Scurrying footsteps stirred the rushes covering the floor. Garrick didn’t bother looking up.
“You’re back, m’lord!” the plump woman servant, Habren, exclaimed. “Did you find…” But her voice trailed off when she noticed his grim expression. Quickly she crossed her ample bosom before disappearing in the direction of the kitchen.
“Garrick!” Ware’s voice echoed off the heavy timbers supporting the high ceiling. Garrick’s head snapped up, and he narrowed his eyes against the smoke from the fire as his younger brother, his shoulders square, his blue eyes bright, his chin thrust forward defiantly, climbed down the curved staircase toward the great hall. A good-looking lad, Ware would soon be a man. His chest was thick, his pride great, though he had not yet seen his first battle.
“There’s been no word?” Garrick growled, knowing the answer before the question passed his lips.
“No.” Ware stood before him, his arrogance visible in the angle of his head.
“No ransom demands?”
“None.”
Garrick’s jaw hardened, and his eyes turned flinty gray. “The knights who guarded Logan. Have they told you nothing else?”
“Nothing, Garrick.” Ware’s eyes slid away from the power of his older brother’s gaze, and his skin seemed to lose some of its dark color.
Garrick’s mouth twisted downward. The boy had no stomach for lashings, and in truth, neither did Garrick. Yet sometimes he had no choice but to beat the truth from those whose loyalty was in doubt. “Did Strahan use every means of making them remember?”
Ware grimaced, as if he were holding on to the contents of his stomach at the memory. “Aye,” he whispered, his teeth clenched. “When it was over, they pledged their fealty yet again. They are loyal men, Garrick. You did them an injustice. ’Tis not their fault that Logan wandered off, perhaps over the cliffs—”
A massive hand clenched over the front of Ware’s tunic, and Garrick yanked hard, lifting his brother off his feet and forcing Ware to meet his gaze. “I blame no one by myself,” he muttered, “but I must know that my men were not a part of this treasonous plot to capture my son.”
Ware, true to his Maginnis spirit, lifted his chin and met Garrick’s gray eyes rebelliously. “Perhaps it was not treason. Mayhap the child ambled off, his nursemaid after him, and they both lost themselves in the forest. They could have drowned in the river or fallen from the cliffs into the sea—”
“Nay!” Garrick snarled, shaking his brother yet again. “No bodies have been found. I will not believe Logan to be dead. The boy did not wander off.” He dropped Ware to his feet and turned back to the fire, hoping the red-gold flames would stave off the cold that had seeped into his soul. “There is still much unrest here. Though Edward is king, there are those who would see him dead and spit on his grave. Since they cannot reach him, they test the very spirit of all those who are loyal to Longshanks. ’Tis not many winters since Llywelyn was killed, less time since the rebellion failed.” Garrick rubbed his chin. “Make no mistake, the rebellion is not yet over. It still simmers in the hearts of Welshmen.” His nostrils flared in anger. “Aye,” he muttered, “and those who were loyal to Llywelyn will stop at nothing to rid themselves of Edward. They would take the life of a child for their cause.”
“So you think the culprits be Welshmen?”
Wearily Garrick shook his head and clenched his fists as if closing his hands around the throat of one of Logan’s abductors. “If only I knew.”
Ware glanced at the fire. “What of the guards who were to watch Logan?”
“Banish them.”
“But—”
“Banish them, I say!” Garrick ordered savagely. “Let them know they are lucky to leave with their lives!”
“You’re making a mistake.”
The insolent pup. Garrick glowered at his younger brother. “I am baron of this castle. I shall do as I please.”
“Yes, m’lord,” Ware replied, mockery filling his voice as the door to the castle creaked open and footsteps rang on the stairs to the great hall. Garrick was in no mood for idle conversation. Strahan of Hazelwood, Garrick’s cousin and most trusted knight, entered.
Tall and broad-shouldered, with a nose that hooked and eyes as brown as the robes of an almsman, Strahan bore little resemblance to his cousins. One look at Garrick and he frowned. “You did not find Logan.”
Beneath his wet tunic, Garrick’s shoulders bunched. “No.”
“Perhaps now you will consider my suggestion.”
Garrick scowled darkly and ground his back teeth together. “You are speaking of that witch.”
“She is not a witch but a sorceress — one who talks to the wind,” Straha
n explained.
“Then she is daft.”