the terms of the agreement, your share will be covered for the next twelve months."

"I have a choice?"

He looked mildly offended. "You are not a prisoner here, Miss Bowe. As far as I am concerned, and as far as any court would be concerned, you are the legitimate heir to Henry Ward's estate and all that it encompasses. The year and a day is an archaic formality, but it is still quite legal in the eyes of the law. The term was introduced in medieval times, I believe, mainly for political marriages that were arranged between parties who barely knew each other. Indeed, in these troubled times when some unions are often dissolved within months of taking vows, the practice makes a good deal of sense, what?"

Ellen nibbled on a fingernail. "I would also have to hand my notice in at both of my jobs. Neither of my bosses were very happy about me up and leaving without any notice."

"That can also be taken care of." He shuffled papers and made another notation. "The bottom line, Ellen, is that you do not have to worry about any financial matters here… or there. Mrs. Winklebottom is an excellent housekeeper despite her draconic tendencies. She is allotted a monthly stipend for paying the household bills and expenses, and for covering the salaries of the staff. Every quarter the books are reviewed and the outlays verified whereupon amounts are adjusted as necessary. Of course, at some future date should you wish to undertake this task yourself—"

"Good God, no. I can barely balance my own account from paycheque to paycheque."

"There, you see? Nothing at all to worry about other than arranging for any personal belongings that you would like to have shipped over here."

She rolled her eyes slightly. "Which means I will have to tell my roommate, Payton, what has happened."

"If you like, I can do that as well."

"No. Thank you but this is not something you can handle for me. She is actually quite sweet once you get past the purple hair and tattoos. I will try my best to stop her from jumping on her unicorn and flying over, but there are no guarantees."

"My dear," he leaned forward and spoke slowly through an earnest smile, "you are quite free to do whatever you wish. You can invite whomever you wish to fly over on whatever conveyance may be at hand. I doubt Mr. Glance, the stablemaster, has seen a unicorn, but I'm sure he could find suitable accommodations."

They both smiled at that.

Wormsley leaned back in the chair and steepled his hands together under his chin. "May I presume to inquire if you have made any sort of decision?"

Ellen nibbled at the corner of her lip and looked down at the pair of credit cards he had pushed temptingly close to her. One was bright blue, the other was green. Both were very elegant with raised gold print and hologram squares.

"I am still not entirely convinced that any of this is real," she said. "Not long ago I was breaking open a piggy bank for cab fare. And now here I am, looking at a bank book filled with ten thousand pounds. If it wasn't for the portrait I saw in my uncle's room, I might not have believed any of it." She looked up. "The hardest part is believing my father kept all of this from me. I can understand families having secrets, but to completely cut us off?"

Ethan's gaze flicked away, avoiding hers. "I'm afraid I do not have answers to all of your questions. Nor would I venture to guess what would cause such an estrangement between the two brothers. As young boys, they always seemed to be quite close, as most twins tend to be."

"You knew my father?"

"My father was your grandfather's solicitor. I was too young to remember Malcolm, but I would see William and Henry on the occasional holiday or in London if your grandfather brought the boys to the office, which he seldom did. I recall them as being polite, serious young men, solicitous to a wee mite like myself. "

"So you have absolutely no idea what caused the rift?"

Once again, his eyes flicked away and he covered his evasiveness by rearranging some papers in the file. "Do I know for an absolute fact? No. Were I to speculate , I would only be guessing or gossiping, and that would place me in the same company as Mrs. Bunkin. Should it come to that, I would prefer to walk barefoot across a field of broken glass."

Ellen watched him shuffle and straighten and tidy his papers. For someone who had invited her to ask any and all questions, it seemed as though her curiosity about her father and his brother had offended him in some way, and she was certainly too new to all of this to start hurting people's feelings.

She chewed on her lip a bit more as Wormsley remained uncharacteristically silent. The entire house seemed to go quiet, so much so that the faint ticking from an ornate clock out in the hallway sounded as loud as a metronome while she tried to think of a way to bring the more jovial, happy Ethan back into her corner.

There was only one way.

"Alright," she said. "Alright, I will do it. I'll stay."

He looked up. "You will? You will accept the terms of the will?"

"It will be a dreadful hardship to have to put up with all of this," she paused and spread her hands wide, "But I'm willing to give it a try."

Ethan exhaled with such a hearty gust, some papers on the desk fluttered. "Oh, I am pleased! I am absolutely delighted! I shall do everything in my power to ensure an easy transition. I confess you have given this old heart some strong palpitations, but I am pleased, my dear. Very pleased! There are, as you can imagine, some mundane legal papers to be signed and notarized, but I shall sort all of that out in short order, what?"

He laid a pudgy hand on the blue file and nodded to himself. "I have copies of your passport and your birth certificate, everything I need to prepare the documents. Veronica and Dr. Chase can serve as witnesses. I shall have to return forthwith to London to file papers with the court, but otherwise—" he stood and thrust out his hand. "Allow me to officially welcome you to your new home."

Ellen offered up a half-hearted smile and shook his hand. "Thank you, I think. If you don't need me for anything else right now I think I will go and find a quiet place to throw up."

Wormsley chuckled. "I suppose we shall have to get used to American humor. Don't forget those."

He was pointing to the bank book and credit cards. Ellen hesitated, then picked them up and slid them into a pocket of her jeans.

When Ellen left Wormsley he was whistling happily to himself. She went along the hall to one of the few doorways she remembered, the one that led through the breakfast room to the glass solarium. From there she exited through the double doors to the terrace, where she paced back and forth several times, sucking in deep breaths at each turn to calm herself.

Her heart was racing, her pulse was pounding and she wasn't sure if she wanted a drink or a pound of chocolate or both.

She settled for standing at the stone balustrade and looking out over the impeccably well-groomed gardens. Her impeccably well-groomed gardens. All of it, all three thousand nine hundred and eighty-two acres of it was actually, legally, rightfully, unbelievably hers and she had to quash an urge to leap up and down and scream. Instead, she gripped the stone rail so hard she snapped the end of her fingernail down to the quick.

"Dammit to hell!"

"Am I interrupting?"

She whirled around and saw Ben Chase standing in the open doorway.

"I saw you leaving the office and rather shamelessly followed. Are you alright?"

She was sucking on her fingertip to ease the sting and pulled it out with a soft pop. "Fine. I'm fine. I broke a nail, is all, and it hurts like a bitch. But I'll live."

"I am happy to hear that." He stepped out onto the terrace and walked across to join her at the railing. He was dressed casually in jeans and a blue jersey shirt that seemed designed to hug every muscle across his chest and shoulders. His hair was loose and wavy, framing a face that made her stomach do a little flip. He looked good and she had so many nerve endings sparking through her body that she would happily have ripped off his clothes, thrown him down on one of the chaise lounges and ravished him until they were both limp with exhaustion.

"I came to see if you wanted to take a walk up to the ruins this afternoon."

He would look glorious naked , she thought.

"I promised you a tour and, with the sun shining and the ground dry, today might be a good day to do so. The reports are calling for rain the next three, four days. Typical English weather, I'm afraid."

His voice was so deliciously deep and smoky that Ellen found herself watching his lips and not really hearing what he was saying. Or caring.

He offered up a hesitant half-smile, half frown. "I realize it's short notice, but—"

"No. I mean yes. Yes, I would love to go to the ruins with you."

"Excellent. Then I haven't wasted a favor asking the cook to pack us a little picnic lunch. I happen to know, along with her luggage, she brought a healthy supply of her preserved Piccadilly pickles and several loaves of her damned healthy hundred grain bread."

"Hundred grain?"

"A slight exaggeration, but I assure you, we'll be picking seeds out of our teeth all afternoon.

Ben insisted she trade her suede shoes for a pair of tall rubberized ‘Welly' boots. It only took a glimpse of herself in a mirror to dampen all of her unbridled energy and ensure the safety of Ben's virtue.

He seemed right at home in the boots, however, and added a tan-colored Indiana Jones hat that made his dark hair flare out beneath the rim. He had a knapsack slung over his back and a camera over one shoulder. He wore gloves too, and produced a second pair for Ellen.

"You never know what you might not want to touch."

"I do appreciate this, although I hope I am not keeping you from anything important."

"Good God, no. To be perfectly honest, you are relieving me of the tedium of going over budget figures. Wormsley tells me there is a shortfall of forty pounds spent somewhere with no receipt to account for it."

"He does seem to be quite efficient. "

"Efficient? A polite way of saying he is anal and counts every penny coming in and going out of the estate. As well he should, of course, but I'm afraid my record-keeping is not nearly up to his standards. I am scolded like a schoolboy every time he goes through the ledgers."

They left through a rear door that took them out of doors by way of the kitchen. He introduced Ellen to the cook, Mrs. Amborski, and flashed a killer smile that won them two meat pies wrapped in a red gingham towel. The pies went into a small wicker basket along with a bottle of wine, a corkscrew, and two glasses.

Ellen was suitably impressed. "I doubt my flirting abilities would gain me much more than a stale cookie."

He tilted his head and smiled. "I wouldn't sell myself short, if I were you."

He held her gaze a moment too long then turned and started walking brusquely across the wide terrace and down the stairs to the cobbled courtyard. The garages were on the right, the stables behind them and for one terrified moment, Ellen thought he was heading toward the latter.

But no. He was merely walking past both outbuildings to the path that circled around the orchard and led up the slope toward the ruins. It was a gradual climb but to Ellen it felt like Mount Everest and she was relieved when he paused at the top.

"This inner curtain wall," he said, pointing to the twenty-foot stone barrier that loomed before them, "would have been the last defensive position should anyone manage to breech the outer walls. Those slits you see in the stone—"

" Meurtrières," Ellen said.

Ben laughed. "I see Wormsley has been playing tour guide. Then you know each of those arrow slits would have had rows of archers behind them. The two cannon snouts you see poking out from the battlements were added around the fifteenth century but I have found no evidence to show that either of them was ever fired."

Great chunks of the wall had gaps where time and weather had collapsed. What remained was covered in lichen and ivy, the oldest vines as thick as a man's wrist. The gate itself was missing but the opening was shaped in an arch that rose to a point in the middle.

"There has been a good deal of vandalism over the past few centuries, evidenced by the state of ruin of the outer wall. You can see remnants of rubble here and there, and you can trace the original outline by following the deep scars left behind in the ground. The foundation of the manor, in fact, was built from the blocks and more were taken over the years to build local farmhouses and the cottages in the village. Saved having to haul stone from the quarries, I expect. But the one thing no one can steal is the view. Although, I guess if you think about it, civilization has stolen a good deal of it. At one time, this was all forest. Thick, green woodlands that stretched from here all the way to London. The once vast Sherwood, for example, is a small token patch of trees marked by an historic plaque."

Ellen stood with him under the arch and looked out over the vista. The panorama of the surrounding hills and miles of rolling fields was nothing shy of spectacular but it was easy to imagine it dark and green with forest. For one hot second she had a strong sense of having stood in that exact spot eight centuries ago when outer wall was intact and there were sentries posted along the wall-walk, their steel helmets glinting under the sunlight. There were knights on the field riding huge horses, tilting at scarecrow targets, charging at stakes, slashing swords at the melons stuck on top. There was a row of archers off to the right firing at targets painted on bales of hay. Villagers and merchants were milling about, their voices mingling with the sound of swords clashing and hooves thundering across the grass.

She blinked and the images faded. She knew absolutely nothing about knights and life inside a castle aside from what she had seen in the movies… yet the sense of déjà vu was so strong she thought she could even smell the dust and sweat.

The sound of clicking drew her back to the present and she saw that Ben had his camera unslung and was taking photos.

"The sheer beauty of this place never fails to amaze and inspire me. The fields constantly change colors with the seasons; the long grasses on the moor shift in waves, like the sea itself when the wind moves through, and in spring it turns crimson with wildflowers. Something as insignificant as a cloud can drift by overhead and throw shadows across the field, changing the composition and colors completely. At twilight, everything, even the air itself turns purple. And at night it feels as if you can reach up and grab a handful of stars."

"Why, Professor Chase, I do believe there is the heart of a poet lurking inside you."

He was scanning the camera across the horizon and he brought it to a stop, aiming it directly at her through three rapid clicks. "Only when I am confronted with great beauty."

The breeze snatched at a silvery curl and blew it across her face and the camera auto-clicked through half a dozen more frames. When he lowered it, he paused a moment then shook his head. "I'm sure people keep telling you, but the resemblance to your grandmother is quite striking. And not just her, but a few generations of your ancestors. Surely you must have noticed on your tour through the gallery."

Ellen had been distracted by the color of his eyes in the sunlight—amber with tiny green triangles. The length of his lashes would make any woman weep.

"The gallery," he repeated. "Where the portraits of your ancestors are hung?"

She blinked and nodded. "Oh. Yes, it was a bit un-nerving, to say the least, to see so many familiar faces staring down at me."

Apart from the painting of her grandmother in Henry Ward's bedroom, there were easily a dozen or more elegant, classical portraits of men and women hung on the twenty-foot-high walls of the gallery, most of them life-sized and mounted in ornate frames. Many of them appeared to share the same silver-blonde hair and pure clear blue eyes, and often the same facial features as Ellen herself. Only the period clothing changed from one generation to the next.

"Myself along with Abigail and the rest of the staff had been forewarned by Wormsley not to gawp like village fools when you arrived, but I'm sure we all failed miserably."

"I wish he had forewarned me ."

"As I understand it, you had already been given quite a few shocks with little time to absorb them."

Ellen smiled. "That, Professor, might just take the prize for understatement of the year."

He laughed and stepped aside so she could pass beneath the arch. Before she did so, she glanced up and noted another carving in the keystone at the peak of the arch. It was the same crest she had seen on the outer gates depicting a wolf and a dragon.

Ben followed her gaze. "Ah yes, the Wardieu crest. You will see it displayed prominently throughout the castle. Was Wormsley able to give you any history of the Keep?"

"The five-minute version," she said, smiling.

"Well, forgive me if I repeat any of it, but the original lord, Draggan Wardieu, was a rather unremarkable nobleman aside from his excellent eye for commandeering a defensive position. It was his sons—Lucien and Etienne, the Wolf and the Dragon respectively, who brought both fame and infamy to Bloodmoor. Lucien fought alongside Richard the Lionheart in the Crusades and went on to become Champion and Captain of the Guard to the dowager Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. As such, he took the name Randwulf de la Seyne Sur Mer and was granted vast estates in France. He was also a close ally and friend to William the Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, whose daughter married the Wolf's eldest son, Eduard. The younger son, Robert—Robin, whom I've mentioned before, followed in his father's footsteps and earned a good deal of fame on the tournament circuit."

"This was the man you said might have inspired the Robin Hood legend?"

"If I was a betting man, I might wager a pound or two on some of his exploits being used indiscriminately to bolster the Robin Hood legend, yes. Others would be fairly quick to point out that Robert Wardieu spent only a month or two here in England. He preferred the forests of Gascony, where he lived for most of his life. But there is some creditable evidence that during what little time he did spend in England, he caused the king enough grief to be declared an outlaw. As you know, outlaws have always lived on the edge of heroism. You need only look to your own Jesse James or Clyde Barrow as proof. "

"They were also very real. There was no doubt as to who they were."

"Only because of newspapers and a few faded old tintype photos. Nowadays there are news films, CCTV, cell phones so that everything can be recorded instantly for posterity. A thousand years ago, there was only word of mouth. And most of that was unreliable, often delivered by travelling bards that could be several weeks or months out of date. If a storyteller found himself being pelted with rotten fruit by a bored audience, he embellished his stories and songs with thrilling adventures that may or may not have happened. Time could be collapsed or expanded; events moved for convenience, characters given names and assigned deeds that would inspire his audience to toss a few more pennies into his purse. As for written records, only one man in a thousand, could even write his own name, so documentation was scarce. It was left to monks and scribes to keep accounts and there again, they censored or altered anything they thought might displease the Church or the nobles."

"You seem determined to crush all of my childhood fantasies."

"Not all of them, I hope. Take Guy of Gisborne for example. He did, indeed, exist around the time of King John's reign, although he was never the Sheriff of Nottingham. That honor belonged to a woman by the name of Nicolaa de la Haye. As I said before, women were not mentioned much in history unless they were royalty or were credited with some memorable accomplishment. In Nicolaa's case, she was a savage proponent of torture. She could peel the skin off a man with one hand while eating a honeyed fig with the other. In fact, her own husband, Onfroi de la Haye, was one of her many victims. "

He was talking as they walked along a well-worn path that had eight-foot-high tangles of weed and vegetation crowding in on either side and formed an umbrella of green overhead.

"You said you had reason to doubt the story about Robin Wardieu's prowess with a bow and arrow." Ellen smacked away the end of a vine that seemed determined to stick in her hair. "But you didn't tell me why."

"A little history first, if I may. Without the Welsh longbow, I doubt the Battle of Crecy would have gone in favor of the English and these Isles would likely be flying the French fleur de lis right now. On the field at Crecy, the French had forty thousand men to England's twelve thousand, of which seven thousand were longbowmen. The French made fifteen charges against the English, each one thrown into disarray by the archers. Reports say the hail of arrows looked like black rain falling from the sky. That was also the battle that took the crossbow off the field. It was heavier and cumbersome to reload; it was useless if it got wet and the range was half that of the longbow. That is not to say the longbow was an easy weapon to fire. The bow itself was five feet long and it took considerable strength to fire it, let alone fire accurately. The best archers would have been likened to today's snipers."

Ellen thought of the girl she had seen on the moor. The bow had been as tall as her. "You said your Robin had a sister who was an excellent archer."

"I did, yes. It was not uncommon to see women archers on the field alongside the men. There was a huge Viking influence in the Saxon bloodlines and a bow was a weapon the women learned to handle, and handle very well.

"However, as deadly as a thousand archers on a battlefield could be, the bow was far beneath the dignity of a knight. Robert Wardieu and his peers would have excelled with the sword and lance, starburst and mace. Bows and arrows would have been reserved for sport, for hunting boar and deer, but in battle, the codes of chivalry for a knight dictated that enemies fought face to face. If you would like to try your hand, we have a few excellent longbows in the armor room."

"I'll do that," she said glibly. "Right after I learn how to swing one of those big swords without falling over."

He grinned and Ellen felt her belly do another little somersault.

"We also have a fine collection of starbursts, lances, maces, and rather wickedly sharp poniards. I'm sure we can find a suit of armor that will fit. They only weigh about sixty pounds."

"A poet and a comedian," she said.

His grin morphed into a laugh. "Alas, I'm actually quite boring once you get to know me. In my element, here, with ruins and musty old rooms to explore, I'm quite comfortable. Put me in a suit and tie and expect me to chat up the local citizenry, and I can break all land records finding a whisky and a quiet corner to hide in."

"I'm rather fond of corners myself," she said honestly. "And I can't, for an instant, imagine you being boring."

He paused and glanced back over his shoulder, but where she might have blushed at her remark, having so recently pictured him naked on a chaise lounge, she found herself staring past him, instead.

They had emerged from the tunnel of bramble and rounded the corner of a broken wall, and there, directly ahead, rose the looming black towers and spires of the medieval stronghold once known as Bloodmoor Keep.