Page 69 of Never Love a Lord
Alys continued, to Cecily’s dismay. “Sybil de Lairne loved Mother.”
“She was a fool, then.”
“Iloved her,” Alys warned her. “And so did you. So did Sybilla. An evil woman would not garner such devotion.”
“We were deceived.”
“Perhaps,” Alys conceded. “But why were we deceived?”
“You are trying to read well of her intentions after the fact, Alys,” Cecily said.
“What if—” Alys mused, ignoring Cecily’s statement. “What if Mother was not only trying to protect all of us, but Sybil de Lairne, as well?”
Cecily looked aghast at Alys. “That’s outrageous. Mother wasn’t even of the nobility. What reason would she have—a lady’s maid with so much to hide, so much to lose—to protect Sybil de Lairne? And protect her from what?” she demanded.
“I don’t know,” Alys admitted gloomily.
“Alys,” Cecily said, striving for a bit of patience and sympathy for the youngest sister, “I know that the revelation of Mother’s true nature has shattered everything you thought you knew about her. But the truth is, we will likely never know why she did what she did. Sybilla is in very real danger now, with very real consequences, and we must focus all of our attention on saving her before she sacrifices herself for us all.”
Alys’s eyes narrowed as she stared off into the countryside, as if considering Cecily’s advice. “Very well, Cee. You drive. I shall think.”
Chapter 23
The enormous party of the king’s men and his prisoners rolled across the countryside, and Julian kept his eyes on Sybilla’s carriage, hoping against hope that something or someone would intervene.
How would he ever vindicate himself to Edward now? How would he ever choose which truths to tell? Telling the whole truth would see Sybilla damned. Telling a partial truth might come round like the curve of a noose to slip over his own head and steal him away from Lucy forever.
What could she possibly be planning? Julian could see no way out for them.
He sighed, staring at the rolling hills, the rarely varying landscape, as the sun sank lower and lower on the horizon, bathing the soldiers in a soft red glow. One of the guards to his right drew his attention to a knoll some distance away.
“Ay, look there,” the man said to his friend, pointing to a blocky shadow topping the rise. “Is it wild, you think?”
“Could be,” his comrade said. “But I thought they were all claimed years ago. Looks too big to be Spanish. Probably escaped his stable, is all.”
Julian doubted the big grey destrier had escaped his stable, although he was without bridle, without saddle, his mane blowing in the breeze as he solemnly watched the procession of soldiers. The horsewaswild, Julian well knew, but not without a mistress.
Octavian was following them, and the idea of it caused Julian’s heart to pound.
“If it is, I feel sorry for the lord missing that beast,” the man said with a laugh in his voice that didn’t sound the least bit sorry at all. “I’ve caught glimpses of him for the past hour. Seems to be followin’ us. Per’aps he’s wild, and the horses have drawn him out.”
His soldier friend shrugged, seeming not in the least bit interested.
“I’d like to have me a horse like that,” the first man said, almost to himself. “If he’s still at our flank when we camp, I’m going out with a lead.”
“You’re an idiot,” his friend said.
Julian had to agree.
Sybilla felt the carriage slow and then at last come to a rocking halt. Her eardrums throbbed from the incessant thundering of the reinforced cage, and the silence seemed too loud.
No one came to her right away, and so she waited, pulling herself up to peer over the edges of the high-set windows, getting her bearings.
They were setting up camp in a field, opposite a stretch of wood on the other side of the road. Sybilla ascertained that they had positioned her cell in the open, a wide berth of nothing around the carriage.
She acknowledged that as quite inconvenient. Even with her escape route from the carriage itself secured, it was going to prove very difficult to move away from the conveyance in the open, unseen. Nightfall would be her only hope, and she could only trust that what she needed would be provided to her.
There was a crashing knock upon the carriage door, and then the cacophony of what sounded like tens of locks, the rattling of chains on metal.
