The Charleston Chase (Phantom Knights Book 2) (28 page)

I moved around the flames that had caught hold of a
crate and surged upward over the other two. The wood would burn
quickly, spreading all over the warehouse. One of the men came at
me, and I raised Guinevere’s dagger pistol. As I squeezed the
trigger, he leapt to the side but the ball grazed his arm. He came
at me again, and I swung the dagger up toward his chest. His arm
deflected, and the blade cut him, but he captured my wrist and
pulled the dagger from my grasp. He threw it away and roughly
jerked me toward him. He grabbed my hair in his fist. I slipped
down, and my hair came away from my head still clutched in his
fist. I was thankful I had chosen to wear my wig. I drove my knee
straight against his groin. When he released me and my wig, I threw
my fist against his nose, hearing it break, a jab to his jaw, and
then I brought my elbow against his eye. Blood was gushing from his
nose, but he reached out for me. I knocked his arm away and struck
his broken nose. He screamed as he fell back against one of the
crates. Grabbing my wig off the floor something black caught my
eye.

The black box, or sphere of light as Sam said the
Holy Order called it, was lying on the floor by the burning crates.
Glancing around, Guinevere was momentarily diverted striking her
opponent. Using my wig as a shield against the flames, I reached
down and grabbed the black box. Flames leapt at the wig, so I
released it, but I had the black box. I ran down one of the paths,
leaving Guinevere with the two guards still alive. I did not owe
her any allegiance. She had betrayed me enough times for me to have
no qualms about deserting her.

The path wound around to meet another. The smoke was
following me down the path, filling the air around me. The
warehouse was stifling, and beads of sweat were slipping down my
temples, my neck, and into the back of my dress.

Relief was permeating me when I saw the door, for
the fire was spreading swiftly, crackling, and causing crates to
fall over. I could almost feel the cooler air rolling off the
water. I reached the door, stepping into the open and sucking in
breaths of smelly but fresh air.

A hand captured the back of my dress and pulled me
back into the warehouse, my arms flailing from the sudden
movement.

“I apologize for this, Bess, but you left us with no
choice.”

A foul smelling cloth covered my mouth and nose. I
fought against her, but to no avail. I felt the black box slip from
my fingers as I slipped into darkness.

***

When I awoke, something was not right. My head ached
atrociously, I could not feel my hands, my legs would not work, and
my vision was black. I blinked a few times and moved my head. I
felt cloth rub against my cheek and realized that some kind of dark
cloth was covering my head. I pressed back, and my arms touched
something soft. I could not feel my hands, realizing they were
numb, bound too tight by what I guessed was rope. My legs were also
bound.

I heard a horse whinny before everything around me
lurched, and I fell forward, unable to stop myself. My face hit a
cushioned seat, causing many sharp pains to dance evilly around in
my head. I did not have a chance to be afraid, too busy trying to
right my body without the use of my arms or legs. Ropes were
binding my legs at both my ankles and my knees.

The carriage door opened, and two hands grasped my
arms, jerking me backward. My boots scraped against the floor of
the carriage before falling out and hitting the ground. The hands
on my arms gripped me, but not painfully, just hard enough that I
would stand.

“Untie her legs,” Guinevere’s voice demanded from
somewhere ahead of me and I tried to rush toward her voice but was
pulled back.

The hands on my arms remained while other hands
untied the ropes around my knees then my ankles. Tingles rushed
through me causing me nearly to cry out as I leaned back against
the broad chest of the man holding me upright.

“Bring her,” Guinevere snapped, and I was shoved
forward.

I took one step and my legs wobbled, then gave out
as I cried against the sharp pricks stabbing all along my legs. I
would have fallen, but the strong hands were there, swooping me up.
All I could do was try to fight the tears that were threatening to
spill from my covered eyes. Not from fright, but from the pain. I
blinked them away as I was jumbled around in his arms when he
mounted some steps. I heard a door open, and I guessed we were
entering a building. He took a few more steps and stopped, placing
me on my feet again, but there was no pain this time.

I felt like I was in an open space with nothing
surrounding me. I stomped one of my boots and heard it strike wood.
The hands left my arms but were replaced by smaller ones, and I was
guided three steps forward.

“Welcome, Bess, to the Holy Order.”

The cloth was pulled off my head, and I blinked
twice, then again. A cry of relief escaped my lips as I started to
move forward, but then I realized the significance of what was
before me, and all my relief transformed into a horror that broke
my heart anew.

“I have awaited this moment for a long time,
Elizabeth,” said the leader of the Holy Order, the man who had for
years been a friend of my family, the uncle of my dearest
friend...

Bess

G
eneral
Harvey was the leader of the Holy Order, and I never once suspected
him. He had played the role of dedicated and kind friend well…until
the moment that he threw me into prison.

Then again, ‘prison’ was not precisely the correct
term for the place I was being held, for the bedchamber was
comfortable, and I was no longer shackled. For there was no
need.

General Harvey had only spoken briefly to me, but I
had been too horrified and shocked to say anything. That had been
three days ago.

When the guards had placed the cloth over my head
again and led me up the staircase, they had not placed me in a
cell. They had led me to a lovely bedchamber with a four poster
bed, and a chamber pot, but nothing else. There were two
prison-like features to my chamber; the bars on the window and the
lock on the door. The bed had been nailed into the floor, and
nothing else could be used as a weapon. Not even the chamber pot,
though I had tried the first day. I heard boots coming up the
stairs and down the hall. The door was unlocked, but when I started
to swing the chamber pot, it was knocked out of my hand, and three
muskets were pointed at my chest.

Four guards arrived at dawn and dusk every day, and
I had the procession committed to memory. Fourteen steps on the
stairs, five steps down the hall, and twelve seconds before the
door flew open.

In the mornings, four guards would come in, three to
hold muskets on me and one to bring my morning meal of thin gruel
and a quarter cup of water and empty the chamber pot. In the
evenings, five guards would come, because that was when I was
allowed real food and a fork. Harvey must have thought I would try
something, like stabbing his guards with my fork. I could have, but
that would have been foolishness. In the evening, I was given fresh
water to wash, but as there were always five pairs of eyes watching
me, I never did more than clean my face and hands.

I tried to speak with the guard who brought my food,
but he remained silent, so I began greeting him as Silence whenever
he entered the room.

On the third day, instead of the morning gruel,
Silence arrived with four other men. Silence did not speak as he
tied my hands behind my back and placed a black cloth over my head.
I was guided into the hall and to the left. There was a hand on my
shoulder, but I knew the steps. Five steps to the edge of the
staircase and fourteen steps to the bottom. We turned right then
walked a short distance, and I could tell when I entered a
different room, for the feeling of the floor beneath my shoes
changed.

When the cloth was pulled away, I was standing in a
large dining parlor. Seated at the table were twelve people staring
at me. Harvey sat at the head of the table with Guinevere at his
left. The seat at his right was empty. The rest were men that I did
not know.

“Brothers and sister, as you can see, I have
gathered you here for a meeting of significance. I give you Raven,
one of the Phantoms who so plagued our guard’s mission while in
Philadelphia.”

Disgusted and eager looks were cast at me. Knowing
my fate was about to be decided, I was not afraid. I had been
branded by a branch of their secret society, and they had stolen
Levi from my family. They did not frighten me.

“What is it to be, Harvey, water, branding, or
starvation?”

“Silence!” barked a disagreeable looking man with a
wrinkled forehead. He looked like a pug dog. “You do not speak to
his supreme highness.”

A laugh burst from me as I looked at Harvey, who was
smiling in return.

Harvey addressed me. “You are here
today, because we have come to a unanimous ruling.” He was leaning
back in his chair. His gray hair was combed back, his beard
covering his chin and the scar that covered the left side of his
face appearing more mangled than I had
ever remembered.

“Raven, former leader of the Phantoms of
Philadelphia, daughter of the first Loutaire, deputy of the
Charleston Phantoms, this court finds you guilty of treason of the
highest order; acts against the good of which the Holy Order
represents. It is the order of this court that all spies for the
enemy be sentenced without trial. I, supreme highness of the Holy
Order, do sentence you, Raven, to be hanged by the neck until
dead.”

A moment of surprise touched me, but it was only a
moment. I had faced worse horrors than Harvey and his followers. A
particular smuggler captain that I had faced was the model of
sinister...

Guinevere’s gaze became wide and
startled as it flew from me to Harvey. “But—”

“You astonish me, Harvey,” I said, cutting in on
whatever Guinevere was going to say. “I did not believe you had the
spine for such work. No doubt one of your puppets will fulfill the
order. Perhaps Levi. He is such a puppet that will dance to any
piping.”

“You refer to Guinevere’s pet. No, he is away on a
special mission.”

“Indeed, and does he fill that empty seat?”

General Harvey smiled. “This seat on my right is for
the next in line to my throne.” His smile vanished as easily as it
had come. “Your sentence shall be carried out in three days’
time.”

My eyes had rested on Guinevere for a moment before
the cloth was placed over my head again. A painful grip on my arm
forced me from the room. The hand did not belong to Silence, for he
was never rough.

When my foot hit the bottom stair, I tripped and
fell forward. The hand on my arm jerked me up. He half pulled, half
pushed me up the stairs. In my chamber, he tossed me on the bed. I
felt him lean over me as he removed the cloth from my head. I found
myself looking into a pair of dark eyes that were full of malice.
He grinned, but it appeared more of a sneer. His teeth were green,
crooked, and one of the front teeth was missing completely. Harvey
had poor taste in lackeys.

“Ye don’t look so hard-bitten to me, I bet ye be
soft all over.”

He pressed his body against me, and rage filled me
so quickly that I was reacting before I realized. I shifted my
right leg out from beneath his and brought it up between his legs
with enough force to keep him from ever producing offspring. He
shouted, and spittle and the smell of garlic landed on my face. He
raised his clenched fist, and I stiffened my body for the coming
blow. It never came.

His fist was captured, and he was pulled off me by
Silence, who threw the man out the door and into the hall. Silence
and two others were still in the room when Silence slammed the
door. He turned to me with a look of contemptuous resignation on
his face. He was not handsome, but he was not sinister either. His
long, stringy, blond hair was falling out of the tie at his neck,
and his wide eyes were full of annoyance.

“You should not have done that,” he spoke for the
first time. His voice sounded resigned.

He helped me to sit up and untied my hands while the
other two pointed the barrels of their muskets at me.

“I should have done more,” I retorted as he
straightened from untying my hands.

“Angering him will only encourage him to try
something else.”

“Let him. All I need is one free hand, and I could
rid the world of a plague.”

Silence rose to his full height which was the same
as mine. “I shall see to it that he is placed outside the house.
You have nothing to fear.”

“Usually when people say you have nothing to fear,
what they mean is that something to fear is imminent,” I replied,
sitting on the bed and straightening the only pillow.

“Fear is a useless emotion,” he stopped at the door,
looking over his shoulder, “unless you know how to make it an
advantage.” He left the room with the others following him out.

I stayed awake for a long time to analyze what he
could have meant. I would not delude myself by thinking he meant to
help me. He worked for the Holy Order.

Thinking about Harvey’s order that I would be hung
did not fill me with the fear that I was sure he wanted. A great
part of me did not believe that my dearest friend’s uncle would
truly harm me. More likely, he wanted to frighten me, and then when
he bartered with Jack and Sam, probably for the artifacts, he would
set me free. It would not surprise me if I were set free on the
morrow.

Lying against the pillow, I had barely closed my
eyes when the door opened softly. Opening my eyes, it was
Guinevere, and she was leaning against the door, her brows slanting
as she looked at me. As I sat up, she hurried over to the bed
gripping a poster.