“In yer world, there’s scant room for love.”
* * *
When Isolde opened her chamber door, a guard stood against the stone wall, rigid and dressed for battle. At the sight of her, his heels snapped together and his head bowed, giving her a view of the Weligbyr crest on the top of his helmet. Made of metal and leather strips, the helmet fitted perfectly to his head, clasping behind his neck and below his jaw, the eyeholes wide enough for the glass lenses used for flying.
“My lady.”
“What is it, Sir Lionel?”
“I’ve come to escort ye to the great hall.”
“And why is that?”
“There’s an outlaw on the loose, my lady. The son of Corbet has infiltrated the castle again.”
A gasp rushed up her throat before she could stop it. A hot blush bathed her breasts and fanned up her throat.
Sir Lionel stepped to her side and steadied her with a hand on her elbow. “Perhaps ye should remain in yer chamber, my lady. I can fetch a tray of food to ye.”
“Nay.” She rubbed her slick palms against her skirts. The high window in the stairwell glowed with light, and she watched an airship float by. A man lazily pedaled it, working the giant bellows, fanning the flames that heated the water chamber.
More controlled, she said, “I’m capable of attending the meal. Lead the way, soldier.”
As they neared the hall, upraised voices reached her, but her father’s stern reply stopped her dead. “Every chamber of this castle will be searched, every stool overturned. No corner will be left untouched. Get ye on it. Now.”
Isolde wished she could hide behind her veil of hair.
“Isolde,” her father barked,” what are ye doing here, girl? Haven’t ye heard our lives are in danger? Sadler, the son of Corbet, walks these halls, prepared to strike against us.” The king approached so swiftly, his robes flapped. His hand clamped upon her arm and spun her toward Lionel.
“Take her back to her chamber at once,” he said over her head.
“Nay, wait. Father, please, may I have yer ear?”
He paused to study her eyes, a crinkle on his long brow. At last he nodded and led her to an alcove, away from the ears of the others.
“What is it, Isolde?”
“This man,” she said, throat suddenly baked with thirst, “son of Corbet. How do ye know it’s the same man who tried to take yer life fifteen years past?”
“He’s been spotted. His countenance compared to the posters. I have the Earl of Millvale hard at work, devising new instruments to locate Sadler, son of Corbet. The earl has been invaluable to me in this hunt. Tonight you will dine with us. He has requested you personally.”
She ignored the slimy feeling she got at the thought of dining with the Earl of Millvale. He had the manners of a marsh wolf. And she ignored her father’s turn of conversation.
“But who turned him in, Father, all those years ago? He’d never gone to trial. He may have been on the wrong plot of land when the crime occurred—”
“Men trained to protect me turned him in. Ye dare question this?” His eyes flattened her retort like a carriage rolling over a shoot of new grass. “I was right in assigning Lionel to yer safety. If ye had it yer way, ye’d be running the corridors with the outlaw himself. Now get ye to yer chamber, Isolde, and don’t return until I’ve said ye’re safe.”
“But Father—”
Making a slashing motion with his hand, he gestured for Sir Lionel to bodily remove her.
Sir Lionel’s big, leather-clad hands closed over her wrists, and Isolde was being dragged off, twisting in his hold to break free, fighting the bonds of his hands, fighting her rising panic. To be locked in the tower with Sir Lionel barring the door and the entire kingdom hunting for Sadler sent her heart into a gallop.
“Nay. Father, don’t lock me up. Let me stay and assist with the planning. Ye know my worth when it comes to military tactics,” she cried, but Sir Lionel caught a glimpse of the king’s stern nod and, gripping her about the waist, swept her toward the staircase.
Being in his arms gave her a sickening sense of her loss of Sadler. And lost, she believed him to be. What man could withstand the army of King Adlard? The entire realm of Weligbyr was about to descend on his head with their cadence detectors—small handheld devices that could uncover a hidden heartbeat.
The Earl of Millvale had invented the cadence detectors. They had been programmed to sound an alarm when they detected a heartbeat matching Sadler’s. The earl still boasted about placing the cadence detectors in the surrounding countryside until Sadler ran across one and it duplicated his heartbeat. Now he could hardly travel without tripping an alarm.
He still hadn’t been caught, though.
“Put me down.”
Sir Lionel’s lips tightened. He adjusted his grasp on her and practically flew up the fifty-eight stairs it took to reach her tower chamber. As they reached the landing, a great, thunderous explosion rattled the castle walls.
The deafening crack of flying machine meeting stone vibrated through Isolde. Sir Lionel threw her to the floor and hurled himself atop her, squashing her cheek against the stone and crushing the air from her chest.
Shouts and chaos sounded below. Corliss dashed out of Isolde’s chamber, tripped over the sprawled knight and princess, and would have pitched headfirst down the deadly staircase if Sir Lionel’s fingers hadn’t lashed about her ankle at the last moment.
She collapsed upon the heap of their entwined bodies with a
whoof.
From the single high window, screams sounded from the yard, overlaid with a mighty roar, which could only mean fire had resulted from the explosion.
“The keep will go up in flames. All men to the bucket lines!” someone called from the yard.
“That means ye, Sir Lionel,” Corliss wailed, cupping her bleeding chin.
“I’ve sworn to protect Princess Isolde.”
Isolde kicked at him. “Get ye to the buckets. What man can threaten me while the keep is on fire?”
His eyes were very close to hers, and she wriggled beneath his grave gaze, terrified he may try to kiss her.
Corliss stared between the two. “Hurry, Sir Lionel. Ye’re needed.”
The knight carefully removed Corliss from his lower legs and set her upon her feet. He scrambled off Isolde and reached down, caught her under the armpits, and hauled her up.
Blushing furiously, she refused to meet his gaze when he asked if she’d been injured. A wispy lock of hair hung in one eye, and she shoved it away. “I’m fine. Go now, sir.”
With a bow and a grin, he hurtled down the stairs, soft-soled boots pattering on the smooth stones.
“If ye must be watched over, at least ye’ve got a beautiful man to ogle.” Corliss made a swooning motion with her head.
Isolde lifted her skirts and flounced into her chamber. Corliss closed the door and hastily tended to her cut. Isolde stood at the window, peering out at the destruction of the nearby armory, where the excess weapons were stored. If she didn’t know better, she’d almost believe the airship had purposely crashed into the keep.
“Let me fix yer hair, Isolde.”
She shooed her maid away and continued to stare at the countryside, squinting to pick up any fleck of movement on the horizon. The villagers had seen the rising smoke and were running up the long dirt road like an insect militia.
Isolde crossed her arms over her waist and thought hard of Sadler, of his burning eyes and his scorching touch. She willed him away from Castle Weligbyr with all her heart, even as her heart sent out a trill of staccato beats, willing him to her.
* * *
With the fire contained to the armory, which had been the only wooden structure surrounding the great stone and glass castle, the men began to filter back inside. And that meant Sir Lionel would resume his duty as Isolde’s personal guard.
She rushed for the door.
“Where shall I tell him to look for ye?” Corliss called to her back.
“No place at all. I don’t want him following me.” And then she was running the stairs, hands braced against the tight round walls to keep from pitching to her death. She had scant minutes to find Sadler, and no one knew this castle better than Isolde. As a child, she’d hidden in every crevice at least once.
She hit the bottom of the stairs and took off running. She sailed past groups of servants and into the kitchens. The scents of fresh stew and bread made her stomach cramp with hunger. She would have liked to sit at the scrubbed table and be given bread smeared with butter and honey as she had when she was little.
Beyond the back kitchen door, the gardens slumbered in the afternoon heat. Blue smoke hung on the air still, but the garden paths were empty of people.
“Slow down, Isolde,” the cook cried, but Isolde’s muscles bunched, and she sprang the last six feet, propelled through the doorway and into the garden.
The hot, muggy air settled over her like a blanket. All at once, she was exhausted from several sleepless nights. She began to weave through the fragrant plants. Bees hummed. An airship lumbered overhead, a long scope projecting from the front where the captain stood, searching the grounds for signs of Sadler.
Would he be in disguise? She hadn’t bothered to search the faces of the servants she ran past, but perhaps he had concealed himself in their numbers. Being the son of a stable master, he was most comfortable around android horses and bits and straps—could he be hiding in the stables?
Isolde followed the path to the rose garden where she and Sadler were supposed to meet. The bushes were heavy with blossoms, and their cloying scents hung in the air. How would it have felt to be kissed by Sadler here in the dark, among the heady smell of roses?
As she approached the tree where she’d huddled in her cloak and waited in the rain, her steps slowed. She touched the rough bark of the wide oak tree, thinking of the velvet scrape of Sadler’s jaw against her sensitive skin. She circled the tree, listening hard to the world around her—the chirp of birds, the faint breeze toying with the grasses in the orchard beyond.
She trailed her fingers over the trunk. Suddenly she felt a smooth spot. The area had been freshly carved out, exposing the creamy white wood. With a gasp, she lifted her trembling fingers. Her hands flew to her mouth, stifling a cry.
S is sorry
, it read.
She whipped her head from right to left, searching for him. Her throat burned to cry out his name, but to do that was insanity. Where had he gone after carving an apology into the tree where she’d sat waiting for him? At her feet, tiny shavings lay. She could still smell the sap.
She wished she could bury her nose against his chest and inhale him, as she had on the shore of the loch. “Where are ye, Sadler, son of Corbet?” she whispered. “Come to me.”
Chapter Six
A low growl penetrated the hay-fuel where Sadler lay hidden. Suffocating from lack of airflow within the deep haystack and straining to discern what machinery was making that noise, he threw out his senses. He peered through the oily hay strands, into the dusty darkness of the stable. The only movement he saw was the slow whip of an android horse’s tail. He pressed his fingertips to the earth and felt for the vibrations of footsteps or churning wheels or hoofbeats.
All still. All quiet. Except for that whiny, gravelly growl, which could only be a zeppelgonger—a steam-powered vehicle with eight-feet-long legs hinged like a man’s. The main torso was as broad as five men, the extendable arms possessing the might of ten.
The noise spread, drawing closer, until Sadler could feel the heavy steel thump of the gigantic feet striding the ground. After another quick look into the stable, he shimmied from under the pile of hay-fuel. Sticky bits of it clung to his bare chest. They’d worked into his waistband and itched abominably, but he had no time for scratching now—the zeppelgonger lumbered into view.
Sadler’s face tingled with adrenaline. Strapped to the torso was a cadence detector. And it was pointed right at him.
He dived into the tunnel and began to sprint, legs eating up the dirt floor, turning the sharp corners with ease. He’d traversed this tunnel in the dark a dozen times since discovering it. His heartbeat seemed deafening in his ears—if the cadence detector could sense him in the depths of the tunnel, he was lost. Lost, lost, lost.
I can’t lose my chance at the king, he thought. I can’t lose my chance with Isolde. Somehow, he had to get the king in the right place at the right time. His little fire beside the fuel barrel hadn’t been timed correctly. King Adlard had paused in the castle yard to talk to his page, and unfortunately, the explosion had occurred before the king could approach. The only thing Sadler had managed was causing a lot of smoke and a mass stampede for water.
A piercing pain gathered in his ribs, and his breath seared his lungs. King Adlard had pulled out all the stops in acquiring the equipment needed to find Sadler—most of it invented by that bastard Millvale. Sadler knew that if he could peer through the ground, he’d see other strange steam-driven beasts and a sky bulging with flying machines, each pilot equipped with telescoping glasses.
The last bend would see him in the castle. What would happen if he popped up in the kitchens, only to see Princess Isolde? He imagined her directing the staff or eating honey buns with pecans. He imagined her wearing a gown the blue-green color of her eyes, the bodice a laced wire-mesh corset and the skirt a full, short flare exposing her legs in high leather boots—boots of the most supple leather that gripped her calves like a second skin. He imagined a set of flying goggles perched atop her loose blonde hair and the flying machine tethered in the yard, filled with steam, ready to board.
They could flee together. Make a getaway.
She likes yer kisses, Sadler. She never said she’d become a fugitive with ye.
He hoped she’d found the message he’d left carved into the oak tree in the rose garden. In the dark hours alone, he’d fantasized about seeing her emerge through the night and into the stable. He would yank her inside the hay-fuel stack with him, fill his nose with her sweet, musky scent, see her eyes darken as he lowered his mouth to hers.