Sworn Loyalty - A Medieval Romance Read Online Free PDF Page A

smile was encouraging as he put a hand down to her. “Round two,” he offered.
    “The cobblestone bridge at Stickney,” she responded.
    He drew her up more than she climbed. After a moment she was settled in place in his warmth, nestling herself against him, and they were in motion again.
     
    * * *
     
    She blinked her eyes and realized she was standing, supported by Erik, his arms around her. She shook her head, the whooshing of frigid water echoing in her ears. The roan was nowhere to be seen. A dappled grey horse stood before them, shifting his weight, his hooves making soft clinking noises as they came down on the stone of the bridge.
    Erik’s voice was soft in her ear. “I know you are exhausted,” he apologized, “but I need to know the final leg.”
    Her thoughts were still sluggish, but a trace of nervousness whispered into her mind. He had followed her lead without question up until now, with the pressure of the Caradoc clan overwhelming all else. Now they were two hours’ hard ride from the threat. They were alone in the gathering dusk. He might balk at where she planned to take them.
    She drew in a breath, steeling herself. There was only one way to find out.
    Her voice was a mere whisper. “Avoca’s Folly.”
    There was a long pause. Mary could feel the tension slide into Erik, the chill in his pose. Then he was carefully turning her around, bringing his eyes to meet hers. His gaze edged with a sharpness she had not seen before.
    His voice was rough. “You know who I am.”
    She nodded, struggling through the weariness. “You are Erik of Cartwright.”
    His lips pressed into a thin line. “And you know that my Aunt Avoca threw herself to her death from that tower some fifteen years ago. It is a cursed location; my mother closed it off ever since.”
    Mary kept her voice even. “And now your mother is dead.”
    Erik flinched, his gaze chilling further. “She died when I was at the Crusades,” he agreed. “She willed the entire property, including the eastern corner with Avoca’s Folly, to a distant relative I had neither met nor heard of. There is a new Lady Cartwright; one who would not welcome us.”
    Mary flushed. She hoped he would attribute her discomfort to the searing pain coursing through her leg and not to his words. There was indeed a new Lady Cartwright, had been for three years now, ever since that week of torment during which Erik’s mother had succumbed, in growing agony, to an infection of the stomach. Mary had done everything she could, had tried every remedy and called for every healer within reach, but in the end it had been no use. The Lady had for so long been a domineering, powerful, almost invincible force in her life. In the end she had been reduced first to a writhing, wailing woman, and at last to a moaning, pleading child. Her thin fingers had laced into Mary’s own long after life had left her fragile shell.
    “There is a new Lady,” agreed Mary in a low voice. She looked to the ground. While she understood Erik’s mother’s instructions, it still pained her to follow them. It was Mary’s nature to be forthright and simple, to state how things were and take what came. But the past Lady Cartwright had not trusted in Erik, or at least not trusted in his ability to hold off the influences of Lynessa.
    From what Mary had seen these past few years, she could not say she blamed the Lady one whit.
    She swallowed, running a hand wearily through her hair. “Given the split you had with your mother ten years ago, and that she did not reconcile even on her deathbed, the last place anybody would look for you would be on her property.” She looked up at him. “And as for the Folly, it’s even less likely that any searcher would want to go near that place. Rumor is that it’s haunted.”
    His eyes were still, the grey-blue almost ice. “That is the rumor.”
    “So we head out?”
    Mary held her breath. If he refused, she could hardly force him to this path. As it was,