Since then, she had seen enough of death. What the rebels accomplished with their pikes and firelocks, the loyalists answered with equal ferocity. Faelan had led his little group around the towns, but Roddy had seen the corpses hanging from trees, and the bodies left to be scavenged in the fields. She heard the stories, and caught the memories in old women’s minds—of sons tortured for information, of the caps of burning pitch and the half-hangings and the flogging. In one place a whole garrison had been murdered in their beds by rebels, and the commander—notorious for his torturing methods—burned in a barrel of pitch. In another the panicked loyalists, deserted by the retreating army, had taken all prisoners out of the jails and shot them without trial.
Now, in the quiet dawn, such things seemed impossible and far away. But she saw a pair of ravens circling a dark spot across the field, and she turned her face and would not look closer.
All right? Earnest asked, a silent question between them. She looked up at him riding beside her, and nodded.
“Where are we?” he said aloud.
It was directed toward Faelan, and tingled with faint belligerence. Roddy felt a surge of annoyance at her brother’s lingering distrust of her husband.
Faelan squinted at the low mountains on their left. “That should be Sculloge Gap.”
“Is that the road to the coast?”
Faelan nodded.
“Aren’t we going to turn that way, then?” Earnest was anxious to reach a port, not for his own sake, but in his determination to get Roddy to safety.
To her surprise, her husband did not answer immediately. Up until now, it had seemed as if he’d had everything planned, and his crisp orders had swept them all along in his wake—even though Geoffrey was burning to rejoin his rebels and Earnest was stewing over the disgrace of having broken out of prison when he’d been falsely arrested in the first place.
Roddy pursed her lips. She wouldn’t have believed six months ago that Earnest could have been so stupid as to care about something like that.
Faelan halted his horse and turned back to face the rest of them in the narrow lane they’d been following. He’d exchanged the red uniform coat for something dark and nondescript. Where the early light touched the shape of his cheek and jaw, the grim outlines were blurred by stubble. “You may go east, if you please.”
“I thought we were trying to make for a port.”
“That’s certainly what I’d do if I were you.” Faelan unstrapped his water flask and upended it. A trickle of moisture slipped down and made a random trail through two days’ growth of beard.
“Well—” Earnest said impatiently. “How am I supposed to know which direction to take?”
With a leisure that was maddening to Earnest, Faelan recapped his flask and twisted to flip open his leather saddle pack. He held out a folded paper. “Forgive me. Have I been monopolizing the map?”
Earnest snatched it. “Damned right you have. I’d been hoping all this doubling back and forth was to some purpose.”
“It was. Staying alive.”
Geoffrey had been staring at the mountains. “I keep telling you, we’ve only to find the United headquarters to get protection. Bagenal Harvey’s our man in Wexford.”
“It’s inconceivable to you, I suppose,” Faelan said dryly, “that the country may still be in the hands of the regular government?”
“You heard the news at Kilcullen!” Geoffrey’s horse danced. “Dublin’s fallen, man!”
“I heard what a scruffy schoolmaster with a broken musket wanted to hope.”
“The militia’s retreated. That’s a fact.”
“Aye.” Faelan frowned toward the north, where at Narraghmore they had watched at a distance as the Suffolk Fencibles and Tyrone militia had marched out of town, leaving it completely undefended. “Aye, and I was impressed with the expertise of your United soldiers. The army itself could hardly have plundered better.”
Geoffrey, unable to think of a suitable excuse for the half-wild mob that had taken over Narraghmore in the wake of the militia, said, “They must be short of officers. I’m heading for Wexford.”
Earnest looked up from his map. “Yes. That’s closer than Waterford, from what I can make out.” He squinted at the rising sun. “Things look quiet enough. I think we should risk pushing on. We could make the foothills at least, before the horses need to stop.”
“Let’s go.” Geoffrey urged his horse past Faelan’s, with Earnest close behind.
Roddy looked after them, and then at Faelan. He met her eyes, and for a moment there was something in his face—a depth in his look, a kind of intensity, as if he were memorizing her features as he must have memorized the folded map.
He looked away before she did, and swung his leg over the saddle.
Roddy blinked down at him. “Are you stopping here?”
He was already loosening his horse’s girth. “Yes,” he said. That was all.
She lifted her knee off the sidesaddle and twisted, sliding to the ground beside him.
“Roddy.” Earnest had paused. “Are you too tired to go on?”
“Faelan is stopping,” she said simply.
Earnest rode back. “Oh—come, Iveragh, do you really see the need? Every hour we dally, this damned thing is exploding around our ears. I want Roddy off this cursed island.”
Faelan’s mouth tightened a little, but he went on stripping his horse in silence. Roddy reached for her girth.
“Dammit,” Earnest snapped. “I think you’ve given orders long enough. You’ve no more notion of the situation than the rest of us. All this dodging has done nothing but keep us in the midst of the worst of it. Leave off that, Roddy, and come along.”
“I’m staying with Faelan,” she said.
Earnest took a breath. She could feel his temper slipping. “Roddy.” He spoke aloud—for everyone’s benefit—very clearly and slowly. “Come now, or by God, I’ll leave you here.”
Roddy grabbed her saddle and flung it to the ground. “Well, Earnest,” she said, equally slowly and deliberately, “by God, why don’t you just do that?”
Earnest opened his mouth. She didn’t give him time to marshal his response.
“Go on!” she cried. “You won’t be missed here—you or Lord Geoffrey. I’m sick of your carping, I’ll tell you that, and I surely don’t blame Faelan if he’s had his fill of it! He saved your necks; he walked into that place and he got you out, and have either of you said one grateful word?” She yanked the saddle pad off and pulled a rubdown towel from between its folds, going after her mount’s coat with vigorous strokes. “No. Oh, no. You just go on griping, as if you were both a couple of royal princes who deserved to have a decent man risk his life for you every other day.”
Earnest dismounted behind her. “Roddy, you’re exhausted—”
She whirled on him. “The devil I am,” she swore. “I’m just tired of your company. I’d ride another hundred miles if Faelan told me to.”
“Lord, girl, are we back to this? You shouldn’t be here. You owe no loyalty to a man who don’t even try to keep you from harm.”
“No loyalty—” Roddy dropped the towel. “Are you blind, Earnest? Are you deaf and dumb? I love him. I love him, and when I think of why we’re here—” She broke, off, unable to control her voice, and dropped to her knees to retrieve the towel.
A leopard don’t change his spots without reason, Earnest thought. Remember that, Roddy.
She threw up barriers, refusing to let him make arguments she could not acknowledge aloud. It was unfair, and he knew it. “Spots,” she sneered recklessly, just to show him she was aware of his tactics. “You don’t know the first thing about spots. Or loyalty either. To rescue you and Geoffrey—that’s loyalty. That’s friendship. What have you done for Faelan? Nothing, except badger him and threaten him and plague him to death. And as for Geoffrey…do you know what my husband thinks Geoffrey and I did?” She saw Earnest’s brows rise, and cried, “Yes—you might as well be shocked, I don’t care. H
e thinks Geoffrey and I cuckolded him. Stupid Geoffrey and his stupid rebellion; my husband thinks I’d rather love his best friend—” Her voice began to shake and rise. “His idiotic friend who isn’t worth the ground Faelan walks on; who’s never lifted a finger to plant something to eat for people who are starving; who thinks fine speeches are reason enough for this bloodbath; who can ride through what we’ve seen and call it victory—”
She was shouting by then. A rough hand caught her shoulder and came across her mouth, stopping the sound. Faelan pulled her back against his chest. “Little girl,” he said in her ear. “Must you broadcast our quarrels to the whole county?”
She froze for a moment, realizing the danger she’d courted. Her muscles went limp and she turned into her husband’s body. “Faelan—” The word was a sob. “I’d never go to Geoffrey. You can’t believe I’d be such a fool. I was so afraid for you, I didn’t want him near you—and he kept making fires, and then I fell in the stream, and I was lost! I was lost and I fell in and I was wet and he was going to make a fire, and he doesn’t know how to do it, even if he thinks he does—you can see the s-smoke from everywhere! Please—” She clutched at the sleeves of his coat. “Faelan, please say you believe me!”
He was stiff for a moment, unyielding. Roddy pressed her forehead against his chest, her mouth trembling on a dammed sob. Then he made an odd sound, a peculiar, strained chuckle, and stroked the back of her neck lightly. “That Geoff can’t build a decent fire? That’s easy enough to believe.”
It was not an answer, exactly, but there was a note in his voice that made her throw her arms around him and bury her face against his dusty shirt.
“It’s the truth,” Geoffrey said softly, meaning more than the fire. “God’s truth, Faelan. I feared she’d be down with pneumonia.”
Roddy felt her husband’s slow, harsh exhalation. “Yes. And so you rendered the only aid you could think of. I might have known it would involve taking a female’s clothes off.”
“She’s all yours, my friend.” Geoffrey’s voice held a tentative grin. “Not in my style at all.”
Roddy turned. “Of course not. Any female with a brain in her head isn’t in your style,” she said waspishly.
“You see what I mean.”
“This is all very affecting,” Earnest said, “but we aren’t making much progress toward a port.”
Roddy straightened. “I’m staying with Faelan,” she declared. “It’s you and Geoffrey who’d best leave the country.”
“I’m not leaving without you. That’s the only goddamned reason I’m here in the first place! God knows, I’d rather be on my way back to Dublin to clear myself. I don’t fancy carrying the title of escaped felon all my life.”
“‘Escaped felon’! When Faelan risked his life—” Roddy almost choked on her ire. “Earnest, do you know what the House of Commons did that morning before Faelan got you out? They almost carried a measure to execute suspected rebels before the rebellion! Before it! So unless you’re looking for posthumous vindication, you’d better take yourself off smartly!”
“Lord, poppet,” Geoffrey said. “Where’d you learn words like that? ‘Posthumous vindication.’ It sounds like something your husband would say.”
“It sounds to me more like something you’d say,” Faelan drawled, “but consider the sentiment seconded.”
“Then how does it look, for God’s sake?” Earnest’s voice quivered on a note Roddy had never heard from him before. “Escaping with the same damned rebel I’m supposed to have been helping in the first place?”
“It appears to me you’re in prime shape.” Faelan let go of Roddy and hefted her saddle from its sprawled position on the ground. “Covered on both sides. If the rebels have Dublin and the French are on the sea, you’re a red-blooded patriot for aiding our hero here.” He nodded toward Geoffrey. “If the thing’s crushed—then…what do you know of it? Butter couldn’t melt in your mouth. You’ve never seen a radical, never heard of democracy, never imagined an upstanding gentleman like Lord Geoffrey was a sleazy closet republican. You’re just a poor English sod who came over to help his sister and got caught in the cross fire.”
“Ever-practical Faelan,” Geoffrey said indulgently.
Earnest looked exasperated. Roddy suspected it was because he had a notion that Faelan was right. For now, with the rebels apparently in control of most of the countryside, Geoffrey’s company was more safeguard than menace. And later, once Earnest was out of Ireland, Delamore money and prestige would be standing against the flimsy evidence. And if the evidence weren’t Faelan’s, it would be flimsy—of that Roddy was certain. Earnest would very likely never even come to trial, unless it was for the escape itself. And surely that could be excused under the circumstances.
Earnest stood, glaring at Faelan and Roddy. She would not open to the question in his eyes, but instead answered by moving closer to Faelan. “Tell Papa that you did your best,” she said in a softer voice. “But I can’t come with you, Earnest. I can’t.”
His glance drifted over Faelan with lingering distrust. “Can’t?”
“I won’t.” Roddy pressed back into her husband’s arms.
For a long moment, Earnest hesitated. Then with an angry sound of defeat he turned to Geoffrey. “So. It’s Wexford, is it?”
Geoffrey grinned. “You and I, comrade.”
“Comrade.” Earnest spun away in disgust.
Faelan worked open the leather bag attached to Roddy’s saddle. “Take this.” He pulled out a second pistol, a money purse, and a packet of powder and ball. “It throws left a hair. Remember that.”
Earnest took the offering. He met Faelan’s eyes with a level look. “Thanks,” he said dryly, and then with a reluctant twist to his mouth: “For everything.”
Faelan nodded, curt, and turned away. He repacked the saddlebag and held it toward Roddy. “We’ll stop here for an hour to eat. I want to push on west while it’s quiet.”
Chapter 24
They reached Kilkenny by noon. The town seemed drowsy with Sunday quiet, but Roddy had learned that horror could hide beneath the calm. They crossed the river Nore in view of the old castle walls, and she looked with eyes of weary apprehension at the scarlet, coats of the occupying garrison stationed at points across the broad lawn. There was evidence that the area had been “disarmed” with the government’s brutal effectiveness. She and Faelan had passed burned-out cottages and stripped farms, and no single soul had appeared on the road, though Roddy knew that the inhabitants were there—in hiding, watching from hedgerows and empty barns.
Faelan stopped just over the bridge and gave her a smile that looked strange and fierce in the dark stubble that shadowed his jaw. “Will you go another hundred miles if I ask you?”
Her whole body ached and her eyes burned. She’d been riding since midnight: she was hungry and thirsty and bruised and scared.
She looked up into his eyes and said, “Yes,” without flinching.
He reached out and touched her cheek as their horses stood with heads lowered together. “Little girl. You’re turning into a heroine on me.”
“Am I?” She managed a smile in return. “It must be rubbing off of you.”
He looked down at that, with a faint frown, as if it had been an accusation instead of praise. He swung off his horse and handed her the reins. “I’ll see what I can find out.”
A quarter of an hour later, Roddy was walking stiffly into an inn with the promise of at least a few hours’ rest. “Not longer,” Faelan said. “Nothing’s reported to the south and west, but communication’s cut off from Dublin. We’re not far ahead of it.”
“Thank you.” She sat down and threw herself onto her back on the deep feather bed. “I’ll certainly rest better for knowing that.”
He pulled his boots off with the jack and sat beside her, smelling of horse and sweat and black powder. Roddy knew she could be no better, except for the powder smell. There was a smudge on his face where he’d used his arm as support onc
e—aiming over his shoulder at a deserter who’d tried to take Roddy’s horse.
She saw his lashes relax and lower as he looked down at her. His glance traveled the length of her body.
Roddy smiled and shifted her fingers, rubbing the back of his hand where it rested on the bed. “Too tired,” she murmured. “Too tired.” She closed her eyes and concentrated on the feeling of him, on the fine muscle and the bone beneath; his hard, steady warmth.
The mattress moved. He leaned over her. She felt his breath on her skin, and then the scratchy touch of his cheek as he buried his face in her hair. “I’m sorry, love. God, I’m so sorry to put you through this.”
She patted his back, the only part within easy reach. “It isn’t your fault. ’Tis all the Geoffreys and the Mullanes and Willises in the world, who look at people and only see chess pawns. Who play with fire and think it’s clay.”
He rolled away and rested on his elbow, looking down at her with dark amusement. “Ah. She’s become a philosopher now.” He tangled his fingers in a strand of her hair and said slowly, “I’m sorry you’re here, I meant, and not safe in England as Earnest would have you.”
“Earnest,” she said with disgust, and then bit her lip.
She turned suddenly, pressing her face to Faelan’s shoulder. “Oh, God, I hope they make it.”
He stroked her hair. “They will. Your brother has some sense, if Geoffrey doesn’t.”
“At least they had a chance.” Her words were muffled in his coat. “Because of you.”
His hand paused, wavered over her hair. He drew back and sat up. “Don’t harp on that,” he said harshly. The floor creaked under his feet as he stood and paced to the open window, where green light filtered through leaves and made a moving pattern on the wall.