Aleksei bade four of the burly outlaws to carry their prisoner into the carriage house and hang him by his wrists from the rafters. For good measure, Ladislaus instructed several more to stand guard with pistols held at the ready, just in case the good colonel revived before they had made him sufficiently secure.
Aleksei barely considered the idea of Synnovea trying an escape now. She seemed far more intent upon following the procession, which he pompously led. His attention was occupied with giving orders to his recruited culprits, and so delighted was he with that particular task that he failed to notice a diminutive form quickly scurrying behind a shrub as he and Ladislaus’s men passed with their burden. He was equally unobservant when the tiny, shadowy shade reached out to grasp Synnovea’s arm and yank her behind that same bush.
“Ali!” Though the cry was no more than a startled whisper, Synnovea could have shouted out the servant’s name in sheer joy. Her relief to see someone who could help was nearly overwhelming. “Why are you still here?”
“As ye can probably guess for yerself, me lamb, Stenka is takin’ his own sweet time comin’ back for me.” The Irish-woman cocked a curious eye after the departing men. “What’s that thievin’ beastie Ladislaus doin’ here anyway? An’ Prince Aleksei, is he in cahoots wit’ the brigand?”
Synnovea had no time to answer the woman’s questions. “Ali, you must help me! Colonel Rycroft is in great danger.”
“Well, I figgered as much meself as soon as I seen him bein’ toted an’ guarded by so many,” the servant commented dryly. Ali peered around the bush, closely eyeing the four who hauled their captive through the door of the stable. “But I haven’t a ken what I can do ta save his handsome self from all ’em foul brutes. They’d only knock me senseless again if’n I interfere, an’ what help would I be then?”
“Listen carefully, and I’ll gladly tell you!” Synnovea whispered urgently. “You must leave here posthaste and halt the carriage on the street before any of Ladislaus’s men have a chance to see you. Once you find Stenka, have him take you immediately to the tsar’s palace. There you must urge a guard to fetch Major Nekrasov for you. Tell the major that Ladislaus is here in the city and that Colonel Rycroft is in imminent peril. It is imperative that a force of men come at once to his rescue. Do you understand?”
“Aye, that I do, lamb,” Ali replied with a nod. “But I gotta go now ’cause I hear Stenka comin’ down the lane.” With a leaping skitter, she raced off to meet the coach as it rumbled up the thoroughfare toward the manse.
Now, with some hope for Tyrone’s rescue flourishing within her breast, Synnovea caught up her skirts and raced after the men who were crowding inside the carriage house. Several tallow lanterns had been lit here and there throughout the barn, but for the most part, the light seemed concentrated upon an open area which they were now surrounding. Synnovea grew cold with dread as the brigands chortled and loudly boasted of their own participation in the capture of the Englishman, but she slipped through narrow breaches in their broad-shouldered ranks until she gained the inner circle. Aleksei stood near the core of that area, and she suffered a moment of panic as she sensed his heightened exhilaration. Facing her, he smirked with malevolent glee and raised a hand to beckon her forward.
“You’re just in time, my dear.” He casually indicated the long, manly form dangling from the rafters. “We were about to awaken your handsome lover with a cold bath. Would you care to admire him for one last moment ere he’s forever scarred and mutilated?”
The strength ebbed from Synnovea’s limbs when her eyes found Tyrone. He now wore only the chausses he had donned beneath his breeches, but they drooped around his narrow hips, barely preserving his modesty as he hung by his wrists. His head dangled forward limply between upstretched arms. His ankles had been shackled to a pair of huge, weighty anvils, which had been separated to keep his legs widespread and at an uncomfortable angle. She could imagine the reason.
Synnovea stifled an anguished moan as Ladislaus reached up a hand and seized a short thatch of pale-streaked hair, jerking his captive’s head upright. Then, with a snort of derision, he let it fall again and signaled a comrade to awaken their prisoner. In the next instant a bucketful of water was flung into Tyrone’s face, bringing him around to a half-muddled state. His head only lolled listlessly between his shoulders while the trickling water cascaded down his body, weighing down the stockings until they sagged against him wetly. Once more the pail was filled from the watering trough and heaved into his face, this time startling Tyrone awake with a gasp of surprise. Tiny droplets of water sprayed outward as he jerked up his head and glared about him. His gaze softened briefly when it paused on Synnovea, but his eyes hardened just as quickly when he took note of the dark bruises on her brow and cheek and the split and swollen bottom lip.
Aleksei stepped forward almost jauntily and held a tallow lantern high to see the Englishman’s face better. “So, Colonel Rycroft, we meet at last.”
“Forbear the introductions,” Tyrone growled, and squinted against the light to fix the man with a piercing scowl. “I know who you are. You’re the toad who tried to force Synnovea into serving your pleasure. It must gall you considerably to think that she prefers me over you.”
Aleksei laughed harshly in loathing disdain. “About as much as it might provoke you to be told that she only used you for her own devices. Only a few days ago my ward became formally betrothed to Prince Vladimir Dimitrievich. She swore to see herself disgraced by the likes of you rather than submit to the marriage. So you see, my friend, you’ve been foolishly duped into believing the wench cared for you. ’Twas but a ruse she invented to save herself from an arrangement of marriage which she abhorred.”
Tyrone shifted his gaze to Synnovea, feeling her treachery pierce his heart as deeply as any steel-tipped pike. Though she stepped awkwardly forward and struggled in vain to speak the words that came to her lips, he knew of a sudden that everything Aleksei had said was true. He had been used! Deceived! Played the fool! And now he would pay for it!
The blue eyes turned coldly away from her to peruse the leering faces of the men who watched him; he recognized several from his first encounter with Ladislaus’s pack. He had heard their sniggering laughter when someone made the translation into Russian. It was just as obvious that they were gloating over their good fortune at having seized him at last.
“So now you have me in your trap.” He faced Aleksei with the declaration. “What do you plan to do with me?”
“Oh, I’ve reserved a special punishment for you, Colonel, one that I’m sure you’ll forever revile. ’Twill serve to remind you of your folly in sullying a Russian boyarina. Indeed, my friend, after tonight you’ll never be able to make love to another woman as long as you live. After you’re given a proper lashing, you’ll be gelded while the girl is forced to watch.”
Aleksei strode around Synnovea, reveling in the revenge he would take, but Tyrone gnashed his teeth against the effort of propelling his body forward against the ponderous weights ensnaring his ankles. Relaxing as he swung backward, he recouped his strength and strained forward again. Over and over he tried until he was swaying to and fro, with each subsequent movement gaining momentum to pull the anvils with him. He saw his goal near and stretched his legs outward to lock the prince in the steely vise of his thighs, but a warning shout from one of the men alerted Aleksei, who, upon espying the imminent threat, gasped in sudden alarm and stumbled back from the dangerously encroaching limbs. From a place of safety, he looked at the colonel with eyes that momentarily portrayed evidence of fear.
When the prince finally regained his aplomb, he gave a crisp nod to the tall, brawny fellow who had stripped himself to his waist, baring a massive chest that was covered with a thick thatch of curling black hair. It was the Goliath who had once sent the colonel’s helmet sailing off his head. Now it seemed that he would have the personal pleasure of dealing out what the thieves deemed a befitting punishment upon their adversary.
The Goliath hefted a many-tongued lash as he strode to a spot slightly behind and to the right of Tyrone. “Brace yourself, Englishman,” he rumbled deeply. “The weapons I wield are more often spikes and cutlasses, but I can assure you that you’ll wish for a quick end ere I’m finished.”
Aleksei smiled in eager anticipation. Bracing his feet apart, he folded his arms across his chest like some dark-skinned sultan as he awaited the first scourging stroke. The titan drew back his arm, shaking out the lash in preparation.
“NOOOooo! You mustn’t!” Synnovea railed and threw herself at Aleksei’s feet, where she sobbed out a desperate plea. “Oh, please spare him! I beg you, Aleksei, don’t do this thing! I yield you whatever you want from me if you would only have pity on him. I’ll give myself to you gladly! Just don’t hurt him!”
“Do you think I’ll sully myself by taking his leavings?” Aleksei sneered as he glared down at her. “You were merely one of the colonel’s fleeting fancies, my dear. Don’t you know that? Bedding every wench who strikes his fancy is what a soldier does best when he’s not chasing the enemy. There’s no accounting for how many others your precious colonel had before bedding you! But no! You had to give yourself to him! Well, I don’t want you now! After this, as far as I’m concerned, you can serve Ladislaus’s pleasure. ’Twill be a fitting punishment for ignoring my warnings.” Lifting his head, Aleksei looked inquiringly at the leader of the thieves. “What say you, Ladislaus? Will she be payment enough for you?”
Synnovea’s head snapped around, and she stared in horror at the flaxen-haired thief whose ice-blue eyes gleamed back at her above a broad grin.
“Oh, Great Exalted Prince,” the lordling thief casually mocked. “With the colonel rendered his just due, she’ll be more than payment enough for me. My men, however, will have to be paid in gold, as you have promised.”
Whirling back to face Aleksei, Synnovea glared at him. “You wouldn’t dare attempt this outrage! The tsar—”
Aleksei intruded curtly. “Natasha was responsible for you during the absence of my wife,” he informed her loftily. “If she allowed you to wander off with the Englishman, and you and he were never seen again…then the fault will lie with her. You can be sure that is as much as the tsar will ever know about this matter.”
Dismissing her with a wave of his hand, Aleksei faced the bare-chested brute and gave him a nod, urging the man to continue. That one hauled back the whip, and an instant later it fell, bringing a pained grimace from Tyrone and a sobbing scream from Synnovea as she threw herself between him and the one who had delivered the stroke. Clasping her slender arms around her lover’s thighs, she braced herself to be his shield and glowered back at the men in defiance.
Tyrone’s rage was supreme. He saw the taunting grins of his foes through a furious red haze. He had no need for them to call him a fool for having played into the countess’s hands. The throbbing in his back served to remind him of that fact, but the pain was not as unbearable as the one that throbbed near his heart and in his brain. Gnashing his teeth in a savage snarl, he tossed Synnovea away with a sideways heave of his body, curtly rejecting her protection. “You conniving little bitch! Get away from me! Even if these louts mean to skin me alive, I’ll take nothing from you, least of all your pity or your shelter! As far as I’m concerned, Ladislaus can have you! With my most earnest blessings!”
Aleksei chortled in uproarious glee as he contemplated her completely astounded visage. “ ’Twould seem neither of us wants you anymore, Synnovea,” he mocked. “That must be a new revelation for a woman as winsome as you. To have not one but two men reject your attentions. Why, you must be devastated.” Wary of drawing near the colonel, he picked up a barn rake and, holding it like a sword, nudged her away from that one. “Now get back and let the fellow be dealt his due. Learn from his example and grit your teeth against the pain of our rejection. Be content that Ladislaus still wants you.”
With another imperious nod, Aleksei bade the Goliath to continue, but retreated hastily to a safe distance before the second stroke fell. Blinded by a deluge of tears, Synnovea stumbled away to a dark corner and cringed in silent, agonizing anguish each time the cat-o’-nine-tails made its venging descent. She heard no mumbled plea for mercy issue forth from Tyrone’s lips, not even a muffled groan as he hung helpless before the master whip. Yet every blow laid to the stalwart back ripped through her with equal savagery.
Covering her head with her arms as the scourging continued, Synnovea couldn’t still her violent quaking or her remorseful weeping. Though she had lost count through her own unending torment, she was crushingly aware of the ominous repetition of the punishing whip. Each time the lash fell, she cringed in horror, and then shuddered in agonizing dread when the whip was dragged back for yet another blow. The strain seemed beyond her endurance, and her spirit whimpered beneath the terrible punishment exacted upon her.
Though Tyrone now sagged limply in his fetters and had no strength to lift his head, his valor and spirit hadn’t yet been daunted. His display of unyielding tenacity captured the reluctant admiration of those who had sought to deliver their own form of justice upon his frame. Ladislaus and his followers were a band of outlaws who had lived and fought with the smell of death all around them for a good many years. They had taken the worst of what the colonel had given them. Some had died by his sword, but it had been an honorable fate, with weapons in hand. It was in their minds that this stalwart enemy deserved the same consideration. A flogging was what they reserved for whimpering, cowardly dogs, and as they all knew, Colonel Rycroft was a warrior of superior skill and courage. Thus, as a whole, the brigands ceased to enjoy the whipping. Instead, they began to mutter among themselves, growing increasingly agitated as Aleksei pressed for at least a hundred or more lashes. A score and ten strokes from the lash crisscrossed Tyrone’s back before the flogging finally ceased, but it was only because the Goliath threw down his whip in disgust and refused to pick it up again.
“Are you mad?” Aleksei railed in outraged astonishment. He was unique among their number in that he suffered no similar convictions of honor and respect but insisted that his revenge be sated to the utmost. “I give the orders here! And I say you must carry out the discipline as I see fit—or, I swear, you’ll not be paid!”
“We’ve done your service!” Ladislaus roared as he strode forward to confront the prince. “You’ll pay us or you’ll die!”
Petrov smirked as he drew forth a gleaming blade and twirled the shining tip between his thumb and forefinger. “We take payment from your hide, maybe, just like you mean for the Englishman.”
“I’ll pay you after he’s gelded and not one damn minute sooner!” Aleksei declared, too incensed by their lack of commitment to consider the threats they made against him.
“Do it yourself, then!” Ladislaus snarled in derision. “We’ll not hurt him anymore for the likes of you! As far as we’re concerned, he has paid his due. We’re fighting men and give him honor as a swordsman. If you had wanted us to duel with him, then we’d have seen him killed by our blades, but not your way.” Contemptuously the brigand jerked his chin outward to indicate the bloodied, lacerated back. “Your way is the penalty for gutless cowards. Outnumbered by scores, the English colonel was taken and abused by your decree, but I tell you this, Boyar, he’s more of a man than you’ll ever hope to be!”
It was the second time that evening that Aleksei had heard the likes of such a statement. The insult infuriated him all the more. His reddened lips drew back from gnashing teeth for barely a moment. Then, with a savage snarl, he glared around him and cursed them viciously for their refusal to help him. His ire heightened progressively until he whirled and, snatching up a sharp blade, plowed forward to seize the top of the colonel’s leggings. Tyrone struggled to protect himself against the mutilation and struck out in defense of himself, but in his much-weakened state, his efforts proved far too feeble.
It was Synnovea who threw herself against Aleksei in a desperate bid to stop
him from doing his evil. Even if she must accept the thrust of the blade herself and sacrifice her own life, she was determined to halt his assault. Viciously she clawed at his face and sank her teeth into the hand that held the knife as he tried to yank free of her. A pained yowl curdled upward from Aleksei’s throat, but she gave him no heed as she gnashed her teeth tighter against his flesh, drawing blood and forcing his grip to slacken until the blade finally plummeted from his grasp. Snatching herself free, Synnovea stooped to retrieve the weapon, but the dark eyes of her antagonist flared with highly inflamed fury. With a horrendous curse, Aleksei caught her by the wide-spreading cloak and whirled her around with all the strength at his command, in a furious temper flinging her deliberately into a sturdy post. Jolted nearly senseless by the sudden impact, Synnovea tottered unsteadily away.
Dismissing her with a satisfied smirk, Aleksei caught up the knife again and plunged toward the object of his jealousy, but the carriage house rang with a loud bellow of rage as Ladislaus leapt to Tyrone’s rescue and knocked the blade from the prince’s hand, sending it skittering across the rough planking of the floorboards.
“No more!” he bellowed. “You’ve had your bloodletting! Now be content, or I’ll see you unmanned myself!”
All reason was sundered beneath the unrestrained fury of Aleksei’s indignation, and he gave no thought to backing down in the face of the other’s challenge. “You filthy barbarian! How dare you threaten me! Why, I’ve had better men than you slashed and split in twain for daring to oppose me!”