Chapter 19

“There are severe sanctions for sleeping on duty.”

Portia opened her eyes and yawned. She smiled blearily at the large figure standing over her, blocking the sun. “I’m not on duty.”

Rufus nodded solemnly. “As of ten minutes ago, you were.”

“Oh, that can’t be!” Portia sat up on the mossy grass. “I can’t have slept that long.” She struggled to her feet, hauling herself up by the tree trunk in whose gnarled roots she had been sleeping so peacefully.

Juno bounded along the riverbank toward them, barking delightedly. She dropped a stick at Rufus’s feet and sat on her haunches, tongue lolling, looking up at him with clear invitation. He bent to pick up the stick, then hurled it along the bank. The puppy sped away.

“I don’t know why I fell asleep, I only sat down for a few minutes,” Portia muttered, shaking out her jerkin, brushing twigs and bits of moss off her britches. It kept happening. An invincible wave of sleepiness would break over her and she’d find herself nodding off where she sat. “Now George will grumble and look reproachful.”

“No he won’t. As it happens, someone else is taking your duty.” Rufus sat down on the grass with his back against the tree and patted the moss beside him.

Portia didn’t immediately accept the invitation. She frowned. “Why?”

“I have a more important task than sentry duty for you.” He shaded his eyes against the warm May sun as he looked up at her.

Portia glanced around. Her eyes glowed with a lascivious light, and her tongue touched her lips. “Here? Isn’t it rather public?”

“For once, you insatiable wench, that was not what I had in mind,” he declared, laughing at her. “Come, sit down, there’s something I have to tell you.”

Portia regarded him thoughtfully. She sensed some current of excitement in the air. His expression was superficially as calm as ever, but his eyes had taken on that electric hue of summer lightning, and there was a barely restrained tension in his powerful frame as he leaned with apparent nonchalance against the tree at his back.

“What’s happened?” She sat down beside him.

“A messenger from Oxford.” He closed his eyes, raising his face to the sun, and a little smile played over his mouth.

“From the king? No, Juno, take it away. It’s all covered in slobber.” Portia picked up the stick the puppy had deposited in her lap and dropped it with a grimace of distaste onto the grass.

“From the king,” he affirmed, still with the same smile, still without opening his eyes.

“Am I supposed to guess? Here, Juno, fetch this instead.” She hurled a pinecone and the puppy raced after it.

“No, when you’ve stopped playing with that animal and can give me your full attention, I will tell you.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She leaned sideways and gave him an apologetic kiss on the corner of his mouth. “I am all attention.”

“The king, in his infinite wisdom, acknowledges the services of his loyal subject by granting the house of Rothbury a full pardon and complete restitution of lands and revenues.” His eyes opened and Portia read there deep jubilation, an inexpressible satisfaction, and something else that gave her a little shiver of disquiet. Triumph… the triumph that comes from the utter humiliation of an enemy, from putting a foot on his neck as he lay at one’s feet.

Juno returned, shaking the pinecone and growling. But something in the atmosphere made the puppy turn aside and flop on the grass with her new toy between her paws, her eyes fixed adoringly on Portia.

“There’s more,” Portia stated. “What is it?”

“I have orders to lay siege to Castle Granville,” Rufus continued. “After our defeat in April, the rebel army far outnumbers the king’s in the north. If we can remove Granville from the equation-permanently prevent him from bringing his militia into battle during the summer campaigns-we’ll go some way to improving our odds.” His hand moved unconsciously to his swordbelt, his fingers playing over the plain hilt of his great curved sword.

“What better person to entrust with the task of capturing the marquis and his castle than his neighbor and blood-sworn enemy, the earl of Rothbury, the king’s most loyal subject?”

The shiver of disquiet became a full tornado. His triumphant words were laced with acid, and it dawned on Portia that Rufus Decatur’s loyalty to his king was not based on principle. He was engaged in this conflict purely for his own ends. And she knew that wasn’t true of Cato. Cato had chosen Parliament’s side out of deep moral conviction. Did that make Cato the better man… the more honorable man?

It was not a question Portia wanted to answer. She knew that the king’s armies were hard-pressed now, after a stunning defeat at Selby in April. A move to disable Cato and his force was only logical. “When do you invest the castle?”

“We leave at nightfall.” He stood up in one lithe unbroken movement and reached down to pull her to her feet. “I intend to be in position at the castle gates when Cato opens his eyes on the morning. Go to the cottage and put your things together.”

“I’m to come?”

His eyes narrowed, the color darkening to the blue of midnight. “You are part of this militia. Every able-bodied Decatur man will take part in the siege. It will be long, tedious for the most part, but I intend to have Cato’s submission before the summer is out… whatever I have to do.” His eyes raked her face. His voice was now very quiet as he said, “Do you have difficulties with this, Portia?”

Her pause was infinitesimal but she knew he’d marked it. She shook her head. “No.”

He continued to scrutinize her countenance, as intently as if he would see into her mind, then he said, “I am assuming Granville will be well prepared for a siege. Is that a correct assumption?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice low. “He has stocks of grain, his cellars are full. I saw the preparations when I was there.”

Rufus’s face was expressionless. “But there is one thing he does not have in plentiful supply. One thing that he and his people cannot live without. Do you know what that is, Portia?”

She frowned, thinking. But her impressions of Castle Granville had been of an impregnable stronghold. Run with superb efficiency. Nothing left to chance. She shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

He smiled but there was no warmth, no humor, no pleasant quality to the smile. “You’ll discover soon enough.” Then with a short nod he strode away.

In the hole left by his departure, Portia became aware of movement, of excitement. Men were running, calling, the drums were beating the roll call, and trumpets blasted from every watchtower, summoning any who were absent from the village. The time for skirmishes was over. The men of Decatur were going to take part in their first real engagement of the war.

And what of the innocent people in the castle? What of Olivia and Phoebe? The babies? Even Diana? What had they done to be made war on? To face starvation and privation? To see the enemy at their gate? To endure the attacks of battering rams and cannon? The relentless firing over the walls? All the miseries of a siege?

Portia could feel no excitement, only a swamping depression. She had to take part if she was to keep faith with Rufus. And yet she wanted nothing to do with it. And what was this secret he held that would bring the walls of Castle Granville tumbling to the besieger?

She went back to the cottage, her step lacking its customary buoyancy. But Juno made up for any shortage of ebullience as she pranced and darted ahead, investigating scents, disappearing headfirst down rabbit holes, her plumed tail waving in frantic excitement.

The cottage was quiet, the fire in the hearth low, used in these warm spring days only for heating water. Portia went upstairs to gather together her possessions. They were sparse; when laid upon the bed, the little pile looked almost pathetic. A change of underclothes, stockings, her buff jerkin, and two linen shirts. Absently she began to fold the squares of linen she used during her monthly terms, laying them on the pile. Then her hands stilled. She stood looking down at the bed.