Page 61 of The Herald's Heart
“Nay,” he replied quietly. “From what little I know of my father, he placed no value on such things.”
“You are right.” Her voice took on a hard edge.
Too vulnerable to her allure, he resisted touching her, even in sympathy. He’d thought this time together would reveal what she felt for him, but all he’d gained was confusion about his own desires. “Why such bitterness over a pleasure the earl denied himself?”
“Because he stole not only my family’s lives but my home and did not even care enough to keep it.” The pain in her expression twisted Talon’s heart. The earl had had a child and not cared enough to keep it.
“’Tis not so strange for an earl to enfeoff secondary estates to a vassal.”
“You don’t understand.” She turned on him with brutal vehemence. “He did not even give Rosewood to a vassal. He let the lands lay fallow, the castle fall to neglect.” Her voice rose. “The serfs and yeomen had no way to earn their livings because he ordered them from the lands they’d farmed for generations. ’Twas years before he deeded Rosewood to Baron Le Hourde.” She struck the rock wall beside her. “Do you hear me? Not enfeoffed but deeded, as if the place had no importance to him other than the gold coins its sale could bring.”
Worried that she might hurt herself, Talon lifted his hands, then reminded himself that holding her was holding the end of his dreams. Helpless, he watched her beat out her sorrows on the stone, then collapse against it, sobbing for the loss of her home and her family. Family, a thing he knew little of but longed for most desperately. Family defined a man’s place. Without family, a man had no more worth than the waves hurling themselves unwelcome against the shore. And family needed a home. He’d learned that from Amis. His friend complained about his grasping, manipulative father, but at least Amis had a family and a clear sense of where home was, even if he did resent it and wanted a home of his own.
“Talon?” Larkin grasped his sleeve. The gesture and the concern in her voice shook him from his dismal thoughts.
“What?” The sun was sinking, edging toward the shelter of the cliff before yielding sway to the night. Spray from crashing waves spumed upward and sprinkled Larkin’s dress.
“Am I mistaken or has the tide risen?”
Yes, several of the caves that opened onto the cove were nearly covered by water. Only a few were high enough to be barely touched by the rapidly rising tide. He checked—waves lapped at the cave entrance to the keep. Then he ran his gaze over the walls of the cavern in which they stood. The tide line that he’d seen earlier marched around the cavern’s uppermost perimeter.
If they stayed here, they would drown.
“We’d best get back to the keep.”
“Aye, I’ll hold the torch while you go out first.” She took the flambeau as she spoke.
He wanted to argue but feared delaying even a small bit. He squeezed his body through the opening, turned and reached for the torch. Larkin wasn’t there.
“Larkin!”
“I’m right here.” Her voice came from below the level of the opening.
“What are you doing? We must go, now!”
“I found something.”
“The box?”
“Nay. This.” She thrust her arm at him and opened her palm.
“Wax? You found wax?” He took the pale smatterings from her.
“Yes.” Her head appeared in the opening.
“And you risk our lives by delaying to find this because ...?”
“Don’t you see? Someone else is using these caves.”
“That may or may not be true, but right now, we must leave.”
“Right.” She shoved the torch into his grasp and crawled through the opening.
Talon shifted the torch to his far hand and held out his free hand to help her through.
She ignored it. All on her own, she thumped to the ground with a sploosh. She looked down at the sodden hem of her gown. “Oh dear.”
“What?”
