Page 62 of The Knight's Pledge
Effie frowned.
“And,” he continued in his smug, superior tone, “Icarry the very information that could exonerate your father and return Darlyrede to your family.”
“It’s notyourinformation,” she pointed out. “It’s your sister’s. Youlostyours in the fire at Darlyrede. Rather irresponsible, actually.”
“I located your brothers,” Lucan continued, unfazed. “Three of them, in fact. Without me, you would still be an orphan, without family.”
“Let me touch the hem of thy garment, master,” Effie gushed and rolled her eyes. “I was never an orphan. I simply didn’t know wheremy family was.”
“But rather than seek them, you chose to align yourself with a misfit band of lawbreakers and while away the years honing your criminal expertise.”
Effie was stunned into silence for a moment. But only one moment.
“Criminal expertise? I was a fifteen-year-old girl when I escaped Darlyrede, Lucan.” She made a sound of disgust in her throat. “And it’s still so difficult for you to understand why I hate you? Really?”
“Yes,” he answered at once. “I’ve never done anything to harm you. Quite to the contrary, as I’ve already pointed out. I didn’t have to accompany you to London in the first place,” he added gruffly. “Especially after youshot me.”
“You simply can’t stand it when someone isn’t in awe of you,” she accused.
“That’snot it at all.”
“It certainly is.” They were riding a little faster now, likely a response to the growing heat of their conversation. But Effie could tell that the rest of the party wasn’t hurrying to match their pace. “You think everyone should fall at your feet for your position with the king, your title, your education, your oh-so-diligent determination to uphold the assumed honor of your sainted name. Your prissy decorum that announces to everyone how much better youare than them.”
“My education was my own doing,” he informed her. “Vaughn Hargrave sent Iris and me to France to get us out of the way of him claiming Castle Dare lands.”
“Yes, he did want you out of the way,” Effie agreed. “But you’re not as smart as you’d like to think; it wasn’t only to have an easier time to try to steal away your inheritance and add it to his own coffers.”
“What was it then, O wise one?”
“It was because you were the last person outside the Warren to see me alive the night I ran away, and he wanted to make sure you couldn’t speak of it once it was discovered I was missing,” she snapped, regretting it immediately, wishing she could take it—and all the other words that poured from her mouth—back even as her accusations built. “I came to you at Castle Dare the night of the fire.”
“No, you didn’t,” Lucan argued.
“I found you—you and Iris were near your nurse. But it was you I spoke with. Don’t pretend you don’t remember.”
“You didn’t,” Lucan insisted. “The only people who came to us that night besides Hargrave were servants of the hold.”
“Perhaps you could ask your old nurse,” Effie suggested.
“I can’t,” Lucan scoffed. “She died later that same night, overcome with smoke while trying to retrieve some of our personal possessions. I felt dreadfullyguilty for it.”
“Is that what Hargrave told you? God, you’d think by now you’d have gone over in your mind everything he’d ever said to you and realized it was all a lie.” Effie let silence hang between them for a moment, letting his words hover in relief against the backdrop of the information she was telling him.
“Youweren’t there,” he insisted throughclenched teeth.
“I begged you to take your sister and go to the king with me that night. Do you remember your response to my plea that we should seek aid from the crown?” Effie demanded ina lower voice.
Lucan turned his head toward her then, slowly. His face was ashen. “That wasn’t you.”
“You struck me,” Effie said. “You accused me of trying to rob you, and ordered me from your sight or you said you would kill me yourself.”
“It wasn’t you,” he repeated.
“You called me a wretch, not worthy to labor in the house of Montague.” She paused, and dealt the final blow. “You were holding your mother’s burned slipper in your hand. And you struck me with it. As if driving away a stray dog.”
He turned his face forward once more toward the advancing road, but Effie didn’t think he was actually seeing anything.
“I was wearing—”
