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Chapter 7: The Heroine (Part 2 of 2)

Nicholas Weston sat beside the small fireplace in his study, feeding the flames slowly with a stack of letters he held in his hands. He sighed. The long, deep sigh of a man who felt much older than his years. Weak, jaded, and helpless.

As the flames consumed yet another piece of parchment, he picked up one more and scanned over the long paragraphs of text:

'Papa, I am sorry for not writing to you earlier. You must forgive me, for I have been very, very busy. I miss you greatly. And Spot. You are taking care of him, aren't you? He likes red apples. I know they are dearer than the green ones but he really likes the red's.

More importantly, I beseech you, I implore you, I BEG YOU to take me from this dreaded place. Drake Rohan is a most nasty, wretched man. I cannot fathom how you could have married your daughter off to such devil spawn. He was with ANOTHER woman on our wedding night, he cuddled with farm BEASTS on the second day of our marriage, and last night he ran off with THAT woman. He didn't even think to ask me for permission to elope?! It is absolutely unbelievably outrageous. He is sullying both our family names! You can file an annulment petition on my behalf, can't you? You do believe your daughter has been mistreated, don't you? You must rescue your beloved daughter afore she dies here!'

The Duke of Marlborough smiled feebly with a shake of his head before throwing the letter into the fire. Oh, Amelia, if he'd asked you for permission it wouldn't be 'elope'. Even without seeing his daughter's signature, there was no mistaking the rushed, boyish font and exaggerated speech that belonged only to Amelia. Even in the darkest hours she always managed to bring him these small moments of joy.

What then followed was another message from Marge, no doubt tucked into the envelope stealthily, and recounted the events in Steersberg in a much more believable manner.

A small chuckle escaped his lips as he read of how Amelia had really busied herself with tormenting the Emir. It was how he knew that his daughter was, in fact, well. Safe and healthy; that was all that mattered now. In different times, his definition for her wellness would have included her happiness, and he would have borne all the consequences of reneging on the betrothal with no second thought if it meant making her happy. But in times like these, happiness was no longer a priority.

"Your Grace, you asked for me?"

He lifted his gaze to the young stableboy at the doorway, who was smiling widely with an innocence that jarred with the cruel realities of this world. With a curl of his fingers, he beckoned the boy forward.

"Your Grace, why's everyone packin'? Are they leavin'? Are we movin'? Should I—"

The duke raised a hand to silence him. "Timo, isn't it?" The boy nodded with far more enthusiasm than anyone around him had for days. "I told them to leave," he said. Before the 'why' could slip from the boy with rounded eyes, he silenced him again. "No questions. I want you to leave by nightfall. Take Spot with you and go to my daughter in Steersberg. Speak to no one until you get there."

"Huh?" Timo gaped. "B-But Your—"

"No questions, Timo. Speak to no one. Do you understand?" he commanded harshly. Timo nodded slowly with a confused frown. "Good. Please ensure this reaches my daughter's hands." He reached inside his sleeve for a small scroll of parchment and passed it to the boy. "Now, go."

After the boy scurried off, he turned back to stare into the fire for a long minute before he sighed again, and fed another piece of parchment to the flames. Every so often, the fire blazed and emitted a dozen flying sparks, causing his eyes to sting. It was a sensation he appreciated, for such slight discomfort was an immense luxury compared to what was coming for him.

* * *

"My lady?"

The first thing Amelia saw as the grogginess in her mind dissipated was Marge's plump face hovering above hers. The lines of concern around the maid's usually-stern eyes were too deep to miss.

"Oh, my lady, you're awake!"

Amelia looked around slowly at her surroundings, recognising the familiar translucent silk draped around her soft bed. But her consciousness still eluded her, and she was having difficulty remembering how she had ended up in her chambers when she was on the way to... to where? "What happened?" she murmured, pressing her fingers to her temples to ease the throbbing in her head.

If it were at all possible, the worry lines on Marge's face seemed to deepen even more. "Do you not remember anything, my lady?"

"I remember... walking..." Amelia squeezed her eyes shut, intent on recalling the missing memories. "Walking... I passed the courtyard, then... then..." Just like that, the floodgates opened, filling the blanks with visions of the brutally beaten maid and the man that made her blood boil. For the first time in her life she wanted to kill.

It wasn't until Marge closed her hands around Amelia's that she noticed she had balled them into fists so tight her nails dug painfully into her palms. "Calm, my lady, you're safe now. Rosie is safe, too," Marge said, her voice soft. "The man is Rosie's father. Comes knocking every moon or two for silver and beats the poor girl until she hands over everything."

"What?" Amelia nearly jumped out of the bed, but Marge was quick to hold her down by the shoulders, knowing the rash young lady would otherwise storm through the entire manor until she found the man in the holding cells and do things to him no lady should do. "How could he? Has no one ever thought to stop him?" she exclaimed.

"They turn a blind eye to it. It's family business." A father disciplining his own daughter, however severely or unfairly, was one of the most natural (and sometimes unfortunate) laws of society.

"Family business my ar—" Marge glared at Amelia. By the Gods Marge could glare. When she did it made even the fearless lady feel shivers down the spine. "Ar..." Amelia reattempted quietly, only to earn herself another colder, harder glare. At last, she threw her hands up in the air and groaned in defeat. "My derriére!" she finished lamely and stuck her tongue out.

Marge sighed but patted Amelia's hand with the tiniest of smiles. "At least this time, because he hurt you, it is no longer just family business."

That was the only good thing to come out of this, wasn't it? Amelia thought bitterly as she touched her own neck and winced at the dull pain of a bruise. Whilst the fact that a man could get away with beating his daughter halfway to death still disgusted her, she would make sure that this man shall never lay a hand on Rosie again.

"Speaking of you getting hurt, my lady, I take it you were heading to the festival when it happened?"

'Twas more of a statement than a question, and the darkened look that accompanied such statement made Amelia swallow nervously.

"Or should I say..." Marge continued in a low, hushed tone, "sneaking off without company?"

"Aw, please... Please don't tell papa."

"I will tell His Grace"—Amelia gasped—"if you do that again."

With a breath of relief, Amelia threw her arms around Marge before rushing to a window. She pushed the curtains aside and squealed at the telltale blaze of mid-afternoon sun. "Let's go to the markets now, Marge. I will deal with that crook later but I cannot miss the first day of the festival!" She tugged Marge by the elbow but the maid did not budge. "Marge!"

"The first day of the festival is over, my lady. You've slept more than a day."

"Do not jest, Marge. I lost some air, I didn't get hurt—"

"You did not just lose some air, my lady. He strangled you. You almost died!" Marge retorted.

"I have no other injury though!" To prove her point, she did a full spin on the spot. "How could I have slept more than a day?"

"Dreamtea," Marge answered curtly.

Amelia stared at Marge with a raised brow. "Dreamtea?" One of the most potent sleeping drugs, for some suffocation?

"Aye, that woman said she only gave you half a cup of it so you could rest for a few hours. But for some reason you—"

"What woman?" Amelia asked, raising her pitch.

"The old healer from the nearby village. Looks half a century too old to be one, methinks," Marge said, shaking her head. "How did you sleep so long though?"

"She gave me half a cup of dreamtea?" At Marge's answering nod, Amelia breathed deep, almost fuming. "Half a cup of that thing might send a man like Tom—you know, the giant down in the kitchens?—to sleep for a few hours. It could kill a small child!" she snapped.

After a moment of stunned silence, Marge stammered, "Oh, my lady, I'm so sorry! I-I..." The old maid cast her gaze downwards in guilt as she realised she had allowed her lady's life to be placed in danger.

Amelia stomped from the bed to the door, then to the balcony, and back to the bed. She despised those who called themselves healers, simply because they were able to bandage a minor wound and brew a tea for coughs; such irresponsibility was not unlike murder. But she could not bring herself to blame Marge for it. Her dear old maid couldn't tell deadly nightshades from blueberries even if it meant the difference between life and death. She took another deep breath and let it out slowly. "We don't have a healer in the manor?" she asked, her tone now calm and steady.

"We did. A rather skilled one, apparently. But the Emir took him along with him to Gods-know-where."

At the mere mention of Drake, Amelia's heart skipped a beat. He had taken a healer? All she'd noticed that night was him and his friends and... Isabella. He'd helped her into her saddle, then rode at her side into the distance. She recalled the scene bitterly, vaguely remembering that there might have been two other men with them. Or was it a dozen?

Two knocks at the door cut through her train of thought. A large, burly man entered and, seeing Amelia's narrowed gaze upon him, bowed stiffly. "M'lady, how are you feeling?"

She recognised this man. Not by his appearance, not really. But his voice... She'd heard this darned voice far too many times in the dream that she'd dreamed far too much. 'Twas the same man who'd barged into the library that afternoon and interrupted... things. "Who are you?" she asked, somewhat tartly.

"Name's Duran, m'lady. I'm one of the Emir's men."

"Duran, thank you again for saving my lady," Marge interjected and gave him a small nod in greeting. Amelia turned and lifted a questioning brow at the maid. "Duran got there just as the man was dragging you away," Marge explained. "He threw a knife—"

"Dagger," Duran corrected stoically.

"—which stabbed him in the arm. He released you, you fell unconscious and Duran brought you here."

"You have my thanks, Duran. Thank you too for the summary, Marge," Amelia murmured sardonically and wrinkled her nose, displeased with how weak she must have appeared before Duran, who would no doubt report this to his... employer, who would no doubt have a laugh about it. Finally, unable to resist her curiosity, she cleared her throat and asked, "So, have you heard from Drake?"

Duran shook his head, extinguishing the kindling light of hope she hadn't even known was there. "M'lord does not report to us while he's out on business." And that was the end of that matter. The room fell into an awkward silence until Duran returned to the matter at hand. "Um, the man that attacked you is causing a ruckus in the cells, m'lady. If you are feeling well enough..."

Amelia smiled. "I am, and I will see him in the Great Hall in an hour." The man had robbed her of her visit to the festival. She would return the favour and entertain herself by serving up his just desserts.

With one cheek propped up against her hand, and the fingers of her other hand busily tapping the arm of her seat on the dais, Amelia stared down at the yabbering man below with a look of indifference. She yawned.

At first, she'd been livid when Gregor asserted his innocence for his crimes.

Taking Rosie's silver each month, he said, was with merit, for he had brought her up from a babe to adulthood. Upon further questioning though, he said it was out of necessity to pay his gambling debts.

Beating her, he said, was well within his rights as her father, and more so because her mother was a whore. For this comment, Amelia had personally delivered a well-packed punch into his face. Unbefitting of a lady, she supposed, but so terribly satisfying.

Assaulting and attempting to abduct the Emira of Steersberg, he said, was a mistake of ignorance. To Amelia's utter disbelief, he had the audacity to blame her for dressing no different to a commoner.

What broke her heart was that Rosie was there on her knees too, wearing darker bruises than the ones she saw the day before, crying and begging her to spare her father's life.

After Amelia explained to her that Gregor had committed executable crimes, he proceeded to rant about the injustice of it all, throwing curses at both women in every second line.

"Ye cunte!" Gregor screamed, struggling madly in the tight hold of two guardsmen.

"Please, m'lady," Rosie begged between desperate sobs.

As she adjudged this man, the crowd that had gathered at the wide entrance of the Great Hall was no doubt judging her, too. Ten minutes in, and her head ached. The criminal had called her a whore thirty-four times, while the victim had wept enough to drown a full-grown man. Amelia raised a hand to silence them both. As expected, Gregor ignored this and called her a whore for the thirty-fifth time. Rosie's eyes rounded to continue her silent pleading.

Loud and clear, she announced, "I want this man banished from here, never to step foot into Steersberg for the rest of his lifetime."

"Ye can't do that!" he yelled, flailing his arms uselessly as the guards dragged him across the floor and causing the stab wound on his arm to open again. He let out a louder cry, "Bitch!"

From the way he struggled impossibly wilder, he was well aware of the pain that was coming his way. Soon, he would be branded with a mark on his forehead, a public decree of his status as a banished criminal. The burn might cause him agony for days, weeks even, but the shame he would bear for a lifetime for all to see. A small price to pay, she thought, for the injuries he'd dealt to his own blood and kin over the years. "I want him out of here. Now."

"WHORE!"

Very creative. She dismissed the insult with a roll of her eyes. "One more word from you and I'll have your tongue, too."

Gregor opened his mouth to protest, but at the critical moment his mind finally kicked into gear and he clamped his lips shut as the guards dragged him out of the Great Hall, the iron chains on his ankles rattling loudly against the stone floor.

Amelia returned her gaze to the steps beneath the dais where the maid knelt, her shoulders still shaking as she sobbed. A frown of self-doubt crept onto her brows. Had she been too harsh?

Regardless, now that the man was dealt with, she could finally do what she had wanted to do since she first saw the woman around the bend of the corridor yestermorn. Amelia descended the dais, wrapped her arms around the young woman and hugged her until the sobs reduced to sniffles. Only, in doing so, it reminded her of the last person who held her like so...

"Umsry," Rosie mumbled into Amelia's chest. The young maid pulled back slowly and lifted her head to meet the lady's eyes with her one good eye. "I'm sorry, m'lady," she repeated.

Amelia tilted her head to the side in question.

"I... accused ya... of-of... bewitching m-m'lord," she stammered.

An eyebrow went up. "Did you? I do not remember."

Rosie nodded. "I di—"

Amelia shushed the woman on a whisper and hugged her again.

* * *

She knew she should've sentenced that scum to death after all. All the noblewomen and rich merchants' wives in the Northern Lands must have gathered at the Steersberg Markets yesterday, for, true to Mistress Perryn's word, all of the exotic scented cloths and caps were gone after a day. All! Gone!

With her cheeks puffed and her arms folded across her chest, Amelia dragged her feet through the winding hallways of the manor mindlessly, passing chambers and minor halls she'd never stepped foot in before.

"Did the Emir say why there's been a delay?"

Amelia froze in her track. It sounded like William. Was he speaking of Drake? She pressed her ear closer to the thin gap where a door was left ajar.

"Aye, it's Lady Isabella." Duran? That lying mongrel said he hadn't heard from Drake. She should've known better than to trust one of his men.

"What of Lady Isabella?" William asked again.

"He didn't say. Only that it was important."

Amelia almost buckled at the knees. She twisted to lean her back against the wall for support. Isabella. She knew it! She'd known all along he was with Isabella. But the truth was always harder to accept when there was no more inkling of doubt, of hope, that mayhap he really did have business matters to attend to. Oh, it was business alright—scandalous business.

She let the coldness of the whitestone wall seep into her body, turning her insides to ice. William and Duran continued their conversation, yet she heard no more.

After a while, she pushed away from the wall and turned back the way she came, the leaden weight in her legs making every step a struggle.

People around the manor had begun to refer to her as the 'heroine'. A fitting match for their hero, apparently. She sneered. A heroine she may be, but she'd never be his heroine.

* * *

"I apologise, Henry. I really must leave," Drake said grimly to his friend as he secured the saddlebag to his horse.

"I understand. Don't you worry, we'll find her. I wager she just ran off 'cause she got bored, anyway," Henry said with a light shrug, though it was obvious to anyone how strained his smile was. He looked away from Drake's studious gaze and mumbled, "Something she always does, you know."

Drake had no words of comfort, none appropriate for a man whose sister had gone missing, possibly at the hands of trained assassins who did not hesitate to kill. If not for the distinctive blood mark he'd found in one of the victim's houses, he would never have guessed that the trouble in Westdawn was the work of master assassins. Their involvement changed everything. It meant they were not dealing with common thugs or mercenaries who could be captured, but with men who could vanish into the shadows at will.

To most, the Assassins Guild was a myth, its existence one of the best-kept secrets of this world. And it might as well be, for their contract price was so high the average man would need to work three lifetimes to afford a single kill. Whoever was behind all this was one resourceful man.

Even stranger, however, was the fact that master assassins only ever killed. That is, they left corpses behind, not disappear with their prey. Perhaps they weren't the ones who had taken Isabella after all.

As a friend, he should be staying for as long as it took to find her. But as the Emir of