"By all means," Jenny said, grinning.

Sir Eustace was with Royce and Stefan looking over some maps when he was informed by the guard that the ladies were asking for him. "Is there no end to her arrogance!" Royce bit out, referring to Jenny. "She even sends her guards on errands, and what's more, they run to do her bidding." Checking his tirade, he said shortly, "I assume it was the blue-eyed one with the dirty face who sent you?"

Sir Lionel chuckled and shook his head. "I saw two clean faces, Royce, but the one who talked to me had greenish eyes, not blue."

"Ah, I see," Royce said sarcastically, "it wasn't Arrogance that sent you trotting away from your post, it was Beauty. What does she want?"

"She wouldn't tell me. Wants to see Eustace, she said."

"Get back to your post and stay there. Tell her to wait," he snapped.

"Royce, they're no more than two helpless females," the knight reminded him, "and small ones at that. What's more, you won't trust anyone to guard them except Arik or one of us," he said, referring to the knights who made up Royce's elite personal guard and were also trusted friends. "You're keeping them bound and under guard like they were dangerous men, able to overpower us and escape."

"I can't trust anyone else with the women," Royce said, absently rubbing the back of his neck. Abruptly, he lurched out of his chair. "I'm tired of the inside of this tent. I'll go with you and see what they want."

"So will I," Stefan said.

Jenny saw the earl coming, his long effortless strides bringing him swiftly toward their tent, two guards on his right and his brother on the left.

"Well?" Royce said, stepping into their tent with the three men. "What is it this time?" he demanded of Jenny.

Brenna whirled around in panic, her hand over her heart, her face a picture of flustered innocence as she hastened to take the blame for annoying him. "I-it was I who asked for him." She nodded in the direction of the guard. "For Sir Eustace."

With a sigh of impatience, Royce withdrew his gaze from Jenny and looked at her foolish sister. "Would you care to tell me why you did?"

"Yes."

It was actually all she was going to say, Royce realized. "Very well, then tell me."

"I… we"-she cast a look of sheer misery at Jenny, then plunged ahead-"we… would like very much to be given thread and needles."

Royce's gaze swung suspiciously to the person most likely to have conceived some way of using needles to his own physical discomfort, but today Lady Jennifer Merrick returned his gaze levelly, her face subdued, and he felt an odd sense of disappointment that her bravado had been depleted so quickly. "Needles?" he repeated, frowning at her.

"Yes," Jenny answered in a carefully modulated voice that was neither challenging nor submissive, but calmly polite as if she'd quietly accepted her fate. "The days grow long and we have little to do. My sister, Brenna, suggested we spend the time sewing."

"Sewing?" Royce repeated, disgusted with himself for keeping them bound and under heavy guard. Lionel was right-Jenny was merely a small female. A young, reckless, headstrong girl with more bravado than sense. He'd overestimated her simply because no other prisoner brought before him had dared to strike him. "What do you think this is, the queen's drawing room?" he snapped. "We don't have any of those-" His brain stalled as he searched for the names of the contraptions which women at court spent hours of every day sewing upon with embroidery thread.

"Embroidery hoops?" Jenny provided helpfully.

His eyes raked over her in disgust. "I'm afraid not-no embroidery hoops."

"Perhaps a small quilting frame then?" she added, innocently widening her eyes as she held back her laughter.

"No!"

"There must be something we could use needle and thread on," Jenny added swiftly when he turned to leave. "We'll go quite mad with nothing to do, day after day. It doesn't matter what we sew. Surely you must have something that needs sewing-"

He swung around, looking startled and pleased and dubious. "You're volunteering to do mending for us?"

Brenna was a picture of innocent shock at his suggestion; Jenny tried to imitate her look. "I hadn't thought of mending exactly…"

"There's enough mending needed here to keep a hundred seamstresses busy for a year," Royce said decisively, deciding in that moment they ought to earn their bed and board-such as it was-and mending was exactly the right form of payment. Turning to Godfrey, he said, "See to it."

Brenna looked wonderfully stricken that her suggestion could have resulted in their practically joining forces with the enemy; Jenny made a serious effort to look balky, but the moment the four men were out of earshot, she threw her arms around her sister and hugged her exuberantly. "We've just overcome two of the three obstacles to our escape," she said. "Our hands will be unbound and we're to have access to disguises, Brenna."

"Disguises?" Brenna began, but before Jenny needed to answer, her eyes widened with comprehension and she enfolded her sister into a second hug, laughing softly. "Men's clothing," she giggled, "and he offered it to us."

Within an hour, their tent contained two miniature mountains of clothing and a third mountain of torn blankets and mantles belonging to the men-at-arms. One pile of clothing belonged exclusively to Royce and Stefan Westmoreland, the other to Royce's knights, two of whom Jenny was relieved to see were men of medium to small proportions.

Jenny and Brenna worked late into the night, their eyes straining in the flickering light. They'd already mended the items they'd chosen to wear for their escape and put them out of sight. Now they were diligently working on the pile of clothes belonging to Royce. "What time do you suppose it is?" Jenny asked as she carefully sewed the wrist of his shirt completely closed. Beside her were many other items of his clothing which had received equally creative alterations, including several pairs of hose which had been skillfully tightened at the knee to make it impossible for a leg to descend beyond that point.

"Ten o'clock, or so," Brenna answered as she bit off her thread. "You were right," she said smiling as she held up one of the earl's shirts which now had a skull and crossbones embroidered on the back in black. "He'll never notice when he puts it on." Jenny laughed, but Brenna was suddenly lost in thought. "I've been thinking about the MacPherson," Brenna said and Jenny paid attention, for when Brenna wasn't overwhelmed by fear, she was actually very clever. "I don't think you'll have to marry the MacPherson, after all."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because Father will undoubtedly notify King James-maybe even the pope-that we were abducted from an abbey, and that may cause such an uproar that King James will send his forces to Merrick. An abbey is inviolable and we were under the protection of it. And so, if King James comes to our aid, we wouldn't need the MacPherson's clans, would we?"

A flame of hope ignited in Jenny's eyes, then wavered. "I don't think we were actually on the grounds of the abbey."

"Father won't know that, so he'll assume we were. So will everyone else, I think."

His brow furrowed in puzzlement, Royce stood outside his tent, his gaze turned on the smaller tent at the edge of the camp where his two female hostages were being kept. Eustace had just relieved Lionel and was standing guard.

The faint glow of candlelight seeping between the canvas and ground told Royce both women were still awake. Now in the relative peace of the moonlit night, he admitted to himself that part of the reason he'd gone to their tent earlier today was curiosity. As soon as he learned Jennifer's face was clean, he'd felt an undeniable curiosity to have a look at it. Now, he discovered he was ridiculously curious about the color of her hair. Judging by her winged brows, her hair was either auburn or brown, while her sister was definitely blond, but Brenna Merrick didn't interest him.